Episode 5 - They’re Made Out of Meat & To Serve Man

TBD - To Be Determined

Theme: Who wants to meet meat?
Time: 35:17

Episode Connections
Authors, stories. Arther C. Clarke, “The Sentinel.” Damon Knight, “Time Enough.” Douglas Adams, Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy. Harlan Ellison, “I Have No Mouth, And I Must Scream.” Terry Pratchett. Arthur C. Clarke, Ender’s Game.
Films. Spaceballs. Galaxy Quest. Independence Day.
TV episodes, series. The Twilight Zone. Mork and Mindy. Quark. Star Trek.
Ideas. Humor in science fiction. Aliens among us. The search for intelligent life. How can they be made out of meat? Carbon chauvinism. Alien probes. There is nothing of interest on the Earth. Travel by special meat containers. Imagine how cold the universe would be if we were all alone. Segue to second feature. Alien emissaries at the UN. Beware of aliens bearing gifts. To Serve Man … its a cookbook! Welcome to the farm. Free-range humans. Why is there so little humor in sci fi literature? Maybe science isn’t funny. If two chemists share a joke, will anyone else think it is funny? Humor is harder than it might seem. We are good for nothing or we are good for food. Human purpose here has little to do with our sentience. We usually prove ourselves through war. Why do the aliens want us to be happy? We LOVE free stuff!

Previous episode: Harlan Ellison, “I Have No Mouth, And I Must Scream”
Next episode: Clifford D. Simak, “Desertion”

Music Credit: "Ouroboros" Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com). Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0 License
Link: Creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/