Theme · Book 8, A Parade of Horribles
Staying human
'If we get to the point where we don't help each other anymore, that's when we stop being human.' The book's argument with itself: Carl covers the Meadow Lark signs so no one farms the elderly for experience, is told by twenty percent of a focus group that he is carrying dead weight, and cannot decide whether keeping them alive was a kindness.
Segment appearances
Progression
Donut: 'Do you really think I could be a proper girlfriend for Carl? It’s a crime against nature' (ch. 16). Carl at the curb: 'I couldn’t react like that' (ch. 45); Bigs's word for what is beyond human: 'Real Gs' (ch. 60); 'Was I different?' (ch. 59); of the what-if apartments, 'That was the point, of course. But it still hurt' (ch. 76); 'It would never be me, and I needed to remember that' (ch. 95). Making a pig sapient crosses 'a line I’d never known was there' (ch. 94).