Long ago they forgot the meaning of humility.
But here it's different.
Here you have to be different.
You start out by saying I don't know.
Then you say I want to know.
Then you say I'll work hard to learn.
Maybe, Bishop thought, that's why they brought us here, so that the one of us in every thousand who has a chance of learning would get that chance to learn. Maybe they are watching, hoping that there may be more than one in every thousand. Maybe they are more anxious for us to learn than we are to learn. For they may be lonely in a galaxy where there are no others like them.
Could it be that the ones at this hotel were the failures, the ones who had never tried, or who might have tried and could not pass?
And the others - the one out of every thousand - where were they?
He could not even guess.