Reading the stories for module 3, I was reminded of the text from my history textbooks. It was surprising to see so many parallels of the past with the present scenario of the stories. The whole point of studying history is to learn from our mistakes, yet all these stories show that we as humans collectively, don’t seem to learn from our mistakes.

One thing that struck me but didn’t surprise me was the humans need to use force. In “Dolphin’s Way”, we see how one of the first things tried by the researchers was studying the dolphins in captivity. Similarly in “Davy Jones’ Ambassador”, we see how the student will share a similar fate of being held captive while being studied or being held in a zoo of sorts. In all of the stories, including “Jerry was a Man” and “The Hominids”, we see how humans believe that they are the superior species, when though there was evidence to prove otherwise.

I really liked the book “Hominids”. It was interesting to see how the alternative world functioned and was organized, a world whose fundamental roots are so different than ours. Their world seems to have found a way to battle the problems, such as crime, overpopulation, etc. that are serious issues in our world, in ways that we would never have thought, because it’s so against our nature. However, reading this, I kept wondering if Ponter had arrived in United States in 2018 rather than in Canada. Would he have received the same treatment? Though initially many were skeptical of him really being a Neanderthal, I was very surprised of the governments’ reaction to his arrival. They granted him citizenship and protection, rather than taking him into custody. I highly doubt this would have happened if he were to arrive in the US today.