Welcome to this week's topic! I'm the host and this my first time hosting. Today I'll take you to a interesting concept in sci-fi: Hibernation.

Hibernation originally refers to animals sleeping through winter. In science fiction, it is a technology that allows humans to sleep for years—sometimes decades or centuries—to skip a period of time. People lie in special pods that keep their bodies alive while they sleep.

But some scientists believe it may one day be real—not only for space travel, but for patients waiting for cures, or even for ordinary people who wish to skip ahead. This week, we consider the strange appeal of pressing pause on our own lives, and what it would mean for the world we leave behind.

Discussion Questions:

 

1. The Personal Escape

Imagine you could safely hibernate through one period of your life and wake up on the other side. Would you do it? If so, what would you choose to sleep through, and why?

 

2. Growth or Avoidance

Some would hibernate to escape hardship—illness, heartbreak, financial stress. Others see it as running away. Do you believe skipping difficulty is a form of wisdom, or does it rob us of something essential?

 

3. Those We Leave Behind

Hibernation separates us from the people we know. If you slept for five years, who would you worry about missing you? Who do you think would change the most in your absence, and how would that affect your relationship upon waking?

 

4. The Waiting Ones

Hibernation is never chosen by the sleeper alone. If a loved one decided to hibernate through a difficult period, would you wait for them? Would you feel abandoned, or would you respect their need to rest? What would you want them to do for you?

 

5. Society Without Us

If hibernation became common, certain people might be pressured to use it—the unemployed, the chronically ill, the elderly. Could this become a form of social cleaning, disguised as medical choice? How would society treat those who return, displaced in time?

 

6. The Present Dissatisfaction

Some argue that the desire to hibernate reflects a deeper unhappiness with the present. If you could change one thing about your current life without sleeping through it, what would that change be? What is stopping you?

 

7. Interactive Element

Find someone whose reason for hibernating—or refusing to—connects to something you have felt. Reply and ask: what do you think you might lose by staying, or gain by leaving?

1. The Personal Escape

Imagine you could safely hibernate through one period of your life and wake up on the other side. Would you do it? If so, what would you choose to sleep through, and why?

I wouldn't do for now because teenager life is enjoyble despite some difficulties and annoyance.  It's said that adulthood is more challenging and tiring than now.  If possible,  I would experience a period and then choose whether to skip it. 

Actually there's an ambiguity: in the subquestion1 the hibernation means skipping a period of YOUR life; but in the following subquestions it changes to a "pause" while the whole world continues going forward.  For example,  Picture you were 18 years old and you chose to sleep for 5 years:

 in the subquestion 1:

You: 18 --> 23; your peers(before your sleep)  : still 18. 

in the subquestion 2-6:

You: still 18; your peers: 18->23

2. Growth or Avoidance

Some would hibernate to escape hardship—illness, heartbreak, financial stress. Others see it as running away. Do you believe skipping difficulty is a form of wisdom, or does it rob us of something essential?

It depends on what the difficulty likes and how severe it is.  The best way,  I think,  is confronting and wrestling with whatever challenges when they come,  but choosing to escape if we are still unable to cope with them after extreme struggle. It should be acknowledged that failure can ruin a person,  leading to his killing himself,  so a temporary avoidance can be expedient. 

However,  if the Hibernation technology was invented, people might be fragile and susceptible,  escaping hardship all the time.  I hope it won't happen. 

1. The Personal Escape

Imagine you could safely hibernate through one period of your life and wake up on the other side. Would you do it? If so, what would you choose to sleep through, and why?

Maybe not, because I have no enough reason to do that.

Welp... a way occurred to me: this ability can improve our sleep: one can freely choose to hibernate for several hours so that we can sleep soundly.

Welp, I've been confused about how to calculate hibernater's age now...

Maybe the key question is: Should the hibernation time be included into the age? And does body function change during hibernation?

3. Those We Leave Behind

Hibernation separates us from the people we know. If you slept for five years, who would you worry about missing you? Who do you think would change the most in your absence, and how would that affect your relationship upon waking?

 Maybe my family.  But upon my waking we are still family and our relationship will be even stronger, because time will "filter" small unnecessary divisions and conflicts between us. 

4. The Waiting Ones

Hibernation is never chosen by the sleeper alone. If a loved one decided to hibernate through a difficult period, would you wait for them? Would you feel abandoned, or would you respect their need to rest? What would you want them to do for you?

If Hibernation is a valid choice for my loved one, I will accept and wait willingly,  even when they make the decision unilaterally-- since that's their autonomy. 

5. Society Without Us

If hibernation became common, certain people might be pressured to use it—the unemployed, the chronically ill, the elderly. Could this become a form of social cleaning, disguised as medical choice? How would society treat those who return, displaced in time?

The negative impact is possible.  Besides evil usages mentioned above,  it can lead to unfairness,  because someone goes directly to a better life tomorrow, while others labor toughly today.  But this is based on the assumption that future life will be better than the current one -- but that's not proved yet. 

2. Growth or Avoidance

Some would hibernate to escape hardship—illness, heartbreak, financial stress. Others see it as running away. Do you believe skipping difficulty is a form of wisdom, or does it rob us of something essential?

While it is tempting to escape hardship by hibernating, it is also true that it works only when the difficulty can be solved by time. For example, when you're unemployed, you hibernate for a society that has more jobs. 

Hibernation is effective for heartbreak. But for illness and financial stress, it depends.

3. Those We Leave Behind

Hibernation separates us from the people we know. If you slept for five years, who would you worry about missing you? Who do you think would change the most in your absence, and how would that affect your relationship upon waking?

That would be my parents. And I'm not willing to imagine that...