"Mr. President," he said, "Peter is not a scientist. And we cannot peer into his mind. We can only see the images his mind projects. Until we build it, we will not know exactly how it works."
And then, when the machine was built, and they took him to it, he didn't know what to make of it. He didn't think they did, either - they were gathered around it in their protective suits like apes trying to figure out an internal combustion
engine.
"Don't look directly into it," the scientist beside him advised. "Those who have experience a kind of .. disorientation."
Unlike the apes examining it, the two of them stood behind three feet of protective, blast-proof glass, and yet both of them had moved to the back of the viewing room - as far away from the artifact as possible.
The machine consis
