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They're Made Out of Meat

133 statements
25 feature instances
8 referencing feature instances

They're Made Out of Meat	type	TVTItem
They're Made Out of Meat	label	They're Made Out of Meat
They're Made Out of Meat	page	TheyreMadeOutOfMeat
They're Made Out of Meat	comment	A short story about two space explorers happening upon a new alien species. However, much to their disgust, they find that they're... meaty.You might have an idea what species they're talking about.Written by Terry Bisson, it was originally published in Omni magazine in April 1991 and nominated for a Nebula Award. Can be read here.Fans have produced short film and radio play adaptations.
They're Made Out of Meat	fetched	2024-04-03T11:03:17Z
They're Made Out of Meat	parsed	2024-04-03T11:03:17Z
They're Made Out of Meat	isPartOf	DBTropes
They're Made Out of Meat / int_1161fb48	type	Bizarre Alien Biology
They're Made Out of Meat / int_1161fb48	comment	Bizarre Alien Biology: The explorers are in utter shock and horror that humans are composed entirely of meat. Humans even communicate and sing by squirting air through their meat and flapping their meat at each other, which meat shouldn't be doing because it's meat.
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They're Made Out of Meat	hasFeature	They're Made Out of Meat / int_1161fb48
They're Made Out of Meat / int_1f6983f7	type	Ambiguous Situation
They're Made Out of Meat / int_1f6983f7	comment	Ambiguous Situation: The explorers go on and on about how bizarre it is that humans are made of meat, but what exactly they are is left deliberately unclear to the reader. All we know is that they live significantly longer than humans and for presumably hundreds upon millions of years at leastnote They refer to "two galactic rotations" in common passing. Two galactic rotations are approximately 400 million years., they're in contact with several other lifeforms and have documented numerous species, and exist in some sort of society that legally requires them to document all sapient life. But most of this is ultimately just implied. The only thing we know about them for sure is that they certainly aren't made out of meat.
They're Made Out of Meat / int_1f6983f7	featureApplicability	1.0
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They're Made Out of Meat	hasFeature	They're Made Out of Meat / int_1f6983f7
They're Made Out of Meat / int_2164d2a1	type	Energy Beings
They're Made Out of Meat / int_2164d2a1	comment	Energy Beings: The "meaties" are literally the only race that die as meat. One race starts as meat, but eventually "ascend".
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They're Made Out of Meat	hasFeature	They're Made Out of Meat / int_2164d2a1
They're Made Out of Meat / int_26d18908	type	Puny Earthlings
They're Made Out of Meat / int_26d18908	comment	Puny Earthlings: The explorers note that humans live for a very short amount of time, and (unlike them) are limited to the speed of light.
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They're Made Out of Meat	hasFeature	They're Made Out of Meat / int_26d18908
They're Made Out of Meat / int_2754014	type	Invisible Aliens
They're Made Out of Meat / int_2754014	comment	Invisible Aliens: They've done some abductions, but wiped the abductees' memory.
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They're Made Out of Meat / int_2754014	featureConfidence	1.0
They're Made Out of Meat	hasFeature	They're Made Out of Meat / int_2754014
They're Made Out of Meat / int_2af7961	type	Faster-Than-Light Travel
They're Made Out of Meat / int_2af7961	comment	Faster-Than-Light Travel: Meat cannot do that, because it's confined to C - space and therefore limited by the speed of light.
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They're Made Out of Meat / int_2af7961	featureConfidence	1.0
They're Made Out of Meat	hasFeature	They're Made Out of Meat / int_2af7961
They're Made Out of Meat / int_31c5e7fb	type	Starfish Aliens
They're Made Out of Meat / int_31c5e7fb	comment	Starfish Aliens: Apparently, all known aliens are Energy Beings: there is one race that undergoes a "meat" stage, but ascends late in life, and another that is partially meat with a plasma-based brain.
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They're Made Out of Meat	hasFeature	They're Made Out of Meat / int_31c5e7fb
They're Made Out of Meat / int_44a893af	type	Humans Through Alien Eyes
They're Made Out of Meat / int_44a893af	comment	Humans Through Alien Eyes: Despite their numerous encounters with other species, the explorers have never encountered a species that is made entirely out of meat for its entire lifetime. It's beyond their understanding.
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They're Made Out of Meat	hasFeature	They're Made Out of Meat / int_44a893af
They're Made Out of Meat / int_4e3d253b	type	Downer Ending
They're Made Out of Meat / int_4e3d253b	comment	Downer Ending: The aliens could (and are supposed to) contact humanity, but they decide not to because they think it'd be weird to interact with meat. It's also made it clear that humans contacting another life form by themselves is impossible, so they've essentially doomed humanity to eternal cosmic isolation. The closing line even highlights just how cruel it is to do that.
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They're Made Out of Meat / int_54243cf7	type	Parrot Exposition
They're Made Out of Meat / int_54243cf7	comment	Parrot Exposition: The story begins this way, as shown in the page quote. The second speaker is just that baffled over this species being made out of meat.
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They're Made Out of Meat	hasFeature	They're Made Out of Meat / int_54243cf7
They're Made Out of Meat / int_57b80b45	type	Fantastic Racism
They're Made Out of Meat / int_57b80b45	comment	Fantastic Racism: In the end, the explorers decide to strike the record of encountering the meaties and declare this sector empty, believing that first contact would be extremely awkward and of little worth. As one of them puts it, "What are we going to say to them? 'Hey, meat, how's it going?'?"
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They're Made Out of Meat / int_5fb6411f	type	We Are as Mayflies
They're Made Out of Meat / int_5fb6411f	comment	We Are as Mayflies: The Fantastic Anthropologist alien notes that they have observed humans for several of our life cycles, which aren't long given that we are meat.
They're Made Out of Meat / int_5fb6411f	featureApplicability	1.0
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They're Made Out of Meat	hasFeature	They're Made Out of Meat / int_5fb6411f
They're Made Out of Meat / int_66f1ee39	type	Fantastic Anthropologist
They're Made Out of Meat / int_66f1ee39	comment	Fantastic Anthropologist: One of the explorers is this, trying to explain to his colleague that humans are meat all the way down.
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They're Made Out of Meat / int_8370585d	type	No Intelligent Life Here
They're Made Out of Meat / int_8370585d	comment	No Intelligent Life Here: The explorers ultimately decide to just write-off this sector of space as "uninhabited" and move on.
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They're Made Out of Meat	hasFeature	They're Made Out of Meat / int_8370585d
They're Made Out of Meat / int_9e9203e1	type	Dramatically Missing the Point
They're Made Out of Meat / int_9e9203e1	comment	Dramatically Missing the Point: The second speaker just cannot wrap their head around the fact that this species is really, truly made of meat. They insist there must at least be a brain made out of plasma or something. When they learn that humans are truly made out of meat, to the point where their brain is also made out of meat, they still don't get it and are confused as to what does the thinking.
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They're Made Out of Meat	hasFeature	They're Made Out of Meat / int_9e9203e1
They're Made Out of Meat / int_a05522e3	type	Alien Abduction
They're Made Out of Meat / int_a05522e3	comment	Alien Abduction: The aliens have captured humans from all over the world for study and are shocked to find that humans are composed entirely of meat.
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They're Made Out of Meat	hasFeature	They're Made Out of Meat / int_a05522e3
They're Made Out of Meat / int_a7caa5b5	type	First Contact
They're Made Out of Meat / int_a7caa5b5	comment	First Contact: Subverted. The aliens refuse to respond to the humansâ€™ radio signals, lest they have to interact with creatures made of meat.
They're Made Out of Meat / int_a7caa5b5	featureApplicability	-0.3
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They're Made Out of Meat	hasFeature	They're Made Out of Meat / int_a7caa5b5
They're Made Out of Meat / int_b486877f	type	Squick
They're Made Out of Meat / int_b486877f	comment	Squick: In-universe: the explorers are completely weirded out and more than a little disgusted at the fact there is sentient, living meat doing stuff.
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They're Made Out of Meat	hasFeature	They're Made Out of Meat / int_b486877f
They're Made Out of Meat / int_c335b9ec	type	Irony
They're Made Out of Meat / int_c335b9ec	comment	Irony: The viewpoint characters discuss what they should do about a planet of meat-based intelligences (humans). They decide to ignore the "meat", and then talk about how lonely the universe would be if you couldnâ€™t find alien life.
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They're Made Out of Meat / int_cf92fea8	type	Cassandra Truth
They're Made Out of Meat / int_cf92fea8	comment	Cassandra Truth: Invoked by the aliens, who make it so that any humans who remember being probed would be considered crazy.
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They're Made Out of Meat	hasFeature	They're Made Out of Meat / int_cf92fea8
They're Made Out of Meat / int_d52d28b6	type	Hypocrite
They're Made Out of Meat / int_d52d28b6	comment	Hypocrite: The two explorers talk about how a "rather shy but sweet hydrogen core cluster intelligence" wants to get back in contact with them, because "Imagine how unbearably, how unutterably cold the universe would be if one were all alone." This little exchange happens just a few sentences after their decision to deliberately deny contact with humanity because they think our meat forms are gross.
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They're Made Out of Meat / int_dd8deee1	type	Xenofiction
They're Made Out of Meat / int_dd8deee1	comment	Xenofiction: The story is written from the perspective of alien beings... beings so alien they aren't even "alive" as we understand them, and focuses on how weird and disgusting humans are from their perspective.
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They're Made Out of Meat	hasFeature	They're Made Out of Meat / int_dd8deee1
They're Made Out of Meat / int_e0207930	type	Humans Are Special
They're Made Out of Meat / int_e0207930	comment	Humans Are Special: Humanity is apparently the only sentient race known that is entirely corporeal for their entire existence.
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They're Made Out of Meat / int_f01a1b71	type	Insignificant Little Blue Planet
They're Made Out of Meat / int_f01a1b71	comment	Insignificant Little Blue Planet: Earth exists in an otherwise empty quadrant of space that other alien life decide to ignore.
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They're Made Out of Meat / int_name	type	ItemName
They're Made Out of Meat / int_name	comment
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The following is a list of statements referring to the current page from other pages.

They're Made Out of Meat	hasFeature	Alien Works / int_f0d033d3
They're Made Out of Meat	hasFeature	Audio Adaptation / int_f0d033d3
They're Made Out of Meat	hasFeature	Humans Are Morons / int_f0d033d3
They're Made Out of Meat	hasFeature	Humans Are Ugly / int_f0d033d3
They're Made Out of Meat	hasFeature	Humans Through Alien Eyes / int_f0d033d3
They're Made Out of Meat	hasFeature	Insignificant Little Blue Planet / int_f0d033d3
They're Made Out of Meat	hasFeature	Invisible Aliens / int_f0d033d3
They're Made Out of Meat	hasFeature	Mechanical Lifeforms / int_f0d033d3

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