Mentats of Dune

If we accept advanced technology in any form, we will begin to make excuses and justifications for using it. There are so many ways to take the wrong path and tumble down a slippery slope, down, down, down. Loyal Butlerians, we must be ever-vigilant and strong! The Emperor’s Committee of Orthodoxy does not go far enough. If we let machines do even menial chores for us, they will soon become our masters again.

I call upon all my faithful followers, across all the worlds of the Imperium, to demand that every planetary leader sign my antitechnology pledge. If any refuse, my Butlerians — and God — will know who they are. No one can hide.

— MANFORD TORONDO, citizen’s decree

The idiocy of it all! I cannot decide whether to laugh at Butlerian insanity, or weep for the future of our species. What will those fanatics demand next? The complete absence of medical technology? Would they outlaw fire, and declare the existence of the wheel too dangerous? Are we all to be relegated to huddling in forests and fields?

Enough. This is the decree of Venport Holdings: No VenHold cargo ship or passenger transport shall trade with any planet that signs Manford Torondo’s antitechnology pledge. We will deliver no goods or passengers, transmit no communications, engage in no commerce with any world that shares his dangerous, barbarian philosophy.

Make your choice: Do you prefer to bask in the glow of civilization, or cower in the shadows of primitive despair? Decide.

— DIRECTEUR JOSEF VENPORT, formal business announcement