DR. YORITOMO WAS SITTING in one of the big, soft chairs, puffing at his pipe, but he leaped to his feet when Stanton came in.
“Ah! About the ritual-taboo culture of the Nipe! Yes. Sit down. Yes. So. Do you find it impossible that a high technology could be present in such a system?”
“No. I’ve been thinking about it.”
“Ah, so.” He sat down again. “Then you will please tell me.”
“Well, let’s see. In the first place, let’s take religion. In tribal cultures, religion is—uh—animistic, I think the word is.”
Yoritomo nodded silently.
“There are spirits everywhere,” Scanton went on. “That sort of belief, it seems to me, would grow up in any race that had imagination, and the Nipes must have plenty of that, or they wouldn’t have the technology they do have.”
“Very good. Very good. But what e
