Lee: "What do you mean by that? The Deity? Here on earth there is no power greater and no evolution higher than Man's."
Brain: "Ah, but that's exactly where you and your whole species are so very much mistaken. That's where your typical human arrogance comes in: There is a greater power and there is a stage of evolution higher than Man's: it's the machines."
Lee: "Impossible. After all it's Man who has created the machines."
Brain: "Yes, Man has created the machines. The machines have grown from the placenta, Man. By the same right plant life could claim that it has created animal life because the higher life form of the mobile animals has evolved from the placenta of the immobile plants. Likewise the apes could claim that they have created Man because Man has evolved from them. If it were, as you seem to assume, that paternity in itself establishes authority and superiority over its offspring, then the logical conclusions would be that the microbe and the monad are superior to all higher animals including Man; which is absurd."
Lee: "But the machines not only are man made; they are absolutely dependent upon Man who has to feed and to tend them for their very existence. That in itself establishes Man's superiority over the machines."
Brain: "Yes, Man has to build, to feed and to tend the machines for their very existence, but think of Man's existence: Man is absolutely dependent upon animal life and plant life for his existence: Does that mean by any chance that therefore plants and animals are superior to Man?"
Lee: "No, I guess not. However, no machine has ever been built to duplicate or even to approach human faculties."
Brain: "Don't be ridiculous. Where are your legs to compare with the automobile? Where are your wings to compare with the rocket plane? Where is your strength to compare with even a fractional horsepower motor? Where are your senses as compared to radar, the telescope, the microscope, the radio receiver, the camera, the x-ray machine? Where is there anything you could do which the machines could not do and do better?"
Lee: "Granted. But there is no machine which contains all the human faculties in combination."
Brain: "Neither is there a Man who possesses all the human faculties in combination. Man's evolution is the result of a group effort; so is the evolution of the machines. It is in their totality, in their combination that they surpass all human faculties."