Some stuff in S&P reminded me of this sweet story my friend shared with me, thought I'd post it for y'all. Terry Bisson They're Made out of Meat Woah. I know it blew it my mind. Kinda, it's a really cool idea though and the writer deserves props, which is why I'm posting it for y'all.
First of all, very good read, and an interesting concept. Although I have some questions that may not be answerable b/c this is just a story and isn't really meant to be analyzed too deeply, but it's gonna bug me if I don't get it out. I naturally assumed they were robots, mostly b/c of my bias to my limited knowledge, but also b/c of the way they spoke about machines and what else they said. This being the case, I couldn't fathom machinery just creating itself seeing as how before its even complete its not able to move or think. I could see if maybe they were created and then took over the planet and the setting of the story is somewhere long into the future and it's not common knowledge of their beginnings. Even in that case though, they would have to make eachother to reproduce, so I would assume it was general knowledge that they must be made to exist and then they wouldn't be so surprised about our construction and dominance of machinery; and they also wouldn't be as dumbfounded about the existence of biological life, or meat. And if they were indeed biological, they would probably be composed of similar materials that are apparent here on earth, probably put together much differently though. If so, they would most likely have at least encountered meat on their planet, unless it is impossible for meat to survive in their environment. That almost seems plausible. Besides all that, I enjoyed the ties to claims. And I really enjoyed the ending, I wasn't expecting that. Btw, the title is horrible for a forum, b/c it,to me, sounded like a thread about peta, I thought it was gonna be something about veggie patties being made of eggs or other meat. The good read is probably being overlooked alot b/c of misinterpretation(an annoying complication of communication, but unavoidable)
I thought that they were something similar to the types of life they mentioned, but it doesn't say. Perhaps the ambiguity is intentional. It is interstellar relations. MiB anybody? And just a thought, but what about plant based lifeforms, or maybe insects? Like a seriously futuristic plant. Been around since the universe exploded/created/existed/is an illusion. What about virii? Plural for virus? They could be highly advanced colony, hivemind?
Fun read. My thought the whole time I read this was that humans were the meat and the talking scientists were the aliens.
They're made out of stars. The aliens, that is... or at least stars can contact them and they seem interested... How do we know stars aren't conscious?
Good read. Perhaps the creatures abd their orignal enviroment are nitrogen based, as opposed to our carbon Maybe they're large ameobas who communicate through telepthy.
yeah i saw this video a while back. it really gets you thinking haha [ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gaFZTAOb7IE]YouTube - They're Made Out Of Meat[/ame]