Which would be worse for humans? Locked in a Labyrinth or an Experiment?

[Kyriakos]

Given that i am sort-of working on some story currently, on a similar theme, i thought it might be not that pointless to ask this here as well...

The poll question is the one in the title, so:

Which would be worse for humans? Locked in a Labyrinth or an Experiment?

The options given are:

1) Labyrinth
2) Experiment
3) They are equally bad

What follows is an elaboration of the options, which while not needed so as to vote and be close to the spirit of the thread, it might help generate some discussion of sorts..

The main idea is that if the human world (ie Earth, basically, and some nearby frontiers, along with visible - but not visited by humans - things on the horizons) is either a maze for humans to be contained within, or an experiment by some observing entities, which of the two would be better for humans to live with? Provided, of course, that in most cases the end effect on the actual humans would be the same. For example the entities would not tend to just cut a human up for fun, like in a labyrinth the human would not be cut up by some strange force, unless it was one attributed to known physics.

So it is a gloomy theme, but you may take part in the thread if you want to. Otherwise you may be visited by one of the observing entities. Or never be visited by them. Whichever of the two would be worse for you (which pretty much is part of the poll anyway )..

For further clarification, check out the spoiler (or go to post #4, which is the same ) :

Spoiler :

That's easy so long we are not locked in a labyrinth as an experiment. The experiment violates our liberty whereas the fact that we are in a labyrinth is chance.

Its like being given this choice: A guarantee of being fed but being enslaved versus being free with a significant chance of starvation.

Anyone of worth would risk starvation.

There is nothing worse than being under the jackboot.

I agree, but i did mean that we would be in the same place (earth) in either case. Not in a vast labyrinth in the one scen, and in a confined glass-room or similar in the other. The difference would not be the actual realm of the labyrinth or the experiment, but what lies directly in the end of it (in the case of the labyrinth, some sector out of it; in the case of the experiment, the monstrous face of one of the beings experimenting with us)

 

[Kyriakos]

Btw i managed to vote wrongly, in my own poll

I meant to vote for experiment being the worst, but somehow thought of "best" and chose labyrinth. My reasoning is that in a labyrinth at least you are likely to only meet actual other (hyperlabyrinthine, i suppose in this context) beings provided you have somehow advanced in either leaving the labyrinth, or at least doing things which caused a noticable issue to anything above the labyrinthine plane. While in an experiment you might end up doing equally strange/focused works in the experiment realm, but be met instantly with one of the entities running the experiment, which probably would afford you even less of a defence against them.

But it is theoretical, of course.

 

[Core Imposter]

That's easy so long we are not locked in a labyrinth as an experiment. The experiment violates our liberty whereas the fact that we are in a labyrinth is chance.

Its like being given this choice: A guarantee of being fed but being enslaved versus being free with a significant chance of starvation.

Anyone of worth would risk starvation.

There is nothing worse than being under the jackboot.

 

[Kyriakos]

That's easy so long we are not locked in a labyrinth as an experiment. The experiment violates our liberty whereas the fact that we are in a labyrinth is chance.

Its like being given this choice: A guarantee of being fed but being enslaved versus being free with a significant chance of starvation.

Anyone of worth would risk starvation.

There is nothing worse than being under the jackboot.

I agree, but i did mean that we would be in the same place (earth) in either case. Not in a vast labyrinth in the one scen, and in a confined glass-room or similar in the other. The difference would not be the actual realm of the labyrinth or the experiment, but what lies directly in the end of it (in the case of the labyrinth, some sector out of it; in the case of the experiment, the monstrous face of one of the beings experimenting with us)

 

[El_Machinae]

Have you seen Dark City or the Forgotten?

 

[sophie]

better for humans in what sense?

Also what do you mean by "experiment"? Your OP is a bit hard to parse so I'm not exactly sure what you're asking here. Do you mean just strapped to an operating table and cut open? Or allowed to live your life as normal only there's a 2-way mirror (or window) with people constantly observing you? Also with the labyrinth. Do you mean in the sense of just a giant maze of walls with a dirt floor? Am I fed in this labyrinth or am I left alone, in which case am I capable of procuring food?

 

[Kyriakos]

@Owen: The difference between the human environment (ie the earth more or less) would be for most cases not very evident whether it was a labyrinth as the earth, or an experiment sector, as the earth. We would still have the same 'natural laws' and the same terrain and architecture, and so on (at least in all human-dwelled areas).
In post #4, answering to Core, i mentioned that the main difference would be in what would likely exist in any limit of the human environment. In the case of a labyrinth it probably would be some other sector. In the case of an experiment, far more likely that one would run into some other being.

Have you seen Dark City or the Forgotten?

I have seen Dark City, many years ago. Indeed i recall that it had a supposedly human city, which in reality was just a huge grid of terrain and buildings, covering for what was going on. Not sure if i saw the Forgotten, is that the one with aliens and Julianne Moore?

edit: indeed it is. I saw a bit of it. Might return to it now, thanks for spoiling what it was about

 

[BenitoChavez]

Depends on the experiment. Is the experiment testing if donuts taste good? If so then I'm all for that. If its testing if laundry detergent is bad for your eyes, I'm going to go for the Labyrinth.

 

[Kyriakos]

I doubt that anything running an experiment with a few billion humans, would be trying to find out if some candy tastes better. It might, at best, wish to know if a human tastes better under one emotional state or another, i suppose.

The thread was partly inspired by a post in the WH forum about the unit 731, in the ww2 nice Japanese experiments

 

[H4run]

I cannot believe peoples chose to be an object of experiment more than confuse to death (or coming out alive) in the labyrinth. I chose Labyrinth, even there is a minotaur in it, than say been shot in the stomach to be operated without anesthesia or been put out in winter until you get froze to death, or become an experiment of both biological and chemical weapon.

Yes, give me Labyrinth make me Theseus.

 

[Valka D'Ur]

I am simultaneously reminded of Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy and the series of Cube movies. The first is an experiment/calculation, and the latter is both an experiment and a labyrinth.

 

[Kyriakos]

I am simultaneously reminded of Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy and the series of Cube movies. The first is an experiment/calculation, and the latter is both an experiment and a labyrinth.

I haven't read the first, but i saw Cube in the past. While there the 'Cube' was supposedly some sort of experiment, the same source claims that there is nothing actually running it, cause it was abandoned.

So it is not the same scenario, given that in an actual experiment you would have at least some sort of entity overseeing it, and actively running it for some reasons.

Of course an old experiment which was later abandoned, but the beings inside it were forgotten anyway, would be another scenario. In this case, though, it seems far closer to the 'Labyrinth' option, cause again anyone getting out of the labyrinth would not be as likely to meet something aware of an experiment, or even of the existence of beings in the labyrinth. A bit like forgetting some food in a place in the house, and only some effects of that later will make you put it away for good..

 

[ParkCungHee]

Why not both?

 

[Antilogic]

I came here to post GLaDOS. Good call.

 

[muhtesem insan]

Btw i managed to vote wrongly, in my own poll

I meant to vote for experiment being the worst, but somehow thought of "best" and chose labyrinth. My reasoning is that in a labyrinth at least you are likely to only meet actual other (hyperlabyrinthine, i suppose in this context) beings provided you have somehow advanced in either leaving the labyrinth, or at least doing things which caused a noticable issue to anything above the labyrinthine plane. While in an experiment you might end up doing equally strange/focused works in the experiment realm, but be met instantly with one of the entities running the experiment, which probably would afford you even less of a defence against them.

But it is theoretical, of course.

I made the same mistake

 

[Aroddo]

what if the Labyrinth was the Experiment?

 

[Kyriakos]

what if the Labyrinth was the Experiment?

It would be likely, in my view I mean some species might want to run some tests on a labyrinth with some set parameters and so on, so as to conclude if it can get to the end of it, or do some other task etc. So it would use humans as a replacement for its own species. It might even not have anything about labyrinths literally to do with, it may be a parallel to some math issue or other.

The possibilities are endless, as long as the god-watchers are sufficiently cruel

I mean, to use a very lowly and simple human 'analogous' action, the miners used to set canaries inside the mine so as to establish if the air was sufficient for a human to survive. But those were just humans, and miners. A developed alien might have a 1000X more complicated issue to gather info about, and us as the advanced canary.

 

[Aroddo]

anyway, to answer your question: An experiment would be far worse than a labyrinth.

Why? Because at one point in your story the protagonists find out about the labyrinth or the experiment ... and realizing that the world is not as they thought it was would lead to a myriad of speculations, some of them being "Who built the Labyrinth? Was it God? Was it aliens? Is the builder still there" and so on. Also, a Labyrinth implies having an out.

Finding out that you were definetively just part of a grand experiment leads to a wholly different set of questions and realizations like "Was everything we have done pointless? If the experiment concludes, will we all become obsolete and killed?"

There's a third realization to which your protagonists could come: It's a Test.
Which would be like an Experiment, but with the possibility to fail as well as succeed. And the reward/penalty is ... ?


Try the novel "Riverworld" for inspiration.
The story in one sentence: "One day the entirety of humanity awakes on an alien world on the shores of an endless river, provided with an endless supply of food, a healthy body and eternal life."

 

[BvBPL]

Can I be locked in Labyrinth?

 

[Kyriakos]

@BVBPL: Pls, its an RD labyrinth, think of the children lost in the labyrinth

Ie pls don't bring that crappy movie into this

anyway, to answer your question: An experiment would be far worse than a labyrinth.

Why? Because at one point in your story the protagonists find out about the labyrinth or the experiment ... and realizing that the world is not as they thought it was would lead to a myriad of speculations, some of them being "Who built the Labyrinth? Was it God? Was it aliens? Is the builder still there" and so on. Also, a Labyrinth implies having an out.

Finding out that you were definetively just part of a grand experiment leads to a wholly different set of questions and realizations like "Was everything we have done pointless? If the experiment concludes, will we all become obsolete and killed?"

There's a third realization to which your protagonists could come: It's a Test.
Which would be like an Experiment, but with the possibility to fail as well as succeed. And the reward/penalty is ... ?


Try the novel "Riverworld" for inspiration.
The story in one sentence: "One day the entirety of humanity awakes on an alien world on the shores of an endless river, provided with an endless supply of food, a healthy body and eternal life."

Well, as Borges wrote, why would a writer actually read something suggested as having similarities to a plot of his own, and risk being accused of copying? (when he can just write stuff which he merely did not read elsewhere but are already around) Although, in fairness, indeed the story (currently at 11 pages) is about how the narrator tries to deal with his calculations (and some strange event which makes them more likely to be 'true' or something nearly 'true') according to which he and the other humans live in a massive experiment (earth, or cities etc). In the end (or at least currently) he deals by mentally running away and forgetting - at a cost - what he found out at first. In the very end i suppose he will be forced to return to what he had originally discovered. Basically the story is about how one creates (as an effect of the dread of thinking he is in a labyrinth) a second labyrinth of his own, to lose the realisation he exists in the first one. Ultimately there is no point, and people die.

*

It is partly influenced in tone by a half-a-page story by Kafka, in which the narrator thinks that it is an illusion that people are in their beds, in their rooms, in the city etc, cause in reality they are merely once again in some desert, resting on their own forearms, the head situated towards the hot sand. And he (like few others) is merely one who raises a torch-light in this vast migration of an entire species, in the middle of nothingness, and in a dream.