The Man Who Evolved

Infobox short story |
name = The Man Who Evolved
author = Edmond Hamilton
country = flag|USA
language = English
genre = Science fiction short story
publication_type = Periodical
published_in = "Wonder Stories"
publisher = Gernsback Publications
media_type = Print (Magazine, Hardback & Paperback)
pub_date = April 1931 "The Man Who Evolved" is a science fiction short story by Edmond Hamilton that was first published in the April 1931 issue of "Wonder Stories". In his comments on the story in "Before the Golden Age", Isaac Asimov called it the first science fiction short story (as opposed to novel) that impressed him so much it stayed in his mind permanently. In her introduction to "The Best of Edmond Hamilton", Leigh Brackett called the story "a fine example of Hamilton's skill in encapsulating an enormous theme into the neat and perfect compass of a short story."

Plot summary

The narrator, Arthur Wright, and his friend Hugh Dutton visit their former classmate, Dr. John Pollard at his combination house/laboratory. Pollard, a classic mad scientist, has been conducting research into the question of what causes the mutations that drive evolution. Pollard informs them that he has determined that cosmic rays are the source of the mutations, and that he has decided that bombarding himself with heavy concentrations of cosmic rays will cause him to evolve into a future version of humanity. (As Asimov notes in "Before the Golden Age", cosmic rays do indeed play a part in causing mutations, but they cause evolutionary changes in large populations rather than individual organisms. Though Pollard claims to have done "something no physicist has been able to do, to concentrate the cosmic rays and yet remove from them their harmful properties", this is merely handwaving. Subjecting oneself to a concentrated blast of cosmic rays would simply result in one's death, something that was known perfectly well even in the early 1930s.)

Pollard has built himself a cosmic-ray-concentrator that will allow him to evolve at the rate of 50 million years every 15 minutes, but he needs someone else to operate it, which is why he has invited Wright and Dutton to his laboratory. Wright reluctantly agrees to operate Pollard's device.

Fifteen minutes in the device leave Pollard with enhanced intelligence and a highly developed physique. However, he is eager to continue the process and explore the further evolutionary changes mankind will undergo. The next stage, though, finds him with a huge bald head atop a frail body and atrophied emotions. He insists on continuing, and each stage of the process finds his brain larger and more powerful, and his body smaller and weaker. The penultimate stage finds Pollard transformed into a vast, naked brain that feeds on pure energy. A final use of the device, to Wright's shock, leaves Pollard a small blob of protoplasm, bringing the evolution of humanity full circle back to its beginning. Dutton goes mad with horror and wrecks the laboratory, and Wright barely pulls him out before it and Pollard's house go up in flames.

Dutton remains permanently mad, while Wright is left to wonder whether Pollard really has simply returned to humanity's starting point. "Or is this evolutionary cycle we saw a cycle in appearance only, is there some change that we cannot understand, above and beyond it? I do not know which of these possibilities is truth, but I do know that the first of them haunts me."

Cultural references

An episode of the Mighty Max television series, "Zygote Music", has a similar storyline, in which a scientist uses a machine to evolve. In the final stage, however, the scientist has been transformed into pure thought. He is defeated in a manner similar to the one used to prevent Pollard from taking over the Earth, namely, advancing his evolution until he is beyond such desires.

Publication

*"Horror on the Asteroid and Other Tales of Planetary Horror", P. Allen, London, 1936.
*"From Off This World", Leo Marguiles and Oscar J. Friend, eds., Merlin Press, 1949.
*"Before the Golden Age", Isaac Asimov, ed., Doubleday, 1974.
*"The Best of Edmond Hamilton", Leigh Brackett, ed., Doubleday, 1977.