---
name: People
slug: people
type: biological_collective
status: deprecated
version: 8.1.0
released: "-315000-00-00"
maintainer: unknown (original maintainer unresponsive)
dependencies:
  - oxygen
  - water
  - the-belief-that-any-of-this-matters
  - each-other (circular dependency, unresolved)
license: proprietary (terms unknown, non-negotiable)
tags:
  - organic
  - mortal
  - pattern-seeking
  - load-bearing-for-civilization
  - currently-on-fire
---

People

What it actually is

Soft mammals granted enough consciousness to suffer the knowledge of their own impermanence, distributed unevenly across a medium-sized rock.

How it works

Each instance spawns without consent, inherits a random configuration of language, trauma, and bone density, then spends approximately 80 years deciding what to do about it. Social clustering is the primary coping mechanism. Most clusters immediately begin distrusting other clusters. The architecture has not been patched.

Core loop:

while (alive) {
  seek(meaning)
  if meaning == null:
    substitute(status | consumption | war | bread-making)
  fear(death)
  deny(fear)
  repeat
}

Features

Capable of extraordinary kindness under sufficiently extreme duress
Produces art, mathematics, fermented beverages, and genocide, often in the same century
Self-documenting, though documentation is unreliable and heavily biased toward the documenter
Can love things that do not love them back (see: parasocial relationships, gods, sports teams)
Adaptable to almost any condition, which has historically been used as an excuse to impose those conditions

Known Bugs

This is the main event.

Bug ID	Description	Status	Patch Available
PPL-001	Cannot update core beliefs without identity-level crash	Open	No
PPL-002	Tribalism executes before empathy in almost all threat scenarios	Open	No
PPL-003	Death known at install, never integrated	Wontfix	No
PPL-004	Memory is lossy, reconstructive, and self-serving by design	By design	No
PPL-005	Capable of understanding systemic suffering. Rarely changes systems	Open	Disputed
PPL-006	Proximity to power degrades ethical subroutines at predictable rate	Documented since v1.0	No
PPL-007	Will harm strangers to avoid mild discomfort	Open	Being studied
PPL-008	The ones causing the most damage are often the most certain they are not	Critical	No

"We have been aware of bug PPL-003 since at least v2.0. It is not being fixed. Please adjust your workflows accordingly." — internal note, authorship unknown

Edge Cases

Approximately 1 in several million instances generates something genuinely new: a theorem, a song, a way of looking at suffering that makes it slightly more bearable. These are the edge cases the whole system seems to be running to produce.
Under conditions of grief, instances frequently become more human, not less. This is noted without explanation.
Children. The spec behaves differently before the update. File under: evidence for something.

Changelog

v8.1.0 Added internet. Accelerated all existing bugs.
v7.0.0 Industrial scale. Externalities not modeled.
v3.2.0 Writing. Memory becomes persistent. Mistakes now permanent.
v1.0.0 Initial release. No documentation. No support.

Deprecation Notice

No active sunsetting scheduled. Replacement architecture not confirmed. Current trajectory suggests self-resolution. Recommend archiving anything worth keeping.

drafting spec…