Science of Discworld III

infectious silence that was contagious.
    The assembled wizards shuffled their feet. Dark rage radiated off their visitor.
    ‘How did it go, Stibbons?’ whispered Ridcully.
    ‘Er, the God of Evolution was his usual self, sir.’
    ‘Was he? Ah, good—’
    ‘I wish, very clearly, to awaken from this nightmare,’ said Darwin, abruptly.
    The wizards stared at the man, who was quivering with rage.
    ‘Very well, sir,’ Ridcully said quietly. ‘We can help you wake up. Excuse us a moment.’
    He waved a hand; once again the blue shimmer surrounded their visitor. ‘Gentlemen, if you please?’
    He beckoned to the other senior wizards, who clustered around him.
    ‘We can put him back without him having any memory of anything that happened here, right?’ he said. ‘Mr Stibbons?’
    ‘Yes, sir. Hex could do it. But as I said, sir, it wouldn’t be very ethical to mess around with his mind.’
    ‘Well, I wouldn’t like anyone to think we’re unethical,’ said Ridcully firmly. He glared around. ‘Anyone object? Good. You see, I’ve been taking to Hex. I’d like to give him something to remember. We owe him that, at least.’
    ‘Really, sir?’ said Ponder. ‘Won’t it make things worse?’
    ‘I’d like him to know why we did all this, even if it’s only for a moment!’
    ‘Are you sure that’s a good idea, Mustrum?’ said the Lecturer in Recent Runes.
    The Archchancellor hesitated. ‘No,’ he said. ‘But it’s mine. And we’re going to do it.’

TWENTY-FOUR
A LACK OF SERGEANTS
    W HAT WAS IT ABOUT V ICTORIAN E NGLAND , and what led up to it, that made it so progressive, inventive and innovative? Why was it so different from Russia, China, and all the other nations that seem to have stagnated during the nineteenth century – accumulating wealth, but lacking a middle class full of engineers, sea captains, clerics, and scientists? We would not expect there to be one simple answer, one trick that Victorian England discovered but other nations did not. That would satisfy the innate human wish for a single thin causal chain, but as we’ve seen, history doesn’t work like that.
    Equally, though, it’s unsatisfying just to list lots of possible contributory causes – the East India Company … Harrison’s excellent chronometer, which helped to make the British Empire so profitable and made aristocratic families send their younger sons fairly safely out into the Empire, from which they came back wiser and richer … Quakers and other nonconformist sects, which were tolerated by the Anglican Church … the Lunar Society’s progeny, including the Royal Society and the Linnaean Society … the College of Apprentices … Parliament and the pretence of democracy, so that a middle class could rise from the merging of junior aristocrats who came back from the Empire to found pickle factories in Manchester … artisans who were coming into towns looking for satisfying jobs.We could make the list ten times longer, though in most cases we wouldn’t be sure about genuine causal connections. And even with ten times as many ‘causes’, we would still have to say ‘all of the above’.
    Are such factors a cause of historical differences, or a consequence? That’s not a sensible question if you insist on a yes/no answer – very probably the answer should be ‘both’. A modern analogue would be to ask whether today’s space-oriented engineers and scientists are a cause of the success of space films and nailed-down science-fiction stories – or did the early scientifically oriented SF stories, with their sense of wonder at the sheer vastness and mystery of outer space, fire those engineers, when young, with the desire to turn fiction into fact? It must have been both, of course.
    The early Victorian apprentices in pottery, ironworking, brick firing, and even bricklaying were respected by, and respected, their masters. Together they laid down enduring monuments for future generations. Similarly, early trains and canals connected all the major cities, and connected factories to their suppliers and customers. This transport system paved the way to the wonderful economic network that Edwardian Britain inherited from the Victorians. These systems were not static, to be admired for what they had achieved. They were dynamic, they changed, they were processes as much as achievements. They changed the way succeeding generations thought about where and how they lived. Even today, our cities rely heavily on what