[Here's a classic bit of internet humor. I wish I knew who wrote this]

The setting is deep space, just beyond the range of Earth's best telescopes. The leader of the Fifth Explorer Force is speaking to the Commander in Chief...

They're made out of meat.

Meat?

Meat. They're made out of meat.

Just Meat?

There's no doubt about it. We picked several from different parts of the planet, took them aboard our recon vessels, probed them all the way through. They're completely meat.

That's impossible. What about the radio signals? The messages to the stars.

They use the radio waves to talk, but the signals don't come from them. The signals come from machines.

So who made the machines? That's who we want to contact.

They made the machines. That's what I'm trying to tell you. Meat made the machines.

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 this sector and they're made out of meat.

Maybe they're like the Orfolei. You know, a carbon-based intelligence that goes through a meat stage.

Nope. They're born meat and they die meat. We studied them for several of their life spans, which didn't take too long. Do you have any idea the life span of meat?

Spare me. Okay, maybe they're only part meat. You know, like the Weddilei. A meat head with an electron plasma brain inside.

Nope. We thought of that, since they do have meat heads like the Weddilei. But I told you, we probed them. They're meat all the way through.

No brain?

Oh, there is a brain alright. It's just that the brain is made out of meat also.

So... what does the thinking?

You're not understanding, are you? The brain does the thinking. The meat.

Thinking meat??? You're asking me to believe in thinking meat???

Yes, thinking meat ! Conscious meat ! Loving meat. Dreaming meat. The meat is the whole deal ! Are you getting the picture?

Omigod. You're serious then. They're made out of meat.

Finally ! Yes. They are indeed made out of meat. And they've been trying to get in touch with us for almost a hundred of their years.

So what does the meat have in mind?

First it wants to talk to us. Then I imagine it wants to explore the universe, contact other sentients, swap ideas and information. The usual.

We're supposed to talk to meat?

That's the idea. That's the message they're sending out by radio. 'Hello. Anyone out there? Anyone home?' That sort of thing.

They actually do talk then. They use words, ideas, concepts?

Oh, yes. Except they do it with meat.

I thought you just told me they used radio.

They do, but what do you think is on the radio? Meat sounds. You know how when you slap or flap meat it makes a noise? They talk by flapping a small opening of their meat at each other. They can even sing by squirting air through their meat.

Omigod. Singing meat. This is altogether too much. So what do you advise?

Officially or unofficially?

Both.

Officially, we are required to contact, welcome, and log in any and all sentient races or multibeings in the quadrant, without prejudice, fear, or favor. Unofficially, I advise that we delete the records and forget the whole damn thing.

I was hoping you would say that.

It seems harsh, but there is a limit. I mean, do we really want to make contact with meat?

I agree one hundred percent. What's there to say?" `Hello, meat. How's it going?' But will this work? How many planets are we dealing with here?

Just one. They can travel to other planets in special meat containers, but they can't live on them. And being meat, they only travel through C space. Which limits them to the speed of light and makes the possibility of their ever making contact pretty slim. Infinitesimal, in fact.

So we just pretend there's no one home in the universe?

That's it.

Cruel. But you said it yourself, who wants to meet meat? And the ones who have been aboard our vessels, the ones you have probed? You're sure they won't remember?

They'll be considered crackpots if they do. We went into their heads and smoothed out their meat so that we're just a dream to them.

A dream to meat! How strangely appropriate, that we should be meat's dream.

And we can mark this sector unoccupied.

Good. Agreed, officially and unofficially. Case closed. Any others? Anyone interesting on that side of the galaxy?

Yes, a rather shy but sweet hydrogen core cluster intelligence in a class nine star in G445 zone. Was in contact two galactic rotations ago, wants to be friendly again.

They always come around.

And why not? Imagine how unbearably, how unutterably cold the universe would be if one were all alone. What's say we get going.

I can never remember who wrote that -- Frederik Pohl? -- but it first appeared in Playboy Magazine, maybe fifteen years ago or so.

(I only read it for the Astronomy, of course...)

Silas

Wrong on both counts.

Author: Terry Bisson

Appeared: OMNI, April 1991


Link: http://www.theody.net/tres/meat.html

__________________
Valiant Dancer

From Terry Bisson's site. I think this was also recently reprinted in Nature or some other notable science magazine - I know I read it for the first time recently, and not online.


<font size=-1>[ This Message was edited by: ToSeek on 2002-01-17 11:51 ]</font>

Thanks for the sources, guys. I laughed so hard that I cried when I read this. Boy it was funny...

But he still...

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Any day you wake up on "the right side of the dirt" is a good day.

T. Anderson

Well, if you're interested in heavenly bodies.... [img]/phpBB/images/smiles/icon_wink.gif[/img]