"In your time."
"I see," Earl said. "Tomorrow I make the discovery. In one time stream I tell Glassman. In the other I decide not to. What made me decide not to?"
"You thought the Brain would be bad for humanity. You were, of course, wrong."
"Was I?" Earl said.
"In that other world, wars are the normal state of things. They stem from problems that don't exist in my world. Over-population, competition in trade in things that aren't necessary to human economy, opposed political systems—all the foibles and inconsistencies of untrained and unorganized populations."
"I understand that," Earl said. "Why don't your people wear clothes?"
"Clothes are unnecessary—one of the things I eliminated in reducing the industrial economy to a minimum. Over-population? There is none. People are made in the laboratory as they are needed. Their lives are uncomplicated by animal problems such as reproduction, and artificial customs such as modesty. Their education is simplified and factual, their lives functional."
"And I made that decision all by myself?"
"Yes. That's why I have brought you here—to get you to change that decision. You see, I must change the past. I must do that in order to correct the future, make the other Earth a sane place, dominated by a second Cyberene which is a counterpart of me."