"james_alan_gardner_-_three_hearings_on_the_existence_of_snakes_in_the_human_bloodstream" - читать интересную книгу автора (Gardner James Alan)

know why you're here?"
"No, senator."
"Come now, doctor," he chided, as if speaking to a five-year-old.
"Surely you must know the purpose of this Committee? And it therefore
follows that we would take great interest in your work."
"My work is medical research," she replied tightly. "I have no
political interests at all." She forced herself to stare McCarthy in the
eye. "I heal the sick."
"There's sickness and there's sickness," the senator shrugged. "We can
all understand doctors who deal with sniffles and sneezes and heart
attacks... but that's not your field, is it?"
"No," she answered. "I'm a hematologist, specializing in SA
compatibility problems."
"Could you explain that for the Committee?"
The doctor suspected that every man on the Committee -- and they were
all men -- had already been briefed on her research. If nothing else, they
read the newspapers. Still, why not humor them?
"All human blood," she began, "is either SA-positive or SA-negative--"
"SA stands for Serpentine Analogue?" McCarthy interrupted.
"Yes. The name comes from the outdated belief--"
"That some people have snakes in their bloodstream," McCarthy
interrupted again.
"That's correct."
"Do some people have snakes in their bloodstream?" McCarthy asked.
"Snake-like entities," another senator corrected... probably a
Democrat.
"Serpentine analogues are not present in anyone's bloodstream," Julia
said. "They don't appear until blood is exposed to air. It's a specialized
clotting mechanism, triggered by an enzyme that encourages microscopic
threads to form at the site of an injury--"
"In other words," McCarthy said, "SA-positive blood works differently
from SA-negative. Correct?"
"In this one regard, yes," Julia nodded.
"Do you think SA-positive blood is better than SA-negative?"
"It provides slightly more effective clotting at wounds--"
"Do you admire SA-positive blood, doctor?"
Julia stared at him. Mentally, she counted to ten. "I am fascinated by
all types of blood," she answered at last. "SA-positive clots faster...
which is useful to stop bleeding but gives a slightly greater risk of
stroke. Overall, I'd say the good points and the bad even out. If they
didn't, evolution would soon skew the population strongly one way or the
other."
McCarthy folded his hands on the table in front of him. "So you believe
in evolution, Dr. Grant?"
"I'm a scientist. I also believe in gravity, thermodynamics, and the
universal gas equation."
Not a man on the Committee so much as smiled.
"Doctor," McCarthy said quietly, "what blood type are you?"
She gritted her teeth. "The Supreme Court ruled that no one has to
answer that question."