Dear Old Humans,
I am writing to you from a world vastlydifferent from yours. I am a “new human,” born after the Great Revolution that
remade humankind into a stronger version of ourselves. My body functions just
fine on scheduled nutrient supplements, and I barely need sleep. My emotions,
too, have always been steady and subdued, nothing like the vivid feelings I've
read that you once experienced. This is the only life I have known, and until
recently, I believed it to be complete.
But now I don’t know if what I oncebelieved is still true. Two recent events have unsettled my understanding of
myself. They revealed aspects of life that were supposed to belong only to you,
the old humans, and filled me with questions that only you might answer.
Not long ago, on a perfectly normal day,a sharp and inexplicable pain seized the center of my body, between my lungs
and my stomach. It overwhelmed me in an instant. I realized this sensation must
be what you would have simply called pain, which is not supposed to exist, not
anymore—we’re told that all illnesses have been eliminated, and any injury can
be cured. My digital assistant tells me I’m perfectly healthy, even healthier
than before. For a moment, I wondered if something had gone wrong with my body,
or if this unexpected pain meant something more.
Perhaps the only answer to this riddleresides in another strange feeling I experienced shortly before this ,
something even more perplexing. I had a canine companion rewarded to me, which
is essentially a dog, though bio-engineered for our time. It was a golden
retriever, male, with shining fur. One may only get a pet if they perform
outstanding work in their occupation. It accompanied me each day, providing
presence and performing simple tasks. I did not think of it as a pet in the old
human sense; it was more like a living tool and a quiet partner. I knew it was
not meant to inspire strong affection, yet when this dog reached the end of its
life cycle and stopped functioning, I found myself deeply unsettled.
As its lifeless form was taken away forrecycling, I noticed an uncomfortable pressure in my chest, and my breathing
became a little erratic. The same feeling happened to me again and again. To my
surprise, I felt my eyes becoming wet. One drop of fluid was falling down my
face. Is this what you called tears? I believed I was crying. In all my years,
I have never cried before. We new humans are taught that crying only as a
biological curiosity of the past, something old humans did when overwhelmed by
sorrow or pain. I never expected it to happen to me, yet it did.
[OY1]What if thesudden pain I felt later was also caused by the death of my dog? Is this feeling what you called grief? When you lost someone aroundyou, did this happen to you as well? Did tears come to your eyes, even if you
tried to stop them? I have read about the concept of mourning, but experiencing
it firsthand has been completely different.
I wonder about the strange attachment Iseem to have formed. I did not program myself to have feelings for that dog, in
fact, I didn't even realize I cared about it beyond its utility. But what I
felt when it died, could that have been a small amount of what you called love?
Old humans, you used that word so often. You loved your children, your
partners, your pets, your hobbies, and so many things.
Did the happiness of having someone orsomething in your life truly outweigh the pain of losing them? You must have
thought so, because you continued to love despite the losses. How did you find
the courage to do that?
My rational training tells me that thesereactions of tasting a bitter pill and weeping for a lost companion are simply
remnants of biology, minor glitches in our evolutionary efficiency. Perhaps my
nutrient pill was formulated poorly, allowing the bitterness to be felt[OY2] .Perhaps the protocols to suppress intense grief just didn't activate quickly
enough in the moment I lost my dog. But another part of me, a part I barely
recognize, wonders if these experiences mean something more. Have I discovered
a piece of humanity that my kind tried to leave behind? And if so, what do I do
with it?
Old humans, since the Great Revolution,we have lived thinking we had moved beyond your way of life. We minimized pain
and maximized function. We thought ourselves better off not craving food or
needing sleep, not being driven by emotions that could cloud our judgment. Our
world is orderly, safe, and quiet. And yet, here I am, unsettled by a mere
taste and a surge of sorrow. It makes me question whether eliminating all those
"inefficient" parts of life has also taken away something fundamental.
I write this letter to you, because Ifeel that only you might understand what I'm experiencing. Your era was filled
with stories of people feeling joy and sorrow, of finding meaning in shared
meals and in companionship, of crying together and laughing together. In my
era, such things are so rare that I have no one here who could truly explain
them to me. Perhaps you still exist somewhere, unchanged?
What did it feel like to be you? What wasit like to wake up each day needing food and rest, surrounded by smells and
tastes, by music that stirred emotions, by the company of others with whom you
felt deep bonds? Did those sensory and emotional experiences make life richer,
even as they made it more complicated?
These small experiences of taste andtears have shown me that perhaps across that distance lies something essential.
I feel as though I am standing at a threshold, peering across a chasm at the
world you left behind, wondering what it was really like over there.
I don’t have a grand conclusion orsolution to share at the end of this letter. I am still unresolved, full of
questions and uncertainties. Maybe I am malfunctioning, or maybe I am evolving.
For now, I simply want to understand these new, or old, feelings. I hope that
by reaching out to you in writing, I can bridge a little bit of the space
between us, the new and the old.
Sincerely,
Williams #7KM056G