Analysis
While Philip K. Dick’s stories are not commonly read and even less frequently analyzed, “Second Variety” is one of those that has been commonly anthologized and is known to most Philip K. Dick fans and scholars. Of the story, Dick said: “My grant theme—who is human and who only appears (masquerades) as human? —emerges most fully. Unless we can individually and collectively be certain of the answer to this question, we face what is, in my view, the most serious problem possible.” (414) It is not the best or the most development of Dick’s stories on this theme, but it is one of the most brutal and memorable. I think what makes is so memorable is its brutal honesty about the logic of war.