Humeccan - John Dickinson

A collection of short stories exposing human nature as mechanistic. The backdrop of our evolution is first painted via a quixotic character’s mission to alert his neighbourhood to coming doom. Two stories then follow different trajectories from the same inflection point of our shifting culture. One has doom averted, another careers towards the prophesied doom. Intimate tales follow, evoking both unseemly and more humane aspects of our nature. The central story, the dark heart, turns, presenting pathological behaviours as seen from the gene’s eye view and as resulting from forces that created us to be the gene-serving ape-machines we are. Further elaborating stories lead deeper into our psychology, dissecting the assumptions we make about ourselves and others. Projections are reflected back. We are challenged to justify our beliefs, and to confront a seemingly bleak view: that of a deterministic universe in which we evolved not for our wellbeing, but to propagate immortal genes. The final story in the collection imagines a future in which an evolved culture helps us live better with our evolved natures. Mechanical devices and scientific concepts are embraced in story titles, anchoring the narratives in the mechanistic character of human nature. The natural world reverberates throughout what is, ultimately, a humane vision.
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