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They're made out of meat (1991)

terrybisson.com

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Re: They're made out of meat (1991)

#161

Post by reverius42 »

EdwardDiego wrote: post #158
stared wrote: post #93

Discarding scientific evidence usually looks differently than "we discussed that we didn’t liked it". Is is usually not looking at all, never starting a discussion, or even lacking an intellectual framework to comprehend the phenomenon. See "The great silence" by Ted Chiang, http://worker01.e-flux.com/pdf/supercommunity/article_1087.p... for this "not looking at". For this "beyond comprehension", think about Solaris…

That short story makes me think of the kea (Alpine parrot) of New Zealand. They're ridiculously smart and dexterous. When I was a ranger I'd tell tourists to think of them as "monkeys who can fly... ...you're laughing, but I'm serious". Their upper and lower beaks can move independently like a human's thumb and forefinger, unlike nearly all other birds, and they can also use their beaks like scissors, or to undo scre…

> the fact that they can survive, and indeed, they thrive, in the harshest environment in New Zealand is far more indicative of their intelligence than any Polly Wanna A Cracker would ever be.

By this logic, aren't extremophiles the most intelligent beings? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Extremophile

Re: They're made out of meat (1991)

#162

Post by zamadatix »

timonoko wrote: post #159

Why is "They Were Made Out Of Meat" Hacker News favourite, but "Bordered in Black" is always flagged? Gemini: In short, "They're Made Out of Meat" makes people feel smart and curious, while "Bordered in Black" makes people feel uncomfortable and argumentative—and on Hacker News, "uncomfortable and argumentative" is a fast track to being flagged.

Asking Gemini with the titles swapped will give you an equally confident story and reasoning about why "Bordered in Black" is actually preferred. This, and more, is why we're interested in what you have to say about the stories instead of what the LLM has to say.

What makes you a big fan of the story/reminded you of it here? I just gave it a re-read and thought it was alright. Not my favorite work of his... but certainly not bad either. Perhaps I've just read too many Sci-Fi stories to be properly shocked by the theme given the relatively short time to be immersed in the setting :).

Re: They're made out of meat (1991)

#163

Post by timonoko »

timonoko wrote: post #159

Why is "They Were Made Out Of Meat" Hacker News favourite, but "Bordered in Black" is always flagged? Gemini: In short, "They're Made Out of Meat" makes people feel smart and curious, while "Bordered in Black" makes people feel uncomfortable and argumentative—and on Hacker News, "uncomfortable and argumentative" is a fast track to being flagged.

[dead]

Re: They're made out of meat (1991)

#164

Post by teapot7 »

Timwi wrote: post #154
teapot7 wrote: post #121

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ok - bear mode activated: I'll add 'The Star Bear' by Michael Swanwick, where a man's series of encounters with a bear in Paris echo his feelings about being a Russian emigre. https://reactormag.com/the-star-bear-michael-swanwick/

You saying “bear mode activated” reminds me of Dicey Dungeons... (For those who don't know, there's a place in the game where, with a moderate amount of luck, you can trigger an item that transforms you into a bear, which changes your stats and available equipment, and you remain that way for the entire rest of the dungeon)

I am in fact a bear at this very moment.

Re: They're made out of meat (1991)

#165

Post by bsenftner »

Frotag wrote: post #107
stared wrote: post #93

Discarding scientific evidence usually looks differently than "we discussed that we didn’t liked it". Is is usually not looking at all, never starting a discussion, or even lacking an intellectual framework to comprehend the phenomenon. See "The great silence" by Ted Chiang, http://worker01.e-flux.com/pdf/supercommunity/article_1087.p... for this "not looking at". For this "beyond comprehension", think about Solaris…

"The Baby-Eating Aliens" also explores hypothetical differences in alien culture. It's also written in the same absurd conversational style. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=469761

That is one of the better reads of my life, and I'm a serious reader.

Re: They're made out of meat (1991)

#167

Post by ubermonkey »

fridder wrote: post #6

The short film someone made is pretty great: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T6JFTmQCFHg

That's Tom Noonan (who recently passed away) and Ben Bailey; one of the kids in the other booth we see briefly is played by Gbenga Akinnagbe in his first film role, who rose to greater prominence as Chris Partlow on The Wire.

Re: They're made out of meat (1991)

#168

Post by psd1 »

justonceokay wrote: post #74
Aperocky wrote: post #73

This is fun to read but any such galactic intelligence would probably recognize that its predecessor were meat, probably kept the original meat safe in a corner of the galaxy too.. The universe were quite uniform in character. Galaxies, stars, they are very predictable and essentially the same everywhere, across billions of years (both time and distance), can't see why that doesn't apply to life too in a general sens…

It’s called fiction for a reason. Glad you’ve risen above that nonsense! I personally hate that it implies there are faster ways to travel than light speed. We know this to be a hard limit in the physics of our universe and it rubs me the wrong way when SF writers just glaze over reality. Not to mention hydrogen life forms, what’s that about!?

I can relate. However. The unspoken rider is "...according to our current understanding". I don't think you have the footing to constrain the future to only what we understand today, especially since we can't reconcile our two most fundamental theories. I don't think you can do that even if you could explain quantum entanglement in terms of relativity.

On a separate note, science fiction isn't generally about science, imo, it's about human politics (Greg Egan being an outlier). The cod-science gives colour and setting. If you read it as stories about humanity, maybe the charlatanry won't irk you so much. I find this mindset helps me deal with my own irascibility.

Re: They're made out of meat (1991)

#169

Post by gaigalas »

outworlder wrote: post #139
babblingfish wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's amazing how consciousness remains a mystery given all the scientific progress over the last 100 years

Consciousness had millions of years headstart. Give it time.

We don't know that.

Consciousness might have actually started today at 7am and, before that, we were all automatons without subjective experience of the world, just going through the motions.

You might say that's impossible, because yesterday you were conscious and you know that, but you can't prove it to anyone.

Epistemologically, this is not a problem that can be solved with "give it time".

Re: They're made out of meat (1991)

#170

Post by psd1 »

Theodores wrote: post #100
nasretdinov wrote: post #50

By all accounts the CPUs we've made with ridiculous stuff like 2nm transistors is _surely_ more advanced than neurons, right? We just haven't figured out how to wire them properly :)

Nature's machines, for example, for reproducing DNA or for photosynthesis, are in a totally different league of 'precision engineering' to anything that our brightest engineers have ever created. At times we get all giddy because we have invented a quartz clock, a wheel, a straight line or a calculator that seems to be better than anything in the world of nature, however, we sometimes have to overlook nature or forge…

Counterpoint: biology looks like vibe-coding. I would hate to have nature as a colleague, she's an arrogant fool with a mail-order degree. I'd rather maintain a Jeep than a knee.
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