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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 :)
I think this story is tacky and doesn't really make sense. Do they already know what meat is? And if so, why do they act surprised when they find that lifeforms are "made" of it? Why even do they have an opinion on "meat"? I find it good for a chuckle perhaps but there's nothing profound in here.
The author is trying to get you to speculate on the kind of intelligence that would say this about humans.
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 sense. Maybe different RNA building blocks and genetic chemistry, but probably work out similar to meat and organic stuff.
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…
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!?
Earlier quoted context omitted.
The short film makes no sense, as the 2 people talking are meat themselves.
They only look like meat to blend in. It's the only way to figure out if they're made out of meat.
Perhaps the makers of the movie neglected to read the story before creating a script?
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…
Earlier quoted context omitted.
I don't know where you get the claims from "anyone" about "enlightenment". This story is obviously satire. Meaning, it is a lie that tells the truth.
> This story is obviously satire. Is it though? What is it satirizing? Is it satirizing the idea of water and carbon based life? How does that tell any truth?
I think basically the humor is how unimpressed they are with a Sagan-style sense of wonder at the cosmos that is implicitly treated as the human perspective, how bleak it would be if true. The aliens ridiculing that is funny, and the actual bleakness of it is funny too.
I think this story is tacky and doesn't really make sense. Do they already know what meat is? And if so, why do they act surprised when they find that lifeforms are "made" of it? Why even do they have an opinion on "meat"? I find it good for a chuckle perhaps but there's nothing profound in here.
I like this story, but I never liked the wording "made out of meat", as if the word exists in a world without animals. I could have accepted "proteins", but that's not a catchy title.
They are clearly familiar with meat-based animals: > “That’s ridiculous. How can meat make a machine? You’re asking me to believe in sentient meat.” > “I’m not asking you, I’m telling you. These creatures are the only sentient race in that sector and they’re made out of meat.” And indeed sentient species that are partly made of meat: > “Maybe they’re like the orfolei. You know, a carbon-based intelligence that goes t…
Their references are not to creatures that are meat through-and-through but fictional alien races that have a kind of incidental relationship to meat that doesn't establish meat-based cognition as normal the way that animals would.
Well, actually, probably not. If you say we're made out of meat, you end up with the hard problem of consciousness. I'm imagining a purple cube in this moment. Is the purple cube made out of meat?
It's electrical signals... Inside your meat