I feel like this is because we fundimentally are. The seeing faces and the pets less so, bc those have valid, accepted reasons for it. The faces is bc our brains basically work on pattern recognition, and thus is always trying to see patterns and connections – even when none exist. The pets are bc humans are hyper social not just to our own but others.
But our seemingly deep desire for a close humanlike entity beyond ourselves is something else. I think it’s really telling that throughout our history, we’re constantly making stories of humans but Not Really. We try to explain why they’re still here but Not – it’s just another parellel space, just further into the deep woods, just under the ocean, just too far into the sky, just in the future by our own creation…and we get there and search for them there and can’t find them, and thus push these hypothetical people in a different place we haven’t been before, where there’s still a chance. Please, please be out there, we seem to ask, please dont leave us all alone; and the stubbornness of this species won’t let us accept the fact that, despite being one of the many many species/subspecies of humans, we’re the only ones left.
I do believe it can be explained by the strange nature of the human species. There were so many varieties out there, so many types of humans. Not the shallow, surface level thats human diversity now, where pretty much we divide ourselves into ‘races’ that boil down to cosmetic and cultural differences. But truly different types of humans. We know early homo sapians came into contact with several, we know we were close to a few.
The Neanderthals, our closest partner, in where pretty much anyone who left Africa has a bit of their ghost echoing in our bones, to the point 20% of the full Neanderthal DNA made it to the modern day, in different ways and in different people. We were close to them, they were parts of the same groups, they were friends, they were family. And now they’re gone. And all the others are gone too.
We try to explain it, try to reach back over this veil of times long gone, and understand all of them, understand why we’re so alone. Was it us? We ask. This has to be our fault. This strange feeling of loss and loneliness must be a punishment for something, we think, like a child who found themselves all alone and can only wail why, coming to self blame. The fae is gone bc we destroyed their lands, the old gods are gone bc of us, we destroyed magic, ai is going to inharently bc cruel since humans are cruel, aliens would never visit us – look at us! We’re destined to destroy ourselves you know. We’re the ones who managed to kill every other group. We had to of. Bc what’s the alternative? This is just a cruel twist of fate? That our loneliness is meaningless?
We have ghosts in our bones and in our hearts. Throughout history it’s been a dance between the desire for a unique connection we lost a long time ago between family members long gone, and this strange survivers guilt pulling us back away again. We mourn our uniqueness, as we know it wasn’t supposed to be like this.
titsay
tangentwithtanner
snowghoul
2087
jacobvanloon
kianamaiart
ellievsbear
