Books
Essay Considering the Novel “Time Machine” by Herbert Walls
One of the greatest Science Fiction books I have read
The novel “The Time Machine” by H. G. Wells contains a very interesting idea worth speculating on it. As this is a very well-known literary work, we can assume that the idea is not only interesting but also important from a philosophical point of view.
In the beginning, I will state the main data of the narrative under consideration, as I consider it necessary to do this before expressing my point of view. The main character invents a time machine and finds himself in the distant future, hundreds of thousands of years ahead. On the road, which runs not through space but through time, he finds himself in a completely different world. Based on the events directly related to his fantastic trip, one can make such a judgment that the theme of this work is the fate of mankind, which, according to the plot, has a tragic character.
The situation is such that human civilization no longer exists, but there are two humanoid species different from humans. They do not have the highly developed consciousness of the people among whom the main character lived in his time. Therefore, these creatures can no longer be called civilization.
Here, I present a notable quote from the Traveler:
And during this time, all activity, all traditions, all complex organizations, all nationalities, languages, all literature, all human aspirations, and even the very memory of the Man as I knew him disappeared. Instead, fragile creatures appeared in the world, who forgot about their high origin, and whitish creatures, from which I fled in horror.
Those words present clear evidence that a population of a different kind has replaced human civilization.
These two kinds of being were the following:
- Eloi were the creatures that lead a comfortable life on the Earth’s surface.;
- Morlocks inhabit the subterranean world.
As we take into account the words of the Traveler, where he referred to the first met Morlok a human-like spider, we can suppose that Morlocks were an unfamiliar species to him, possessing eight limbs. Simultaneously, they presented some kind of primates, so they were such creatures that would be unimaginable in our era; they were supposedly capable of climbing walls like spiders.
Supposedly, the world the Traveler originated from can be considered an amazing and interesting world. However, it was a world that would be dangerous and unfamiliar for a civilized human being.
The “white beasts” referred to in the given quote are nobody but those called Morlocks.
They were a treat for the Time-traveler, and the character was compelled to salivate from them enduring perilous encounters this way.
He did not take into detailed consideration the events that transpired ‘beneath the wheels of his machine’ over eight hundred thousand years, but he had speculative ideas about the cause of humanity’s anthropological decline.
He had such a hypothesis that the conditions of life had been improved gradually until it became a greenhouse, and this had caused what the character had encountered.
He described the world he had witnessed as follows:
I concluded that for countless years on earth, there was no danger of wars, no violence, no wild animals, no pathogens, there was no need for labor.
Speaking metaphorically, the history of humanity was comparable to a loop.
Imaginatively, we can put the prehistoric kind of primates on one of the bottom edges of the loop. This is the population that existed in reality and that from which civilized humanity has descended. On the other edge, we can imagine the creatures the Time-traveler met in the new world. The initial segment of the loop, excluding its extreme fragment, is what had been occurring in the world for many years ‘under the wheels of the Main characters of the scenario of the novel’.
Since H.G. Wells lived in his era, he understood that mankind had undergone gradual development: from some kind of hunters-gar’s machine’, in other words, this is ‘others to the state we can consider civilized and reasonable, and this was the exact fact related to mankind that we can associate with the first part of that loop while its continuation is what the author had added imaginatively to the history in his work.
However, it is worth considering that the feature of the plot of the novel “Time Machine” expresses the author’s preoccupation with the fate of civilization.
Perhaps this writer was an especially attentive empirical observer who noticed that humanity was striving to improve the conditions of its life, and these efforts were occasionally successful.
When contemplating the presented topic, we encounter the paradox of human existence.
It is natural for humans to seek increasingly comfortable conditions, to raise the standard of living, and to develop themselves.
It is closely connected to the human being’s mind and differs from other kinds of beings.
At the same time, excessively favorable circumstances in a positive trend present a threat to regress.
Regarding my perspective on the idea and the plot, I can approach it from various angles:
- It’s naturalness and realism in my view.
- It’s relevance from my standpoint.
In general, I agree with the author’s idea stating that people can degrade gradually if they have no difficulties in their life, nevertheless, it’s not time to dismiss the idea.
A particular situation, such as the one beneath the surface of the plot of the discussed literary work, requires clarification for deeper analysis.
While it’s plausible to embrace the notion that the absence of challenges creates a sheltered environment detrimental to human growth, this doesn’t necessarily align with Herbert Wells’ idea.
Initially, let’s contemplate a hypothetical situation with no relation to the whole of humanity but about some particular imagined people who live quite careless lives.
Let’s consider a scenario where someone is born into a wealthy family, for example, it may be a child of stars as well as a prince or a princess from a royal family.
This person could live a celebration life without working and restrict their education to secondary school.
Why would this person need higher education or a college degree if they are already well-off?
As long as their ancestors are alive, there will be enough money for both themselves and their descendants. When the ancestors pass away, their descendants will still be financially secure due to the inheritance, which is sufficient to lead a comfortable and carefree life.
These individuals can lead lives as they please, embracing an idle lifestyle without nurturing their minds. Consequently, these circumstances could be perceived as a threat to intellectual degradation.
For instance, over time, this can lead to the development of senile dementia.”
Herbert Wells’ idea is similar but is considered on a different scale. To elaborate, this concept is contemplated on the scale of humanity as a whole rather than individual persons. In other words, this is the same idea but globalized.
As this idea does not have a large encompass, it’s not difficult to contemplate, but its globalization is a different case.
I would like to express the following perspective:
It is uncertain whether humanity can completely overcome all its problems.
The theory that I find realistic and logical suggests that mankind is not omnipotent. Furthermore, the elimination of factors mentioned in the second quote, such as wild beasts, wars, and bacteria, contradicts the laws of the Earth’s ecosystem in my viewpoint. As a result, I find this unrealistic.
We cannot predict the exact fate of mankind, but it is evident that humans are prone to various conflicts.
Human nature itself exhibits a tendency toward conflicts, quarrels, and wars.
Primarily, wars arise when individuals endeavor to acquire something for which they are willing to engage in armed conflict.
For example, the Russo-Japanese War emerged from the desires of two states to control the fortress, Port Arthur, recognizing the potential political advantage. Each of these states aimed to secure exclusive ownership of the fortress.
Thus, two parallel and conflicting interests emerged, leading to a military conflict. Another example is Russia’s military invasion of Ukraine, driven by the power-hungry ambitions of a single influential and dangerous individual. Because of the inherent aspects of the human mind, there will always be individuals capable of occasional violence and instigating wars.
Let’s explore additional reasons why the world is not perfect and entirely safe. I will evaluate each factor against reality and articulate my perspective on the feasibility of the absence of danger for each species in the real world.
Wild animals
What the Time Traveler suggested can be understood ambiguously by reading the quotation.
The first option — they did not exist at all, the second option — they existed. but did not pose a danger to humans; probably all people were safely isolated from them.
Consider the first version of understanding the judgment of the Hero of this story. The question arises: will all wild animals die out in the process of human existence?
This is not a fact at all. In addition, the extinction of all predators will be a huge imbalance in nature, fraught with a serious catastrophe. If we understand the hero’s statement in a second way, that is, relying on such an idea that people were isolated from predators, then this is already closer to reality. Being a victim of a predatory animal is a relatively rare event compared to incidents of another kind since people live in isolation from animals, namely, predatory animals have their habitat, and people have their own.
Detrimental bacteria
This can be generalized, that is, I think it is appropriate to talk about all diseases in general instead. So far, various diseases have taken place in the human world, but humanity is struggling with this flaw. While science is advancing, pills, drugs, and treatments are being improved, this type of danger, that is, disease susceptibility, is in the fight against medicine.
In addition to the types of dangers mentioned, there are also dangers of other types, but, from my point of view, there is no need to describe the arguments about them all in detail, so I will talk about them briefly. There are dangers from disasters, natural, such as earthquakes, floods, and other types of natural phenomena, and technical, such as, for example, an accident. No one is immune from all these emergencies, as well as from the types of incidents described above. And I think these types of dangers can be attributed to those that are most difficult to eliminate from human existence.
Thus, in our imperfect world, there are difficulties and dangers of very diverse types, varying in degrees of threat, but, in general, it is doubtful that humanity can completely protect itself from everything.
I do not agree with the idea of the author if he believes in it. Now, I would like to return for a moment to the same idea, only not in a globalized form, that is, to a hypothetical situation where individual people live in greenhouse conditions. These people are also not ideally protected from accidents. They are members of the same human species, and even if they are rich and live a wonderful life in provision, they are still vulnerable and not omnipotent. However, an idle lifestyle can negatively affect their mind and personality. This means that greenhouse conditions, in which a person gradually degrades, can take place together with the presence of hypothetical dangers in the life of a person living in such conditions.
Here, I would like to emphasize that the Eloi, who, presumably, were a continuation of humanity at the stage of the decline of civilization, did not live in ideal conditions, their existence was in danger of dying from the paws of the Morlocks and being eaten by them. That is, the consciousness has already degraded, and the conditions have not yet become ideal and, apparently, will not be. Greenhouse conditions take place when a person’s life consists entirely of activities that are pleasant and interesting for him, and there is nothing to worry about.
At the same time, I would like to distinguish between:
- the hypothetical probability of dying under some unpredictable tragic circumstances or suddenly getting into some kind of difficult situation and
- the fact that a person in greenhouse conditions does not live with anxiety about what might happen to him.
But if we again start talking about globalizing such a situation, that is, transferring it to all of humanity, at least hypothetically, we again encounter difficulties.
I do not imagine that all mankind could live an idle life consisting only of favorite and pleasant activities. To do this, perhaps, all people in the world should be equal in social status, which, in turn, also does not seem realistic to me.
Ultimately, I will say that I do not consider the author’s thoughts realistic, and, as a result, I do not consider such an idea particularly relevant.
Now, I have expressed all the main things about my attitude to the novel in question, but I have something else to add. The Timetraveler introduced the factor of dividing humanity into poor and rich people in his reasoning about the continuation of human history. At the same time, he suggested that rich people had more and more territory for their wonderful estates and luxurious life on Earth. The poor, respectively, had less and less space on Earth and moved underground to live and engage in routine dirty work. One can presumably include in this category people of such specific professions as janitors, cleaners, and people who were engaged in some kind of manual labor.
Eventually, the former gradually evolved into creatures called Eloi and the latter into creatures called Morlocks. The factor of the financial contrast is connected with the actual problem today, namely, the problem of social justice. In today’s world, there are a variety of people whose financial condition, and, consequently, their lifestyle, is so different that it’s just scary to compare. It seems that it did not exist before. Perhaps only tsars and kings could differ from ordinary citizens in their wealth to a significant extent. This suggests that the gap between the poor and the rich is widening over time.
For example, they say that Russian pensioners live very poorly and are even forced to climb garbage dumps, and at the same time, there are people who not only have everything they need for a normal life but they also have luxurious properties in abundance. In the novel under consideration, the author reflected the same factor in the fantastic anthropological features of the plot. Gradually, people became different species, and this happened due to a different way of life in different habitats, which was closely related to the financial gap.
It can be assumed that humanity was divided into two large groups, of which the first was made up of the rich, and the second — their servants, that is, the people who served them and did everything necessary for them.
Thus, the people of the first group had an idle and carefree way of life, that is, they, as a whole group, got into a situation similar to the hypothetical situation described above regarding separately taken, abstract people. The second lived a different life, doing hard and routine work, and their place was the underworld.
In fact, there is a similar situation. As far as I am concerned, the gap between rich and poor is growing, and there are even details: before, an ordinary American family of four people (two parents and two children) could live in a large private house now, the same family has difficulty renting a good apartment, and this is because, for some reason, the rich should get richer and richer, and the poor poorer and poorer.
If, as they say, the gap is widening, then what will happen next — poor people will have to live on the street? It’s a bit of a pity that The “Time Machine” is not a very modern novel, but this work was written at the end of the 19th century because this impressive story with the gap between rich and poor is more observable and impressionable now than it was at the time when the work in question was written. Nevertheless, this novel is reminiscent of an actual and fascinating problem today.
Is this a coincidence or something more than just a coincidence? There, according to the plot, the continuation of poor or, if I may say, poor people went to live underground. This can lead to this thought: “This is where second-class people can go! This is probably one of the options for the development of the scenario of the life of a divided population in our days and beyond if it is impossible to live a full life, no longer on the street, not at railway stations, and not in forests, then, probably, underground.”
Nevertheless, according to the plot of the novel “The Time Machine,” in the end, both of them got something equal. The difference in the standard of living in the material plane still exists, as such, and the guest of this era sees it between ground palaces and what can be found underground, but still, the material aspect of life is one thing, and the mental level is something else.
The entire post-human species shared a fate in the sense that they both became dumb and looked more like animals than sentient beings. Such was the end of the rope, which twisted for a long time but came to an end — everyone was equalized.
