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308 achieved before such weapons were invented, particularly if the major land areas on that planet were not separated by oceans. Puccetti suggested that a global community of intelligent organisms could achieve political unity even before the discovery of what we call modern science and technology."! A civilization that had achieved such unity, perhaps as a result of con- quest by one society, might well survive the introduction of powerful weapons. Such a civilization would not necessarily welcome the presence of another technological species. Dyson insisted on objectivity. “Our business as scientists is to search the universe and find out what is there. What is there may conform to our moral sense or it may not... . It is just as unscientific to impute to remote intelligences wisdom and serenity as it is to impute to them irrational and murderous impulses. We must be prepared for either possibility and conduct our searches accordingly.”!” When humans expand away from their home planet, they will take their natures with them; so will intelligent aliens. In the Western world, there has been a widespread belief that human warfare is a modern invention and that prehistorical societies were peace- ful. Implicitly, there is a hope that war can be eliminated. Optimistic, progressive-minded English and American readers are not comfortable with military necessity, Barry Gewen observed; they want their historians to explain why warfare is becoming obsolete.'* Anthropologist Lawrence Keeley, in his book War Before Civilization, pointed out that prehistorians have increasingly pacified the past. Many textbooks ignore the prevalence or significance of warfare." Yet, archae- ologists and anthropologists have found evidence of militarism in as much as 95% of the cultures they have examined or unearthed. Time and again groups that once were lauded as gentle and peace-loving were later exposed as being no less violent than the rest of us. The Maya once were considered a peaceful society led by scholarly priests; that all changed when the texts written by their leaders could be read, revealing a long history of warfare and conquest. Societies waged organized war in the Near East before recorded history; archaeologists have uncovered evi- dence of a fierce battle fought in northeastern Syria 5500 years ago. Research has shown that warfare was endemic throughout the entire southwestern United States, with its attendant massacres, population Assumptions: After Contact War Will Be Obsolete It takes two to make trade, but only one to make war. Dhiven —Murray Leinster, 1945"