They're made out of meat (1991)

http://www.terrybisson.com/theyre-made-out-of-meat-2/

by surprisetalk • 4 months ago

637 174 4 months ago

sl-1• 4 months ago

Related: Carl Sagan's Cosmos resampled to make a "Meat Planet" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZP7K9SycELA

Bisson once lived in the town just across the river from where I grew up and was an inspiration for me as a nerdy kid from the sticks who just wanted to write science fiction. His novels Talking Man, Fire on the Mountain, Voyage to the Red Planet, and Pirates of the Universe (don't be fooled by those last two titles; he was always undermining old sci-fi tropes) were among my favorites. This story is one of his goofier ones. I wasn't as big a fan of his short stories as they tended towards the jokey style of absurdism, but a favorite of mine is his "Bears Discover Fire."

fridder• 4 months ago

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

eloisant• 4 months ago

The short film makes no sense, as the 2 people talking are meat themselves.

the_af14• 4 months ago

Plus for the story to make sense, they have to be seeing Earth from scans/sensors, and one of them must in fact not be familiar with Earth at all, having disbelief in what the other is saying. But if they are both there, in a diner, they cannot be as skeptical.

I get the constraints of short indie films, I love them regardless, but in this particular case it completely misses the mark.

jvuygbbkuurx2• 4 months ago

It was funny when they talked about meat sounds using meat sounds.

AlwaysRock• 4 months ago

"probed them all the way through. They're completely meat."

The two talking, and other races, are machines that cover themselves however they like. These two are machines with artificial skins. That is normal. Fully meat beings are not. At least that is how I always read this story.

bigbuppo2• 4 months ago

They only look like meat to blend in. It's the only way to figure out if they're made out of meat.

TazeTSchnitzel• 4 months ago

You're interpreting it overly literally. Cinema can be as abstract as theatre or the written word.

ceejayoz5• 4 months ago

You should probably go watch the Terminator movies.

otikik2• 4 months ago

I interpreted this in two different ways:

* This is a virtual environment and the "meat actors" are depicting avatars of virtual/not-meat entities inhabiting that world. That's why there's inconsistencies with real life, for example the red guy's clothes. This was what I thought when I first saw this short.

* This was really an exchange of concepts and data in a language not really suitable for humans to understand. So what you are seeing is not what actually took place, but a translation. Some machine took the abstract data interchange and translated it to what it thought would be more appropriate for a meat head to understand, including setting it up in an environment that would make sense to a human. But it made some mistakes (the clothes, the weird behavior of some characters). This could have predicted AI Video slop, in a way.

gcanyon• 3 months ago

They only look like they're made of meat. And they only look like they're made of meat to you because you know you're made of meat, and they look like you.

To them, they're just disguised as "what the creatures on this planet look like," which is obviously (to them) not meat, because they've never seen meat beings. To them, we are obviously not-meat, although how we appear is compatible with being meat. But silicone dyed the correct shade can look like meat. Stone painted the right color can look like meat.

And if you say that silicone and stone don't look like meat even when prepared to copy it, bear in mind that we are made of meat and very good at distinguishing it. Different races favor different attributes for distinguishing one person from another, hence why "they all look alike" is somewhat true for pretty much any "them" you care to name. Rocky from Project Hail Mary almost certainly thinks all humans look alike.

amiga386• 4 months ago

I like that the bearded one can't help cracking up when he says "the ones you probed": https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T6JFTmQCFHg&t=285s

dreamcompiler• 4 months ago

I'm a big fan of Tom Noonan (the character in red). He unfortunately passed away a few weeks ago.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tom_Noonan

antisol• 3 months ago

Oh No! Sad news! I missed hearing about it at the time.

I'm also a big fan. He's awesome in a bunch of things, but my favourite is Cain in Robocop 2. Such a great performance.

"Jesus had days like this. Hounded and attacked like a criminal. But like him, I don't blame you. They program you, and you do it"

"Frank. The Benzedrine's got my teeth wiggling. Cut it... Scopalomine, five mills per"

aidenn0• 3 months ago

How does one get Tom Noonan to play in a film-school movie?

StumpChunkman• 4 months ago

Agreed! I love the saxophone riff for the opening/closing song.

Also, funny to see Ben Bailey outside of a taxi cab.

joezydeco2• 4 months ago

It's a good visualization but they skipped the punchline, which was the entire purpose of the story.

hn_throwaway_99• 3 months ago

Yeah, I found this was definitely a case of "the book was much better than the movie", especially odd since most of the dialog was word-for-word, yet they skipped over the small parts that gave the story its lesson and relatability. Like the whole "officially or unofficially" part is one of my favorite parts of the original story, as it makes it seem like these intergalactic beings have to deal with the same concerns as Bob in corporate HR.

I think it highlights why the original text was uniquely brilliant and why it makes it reliably makes it to the top of HN every year or so.

ubermonkey• 3 months ago

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.

nilram• 3 months ago

Although there's other's that are a little more true to Bisson's dialog, that's my favorite for the actors, and especially the background music.

api• 4 months ago

Great short film version: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T6JFTmQCFHg

I do wonder sometimes if someone out there is waiting for something actually intelligent to emerge down here.

rob74• 4 months ago

If they exist, they're probably currently placing bets whether we will manage to destroy ourselves (or at least set our civilization back by centuries) with our nuclear weapons, our climate change or our social media...

Tade0• 4 months ago

Depends how they're listening I think.

There was a time not long ago when reportedly looking at the emails being exchanged around the world one would think the most pressing matter, discussed at length, was how to "enlarge your penis".

Izkata• 4 months ago

I like the idea we live inside the Veil of Madness (A sort of galactic bermuda triangle that drives inhabitants insane, so all spacefaring civilizations stay away).

https://www.reddit.com/r/HFY/comments/8vbfgk/the_veil_of_mad...

the_af14• 4 months ago

I upvoted because I didn't know the short film existed and it's interesting.

I think the short film completely misses the mark if both entities are there in human form, in a diner. (Of course, budget constraints, and the adaptation cannot just be two inorganic beings talking, but still...)

tomhow• 4 months ago

Previously...

They're Made Out of Meat (1991) - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43994603 - May 2025 (3 comments)

They're Made Out of Meat (1991) - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38420111 - Nov 2023 (168 comments)

They're made out of meat (1991) - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31965062 - July 2022 (151 comments)

They're Made Out of Meat (1991) - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24737993 - Oct 2020 (292 comments)

They're Made Out of Meat [video] - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23436550 - June 2020 (4 comments)

They're Made Out of Meat - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11561522 - April 2016 (3 comments)

They're made out of meat - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8910420 - Jan 2015 (1 comment)

They're Made out of Meat - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8152131 - Aug 2014 (170 comments)

They're made out of meat - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8098264 - July 2014 (1 comment)

"They're Made out of Meat?" Short first contact sci-fi story - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3549320 - Feb 2012 (62 comments)

They're made out of Meat - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=774139 - Aug 2009 (3 comments)

ableal• 4 months ago

Somehow this story isn't as fun today as it was when first printed ...

globular-toast2• 3 months ago

Was it ever "fun"? I always found it scary and depressing, in a good way, of course.

mortenjorck• 4 months ago

As I’ve gotten older, it’s become increasingly hard for me to understand how anyone can read such comical reductionism as enlightenment.

We are infinitely complex arrangements of systems built upon systems, from the quantum properties of carbon atoms up through the proteins that make the “meat” we are so glibly reduced to, through the complexities and adaptations of mammalian bodies, up to the fearsome order of the human brain and the intricate sprawl of human society and culture.

To reduce us to anything less is to deny the awesomeness of the cosmos itself.

empath75• 4 months ago

Do you feel the same about cows and pigs and chickens? One way to read this is your reading. Another way to read it is as an attempt to make you question the concept of meat.

BearOso• 4 months ago

To reduce us to anything less is to deny the awesomeness of the cosmos itself.

Teacher: "Photosynthesis makes energy from water, CO2 and light. The mitochondria are the power centers of the cell."

Grade-schooler: "How do they work?"

Teacher: "Um. Um..."

Modern scientist: "Quantum entanglement and tunneling. We don't really understand any of it."

tantalor• 4 months ago

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.

indoordin0saur5• 4 months ago

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?

lucianbr• 4 months ago

How many of the billions of people alive have your perspective? How many of our leaders even, given the news in the last... let's say two weeks. But you can look at thousands of years of history and to me it still seems that people and their leaders don't share your view of "infinitely complex arrangements". I mean they might think such of themselves, but of "others", obviously not.

The story mentions some "official rules". Consider that we also have official rules and behaviour that does not obey them.

I dare suggest your own view might be reductionist.

0x3f• 4 months ago

Part of the human expression of disgust includes thought terminating cliches. Imagine how the average person would talk about a race of bug-like aliens, no matter how advanced they were. It would be a dismissive kind of 'ew, gross'. The humor is in seeing other beings reacting that way to us. I don't think it's supposed to imply the aliens are some kind of flawless geniuses revealing the true nature of human beings.

zulux2• 4 months ago

Sentient plants that move quickly would be another case of us humans going "WTF?!?!"

RajT88• 4 months ago

Rainier Wolfcastle: THAT'S THE JOKE

the_af14• 4 months ago

As I’ve gotten older, it’s become increasingly hard for me to understand how anyone can read such comical reductionism as enlightenment.

First, it's a humorous piece.

Second, it's as much a critique of the aliens as of the humans. The aliens are also depicted as clueless about what makes human life interesting, and even shown to be petty in the end. Their behavior is entirely "human", so if they are criticizing humans for it...

indoordin0saur5• 4 months ago

"They're made out of wires!"

"Oh god, you're right! They're all just tiny pieces of rubber and silicon, transistors and circuits all crammed chaotically together! How horrifying!"

glenstein4• 4 months ago

I feel like the point of the story was that it was celebrating how spectacular the brain is, by showing how unlikely it would seem, and how incredulous another intelligent creature could be upon hearing of it if it weren't already built into their sense of normal.

It might be that this alternative cosmic sense of "normal" is not a real thing (meat may prove to be more cosmically normal than machine at the end of the day), but the sense of wonder in response to something as ridiculous as a brain, in its capabilities and its design, is a real feeling that the story is appropriately trying to evoke.

kelnos2• 3 months ago

You must be fun at parties.

It's comedy. You might not find it funny, but it's rather small-minded to suggest that no one else could find it funny.

emp_• 4 months ago

It was incredible man. Mold on a rock that got to think. Ha, it was amazing while it lasted

probablyworks2• 4 months ago

This American Life also did a good narration of this in Act 2 of episode 803 https://www.thisamericanlife.org/803

HanClinto• 4 months ago

Bad URL, but this YouTube clip works for me: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5usXhX0zaO4

probablyworks2• 4 months ago

good callout - https://www.thisamericanlife.org/803/transcript

analog8374• 4 months ago

So, Link, it's all very straightforward and scientific if you just think about it carefully for a moment : we're made out of pixels.

AntiDyatlov2• 4 months ago

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?

rokkamokka• 4 months ago

It's electrical signals... Inside your meat

AntiDyatlov2• 4 months ago

So the power grid is having experiences? Computers too?

otikik2• 4 months ago

Of course not.

If you put two stones in the ground, they define a line. It goes through the center of mass of both stones and extends towards both sides through the universe.

Now remove the stones.

Does the line stop existing? You can still "see it" in your brain. It could be argued that the line has always been there. That the stones were just a marker. A means for an idea to manifest in the physical word. You could put any two other markers at any point on that line and they would represent the same line.

The idea that "the cube is made out of meat" is akin to saying that "the line is made out of stone". Ideas always exist, their representation in the physical world don't.

Your sense of consciousness is just one of those representations. It is "immortal", just like the line is. In principle it could exist without the physical substrate that is your brain, or in a different substrate. Probably there's a way to encode all of that into a big number.

I think this is where the idea of an "immortal soul" comes from. It is however kind of easy to misinterpret it, especially if one is a mesopotamian sheperd who explains the world with gods and religion.

pixl97• 4 months ago

Where does the simulation happen inside a computer.

The hard problem of consciousness isn't.

glenstein4• 4 months ago

This is the funniest possible place attempt to open a hard problem of consciousness conversation, but also fitting because it makes it as ridiculous as I feel it actually is.

On another level even this clarification kind of misses the mark because many/most versions of the HPOC still treat physical substrate as a necessary condition, just not a sufficient one, sometimes will appeal to radio receivers, or the mental and physical being two aspects of the same underlying thing (sometimes called neutral monism). I personally think that view is mistaken and deeply confused, but even so, it's a view that ties consciousness to the substrate of "thinking meat" without reducing it, and would probably be a moot point from the aliens perspective.

grumpopotamus• 4 months ago

Also by Terry Bisson and one of my favorite stories is Bears Discover Fire 1990 https://www.lightspeedmagazine.com/fiction/bears-discover-fi...

haritha-j• 4 months ago

I didn't really get it to be honest. I feel like something went over my head.

zulux2• 4 months ago

Fair enough.. It's not really sci-fi. Just a quiet slice of life with a twist.

If I may be so bold, this story would have sucked when I was younger, but now that I've been acquainted with the ages of all the characters, it makes sense.

emmelaich2• 3 months ago

Same, I thought the newberries were going to be some sort of intelligence enhancer.

GMoromisato• 4 months ago

I loved this story when I first read it. I made me feel wistful, like a world was dying and simultaneously being born. I can't explain it, but the idea of bears using fire has stayed with me ever since.

chrisweekly• 4 months ago

I'm reminded of an excellent surreal novel, "The Bear Comes Home" by Rafi Zabor, about an ursine jazz saxophonist.

Pay08• 3 months ago

That's the same feeling I had about the first half of Children of Time.

vsajip• 4 months ago

Is it me, or is there a subliminal message in the banner of LightSpeed magazine? No time to look into it, but there appears to be a changing message that flashes on and off to take the place of the "LIGHTSPEED" graphic in the banner. The only one I caught was "RESIST".

mcmcmc• 4 months ago

There’s definitely something, I saw RESIST pop up for a flash as well.

OkayPhysicist• 4 months ago

"Resist" and "Do not obey in advance". It's just an animated GIF.

pmarreck• 3 months ago

Just read this for the first time. Wow.

mihaic• 4 months ago

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.

whycome• 4 months ago

Maybe it’s lab grown in a future and not tied to animals in any way. Just for food.

jvuygbbkuurx2• 4 months ago

I think that is what makes it great, because it makes it sound absurd.

If it was just talking about carbon based lifeforms it wouldn't land the same way.

post-it• 4 months ago

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 through a meat stage.”
“Spare me. Okay, maybe they’re only part meat. You know, like the weddilei. A meat head with an electron plasma brain inside.”

glenstein4• 4 months ago

I get your point but I don't think that those quotes establish familiarity with meat based animals. Familiarity with animals would be something like "yeah, sure, we know about that planet with cows but this is something else entirely!" (Also humans wouldn't be so surprising if they knew about things like cows).

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.

FarmerPotato4• 3 months ago

You have to read the story in the original eshidilii. It just sounds so illogical in English.

globular-toast2• 3 months ago

The characters aren't speaking English. We are reading the author's translation into English and we have to trust the author's judgement.

Maybe this kind of thing isn't for you if the above is required explanation, though.

glitchc• 4 months ago

Earlier I found it awe-inspiring. Nowadays I find it funny because we have yet to even remotely approach the complexity of meat.

babblingfish• 4 months ago

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

ryeights3• 4 months ago

Is it surprising? It seems likely you could build a complete working model of the universe with no provision for consciousness at all. As far as modern science goes, it's an intractable problem

outworlder4• 3 months ago

Consciousness had millions of years headstart. Give it time.

ohnoNotAgain321• 4 months ago

They're made out of meat (1991)

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