MONDAY, MAR 22, 2021: NOTE TO FILE
True Stories
Told by true believers
Eric Lee, A-SOCIATED PRESS
TOPICS: MODERN TECHNO-INDUSTRIAL CULTURE, FROM THE WIRES, WE HAVE MET THE ENEMY HE TELL A DIFFERENT STORY
Abstract: A lost missive.
COOS BAY (A-P) — I accidently deleated this one. Note subtitle and date, and that I used this image.
But to tell a true story, assume a virus speads that has no symptoms. It is more virulent than the Delta varient of COVID 19. Within a month, almost all humans have had it. No scientists have detected it. Women who do not become pregnant (test positive) think nothing of it. Within two months some doctors, who specialize in reproductive care, notice they have no new clients. They suspect some random chance thing is involved that affects only their practice. But some start comparing notes with colleagues and they have no new clients either. The 'how come' question spreads within the well informed community because, indeed, there are no know pregnant women in the world. Babies are still being born and the claim there will someday be no babies is viewed by about half of humans are another claim by the far-right (and left) to monger fear and sieze power.
A day soon comes when there are no births. The last known women to give birth lives in Papua New Guinea with the last child on Earth. Given that the last child was born in 2024 and the maximum verified lifespan of a human is 122 years, in 2146 there are no humans on the planet. Of course, if no child born in 2024 could both live to 122 and provide self-care, then the last human would have died before 2146. How much sooner? I can't tell that story.
Google 'probablility of living to 100' and note the many, actually unanomous, probability calculators that show a child born today has at least a 1:10 chance of living to be over 100. Some assert a 1:3 chance of living over 100. All tell a story of ever increasing life expectancy. The future will be like the past (how could it not be?) and progress means, by diffenition, that everyone will be living longer and better lives. That humans are storytelling animals and that there are no true stories may be more obvious in a 100 years. But that's another story, and there are no true stories.
But some stories are better than others. Those who tell them may persist longer. The tellers of not so good stories will not, and their stories will pass away with them. There is, for example, the ever popular Lord Man story. Some tell of a day with only ruins tells the story of Lord Man, provided some passing exo-biologist/archeologist passes by and notices the ruins and bothers to study them. But humans don't like this story, don't write a novel based on it and expect a Hugo.
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