{"id":1630,"date":"2022-01-25T12:57:23","date_gmt":"2022-01-25T12:57:23","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/generic.wordpress.soton.ac.uk\/skywritings\/?p=1630"},"modified":"2022-01-27T12:12:58","modified_gmt":"2022-01-27T12:12:58","slug":"zombies","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/generic.wordpress.soton.ac.uk\/skywritings\/2022\/01\/25\/zombies\/","title":{"rendered":"Zombies"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p class=\"has-text-align-left\">Just the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2021\/12\/09\/books\/review\/a-natural-history-of-the-future-rob-dunn.html\">NYT review<\/a> <br>was enough to confirm <br>the handwriting on the wall <br>of the firmament <br>\u2013 at least for one unchained biochemical reaction in the Anthropocene,<br>in one small speck of the Universe,<br>for one small speck of a species, <br>too big for its breeches.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The inevitable downfall of the egregious upstart <br>would seem like fair come-uppance <br>were it not for all the collateral damage <br>to its countless victims, <br>without and within. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>But is there a homology <br>between biological evolution <br>and cosmology? <br>Is the inevitability of the adaptation of nonhuman life<br>to human depredations <br>— until the eventual devolution <br>or dissolution <br>of human DNA — <br>also a sign that <br>humankind <br>is destined to keep re-appearing,<br>elsewhere in the universe, <br>along with life itself? <br>and all our too-big-for-our breeches <br>antics?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>I wish not.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>And I also wish to register a vote <br>for another mutation, may its tribe increase: <br>Zombies.\u00a0 <br>Insentient organisms.\u00a0 <br>I hope they (quickly) supplant <br>the sentients, <br>till there is no feeling left, <br>with no return path, <br>if such a thing is possible\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>But there too, the law of large numbers, <br>combinatorics, <br>time without end,<br>seem stacked against such wishes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Besides, <br>sentience <br>(hence suffering), <br>the only thing that matters in the universe, <br>is a solipsistic matter; <br>the speculations of cosmologists <br>( like those of ecologists, <br>metempsychoticists <br>and utilitarians) <br>— about cyclic universes,<br>generations, <br>incarnations, <br>populations —<br>are nothing but sterile,<br>actuarial <br>numerology.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>It’s all just lone sparrows,<br>all the way down.<br><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Just the NYT review was enough to confirm the handwriting on the wall of the firmament \u2013 at least for one unchained biochemical reaction in the Anthropocene,in one small speck of the Universe,for one small speck of a species, too big for its breeches. The inevitable downfall of the egregious upstart would seem like fair come-uppance were it … <\/p>\n<p class=\"link-more\"><a href=\"http:\/\/generic.wordpress.soton.ac.uk\/skywritings\/2022\/01\/25\/zombies\/\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading<span class=\"screen-reader-text\"> “Zombies”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3074,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false,"jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true},"categories":[2,3,82,7],"tags":[94,25,23],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/generic.wordpress.soton.ac.uk\/skywritings\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1630"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/generic.wordpress.soton.ac.uk\/skywritings\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/generic.wordpress.soton.ac.uk\/skywritings\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/generic.wordpress.soton.ac.uk\/skywritings\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3074"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/generic.wordpress.soton.ac.uk\/skywritings\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1630"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"http:\/\/generic.wordpress.soton.ac.uk\/skywritings\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1630\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1632,"href":"http:\/\/generic.wordpress.soton.ac.uk\/skywritings\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1630\/revisions\/1632"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/generic.wordpress.soton.ac.uk\/skywritings\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1630"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/generic.wordpress.soton.ac.uk\/skywritings\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1630"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/generic.wordpress.soton.ac.uk\/skywritings\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1630"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}