From: Michael Straight <straight@email.unc.edu>
Subject: Re: (urth) Infrequently Asked Question Answered
Date: Wed, 19 Jan 2000 10:26:26 

On Wed, 19 Jan 2000, David Lebling wrote:

> Recall that there is a certain strain of C. S. Lewis in the hierodules'
> attitudes: Lewis believed (or at least wrote, in _Out of the Silent Planet_)
> that space colonization and the desire for immortality were sins.

I don't think Lewis thought colonization and immortality were themselves
sinful.  It would be more accurate to say he thought either one would be
disasterous because of sin's corruption of humanity.  To colonize the
universe would be to spread corruption to possibly untainted planets.  
And since death provides a chronological limit to how bad a person can
become, immortality would make it possible for someone to become more and
more evil forever.

-Rostrum


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