English essay

Every day as the people of our world expand the technology, and find new and easier ways

to assist one’s self in everyday tasks or daily life, it affects the future of our race. We see these

advantages in technology as aids and a good thing, but do we realize that having too much help,

in the end teaches you nothing? As technology advances throughout time, all the extra help will

cause laziness and in turn this will cause a domino effect. Therefore having a loss of will power

and determination will cause creativity and wonder to diminish. We can see this slowly start to

happen in today’s society, but the new forms of humans, Eloi and Morlocks in novel “The Time

Machine” by H.G. Wells are examples of extreme cases of what this could all lead to. In the

future all is given to them, it is not necessarily an aid to human kind, but brings a disadvantage

onto the human race. Having everything done for them and making life too easy creates no will

power and creativity ceases to continue, making the Elois lazy, eventually reversing the effects

of evaluation, and returning our old ancestors characteristics and instincts to the

Morlocks.

As the technology advances as time moves on, by the year 802701 having everything

given to you as an Eloi, or upperworlder has become natural and expected. They do not worry

about how their clothes get made, about buying or selling items or where their food comes from.

These humans have had their lifestyle and personalities altered into non-caring, lazy, and short

attention spanned race.

As the Time Traveler arrives to the future, the Eloi (upper world

humans) rush him into a large dining room for a feast. As they feast upon fruit, The Time

Traveler must learn the language of the people in order to communicate with these new people.

As he attempts to understand and learn this new language, he realizes that the Eloi’s attention

span shortens very quickly, and he can only learn in short spans of time before they all get bored

and switch their attention to something different:" At first my efforts met with a stare of

surprise or inextinguishable laughter, but presently a fair-haired little creature seemed to grasp

my intention and repeated a name. They had to chatter and explain the business at great length

to each other, and my first attempts to make the exquisite little sounds of their language caused

an immense amount of amusement. However, I felt like a schoolmaster amidst children, and

persisted, and presently I had a score of noun substantives at least at my command; and then I

got to demonstrative pronouns and even the verb "to eat." But it was slow work, and the little

people soon tired and wanted to get away from my interrogations, so I determined, rather of

necessity, to let them give their lessons in little doses when they felt inclined. And very little

doses I found they were before long, for I never met people more indolent or more easily

fatigued.” (Wells, 35)


These people are only able to concentrate on certain things for short spans of time, because of

the lack of need, wonder, discovery and imagination is gone. This has happened in cause of the

technology of the time doing everything for them, because there is no need for any of these

reactions, the Eloi do not bother to use them.This behaviour continues to show as the story

develops, these humans have no worries of finding a mate to create offspring and reproduce,

everything is perfectly controlled and in turn lose the emotion of affection, and attachment

towards anyone else. "It happened that as I was watching some of the little people bathing in a

shallow, one of them was seized with a cramp, and began drifting downstream. The main current

ran rather swiftly, but not too strongly for even a moderate swimmer. It will give you an idea,

therefore, of the strange deficiency in these creatures, when I tell you that none made the

slightest attempt to rescue the weakly crying little thing which was drowning before their

eyes.”(Wells, 56)


As the world is perfectly controlled, leaving no need to find someone, for a life mate, nor have

anyone to be raised by, leaves no reason for the maternal instinct to develop. If this does not

develop, one cannot become emotionally attached to anything, this is the reason for the little

Weena to be left on her own to fend for herself.

If a life is already planned out and is in a perfectly controlled environment, would there be a

point in making life more difficult than it has to be, by forming complicated languages when it

will not be used to its fullest? The Eloi use a language made of very simple terms and phrases

making it very easy to catch onto once they have given you enough time to be taught it. This

lack of communication in the upper world, does not differ very much from the one of the

underworld with the Morlocks behaviour. The Eloi are not the only ones to have lost their

personal skills, the Morlocks have also changes over the years, by being separated from the

outside world, and there is no need for as much interaction. As the time traveler starts to learn

the upperlanders language, he realizes that it is very simple, not containing structured

sentences, being very easy, much like a caveman might speak.


Over the years as less is needed, the language of the humans has become simpler, consisting of

short sentences and simple grammar, The time traveler discovers this as he spends more time

in the future:"I made what progress I could in the language, and, in addition, I pushed my

explorations here and there. Either I missed some subtle point, or their language was

excessively simple-almost exclusively composed of concrete substantives and verbs. There

seemed to be a few, if any, abstract terms, or little use of figurative language. Their sentences

were usually simple and two words, and I failed to convey or understand any but the simplest

proportions." (Wells, 51)


A complicated language is now of no use to these people, having everything at the tips of their

hands ready for them to use, only simple requests are needed.

As the Morlocks have lived in complete darkness for hundreds of years, they have become a

very aggressive species, not used to other contact form the above world, nor anything else; they

have lost all modern human social skills."I stood in the dark, a hand touched mine, lank fingers

came feeling over my face, and I was sensible of a peculiar unpleasant odour. I fancied I heard

the breathing of a crowd of those dreadful little beings about me. I felt the box of matches in my

hand being gently disengaged, and the other hands behind me plucking at my clothing. The

sense of these unseen creatures examining me was indescribably unpleasant." (Wells, 63)


These actions demonstrate how the complete darkness has affected this species. As they are not

able to see much they must use their other scenes to get a feel of their surroundings. As because

of this, they have lost the perception of personal space, and consideration for others around

them, very similar to the Eloi from above.



All these new ways of living, has turned back the time on the species behaviour. Being forced

underground, the new found innocence of the upper world, and the incredible advance in

technology has been a great factor upon this. Now the human race has inherited many or the

characteristics as ancestors from when the world started, as well as many animals such like the

dinosaurs.

The Morlocks have been the ones to serve the Eloi over the years, their technically inclined

skills have brought them underground to take care of the sewage, electricity, ventilation etc.

After being stuck underground for so many years, their lack of social skills have renewed their

fun of killing animals for fun, as men started to do as time first begun. "The upper world people

might once have been the favoured aristocracy, and the Morlocks their mechanical servants; but

that had long since passed away. The two species that had resulted from the evolution of man

were sliding down towards, or had already arrived at, an altogether new relationship. The Eloi,

like the Carolingian kings, had decayed to a mere beautiful futility. They still possessed the earth

on the sufferance, since the Morlocks, subterranean for innumerable generations, had come at

last to find the day lit surface intolerable. And the Morlocks made their garments, I inferred, and

maintained them in their habitual needs, perhaps through the survival of an old habit of service.

They did as a standing horse paws with his foot, or as a man enjoys killing animals in sport,

because ancient and departed necessities had impressed it on the organism."(Wells, 77)


The Morlocks have been imbedded with the idea that having to make everything for the Eloi

with return for nothing is a normal part of life, but with being forced into the ground at all times

to do so, they must find a way to eat. Over the years this has lead to the feasting of their same

race. The Eloi end up paying for the work they get done for them.


The Morlocks characteristics continue to resemble the ones of our ancestors further back

in time, as there is a lack of food underground increases; these people have resorted to eating

their own species as a way to survive. This resembles many of the tribes around our modern

world that have practiced cannibalism; eating their own species as tradition or way of life.


"The place, by the by, was very stuffy and oppressive, and the faint halatus of freshly-shed

blood was in the air. Some way down the central vista was a little table of white metal, laid with

what seemed a meal. The Morlocks at any rate were carnivorous!" (Wells, 72)


The Eloi pay the price for having everything given to them, as a way to pay, the Morlocks will

take them for meat. Eating to stay alive, and as a way to repay them for forcing them

underground all these years. This way of live has made the Morlocks resort to how animals from

the past have eaten their own kind. A perfect example of this would be the dinosaurs, although

they were all dinosaurs, there were many species of them, and they would feed upon each other.



With the great change in technology, and its effect on the evolution of the human kind, as a result

has caused a great change in the behaviour and mind set of humans. As all the technology has

developed over the many years, it has been able to assist and do things for the humans in many

ways. After years and years of everything being done for them, they have lost their will power to

do things on their own, their language has become simpler, in a form much shorter and easier to

speak in the lack of need to have an intricate conversation. The accessibility to this vast amount

of technology, in a perfectly controlled environment causes the brain to be used less, which as

evolution continued, the humans adapted to their lifestyle, turning back their minds to have

many characteristics of our earths ancestors.


Wells, H.G.. The Time Machine. 2002. New York: Scholastic inc., 1895.
(Burgess Introduction)