Philosophical Story Reaction Paper 1
ONE-SENSED HOMOS
by Rosana Vazquez for Intfilo
Philosophical Story Reaction Paper 1
Five hundred days ago in a universe far, far away, although quite similar to ours, some random guy named Oscar decided to create a world. The world he created is a lot like ours during the dawn of time - it has plants, plant-life, oceans, seas, mountains and whatnot, plains and islands and whatnot, and animals. The world he created was mainly for his amusement - and he wanted to fill this planet up with human-like creatures we shall call homos (short-cut for homo sapiens, though not quite homo sapiens because they aren’t humans). And given that he had encounters with human creatures, he decided that the homos who would be inhabiting his planet would be different.
His homos, instead of having all of the four senses (sight, touch, hearing, smell and taste) could only have one. And so, he created Sighted, Touched, Hearded, and Smelly Taste Buds as his homos inhabitants: where Sighted could only see, but not touch, hear, smell nor taste; Touched could only feel or touch, but not see, hear, smell nor taste; Hearded could only hear, but not see, touch, smell nor taste; and Smelly Taste Buds could only smell and taste, but not hear, touch, or see.
In order to figure out which of the homos he liked best - Oscar gave each and everyone of them a smango (which is short for Super Mango, which is a lot like our human mango except it’s super), and each one of them had to describe it to him.
Sighted was first.
“It’s yellow, and it’s big!” He said.
Oscar, the random guy who decided to create a world, waited for a moment. “And?”
“It’s yellow, and it’s big. And it has some spots.”
“What about the way it tastes? The way it feels, the way it smells? That smango is better than any mango one would find on some random planet called earth!” Oscar retorted, feeling somewhat insulted that Sighted thought so little of his smango.
Sighted replied “Then it tastes big, and it feels yellow!”
Oscar sighed. He remembered that Sighted could only see, and sight wouldn’t allow one to touch, feel, nor taste - thus limiting his sense of reality to the yellowness and bigness and the relative spottiness of the smango.
“Maybe Touched would provide greater insight”, Oscar thought.
So Touched was called in.
“It’s smooth, and shaped like a grossly irregular tear drop” He said, when asked to describe the smango.
Again, Oscar, the random guy who decided to create a world, waited for a moment. “And?”
“That’s about it.”
Oscar rolled his eyes - remembering that the world of Touched would be limited to what he felt, and that he could not see, hear, nor taste and smelled.
Then he called in Hearded.
Hearded, when asked about the smango, he replied “What smango?”.
Apparently, there was nothing - or atleast, Hearded was experiencing nothing in terms of the smango.
Oscar raised an eyebrow at this. But then he remembered that Hearded could only hear, and you can’t exactly hear an inanimate object - so as far as his senses were concerned, the smango didn’t exist.
Finally, Smelly Taste Buds came in, hands all sticky and yellow.
“What do you think about the smango?” Oscar asked.
“It was sweet, juicy and fruity!” replied Smelly Taste Buds, licking his fingers. “And it smelled oh so good too.”
That put a smile on Oscar’s face, although he didn’t bother asking about how it looked, or how it felt - at least one of the homos was able to appreciate the wonder of the smango, though not in it’s fullest sense.
It dawned on him then. Like some major epiphany.
Oscar picked up the prettiest, yellowest, smoothest, and tastiest smango, began examining it and began to eat it. He loved its color, its texture, its smell, and its oh-so-juicy goodness. He enjoyed the smango for what it really was, or at least, for what his sense allowed him to.
He was doing things the wrong way.
Instead of creating the homos of his world to experience one and only one sense, wouldn’t they have more fun experiencing more than one sense, more than four senses, perhaps more than seven? Wouldn’t that allow his precious homos to experience more and enjoy more of the world he had created?
And as he suckled that last drop of juice out of his super smango, he snapped his fingers, opening all of his homos to all the senses possible - more than the four to five senses random human beings in some other parts of the universe could experience.
“That should make them happy”, he thought.
But to his surprise, when Oscar took a look at Sighted, Touched, Hearded, and Smelly Taste Buds - they were nothing more than corpses whose heads had exploded…
Apparently, having more senses than what they were used to, altered their view of reality to a point none of them could have ever managed, and the sheer awe of their views made their heads explode. Really.
by Rosana Vazquez for Intfilo
Philosophical Story Reaction Paper 1
Five hundred days ago in a universe far, far away, although quite similar to ours, some random guy named Oscar decided to create a world. The world he created is a lot like ours during the dawn of time - it has plants, plant-life, oceans, seas, mountains and whatnot, plains and islands and whatnot, and animals. The world he created was mainly for his amusement - and he wanted to fill this planet up with human-like creatures we shall call homos (short-cut for homo sapiens, though not quite homo sapiens because they aren’t humans). And given that he had encounters with human creatures, he decided that the homos who would be inhabiting his planet would be different.
His homos, instead of having all of the four senses (sight, touch, hearing, smell and taste) could only have one. And so, he created Sighted, Touched, Hearded, and Smelly Taste Buds as his homos inhabitants: where Sighted could only see, but not touch, hear, smell nor taste; Touched could only feel or touch, but not see, hear, smell nor taste; Hearded could only hear, but not see, touch, smell nor taste; and Smelly Taste Buds could only smell and taste, but not hear, touch, or see.
In order to figure out which of the homos he liked best - Oscar gave each and everyone of them a smango (which is short for Super Mango, which is a lot like our human mango except it’s super), and each one of them had to describe it to him.
Sighted was first.
“It’s yellow, and it’s big!” He said.
Oscar, the random guy who decided to create a world, waited for a moment. “And?”
“It’s yellow, and it’s big. And it has some spots.”
“What about the way it tastes? The way it feels, the way it smells? That smango is better than any mango one would find on some random planet called earth!” Oscar retorted, feeling somewhat insulted that Sighted thought so little of his smango.
Sighted replied “Then it tastes big, and it feels yellow!”
Oscar sighed. He remembered that Sighted could only see, and sight wouldn’t allow one to touch, feel, nor taste - thus limiting his sense of reality to the yellowness and bigness and the relative spottiness of the smango.
“Maybe Touched would provide greater insight”, Oscar thought.
So Touched was called in.
“It’s smooth, and shaped like a grossly irregular tear drop” He said, when asked to describe the smango.
Again, Oscar, the random guy who decided to create a world, waited for a moment. “And?”
“That’s about it.”
Oscar rolled his eyes - remembering that the world of Touched would be limited to what he felt, and that he could not see, hear, nor taste and smelled.
Then he called in Hearded.
Hearded, when asked about the smango, he replied “What smango?”.
Apparently, there was nothing - or atleast, Hearded was experiencing nothing in terms of the smango.
Oscar raised an eyebrow at this. But then he remembered that Hearded could only hear, and you can’t exactly hear an inanimate object - so as far as his senses were concerned, the smango didn’t exist.
Finally, Smelly Taste Buds came in, hands all sticky and yellow.
“What do you think about the smango?” Oscar asked.
“It was sweet, juicy and fruity!” replied Smelly Taste Buds, licking his fingers. “And it smelled oh so good too.”
That put a smile on Oscar’s face, although he didn’t bother asking about how it looked, or how it felt - at least one of the homos was able to appreciate the wonder of the smango, though not in it’s fullest sense.
It dawned on him then. Like some major epiphany.
Oscar picked up the prettiest, yellowest, smoothest, and tastiest smango, began examining it and began to eat it. He loved its color, its texture, its smell, and its oh-so-juicy goodness. He enjoyed the smango for what it really was, or at least, for what his sense allowed him to.
He was doing things the wrong way.
Instead of creating the homos of his world to experience one and only one sense, wouldn’t they have more fun experiencing more than one sense, more than four senses, perhaps more than seven? Wouldn’t that allow his precious homos to experience more and enjoy more of the world he had created?
And as he suckled that last drop of juice out of his super smango, he snapped his fingers, opening all of his homos to all the senses possible - more than the four to five senses random human beings in some other parts of the universe could experience.
“That should make them happy”, he thought.
But to his surprise, when Oscar took a look at Sighted, Touched, Hearded, and Smelly Taste Buds - they were nothing more than corpses whose heads had exploded…
Apparently, having more senses than what they were used to, altered their view of reality to a point none of them could have ever managed, and the sheer awe of their views made their heads explode. Really.