prime postulate

The Prime Postulate

Glog's Gang and Glurg's Gang were fighting over a cave. It was a rather nice cave, it must be admitted: spacious, airy, and clean. It was, in fact, the sort of cave that belonged, by Divine Right, to the Good Guys.

"That our cave," said Glog. "God give it to me."

"You full of some kind of pressed meat substance," said Glurg. "God give it to me!"

"Now, I know you not worship real God," said Glog, "'cause he tell me cave mine!"

"You infidel," replied Glurg. "You got false God. God tell me you got to die for that."

"No," countered Glog. "God tell me, you got to die!"

A fellow named Grog was listening to this debate, and at that point, he offered an opinion. "You know," he said, "it sounds like you guys worship exactly the same god."

Glog and Glurg glared at Grog.

The cave impasse continued for several days, until one night, Glurg's Gang attacked Glog's Gang, murdering and raping. Glog's guys were caught with their pants down, so to speak, but a week later, after gathering the biggest rocks and clubs they could find, they returned the favor.

At length, Glog and Glurg found themselves face to face again.

"You horrible, evil, criminal people!" accused Glog. "You violent, vicious vermin! Look what you do to innocent people!"

"It not us!" replied Glurg. "You hit us back first! You kill innocent people, not us!"

"But you attack first!" roared Glog.

"That pre-emptive strike!" answered Glurg. "We know awful people like you attack us first, if we don't attack you."

"You commit terrible atrocities!" said Glog. "Murder, rape, torture. Etc."

"Wrong!" screamed Glurg. "You commit terrible atrocities!"

Grog happened to be listening again. "Tell me," he said, "why your murder, rape, torture, etc. is ok, while the other guy's is not."

Glog and Glurg turned toward the interloper with rage.

"You don't know nothin' about it!" growled Glog nastily. "This between Good Guys and Bad Guys. We Good Guys. They Bad Guys. Anything we do ok, 'cause God say so."

"He completely wrong!" howled Glurg. "We Good Guys. They Bad Guys. God tell me that. God only talk to me!"

"So, you actually agree on everything," observed Grog. "'We are the Good Guys, and anything we do is justified because we are the Good Guys.' You might call that the Prime Postulate. The only thing you disagree on is the value of the variable 'we.'"

"No," agreed Glog and Glurg, "only thing we agree on is you need to shut your damn mouth!" And with that, they fell on Grog in unison and cooperatively murdered him.

Then they were free to fight for the glory of the one, true God.

God scratched behind his ear with a cloven hoof and stroked his horns gently. "That," he smiled, "should just about cover it for the whole of human history."