The Time Machine Part Deux

In class, we seemed to come to the conclusion that by the year 802,701 A.D. the world had atrophied because the human race (and its descendants) had gone to what they considered the very end of progress and abruptly stopped. At the time when Wells' was writing The Time Machine, some believed science and technology had gone as far as it could go. But living over a century past we know this is not true. While we keep creating products beyond our imaginations ten years ago, that creative juice is still flowing. We haven't stopped striving for the easiest work-out machine or doors that go whoosh. It seems that we won't reach the peak of human invention anytime soon. Consumers demand the best products and that will keep our minds brewing. Computers are getting faster and lighter, television screens have gotten larger, iPods are smaller, and if we should complete all of this, the products will be redesigned to be more aesthetically pleasing. And with each invention comes consequences and problems we must solve. Back when Ford's assembly line was pumping out cars left and right, he wasn't thinking of how it might cause pollution. But now we must worry about problems like pollution and global warming and nuclear weapons.

Sure, necessity is the mother of invention. But what necessity was there for the Time-Traveller to build a time machine? Maybe that is why progress came to a halt. Inventing a time machine in the Victorian era when there are problems needing to be solved seems to jump ahead of itself. Did the Time-Traveller have a reason to invent a time machine other than he could?I think Wells not only presents a story warning of the finite nature of humanity but also what he believes is the finite nature of technology.

In class, the Eloi were depicted as the victims of complaceny, but aren't the Morlocks too? While the Morlocks possess some sense of survival instinct by hunting Eloi, they have done nothing to advance this. In Chapter 5 the Time Traveller first sees the Morlocks drag away one body. I might not know they're eating preferences, but it seems like one Eloi is not enough to feed a whole underground society. One Eloi for however many Morlocks once a day does not seem like a healthy diet. But the Morlocks seem fine with this arrangement. The Time Traveller believes the Morlocks to be a type of working-class, but we don't see them work. Our only evidence that they are "working-class" are the machines underground and their fascination for buffing the time machine. Complacency seems to have affected the Morlocks too because they don't try to adjust their hunting habits to produce more Eloi per nightly hunt. They seem secure with the idea that they are the top of the food chain and don't wish to change that. However, the Eloi rank #1 in terms of complacency.

Which brings me to the point of the "good" little Eloi. While reading I never saw the Eloi as good, perhaps innocent at first. When Weena was drowning, no attempt was made to save her. Their inaction seemed downright cold-hearted and evil to me. Though I can't fault them too much because their complacency was unintentional. It's not their fault they're born that way. On the other hand, the Morlocks were definitely evil, not based solely on the reason that they ate the Eloi, but they had intentions, something the Eloi lack entirely. The Morlocks tried to lure the Time Traveller into the pedestal and then attack him. It would have been an alright plan if the Time Traveller didn't have a time machine.

All in all, class was fun. I mean, how can talking about giant crabs at the end of the world not be fun?

A Second Theory of the End of the World

After class I came to a second potential theory for the inclusion of the end of the world in The Time Machine. By including the end of the world he is suggesting the potential for a world without humanity--the key being that somehow we died out. I don't claim a strong understanding of the mind of a late 1800s Brit, but I would assume that they did not see the potential for the end of humanity. In a Post Atomic, post World War, world with our understanding of the rather fragile and small place we hold both on earth and in the universe it's quite easy to foresee a future that does not contain humanity. The section could have been intended to serve as a further call to action, suggesting that if trends continued as he (Wells) saw them humanity would come to an end. This would seem to agree with the other conclusions we reached about the book speaking to a kind of human pride, the idea that the current society in which he lived was not dangerous to countries, classes, individuals, etc., but to humanity as a whole--there can be no worse fate for a species than extinction and that was, perhaps, what Wells intended to draw our attention to.

On a side note: On a number of occasions in class the idea of the Murlocks being evil and Eloi being good, but I am not sure Wells' characterizations of the two fall into these distinct categories. Granted, during the story itself the Murlocks take on a barbaric nature and dark character, but during the time the Traveler spends pondering his theories about the future society the Murlocks are treated quite well. He holds exstensive sympathies for the Murlocks. Even after he realizes the "true" nature of the relationship, he recognizes a certain ironic justice in the idea that the formerly oppressed would rise up to sit as the oppressors, and since the book serves as a warning against complacency the Eloi, who do nothing and don't seem to care that they are being eaten, not the Murlocks, who retain a certain amount of ingenuity and craftiness, are the true evil in the story.

The Time Machine

I really like H. G. Wells' use of science in The Time Machine. While setting up how the time machine worked was essential to the plot, I enjoyed the little details he provided. His explanation of time as a 4th dimension was very clear and plausible to the point that I wanted to build my own time machine in my room. Even the details about the night sky shifting were accurate and brought me back to my astronomy days. But enough rambling about the little things.

Most of my understanding of the Eloi and Morlocks is influenced by The Communist Manifesto, which I had to read for another class this week. And it seems as though that the Time Traveller was thinking along the same lines. After witnessing the Eloi and their simplicity and laziness, he believes that this is the "utopia" that communism caused: a classless society with no incentives to work. However, he comes across the Morlocks and changes his theory. Now the Time Traveller is presented with two different human-like specimen and immediately jumps into assuming that the Eloi are the elite and the Morlocks are the working-class, based solely on their habitats. To him, the Eloi must be the elite because they remain topside and sleep in these palaces while the Morlocks were forced to work on the subterranean level. The final discovery that the Morlocks eat the Eloi shifts his theory once again. Wells makes it seem that the working class Morlocks are seeking revenge on the Eloi. But I think the roles are reversed here. The Morlocks are the bourgeoisie and the Eloi are the proletariat, though not in the modern sense of the words. The Morlocks are "exploiting" the Eloi in the most primal sense; the class struggle becomes predator versus prey.

As the Time Traveller went further into the future, it seemed to become less and less civilized (in terms of technology and species). At the end of the Earth, there was no trace of the Morlocks or Eloi, only large crustaceans roamed the land similar to the dinosaurs. Through the three time-settings, we see that civilization as we know it regresses.

By jumping so far into the future, Wells leaves much mystery to the reader. What happened between the Victorian era and 802,701? What was the turning point? Presently, scientists and inventors are searching for the next big thing to make our lives easier and solve large problems like global warming and such. When did we run out of problems to solve? Could it be in the next 50 years?

When I first read that the Time Traveller was in the year 802,701 I thought of myself in that time taking a history class. With over 800,000 years to cover, what becomes irrelevant and what is important? Well, that seems sufficient for now. Hopefully after class my thoughts will have some semblance of structure.

Time Machine Thoughts

I felt the reading was quite interesting. However, I feel that conflict will never depart from humanity. I mainly feel this way because the world past and present has always focused on the differences, not similarities in humanity. If humanity does atrophy, like Wells suggests, I think the differences will only grow and that there will not be two classes, but multiple that will be locked in combat.

The Time Machine

I have always found the time machine to be an interesting work. It seems to propose three potential futures for humanity, and while the Utopian vision that first occurs to the traveler may seem to be ideal, I find all of them quite disheartening. Wells is suggesting that humanity will, after solving all its problems, begin to atrophy. I must question the logic that suggests both that humanity will overcome all obstacles to the point where life becomes easy, and that should this happen humans would not create our own problems to overcome or feats to accomplish. I point to pieces we will read later, to other science fiction, and to the history of humanity, and suggest that as we solve more social and economic problems instead of sitting back we, as humans, will always look beyond our current realm and explore what comes next. Science fiction itself serves as evidence of humanity's eagerness to move forward in our development and to explore the edges of our current civilization.