The Machine - True Story?
I suddenly remembered one of my favourite stories when I was studying literature in secondary school. The story was called 'The Machine'. It is a sci-fi story that mentions about a imaginary world that is much ahead of our time. Everyone in that world just simply sit, sleep and watch TV. The way that they communicate with the outside world is through a chatroom (take note that this was a story written in 1960s to 1970s) and personal messages. The people in this room cannot breath outside of their own cubicle. They rely on 'The Machine' to keep them alive. They worship 'The Machine' like a god.
Whenever these people wish to go out of their 'cubicle', they have to be transported using a 'wheelchair lookalike car'. Since these people stay in their rooms the whole day, they do not exercise, they cannot walk. They do their work infront of a box and their work is mostly literal in nature, translators, writers, research writers, designers...work that do not require much strength. Manufacturing of physical products have already been taken over by 'The Machine'. So the story was this lady had a very adventurous child that wish to climb out of 'The Machine'. The author illustrated 'The Machine' as a honey-comb like structure with cubicles laying side by side. There is no such thing as sex in 'The Machine'. People conceive through donating sperms, the women took the sperms from the sperm bank and had to conceive on a compulsory basis to keep the human race alive.
So back to the son that wanted to climb out of 'The Machine'. It is believed that no one could do so because outside of 'The Machine' air was stale and unhealthy - close to toxic. Thus, it was physically impossible to get out there. The son, however, was very curious. He is an adult of about 25 - 30 years of age and he hates 'The Machine', he hates the chanting of the prayers to this imaginary god-like creature. So he went around, cubicle by cubicle to look for a hole - a tiny hole that showed a streak of light. Finally, he found that hole and took a hammer to hit that hole. He hit and hit and hit. He heard the wind, he saw more rays of the sun. He finally hit till there was an opening just enough for his then frail body to climb through. Then, he felt difficulty in breathing, his lungs were shrieking and calling out for him to go back to the arms of 'The Machine'. He felt tempted to climb back but then, he thought to himself. 'Even if I die, I would not want to die in the arms of the monster'. In the end, he climbed out, he saw the sun. His lungs were suffering. He saw some weeds and wild flowers. He shed a tear and fell asleep. But, he was smiling, he had finally found the light at the end of the tunnel. He was no longer bounded by 'The Machine', he was free. There and then, he slept quietly and naturally.
His mom, looked from afar when he was hitting the hole with the hammer. Without much feelings and much disagreement. She cursed and sweared. She did not curse the machine, she cursed the ignorance of her child. She blamed herself for giving birth to a useless child. She went back to the cubicle she stayed in. When she was in the cubicle, she heard strange sounds. After five minutes, no ten minutes she heard sirens. What happened was, the hole that her son made caused a sanction that pulled the 'pure air' out from the machine. Soon after, she had difficulty breathing, she could not breath properly, she gasped and tried to walk. Her legs failed her, she cannot stand because she is too used to sitting infront of the box. She gasped and thought: 'Where is my son, if I knew I am dying I would wish to die with him'. With that she breathed her last breath and fell to the ground. There was silence now, 'The Machine' was dead. No human was alive. Silence filled earth.
Wow...that is a long story...and I only summarised it. I just suddenly remembered that a lot of things written by people in the past seem to come true. For example, my friend was mentioning that 20,000 Leagues Underwater...depicted a large machine that is actually the modern age submarine. If this story is going to come true in the future. I think humans should really think twice before sticking their butt on their chairs everyday forgetting about exercising, meeting people and the face to face communication. Eventually, instant messaging would be an inaugural part of our lifestyle but I think the personal touch is still important. We wouldnt want machines to control us instead of us controlling the machines. Just recall the time when the internet was down and you yelled 'Shit, I hate computers!'. Beware....
Whenever these people wish to go out of their 'cubicle', they have to be transported using a 'wheelchair lookalike car'. Since these people stay in their rooms the whole day, they do not exercise, they cannot walk. They do their work infront of a box and their work is mostly literal in nature, translators, writers, research writers, designers...work that do not require much strength. Manufacturing of physical products have already been taken over by 'The Machine'. So the story was this lady had a very adventurous child that wish to climb out of 'The Machine'. The author illustrated 'The Machine' as a honey-comb like structure with cubicles laying side by side. There is no such thing as sex in 'The Machine'. People conceive through donating sperms, the women took the sperms from the sperm bank and had to conceive on a compulsory basis to keep the human race alive.
So back to the son that wanted to climb out of 'The Machine'. It is believed that no one could do so because outside of 'The Machine' air was stale and unhealthy - close to toxic. Thus, it was physically impossible to get out there. The son, however, was very curious. He is an adult of about 25 - 30 years of age and he hates 'The Machine', he hates the chanting of the prayers to this imaginary god-like creature. So he went around, cubicle by cubicle to look for a hole - a tiny hole that showed a streak of light. Finally, he found that hole and took a hammer to hit that hole. He hit and hit and hit. He heard the wind, he saw more rays of the sun. He finally hit till there was an opening just enough for his then frail body to climb through. Then, he felt difficulty in breathing, his lungs were shrieking and calling out for him to go back to the arms of 'The Machine'. He felt tempted to climb back but then, he thought to himself. 'Even if I die, I would not want to die in the arms of the monster'. In the end, he climbed out, he saw the sun. His lungs were suffering. He saw some weeds and wild flowers. He shed a tear and fell asleep. But, he was smiling, he had finally found the light at the end of the tunnel. He was no longer bounded by 'The Machine', he was free. There and then, he slept quietly and naturally.
His mom, looked from afar when he was hitting the hole with the hammer. Without much feelings and much disagreement. She cursed and sweared. She did not curse the machine, she cursed the ignorance of her child. She blamed herself for giving birth to a useless child. She went back to the cubicle she stayed in. When she was in the cubicle, she heard strange sounds. After five minutes, no ten minutes she heard sirens. What happened was, the hole that her son made caused a sanction that pulled the 'pure air' out from the machine. Soon after, she had difficulty breathing, she could not breath properly, she gasped and tried to walk. Her legs failed her, she cannot stand because she is too used to sitting infront of the box. She gasped and thought: 'Where is my son, if I knew I am dying I would wish to die with him'. With that she breathed her last breath and fell to the ground. There was silence now, 'The Machine' was dead. No human was alive. Silence filled earth.
Wow...that is a long story...and I only summarised it. I just suddenly remembered that a lot of things written by people in the past seem to come true. For example, my friend was mentioning that 20,000 Leagues Underwater...depicted a large machine that is actually the modern age submarine. If this story is going to come true in the future. I think humans should really think twice before sticking their butt on their chairs everyday forgetting about exercising, meeting people and the face to face communication. Eventually, instant messaging would be an inaugural part of our lifestyle but I think the personal touch is still important. We wouldnt want machines to control us instead of us controlling the machines. Just recall the time when the internet was down and you yelled 'Shit, I hate computers!'. Beware....
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