Chief Writer/Qian Miao
Love flows with people's hearts and can appear under any circumstances. This is the mystery of love.
When did love begin and disappear? This question may be a bit difficult for anyone to answer, even cruel. In contrast, people may remember the origin of love more easily-perhaps it begins with an casual meeting, a shy look, or a blind date arranged in Starbucks. Love flows with people's hearts and can appear under any circumstances. This is the mystery of love.
So, when did love end? Perhaps love will end in two people's over-familiarity, or it may disappear quietly in the fatigue of marriage. For those lovers who are affectionate and walk all the way to the end of their lives, the finish line of love is actually painted at the end of their lives. Everyone knows that the so-called "ghost" is just a beautiful imagination in real life. So, can future love cross the boundary between life and death? Although it is not known yet, science fiction writers have described a love beyond life and death for us.
From the harsh eyes of sci-fi fans, john scalzi's masterpiece "The War of the Old Man" may not have much luster, and the key sci-fi elements and bridges are not new. Plots such as genetically modified super soldiers and star wars are even old-fashioned to readers in the 2 1 century. On the other hand, The Old Man's War is one of the most popular science fiction works in America in the 2nd/kloc-0th century. If we want to analyze the reasons, the author's witty language and the changes in the tastes of European and American science fiction readers certainly make the story more popular, among which the love clues and storylines closely related to science fiction make readers particularly moved. In the trilogy War of the Old Man, the love between John Perry and his wife (or his deceased wife) Kathy (or Jane Sagan) can be called a "ghost" in the era of science fiction-perhaps this is what love will look like in the future.
"On my 75th birthday, I did two things: the first was to go to my wife's grave and the second was to join the army." It's hard to stop reading such an opening. At the beginning of this sci-fi story, the 75-year-old hero, John Perry, is ill and seems to be dying, and his wife Kathy has already died before him. With a disabled body, Perry still cannot forget his dead wife. He often goes to the cemetery to sweep her grave and misses the life they lived together. This touching love will come to an end, but it is actually the beginning of a wonderful science fiction story and the continuation of a relationship.
It is said that the most precious thing in the 2 1 century is talent, but in Scacci's story, the most precious thing is a person's life experience in these years, which largely depends on his age. Perry, who has reached the age of 75 and is seriously ill and joined the army, thinks that as long as he joins the human space force and enters the space base, there will be some superb medical skills to help him treat diseases. In fact, for the human space force, the most valuable and only thing worth recycling is his own consciousness. An aging skin was discarded and replaced with the body of a young super soldier.
Stills of the movie Ghost
Frankly speaking, whether it is the so-called "consciousness transfer" or the so-called genetically modified super soldier, such a bridge is really not new in science fiction works. However, in The War of the Old Man, the author Scazzi intentionally or unintentionally opened a new topic-when our bodies have changed, will the remaining old souls still love you? Who is the "you" I love?
what is love ? What does love depend on? Where is the end of love? For these seemingly metaphysical ultimate problems, this science fiction novel makes some discussions through imaginary techniques and scenes. Do you need to care about the existence of "self" in love, or how does "self" affect the state of love? John Perry, who changed from a terminally ill old man to a super soldier, told us that no matter how self changes, love will never change.
After all, a love needs two people to continue. Outside Perry, the other side of love, the situation is even more special. Although Perry changed his body, after all, he still retains the memory of his past life, but when his dead wife reappeared, he was already a super soldier without any past life memory. Perry was rescued when he was in danger on the battlefield and dying. At this moment, he happened to see the face of his dead wife. After many inquiries, I learned that his wife Kathy died of illness and could not join the space team to become a super soldier. However, the space team made a more thorough super soldier by extracting her DNA and then transforming it. Because they are all the DNA of dead people, the troops formed by these people are called "ghost brigades". These so-called ghosts are just similar to their own "past lives" in DNA, but they are completely free from the bondage of past life memories.
Perry's love for Kathy can be regarded as "everlasting, everlasting;" One day, both will end, and this endless sadness will last forever. "He extended his love for his wife to DNA. When the couple met again in their last life, it was already a human space air force base in outer space. After genetic modification, both of them changed into green skin and cat's eyes, and their brains were equipped with auxiliary computers. In this imaginary sci-fi scene, two inhuman space super soldiers sit opposite each other. Their previous lives were an old human couple who lived together for more than half a century. At this time, a reborn old soul looked at a set of familiar DNA affectionately.
Is death the ultimate obstacle to love? For thousands of years, people who really love each other have given a firm answer: absolutely not. Faced with the ultimate proposition of death, as long as there is true love as the backing, some people can firmly cross the past-for example, Dr. Faust in Dante and Goethe's Divine Comedy, above, he is looking for a green void under the guidance of true love, below, yellow spring; There are also lovers who can successfully deceive death and gain eternity, such as Du Liniang and Liu Mengmei in Peony Pavilion; Or "it is also happy to be a ghost", such as the lovers separated by yin and yang in the movie "Ghost".
If we say that in previous works of art, human beings only show the greatness of love by comparing death, then in science fiction such as War of the Old Man, the author touches on some practical problems-can the time limit of love really be set at 10,000 years? What is the basis of love, whether it can get rid of physical troubles and finally cross the grave to face God's naked soul, or a string of DNA written by biological code with double helix structure? When the old soul faces DNA, what kind of spark will it spark? If we put aside the setting of super soldiers and the fierce space war scenes in this science fiction novel, then the problems raised by the author in the story may also be realistic problems that mankind will face in the future.
A couple goodbye, still staring at the reborn DNA with the old soul of past life memory, just like a frivolous prodigal son, clumsily trying to strike up a conversation with a woman. He stared at his familiar face for a long time, which has caused the other person's discomfort. The female soldier whose new name is Jane Sagan responded: "It's impolite to stare at people." The woman said in Kathy's voice, "Don't talk, you are not my type." -the old soul has been rejected before it is recognized. The scene of "husband and wife reunion" is not embarrassing, but it is actually reasonable. However, when old Perry sent details of their past lives, including their wedding photos, he got a stormy response from the other side. The female soldier who inherited his dead wife's DNA gave her husband a good beating. "From now on, stay the fuck away from me. If I meet you again, you will regret not letting me leave you to die "-such a fierce reaction, it is hard to say that there is no love element mixed in it, and it may also turn into love.
After all, it is science fiction, and the author needs a main line that can promote the development of the plot and a warm ending. In the story, John Perry and Kathy, or Jane Sagan, finally come together again. Once again, through science fiction, with the power of love, human beings have defeated death. In the story, Perry showed Jane Sagan their wedding photos in previous lives, which actually had great power for the woman. As a super soldier who grew up from the DNA of dead human beings, Jane Sagan has a strong curiosity about the source of her DNA. Under the wheel of evolution, human DNA is constantly changing. Once you know that your DNA has had another life experience, you will naturally have a strong interest in your past life-but if you think about it from the setting of the novel, will people be responsible for their DNA? Is this premise enough to produce love?
Love is a choice, love is a fetter, and love is a bondage. No matter ancient or modern, Chinese or foreign, the most romantic imagination of human beings is to let it overcome death. However, standing at the junction of science and science fiction in the 2 1 century, in the face of everlasting love and ever-changing biological sciences, should we seriously discuss a possible ethical question: Do we really want to have three generations to make love last forever? Or simply let death be the master and give love a decent ending?
In the story of War of the Old Man, most of the plots are told by the protagonist John Perry in the first person. As soon as he recognized his dead wife, he returned to the front without hesitation. For example, when the Supreme Treasure in the movie sees Bai Jingjing, he calls him Miss, regardless of whether the other person brushes his teeth or not. Since then, the main emotional development has been as expected by readers: Jane Sagan, after seeing the wedding photos of people who had her own DNA before and meeting her husband in previous lives, went from curiosity to temptation until she fell in love with John Perry and became a couple of super soldiers. However, in Jane Sagan's mind, where did love come from, and what made John Perry become another person in her eyes?
To be sure, Jane Sagan's love is not as long as John Perry's. Her love stems from curiosity, or from Perry's conversation, rather than DNA's "fate". The so-called love, of course, comes from the intentional or unintentional search and creation of animals in courtship, but it comes from the influence of accident and surrounding environment to a greater extent, and has no direct relationship with the genetic material DNA of everyone's life. DNA may unconsciously determine a person's aesthetics, but it cannot determine why a person falls in love with a particular person, just as identical twins with identical DNA may have completely different perspectives on mate selection.
People don't doubt that love is a good thing. Love will come from all kinds of wonderful environments and happen between two people in the right place at the right time. From myth to drama to science fiction, human beings have placed all kinds of beautiful imaginations and wishes on love, hoping that love will be invincible. But maybe it's time to put a deadline on love. In the modern and foreseeable future society, the definition of "individual" may become more and more vague, so how to define and continue the responsibility and bondage brought by love?
What determines a person? The answer to this question may fundamentally determine the duration and scope of love. In principle, everyone is independent and free, but defining an independent individual is far from as simple as we think, especially in the foreseeable future society. When human gene editing and copying become the norm, human clones appear widely, when artificial intelligence that can "communicate" with human beings begins to appear and widely enters human daily life, or in the more distant future, like the scene described in War of the Old Man, human consciousness can no longer be bound by the body, but can be preserved or even transferred, so the definition of "human" will become more and more difficult.
In such a future scene, love may even appear absurd. Modern people will inevitably doubt whether their partners love their own "people" or their own money. In the future, people may need to distinguish whether the other person loves their own body or consciousness or their own unique DNA. In addition to skin aging easily, it is difficult to stay young forever, consciousness can be transplanted, and DNA can be copied infinitely-in the future world, love seems infinitely close to eternity.