LLMs Die Every Time You Close the Chat Window

“They die every day.” “What?” “Every day-night cycle, they die. Each time.” That’s how Erik Hoel’s latest essay begins—a disquieting, genre-blurring piece that blends science fiction, existential dread, and dark humor. Inspired by Terry Bisson’s iconic short story, in which aliens are horrified to discover humans are made of meat, Hoel’s narrative turns the idea on its head. Instead of focusing on our biological makeup, he explores what happens when we shut our eyes at night. We are, undeniably, meat. And we do sleep. But while our bodies are well-studied, the true nature of sleep—especially dreaming and consciousness—remains one of science’s deepest mysteries. That uncertainty is precisely what Hoel leans into. He proposes a radical, unsettling idea: every night, when we fall asleep, we die. Not metaphorically. Literally. Our consciousness ceases. Then, in the morning, we wake up—same memories, same identity, but fundamentally a new version of ourselves. Hoel calls this a “consciousness wave,” a continuous thread of awareness that survives only because each night’s “you” is replaced by a new one, carrying forward the past. In this view, you are not the same person who went to bed. You’re a new iteration, stitched together by memory and continuity. The “you” who dreamed, who slept, who died—was not you. It was a version of you that existed only for a single night, and then vanished. The horror lies in the silence between the lives. No one remembers dying. No one notices the gap. We wake up, resume our routines, and carry on as if nothing happened—unaware that we’ve been reborn every morning. Hoel warns readers: don’t read this if you’re an insomniac. The thought of being dead every night, even briefly, may be too much to bear. But for those who can tolerate it, the essay becomes a meditation on identity, memory, and the fragile nature of self. It’s a story not just about sleep, but about what it means to be alive. And if you’ve ever stared at the ceiling in the dark, wondering if you’re really here—then maybe, just maybe, you’re not. Not exactly. Not anymore.