#about humanity

[sophaeros]

x

[crasybirdlady]

Humans are weird: Tigers about the house.

I saw a documentary on YouTube called Tigers about the house.

A zookeeper is raising two tiger cubs. What if that's what makes Humans so special? The ability to raise the offspring of other species?

Tchach took a deep breath before going onto the klazoo space station.

The pirates had hit the station hard. Killing the adults leaving the newborn chicks and eggs to die. It would be a tragedy to any species, but for the Klazoo it was devastating. Only one in every 4 egg made it to adulthood and the species desperately needed to raise their numbers.

It was the humans who found the space station only hours after the attack.

They were extremely upset and had done all they could to catch the pirates. Now it was Tchach turn to do his part and help with the transfer of the station.

The human commander greeted him with the human smile and Tchach suppressed the impulse to flee, knowing intellectually that a smile was not a thread.

The human commander looked less put together than normally. He was in uniform but had a funny contraption on his front.

Tchach wondered if it was part of human burrial traditions and worn in honnor of the dead Klazoo.

Suddenly he heard a small squeaking, just like the squeaking of a Klazoo hachling. But that was impossible! Klazoo hatchlings need an adult to lay on them the first few days of their lives and after that, they would need the parents pouch for weeks. And since they imprinted on the first adult they saw, they would refuse food from anyone than the parents.

The contraption on the commanders front moved and the small head of a Klazoo hachling peeked out. It's big eyes blinking in the harsh light.

The human let his hand slide gently over the top of the little head and with a smile said: "well well look who's up. You are determine not to miss anything aren't you"

The Klazoo squeaked again this time louder and the commander looked at Tchach and said "I'm sorry, we have to take this to my private quarters. This little fella is hungry again"

Speechless Tchach followed the commander. How was this possible?

Then he noticed that a lot of humans was wearing the same kind of contraption as the commander and finally he found his voice: "how did you save these hachlings?"

The commander smiled but this time it was a sad smile.

"Most of the older hachlings had died when we came. But the newly hatched we could save. Luckily we had a retired zookeeper on board and she knew just how to save newborn hachlings"

Tchach wondered just what a zookeeper was and why she would know what to do.

When the commander explained he was once again speechless. The humans raised the offspring of other species with success?

After feeding the hachling the commander took Tchach to the space stations nursery.

Row after row of eggs covered in what looked like teacosies under heatlamps. The "teacosies" had small motors making them quiver slightly, simulating the movement of an adult Klazoo laying on the egg.

In the next room small newly hatched lay in incubators. They were covered in weighted blankets again simulating an adult laying on the egg.

All in all the humans had saved nearly 70 % of the Klazoo egg and hachlings. It was nothing short of a miracle.

Even more so, because by saving the hachlings the humans agreed to become their parents, since a hachling would not accept food from anyone than the parents for the first year of their lives.

So for the first time in recorded history an alian species was allowed onto the klazoo honeworld. Insuring that Klazoo hachlings raised by humans would know the honeworld and traditions of their ancestors.

Soon human pediatricians, nurses and zookeepers were in high demand all over the galaxy, saving countless of offspring who would have died otherwise.

[kaablooie]

Go Time

(Back to the beginning: Part 1)

Part 9.

Shanza looked around the cargo bay in abject horror. Remains of the Radasha were everywhere. How could Zeno have allowed this to happen? The violence and viciousness required for one sentient being to do this to another she just couldn’t wrap her mind around. 

Zeno had said the one with the caved in head had a stun rifle thrown at it. How did the human even manage that?? The calculations required to predict the trajectory of a rotating shape like are insanely complex, and this human did it in his head, during a fight? To consider that it was intentional and Camden possess such computational power at his disposal was frightening. The more she learned about humans the more terrified she became. Perhaps the Lodra Terraphobes had the right idea after all. Maybe Terrans were just too damn dangerous.

No one wanted to clean up the mess and Zeno was not reacting to this with a clear mind. He should have been outraged. Disgusted. Horrified at what was plastered all over the place. Instead he seems to be giddy with the physical prowess of the human and intent on discovering what else it was capable of. He was currently recording the incident into his computer before the details of the attack left him. 

She was supposed to be helping the others strap down the cargo. They had decided that it was easiest to just depressurize the cargo bay and let the vacuum of space suck out Camden’s rampaging aftermath. Shanza was watching him shoulder some crates to the side so he could strap it to the hook in the ground. If he frightened her before, he absolutely terrified her now. His absurdly large muscles strained against a crate that would have required a grav clamp to move, yet there it was, sliding away to his will so he could secure it with the straps. These humans had no place is civilized society and it was just a matter of time before he killed them all. 

Shanza had seen the broadcast from the Lodra Initiative’s Commander along with everyone else describing the fight. They were recruiting, and as far as she was concerned, with good reason. 

Zeno saw Shanza standing there watching him and glided over to her. “Shanza,  I want your help setting up some tests for Camden.” If she couldn’t tell he was excited by his tone, the soft shifting red hues of his skin gave it away. “I want to evaluate his ability to predict a thrown object’s trajectory. To think that throw with the rifle might be anything other than luck would revolutionize the potential mental capabilities of attributed to humans. Also, the previous strength tests we performed don’t account the strength required to do what he did to some of those Radashas. Could the stun weapons have somehow affected his muscles? Camden mentioned it might have something to do with a chemical called adrenaline his species is apparently capable of creating. Imagine! A natural chemical enhancement that your body produces when needed! There is so much to learn.”

“No.”

“We can begin by setting up - “ he abruptly cut himself off. “What?”

“No, I won’t do it.” Shanza replied. “Can’t you see how dangerous he is? We should never have taken him from his planet. We need to return him.”

Shanza could tell she had surprised him. They had worked together for a very long time, and this was the first time they had ever had a fundamental disagreement about what course of action they should take. 

“Shanza, this research with Camden will make us renowned throughout the galaxy. So little is known about Terrans, and Humans in particular, other than they are dangerous, and that is just from old stories from generations ago. We have no idea what they’re capable of. Don’t you see the opportunity we have here?”

Inflating the air sack on her back, the equivalent to screaming, she responded, “Don’t you see the danger you’ve put us in?? The human is an unpredictable beast and will get you killed. Zeno, I care for you and value the work we’ve done in the past, but I can’t be a part of this.”

And with that, she turned her back on him and left the cargo bay.

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If you’ve liked what you’ve read, please consider joining me on my Patreon page where you can get early access to each chapter. https://www.patreon.com/roman_williams

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Next: Part 10

Other parts:

Part 1

Part 2

Part 3

Part 4

Part 5

Part 6

Part 7

Part 8

Part 9

Part 10 

Part 11

Part 12 (On Patreon) 

[yourunicornmind]

Quantum paper shuffling

Looking forward to another week of paper shuffling.

But actually, I work at a computer, therefore I am actually shuffling electrons.

Electrons are very small. So small they are subject to quantum effects.

Influencing quantum effects is beyond the ability of this mere human.

So logically, no-one would notice if I didn’t do it.

Still trying to work out how to explain this to my boss

[zairatimmel-blog]

Fuck That

You won’t change the world.

You will get your schooling done to make your parents happy,

And get a degree in something you find intolerable.

But at least it will pay well.

You will get a desk job.

You will sit at a desk eight hours of every day to take home some measly little paycheck.

You will be bored and hate your desk and your paycheck.

You won’t find any comfort that you are helping the world,

Because you won’t be.

Unless making your boss richer is your purpose in life.

I doubt it.

You will realize that life,

Or rather, real life,

Is uninteresting.

As a child you were filled with dreams and hopes.

Of change, of adventure, of peace.

You could be anything.

But you grew up and realized that real life doesn’t work that way.

You stopped trying to be the hero of the story and have settle for just being a minor character,

Of a minor subplot.

 Suck it up, you will tell yourself.

And with that,

I can agree.

Suck it up.

Suck up the disappointment and the naivety.

Suck up the belief that you are just one in a flock of sheep,

That has no real purpose.

Suck up the anguish, the loneliness.

The pain, the failure and the uninterest.

Take it all and throw is away.

 Humanity wasn’t built for passivity.

They were built for dreams.

And change.

And wonder.

Take all the ideas you had as an adult,

That the world was unchanging and unforgiving.

And show it to your child self.

And let them be the one to tell you the words that you were waiting to hear.

The words that will change you, just as your younger self wanted to change the words.

Show them your passivity and meaninglessness and let them tell you,

Fuck That.

[operation-earthanoids]

What if the first aliens we meet were AI themselves and saw we had created almost exact copies of them (or at least something eerily similar to them)? How would they react if we told them that we'd never seen them before and the fact that our AI looked like them was just a coincidence?

That would likely be quite startling to them. I know I’d probably be very upset if someone I’d never met somehow managed to create a being that looked just like me. I’m assuming the AI are at least somewhat sapient, because seeing a copy of yourself that just functions as a computer for someone else would be a level of creepy I can’t even begin to fathom.

[operation-inclusion]

Aliens And (Human) Gender

Here’s an idea - what if human and alien concepts of gender are radically different, but this doesn’t stop aliens from realising that human terms fit them so much better than the ones they’ve used before, and vice versa? Just imagine: 

An alien who had no words to express their sense of identity until they met a human and realised Oh. I'm a girl. or Oh. I'm a boy

Aliens realising they're genderfluid or agender or mauverique after talking to humans

Aliens coming from species that have no concept of gender and realising that they have one after talking to a trans human

Aliens being trans

Conversely, humans talking to aliens about gender, and hearing an alien describe their own gender, and suddenly everything makes sense

Humans discovering that they never felt like their assigned gender while discussing gender roles with their alien best friend and finding that the alien’s definition of gender fit so much better

Transgender humans and transgender aliens comparing their experiences