This post is a followup to a post claiming the aliens designed by H R Giger in the movie “Aliens” are based on the human body.
That previous post claimed Giger created his aliens based on sensations he was receiving from his Please take a moment to examine the following Giger image showing an alien on the chest of a human being with the alien inserting a tube into the mouth of the human being.
The previous post claimed Giger based the design of that alien on sensations he was feeling from his mouth and lungs. He visualized those sensations as being caused by a creature like the one in the picture. The exact look and design of the creature are based on the exact physical sensations his body is experiencing.
What are those sensations that Giger felt that he based the alien on? They were the hyper detailed sensations of breathing.
When most people breath they feel their chest rise and perhaps other muscles move. That is all. They feel like they are sucking air into their body when their muscles expand, and they are pushing air out of their body when their muscles contract.
A human being who is hyper-aware of the sensations experiences the sensations of breathing in a more detailed way that is closer to how the act of breathing really works. The act of breathing really works by the atmosphere forcing air into the body. The entire atmosphere of the planet earth can be visualized as forcing some of itself into the lungs of the human body. In that visualization of breathing, the act of breathing is really about forcing air out of the body instead of pulling air into the body.
That description can be very hard to visualize. The following series of pictures might help with understanding the point this post is trying to make.
Please examine the following photo.
This picture shows a strongman participating in a contest whose goal is to blow up a hot water bottle as large as possible. For those readers who are not familiar with hot water bottles, the point of the competition is that hot water bottles are made from a very thick material that makes them very hard to inflate. The strength required to inflate a hot water bottle by exhaling into one is mind boggling.
When you looked at the photo of the man blowing up the water bottle, did you realize that the man and water bottle look similar to Giger’s image of the human being with an alien on his chest?
The only real difference between the two pictures is that the alien has a more complex shape than the hot water bottle,
and the man is blowing into the hot water bottle while the alien has a tube stuck into the mouth of the human being.
So the alien can be visualized as an empty bag or hot water bottle full of air,
instead of a living creature with part of itself inserted into the throat of the human being.
The sensations that Giger based the design of the alien on are the same sensations that would be experienced by the strong man if he relaxed his body and allowed the high pressure of the air in the hot water bottle to press into his mouth and lungs.
Instead of breathing feeling like the self motivated act of expanding and contracting his chest, Giger felt as if something outside of his body was forcing air into it that his body then forced out.
The author believes Giger created horrifying aliens instead of some more benign type of alien because the idea that something outside of his body and beyond his control was forcing air into his lungs and thereby keeping him alive, instead of him being completely in control of his own life giving breathing, frightened him badly.
There is also the possibility Giger realized that if something outside of his body was breathing for him, it was possible that he was merely an appendage of whatever it was that was forcing air into his lungs, instead of an autonomous thinking human being.