"In cold words you feel that no untrained lunk has a right to have an idea."
He froze. "I did not say that."
"You implied, at least, that suggestions from outsiders were not welcome. I begin to understand why the Medical Center has failed to get anywhere with Mekstrom's in the past twenty years."
"What do you mean?" he snapped.
"Merely that it is the duty of all scientists to listen to every suggestion and to discard it only after it has been shown wrong."
"Such as—?" he said coldly, with a curl of his eyebrows.
"Well, just for instance, suppose some way were found to keep a victim alive during the vital period, so that he would end up a complete Mekstrom Human."
"The idea is utterly fantastic. We have no time for such idle speculation. There is too much foggy thinking in the world already. Why, only last week we had a Velikovsky Adherent tell us that Mekstrom's had been predicted in the Bible. There are still people reporting flying saucers, you know. We have no time for foolish notions or utter nonsense."
"May I quote you?"
"Of course not," he snapped stiffly. "I'm merely pointing out that non-medical persons cannot have the grasp—"