"Suppose a mutation off the human stock occurs which is quite different from normal humans, not simply in being stronger and healthier, and more intelligent and more moral than humans, but is also capable of unusual powers, say, moving objects at a distance, etcetera, and that, clearly, this mutation represents an evolutionary advance as far beyond us as we are beyond the chimpanzee. What should we do with this entity? Assume it is within our power to destroy it and its kind, but also assume that if it is permitted to reproduce itself and grow strong, it will become the dominant life form on earth."

There are any number of standpoints from which one could tackle this issue. The three main perspectives from which to approach this question, in my opinion, are the following: moral, practical, and social. Or to put it more plainly, what is the right thing to do; what is the best way to ensure that the right thing is done; and how can we convince the general population to carry it out.

Firstly, the moral issue. It seems natural enough to want to protect our own race and our status as the dominant form of life on Earth (always assuming we are; certain insects might dispute our claim, were our races capable of communicating with each other). The moral issue before us combines two questions: Is it right to kill another to preserve oneself? And is it right to kill the few in order to preserve the many? In either case, to even contemplate the idea requires that we assume that the mutant race is a direct threat to our own.

Is this a fair assumption? Perhaps this new race -- homo mutandis or homo superior, if you will -- would treat us well and humanely. But we do not want to be treated humanely by anyone; we want to be in control, deciding whether or not to treat other races humanely. Though reactions would vary with individuals, it is probably fair to say that most humans value their independence and freedom enough that we would prefer the condition of a starving wolf to that of the most well-fed and pampered lapdog.

So how to avoid becoming the pets of homo mutandis, then? How to maintain our position as the planet's dominant species? For we can hardly be expected to value the well-being of another race more highly than our own; even had we not been conditioned by centuries of being taught that we are the culminating point of Creation (or Evolution, depending on the century), we would still be required to consider our own race first. In the game of evolution, there is only one rule: Survive. If the success of homo mutandis would mean our own downfall, then we must take steps to prevent their success. In simplest terms: "If it's them or us, I vote us."

Of course, the operative word in this dictum is if. The question as stated seems to overlook one important fact: This "mutation off the human stock" is someone's child. Someone's children, I should rather say, considering that there is clearly more than one of these mutants, if we are looking at the possibility of them reproducing themselves (and, as the question is phrased, "it and its kind"). And these children are as surely our own as any "purely human" child. If not more so, for they may represent the future of our race; if they are better suited to survive than our unmutated children, they will be more likely to carry on our genes that remain within them. If we can acknowledge the fact that our ancestors were apes, why should we not take pride in the possibility that our grandchildren may be gods?

And yet, and yet...there is still a selfish urge to protect our own race's survival, even at the expense of our race's collective descendant. Like Kronos devouring his own children, we may fear to be succeeded by our stronger offspring -- and in our fear and pride, believing our race to be immortal and to have no need of heirs, we may turn cannibal.

There is a third possibility -- to raise the mutant children to believe that they are under obligation to serve their parent race. Teach them that as a young race, they are lesser beings who should obey the elder race until we decide they are ready to exist on their own. And, essentially, reap the benefits of their superhuman powers for our own race's benefit -- turn them into our servants, and the servants of their "pure-human" siblings.

This idea has its own particular danger: that of potentially underestimating the new race. Almost every parent comes to the realization that children can only be lied to for so long, whether the lie is that Santa Claus brought the new bicycle or that a divorce means Daddy is going on a business trip. Likewise, there is only so far that a child can be manipulated with promises or threats. With superintelligent children, however, we "parents" may not realize that we are no longer fooling them until it is far too late. And by that time we will already have taught them to think of their kind and our kind as different entities. The fact that their kind is superior to ours, one can assume, would be simple enough to discover. And whatever advanced morality they may have, they would be unlikely to look kindly upon a parent race that has attempted to deceive and manipulate them...and they would almost certainly hold us in contempt, both for the attempt and for the lack of intelligence that caused it to fail. The added danger of a large-scale sibling rivalry is also very real; the jealousy of the despised son for the favored son has its roots in our own history and mythos as far back as Cain and Abel, and can only be worse when the despised ones know that they are despised for being superior. [This particular caveat cuts both ways; we cannot afford to favor Joseph over his brothers, the mutant children over the unmutated ones, any more than we can afford to play the wicked stepmother in favoring the less gifted ones and punishing the superior ones for outshining them. A fair analogy, morally speaking; the high-minded Cinderella forgave her stepsisters easily, while it took Joseph's only-human brothers years to forgive him.]

To sum up, we have three options and their likely consequences. Protect these strange children of ours, love them, encourage them to become what they can be, and they (being the higher moral creatures that they are) will surely repay their parent race and their unmutated siblings with respect and love when they mature. It is entirely possible, even likely, that they will recognize our need for independence and respect it as well.

Attempt to control the mutants, exploit them, use their advanced powers to our own advantage, and they will grow to know their parent race for the contemptible cowards that we will have proven ourselves to be; how they will treat us, or our homo sapiens children, is debatable, but it will surely not be with affection.

But kill them now before they become a threat, and continue to do so with any similar mutations in the future, and our race will have ensured that we will not be supplanted...by wiping out whatever chance we may have for evolving into anything more than what we are now. We will, in effect, become an evolutionary dead end. If this were to happen, Nature would be better served to begin considering evolving the "second team" from insects or reptiles, rather than continue trying to improve upon a race so determined to resist improvement. And any superior race that might evolve unhindered from this "second team" would not be nearly as forgiving to Earth's former masters. Evolution is a truth and a necessity; it behooves us to consider it an imperative as well.

It would seem clear, therefore, that speaking morally, we should not destroy the mutants; even if we are to consider only the welfare of our own race, it is demonstrable that such an act of "self-defense" would ultimately be an act of self-destruction. Now, practically and socially speaking, how could this moral decision be implemented?

As we have stated before, self-preservation is the nature of living beings. However, in some creatures self-preservation is purely on a personal level; in others it extends to defending one's immediate family, one's own offspring, one's mate; in still others it can extend to defending all members of a pack, or a clan, a tribe, a nation, a country, a race. The set encompassed in the "self" of self-preservation can be said to be a measure of a creature's level of evolution, or level of civilization.

The solution is therefore clear: we must view these mutant children as truly ours, as a part of us, not as some upstart race attempting to overthrow us. There need be no revolution; the succession of dominance can pass from one generation of humans to the next. Otherwise we become the fear-maddened Kronos, willing to devour our own offspring rather than allow them to grow old enough to supplant us, deluding ourselves that we will not be supplanted by another's children instead. And it is a delusion -- progress, cultural and biological, is the way of things, and if we cannot advance then something else will.

As to the third question: Discouragingly, this promises to be the most difficult of the three. Many members of our race have enough trouble seeing other homo sapiens as their own kind, despite the best efforts of those who advocate unity; ironically, the best way to create unity among humans could very well be for a new race to spring up, a new "them" for "us" to ally against. There is precious little hope, however, that such humans could be persuaded to think of mutants as their kindred. This kind of xenophobia is a bug, not a feature, and potentially a costly one in evolutionary terms -- both biologically and culturally. And I can think of no practical way to prevent those who fear the mutants from making their hatred known. As such, we can only hope that the higher intelligence and morality of homo mutandis will serve to prevent them from reacting in kind to the more primitive members of their parent race, as such reaction could only result in just the sort of conflict we are hoping to avoid.