"Meat?"
"Meat. They're made out of meat."
"Meat?"
"There's no doubt about it. We picked several from different parts ofthe planet, took them aboard our recon vessels, probed them all the waythrough. They're completely meat."
"That's impossible. What about the radio signals? The messages tothestars."
"They use the radio waves to talk, but the signals don't come from them.The signals come from machines."
"So who made the machines? That's who we want to contact."
"They made the machines. That's what I'm trying to tell you. Meat madethe machines."
"That's ridiculous. How can meat make a machine? You're asking metobelieve in sentient meat."
"I'm not asking you, I'm telling you. These creatures are the onlysentient race in the sector and they're made out of meat."
"Maybe they're like the Orfolei. You know, a carbon-basedintelligencethat goes through a meat stage."
"Nope. They're born meat and they die meat. We studied them forseveralof their life spans, which didn't take too long. Do you have any ideathelife span of meat?"
"Spare me. Okay, maybe they're only part meat. You know, like theWeddilei.A meat head with an electron plasma brain inside."
"Nope. We thought of that, since they do have meat heads like theWeddilei.But I told you, we probed them. They're meat all the way through."
"No brain?"
"Oh, there is a brain all right. It's just that the brain is made outofmeat!"
"So... what does the thinking?"
"You're not understanding, are you? The brain does the thinking. Themeat."
"Thinking meat! You're asking me to believe in thinking meat!"
"Yes, thinking meat! Conscious meat! Loving meat. Dreaming meat. Themeat is the whole deal! Are you getting the picture?"
"Omigod. You're serious then. They're made out of meat."
"Finally, Yes. They are indeed made out meat. And they've been tryingtoget in touch with us for almost a hundred of their years."
"So what does the meat have in mind?"
"First it wants to talk to us. Then I imagine it wants to explore theuniverse, contact other sentients, swap ideas and information. Theusual."
"We're supposed to talk to meat?"
"That's the idea. That's the message they're sending out by radio.'Hello.Anyone out there? Anyone home?' That sort of thing."
"They actually do talk, then. They use words, ideas, concepts?"
"Oh, yes. Except they do it with meat."
"I thought you just told me they used radio."
"They do, but what do you think is on the radio? Meat sounds. You knowhow when you slap or flap meat it makes a noise? They talk by flappingtheirmeat at each other. They can even sing by squirting air through theirmeat."
"Omigod. Singing meat. This is altogether too much. So what do youadvise?"
"Officially or unofficially?"
"Both."
"Officially, we are required to contact, welcome, and log in any and allsentient races or multi-beings in the quadrant, without prejudice, fear,orfavor. Unofficially, I advise that we erase the records and forget thewhole thing."
"I was hoping you would say that."
"It seems harsh, but there is a limit. Do we really want to makecontactwith meat?"
"I agree one hundred percent. What's there to say?" `Hello, meat.How'sit going?' But will this work? How many planets are we dealing withhere?"
"Just one. They can travel to other planets in special meat containers,but they can't live on them. And being meat, they only travel through Cspace. Which limits them to the speed of light and makes thepossibilityof their ever making contact pretty slim. Infinitesimal, in fact."
"So we just pretend there's no one home in the universe."
"That's it."
"Cruel. But you said it yourself, who wants to meet meat? And theoneswho have been aboard our vessels, the ones you have probed? You're surethey won't remember?"
"They'll be considered crackpots if they do. We went into their headsandsmoothed out their meat so that we're just a dream to them."
"A dream to meat! How strangely appropriate, that we should bemeat'sdream."
"And we can mark this sector unoccupied."
"Good. Agreed, officially and unofficially. Case closed. Anyothers?Anyone interesting on that side of the galaxy?"
"Yes, a rather shy but sweet hydrogen core cluster intelligence in aclassnine star in G445 zone. Was in contact two galactic rotations ago,wantsto be friendly again."
"They always come around."
"And why not? Imagine how unbearably, how unutterably cold the universewould be if one were all alone."
by Terry Bisson
From "Bears Discover Fire and Other Stories," Copyright © 1994, TorBooks
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So glad you Ruben for posting this..will be sharing all over the place.