White-Luck Warrior VI

[Curethan]

@ Callan,

I'm saying that the author has chosen to explore the idea of the soul as being real. It's fantasy + philosophy 101. He's put souls in there and the idea of a real god. That means free will. The basis of the concepts are classical ideas from Plato and Aristotle, stoicism et al. They are presented as real, so the author's personal belief about whether free choice exists in the real world is immaterial - anyway, I am certainly not going to say what he believes. But I can tell you that people in these books have souls. And I can tell you from a philosophical viewpoint, this is inexorably linked to the notion of free will. RSB studied philosophy, ergo this is dealt with in how he presents these things.

Its like suggesting that sorcery isn't real in Earwa because Bakker doesn't actually believe in magic :P

[jurble]

Cnaiur disagrees. Once you know you are being manipulated, it breaks the chain and allows choice.

And he is wrong. The calculations are simply harder. But Kellhus manipulates him the same. There is no such thing as choice, neither for the world-born, or for the Dunyain. The Dunyain are simply cognizant of this.

[The Imp's Advocate]

And he is wrong. The calculations are simply harder. But Kellhus manipulates him the same. There is no such thing as choice, neither for the world-born, or for the Dunyain. The Dunyain are simply cognizant of this.

Kellhus does not manipulate him the same. It's a struggle between them, and Kellhus did not win every battle. Remember Proyas? Cnaiur forewarned Proyas of Kellhus' methods, and Kellhus found himself in a situation that he didn't anticipate, and was not prepared for. It resulted in him nearly getting killed, a situation even Mo's Thousandfold Thought faltered at.

In a world with an omniscient, omnipresent, all-powerful God, everything is determined beforehand and there is no free will, even though it appears to us that there is. But the gods can be blind, Kellhus can make mistakes, and the closest thing we have to a God god in our theories is a set of laws of morality for the universe.

Free will exists.

[Sci-2]

It seems pretty clear Bakker makes us question the notion of Free Will in the books. However, he does seem to have people awaken and fight against their conditioning.

What seems really clear is that the world is unjust, that the God behind the morality is either sleeping at the wheel or incredibly cruel. People are herded into damnation simply by accident of birth and endless conditioning of their personalities.

[Kalbear]

Feel free to say I've grabbed onto some wacky interpretation of objective. Indeed, I would prefer if it just came down to such a mistake on my part.

You've grabbed some wacky interpretation of it.

In Earwa - this is the important thing - the universe functions differently than it does in the real world. For starters, there is a place called the Outside, and it is real and reachable. Magic exists and is demonstrably scientific and repeatable. Souls exist and are measurable. And the method of transit from the Earwan physical world of souls to the Outside is by means of a weighing device, which has the traits of objective morality - morality that is measurable, repeatable, and works everywhere the same way.

Now, this objective morality is the same concept as a sci-fi book having ways to circumvent lightspeed or a fantasy book having ways to summon shadowdemons. The existence of an objective morality in a fantasy novel does not mean that we must either believe it or the other. You are right that it is not a TRUE objective morality in the sense that it does not govern all real and imaginary worlds everywhere, but that's a really lame argument to make. it's like saying that because star wars has hyperspeed and lightsabers and the force but they're not in the real world that Star Wars is a lying liar who lies. Of COURSE it's a lie! This is a made up tale! It's all a lie.

I also don't have a single problem grasping the rules of a morality that isn't my own without believing in it. Even if there was a true objective morality in our world I wouldn't have a problem grasping the rules without believing in it - which is indeed what virtually every Earwan does already, since they constantly violate the rules of morality for personal gain or other reason.

One does not have to follow an objective morality, after all, even after knowing about its existence.

Also, on sorcerers being damned: they are by far the best people to understand damnation, since they can go to the Outside and see it and come back. We don't know for sure if sorcerers are damned, but they have a lot of evidence including first-person accounts to use in their favor.

[jurble]

Kellhus does not manipulate him the same. It's a struggle between them, and Kellhus did not win every battle. Remember Proyas? Cnaiur forewarned Proyas of Kellhus' methods, and Kellhus found himself in a situation that he didn't anticipate, and was not prepared for. It resulted in him nearly getting killed, a situation even Mo's Thousandfold Thought faltered at.

In a world with an omniscient, omnipresent, all-powerful God, everything is determined beforehand and there is no free will, even though it appears to us that there is. But the gods can be blind, Kellhus can make mistakes, and the closest thing we have to a God god in our theories is a set of laws of morality for the universe.

Free will exists.

God does not preclude free-will. Physics does. Just because Kellhus can make errors does not mean free will exists. It means he lacks data. Moreover, he DID expect Cnaiur to betray him. He formulates Cnaiur's betrayal and Serwe's death in a short scene at the beginning of TWP. I'll look for it after I come back from class.

If Free-Will exists, then everything the Dunyain do is pointless. But it doesn't. It can't exist. Perhaps you misunderstand the definition of free-will being used here. The ability to make decisions and act on decisions is not free will. That is an illusion. The fact that the question exists in the first place (the Circumstance to the Dunyain) means you are bound to the causal chain. Your decision is the only decision you can make. Your brain's processors thrumming along to your personal equation of existence, plugging in whatever variables they need to, will make the same decision every single time given the same circumstances.

The whole goal of the Dunyain to become free of causality so that free-will can actually exist. To be an unmoved mover.

[The Imp's Advocate]

God does not preclude free-will. Physics does. Just because Kellhus can make errors does not mean free will exists. It means he lacks data. Moreover, he DID expect Cnaiur to betray him. He formulates Cnaiur's betrayal and Serwe's death in a short scene at the beginning of TWP. I'll look for it after I come back from class.

If Free-Will exists, then everything the Dunyain do is pointless. But it doesn't. It can't exist. Perhaps you misunderstand the definition of free-will being used here. The ability to make decisions and act on decisions is not free will. That is an illusion. The fact that the question exists in the first place (the Circumstance to the Dunyain) means you are bound to the causal chain. Your decision is the only decision you can make. Your brain's processors thrumming along to your personal equation of existence, plugging in whatever variables they need to, will make the same decision every single time given the same circumstances.

The whole goal of the Dunyain to become free of causality so that free-will can actually exist. To be an unmoved mover.

It doesn't take Kellhus' brain to figure out that Cnaiur would betray Kellhus.Give me the quote, and I'll believe you, but I'm pretty sure that Kellhus was unprepared for the exact method of it: Cnaiur coaching Proyas. I don't remember if we read it from Proyas' or Kellhus' perspective, but he definitely showed uncertainty and made missteps.

And that is certainly the Dunyain's perspective, that free will doesn't exist - yet. It's the philosophical basis for their way of life. But simply because their breeding program brains and intense training lets them manipulate people doesn't mean that they are right. We know they are ignorant of magic and the Outside, limited in a sense by their pure focus on the logos.

But people's actions cannot be so finely determined except by an omniscient, all-powerful entity. Then all the causal wave-functions collapse, and there can be no choices other than what that entity sees. Kellhus is not that entity, the gods Outside aren't that entity, it might not exist at all.

If Kellhus ascends, and becomes truly all-knowing and all-seeing, then free will will cease to exist (for everyone except him, and maybe not even then). For now, it's still going.

[jurble]

There was a world, Eärwa, enslaved by history, custom, and animal hunger, a world driven by the hammers of what came before.

There was Achamian and all he had uttered. The Apocalypse, the lineages of Emperors and Kings, the Houses and Schools of the Great Factions, the panoply of warring nations. And there was sorcery, the Gnosis, and the prospect of near-limitless power.

There was Esmenet and slender thighs and piercing intellect.

There was Sarcellus and the Consult and a wary truce born of enigma and hesitation.

There was Saubon and torment pitched against lust for power.

There was Cnaiür and madness and martial genius and the growing threat of what he knew.

There was the Holy War and faith and hunger.

And there was Father.

What would you have me do?

Possible worlds blew through him, fanning and branching into a canopy of glimpses . . .

Nameless Schoolmen climbing a steep, gravelly beach. A nipple pinched between fingers. A gasping climax. A severed head thrust against the burning sun. Apparitions marching out of morning mist.

A dead wife.

Kellhus exhaled, then breathed deep the bittersweet pinch of cedar, earth, and war.

There was revelation.

from the end of chapter 9 in TWP

[lokisnow]

from the end of chapter 9 in TWP

Nameless Schoolmen climbing a steep, gravelly beach. A nipple pinched between fingers. A gasping climax. A severed head thrust against the burning sun. Apparitions marching out of morning mist.

A dead wife.

presuming the first is the last, and is from Dagliash. But how would Kellhus know what the geography of Dagliash was like? I guess from Akka, but it'd be nice to wonder if this particular detail is indicative of a prophetic vision rather than a probability trance. Nipple and climax could/would seem to be the skinspy interrogation of Serwe, or it could be any of dozens of other possibilities. Severed head, could be Kellhus' head at Dagliash, could be skin spy's head at the Circumfix. The appartitions seem to be the end of TWP when the beseiged and post circumfix religiously fanatic exit the city and rout the beseigers. Dead wife seems to be clear, or it's a double vision and is Esme and we only think its Serwe because we're conditioned to look only to what we already know. ;) But this whole passage could very well indicate that Kellhus from this point was conditioning everything that happened with the Circumfix.

[jurble]

presuming the first is the last, and is from Dagliash. But how would Kellhus know what the geography of Dagliash was like? I guess from Akka, but it'd be nice to wonder if this particular detail is indicative of a prophetic vision rather than a probability trance. Nipple and climax could/would seem to be the skinspy interrogation of Serwe, or it could be any of dozens of other possibilities. Severed head, could be Kellhus' head at Dagliash, could be skin spy's head at the Circumfix. The appartitions seem to be the end of TWP when the beseiged and post circumfix religiously fanatic exit the city and rout the beseigers. Dead wife seems to be clear, or it's a double vision and is Esme and we only think its Serwe because we're conditioned to look only to what we already know. ;) But this whole passage could very well indicate that Kellhus from this point was conditioning everything that happened with the Circumfix.

Huh, Dagliash? Dagliash is thousands of miles away. Kellhus' head at Dagliash what? The Nameless Schoolmen climbing a beach is the Mandate arriving, I think. Might refer to something else. The severed head is definitely Cnaiur raising Sarcellus' head.

[Callan S.]

@ Callan,

I'm saying that the author has chosen to explore the idea of the soul as being real.

Ah, I get you - I retract my prior assertion. I missread you :(

But I can tell you that people in these books have souls.

But I'll continue to be argumentative anyway, because this is the interwebs!

Well, there aren't any people in the books (unless the books are kinda like soilent green...). I mean, it's a conjecture of souldom, really?

The skinspies and sranc have no soul because they lack reason

Except for that skin spy who infiltrated the mandate, as he could do magic.

Sometimes souls bounce?

[lokisnow]

Huh, Dagliash? Dagliash is thousands of miles away. Kellhus' head at Dagliash what? The Nameless Schoolmen climbing a beach is the Mandate arriving, I think. Might refer to something else. The severed head is definitely Cnaiur raising Sarcellus' head.

arriving where, shimeh? (I need to reread TTT I've forgotton so much)

[Curethan]

If Free-Will exists, then everything the Dunyain do is pointless. But it doesn't. It can't exist. Perhaps you misunderstand the definition of free-will being used here. The ability to make decisions and act on decisions is not free will. That is an illusion. The fact that the question exists in the first place (the Circumstance to the Dunyain) means you are bound to the causal chain. Your decision is the only decision you can make. Your brain's processors thrumming along to your personal equation of existence, plugging in whatever variables they need to, will make the same decision every single time given the same circumstances.

Nope.

The dunyain merely seperate the idea of the logos from the soul. They believe the soul is part of the world (and therefore bound by causality), but that the logos lies outside the circle of the world.

Its quite evident that the soul is conected to the outside. Moenghus doesn't believe in damnation and refutes this evidence when Kellhus points it out.

The fact is that the worldborn cannot implement their will because it has been surrendered to passion and belief. That is why they are subject to damnation and the manipulations of the hundred gods. But kneeling is still a choice.

Psatma to Meppa; "You throw number sticks for your salvation, when all you need do is kneel."

Refer to my earlier quote to see that the logos is derived from Plato's philosophical breakdown of the soul. In both situations it refers to reason. And according to the dunyain all souls possess conatus (will, seperated from desire and appetite) but cannot escape the cycle of passion and are thus enslaved by what comes before. They believe the will to be illusory, but thats only in the sense that the worldborn decieve themselves. This doesn't mean they don't believe in free will - it's what they strive for and they recognize its development as an incremental process.

Cnaiur escapes Kellhus' manipulations by making whim his rule. He is only able to do this because of his intellect (i.e. the logos), not because of his madness (which is entirely predictable).

Psatma mentions how much Kellhus has stolen - she is refering to the number of souls he has yoked to his choices. Their damnation rests with him. Whole nations can be damned.

Put it this way, you simply can't be enslaved without the notion that you can somehow be freed.

Finally, the epigraph from prologue 1 (TDTCB) gives Ajencis' definition of the soul; "that which precedes everything". If that does not serve as a clear indication that RSB intends to explore the soul as the notion of free will, I can't really offer anything else that will convince.

[Curethan]

Except for that skin spy who infiltrated the mandate, as he could do magic.

Sometimes souls bounce?

Yeh, somewhere in the TTglossary there is a reference to animals sometimes born with a soul as well. Once they got an ensouled skinspy they could use their sorcery grafting procedure. Highly unlikely that the consult would clue on to the idea of intentionally giving their bioweapons the potential to defy them though - even though that defiance would be as even more unlikely than the randomly souled critter. It does remind me of the occasion when Kellhus tried to bluff not-Sarcellus II that his predecessor had gone turncoat.

Souls in the outside are somewhat different from ensouled critters too. They appear to be discrete conglomerates of experiential memory and emotion that can be given some kind of afterlife or absorbed or otherwise somehow utilised by outside agencies. More like ghosts, I think.

Not really sure what a bouncing soul is though - something like a discrete ghost/topos maybe?

[Kalbear]

I think that the free will idea is a nonstarter, especially for Bakker - since he essentially is a zealot for the notion that no one has free will and all our thoughts of free will are rationalizations based on prior neural programming and environmental cues.

The Dunyain believe what comes before determines what comes after and long to break that chain. However, they're wrong; it's clear that with the Outside, with the 'everything happening at the same time' thing that Mimara experiences, from the White Luck Warrior, from the prophecies that are true - that what can come after can influence what comes before. However, that doesn't change the idea that there is no free will. It just changes what sources choose your actions for you. It seems like the only way to break the chain of the darkness that comes before is to become something inhuman.

Which is one of the reasons I figure Kellhus is trying to become the No-God.

[Callan S.]

You've grabbed some wacky interpretation of it.

Okay, but if below your trying to explain how it's wacky, I don't get your explanation as yet. I'll explain further how I don't get it, below.

In Earwa - this is the important thing - the universe functions differently than it does in the real world. For starters, there is a place called the Outside, and it is real and reachable. Magic exists and is demonstrably scientific and repeatable. Souls exist and are measurable. And the method of transit from the Earwan physical world of souls to the Outside is by means of a weighing device, which has the traits of objective morality - morality that is measurable, repeatable, and works everywhere the same way.

How do you distinguish between, say, gravity (ie, you let go of something, it falls) and say, pressing an elevator call button and the elevator door opens, it awaiting?

The latter happens consistantly, measurable, repeatably. Works the same way each time. Objectively, even.

So, is it a law of the universe that that button calls an elevator. An objective law?

Or is it a fabrication? An artificial construct?

So. How did the morality, for you, manage to fall into the same basket as gravity, rather than the other basket?

Now, this objective morality is the same concept as a sci-fi book having ways to circumvent lightspeed or a fantasy book having ways to summon shadowdemons. The existence of an objective morality in a fantasy novel does not mean that we must either believe it or the other. You are right that it is not a TRUE objective morality in the sense that it does not govern all real and imaginary worlds everywhere, but that's a really lame argument to make. it's like saying that because star wars has hyperspeed and lightsabers and the force but they're not in the real world that Star Wars is a lying liar who lies. Of COURSE it's a lie! This is a made up tale! It's all a lie.

So your saying morality is all a lie as well, as much as lightsabers and hyperdrives are?

When I hear morality, I hear a reference to a real thing from the real world, even if it's only inclinations baked into real life genes.

Is the reference to morality a reference to something from our own world? I mean, when Solo falls in love for Leia, I assume it's a kind of 'love' that we can see in our world, as an example of a direct reference to our own world, right next to light sabers and hyperdrives. Or is Earwa morality a reference to some sort of fantasy, made up hyperdrive morality? Well, if so, as much as you think I make a lame argument, I think calling something 'morality' when it has no ties to real life morality, is a really lame name?

But even if it's a lame name, if such is the case, then I would pay your case. It's not impossible for an author to use the word 'morality' for something that has nothing to do with what I call morality. Like an author could have giant moray eel like creatures that the characters ride around on, and call them 'moralities' (geddit? moray - moral! Me so funny!). Kind of a lame name, but okays?

I also don't have a single problem grasping the rules of a morality that isn't my own without believing in it. Even if there was a true objective morality in our world I wouldn't have a problem grasping the rules without believing in it - which is indeed what virtually every Earwan does already, since they constantly violate the rules of morality for personal gain or other reason.

One does not have to follow an objective morality, after all, even after knowing about its existence.

Except the word 'damnation' is important to you. I'm sorry, I'm disinclined to believe it if you say that word isn't important to you, given your previous posts. And these books keep getting you to include a word of great import to you.

If anything, this is the sort of thing I think Scott goes on about when he says the books have layers that could make up various thesis's. I imagine he's probably pitching the idea of how a text can grab an important thing to you, and animate it. Let's look at his blog post

Somehow, using only the reed-thin bandwidths of oral and visual signalling, these supercomplicated systems are able to coordinate, assimilate, and compete. Posed in these terms, it almost seems a miracle that language works at all. In a sense, it’s like stirring the ocean with a swizel-stick, except that this particular ocean consists of information: everything the system takes up will have systematic consequences—potentially drastic ones. Love. Murder. This ocean has evolved to be stirred by next to nothing at all.

Stired by next to nothing at all. My exact point. How do his words have such power with you? How can he grab the importance you find in the word 'damnation' and animate it as he will? Or more to the point, when you see this process - do you want to go with such a process? Or not? Maybe the former? Maybe the latter? To be or not to be? I'm not trying to describe the process simply to push for a particular choice on that matter. More describing it so you have a choice on that matter.

Also, on sorcerers being damned: they are by far the best people to understand damnation, since they can go to the Outside and see it and come back. We don't know for sure if sorcerers are damned, but they have a lot of evidence including first-person accounts to use in their favor.

Again, 'damnation'.

In terms of seeing what the celestial mafia has in store - Well, everyone sees the outside in a different way, it's noted in the books. Which makes me wonder if it exists, really? Outside, or just the corners of a frame? But it does seem to be a nasty celestial mafia out there, that's for sure.

[Callan S.]

Which is one of the reasons I figure Kellhus is trying to become the No-God.

I'm inclined to think that's the shortest path to becoming a self moving soul. Though how do you become the absence between thoughts?

[Kalbear]

How do you distinguish between, say, gravity (ie, you let go of something, it falls) and say, pressing an elevator call button and the elevator door opens, it awaiting?The latter happens consistantly, measurable, repeatably. Works the same way each time. Objectively, even.

So, is it a law of the universe that that button calls an elevator. An objective law?

On a surface level? I can't. Neither can you, actually; there's every possibility that gravity is a second or greater order force that is derived from something else, as is the case with relativity theory as well. Gravity is a way to describe what happens in a repeatable way. Now, what we believe is that there is a objective set of laws that govern our universe, but we don't know. And we can't, actually, either.

The thing about the elevator system is that if I wanted to, I could take it apart. I could figure out how it works. Gravity is the same way, though it takes massive force to do so.

So neither are objective laws. Gravity is a theory and the elevator is applied theory.

So. How did the morality, for you, manage to fall into the same basket as gravity, rather than the other basket?

Because Bakker described it as such?

So your saying morality is all a lie as well, as much as lightsabers and hyperdrives are?

Don't be obtuse. I'm saying objective morality is a fiction as much as the others are.

When I hear morality, I hear a reference to a real thing from the real world, even if it's only inclinations baked into real life genes.

Morality isn't a real thing from the real world - it's a meme. It's a construct, a concept - like democracy or capitalism. There isn't any universal morality in the real world either. Some of morality is baked into genes and ties into what makes social animals work, but a lot of it is just complete fiction that evolved over time. So that's your problem that you automatically hear something that is built into humans; it needn't be the case.

Is the reference to morality a reference to something from our own world? I mean, when Solo falls in love for Leia, I assume it's a kind of 'love' that we can see in our world, as an example of a direct reference to our own world, right next to light sabers and hyperdrives. Or is Earwa morality a reference to some sort of fantasy, made up hyperdrive morality? Well, if so, as much as you think I make a lame argument, I think calling something 'morality' when it has no ties to real life morality, is a really lame name?

The reference to morality is a reference to the definition of the word. Much like 'sword' is a reference to the definition of sword. It would be lame if Bakker was using morality to mean something like 'getting fucked in all holes by tentacles' but he doesn't; he means what the definition means, which is a system of measuring right and wrong. That's all morality is. It is different from any established morality we currently have and have ever had (for example, sorcerers are immoral) but it's still a morality. Furthermore, it apparently is established by the universe with actual punishments for being immoral and rewards for being moral. That is very different than our universe, at least from what we can tell.

And that's the real trick, Callan - that in our universe we have no way of determining what these rules are. We cannot go to Heaven or Hell and come back. We cannot talk to the souls of the damned. We can't visit the Outside. But on Earwa, they can. They can determine via measurable results whether or not someone is damned or saved. Using the Judging Eye, they can even see the damnation. We don't have that capability.

So perhaps you object to the objective part. Because it is a morality in Earwa, period.

But even if it's a lame name, if such is the case, then I would pay your case. It's not impossible for an author to use the word 'morality' for something that has nothing to do with what I call morality. Like an author could have giant moray eel like creatures that the characters ride around on, and call them 'moralities' (geddit? moray - moral! Me so funny!). Kind of a lame name, but okays?

It's morality. It is a system of rules to determine right and wrong. If you don't call that morality, what do you call morality? Because at this point it sounds like some stupid semantic argument you're making, and it's getting very tiresome.

[Curethan]

Lol, how the heck do you manage to believe there is external morality that diferentiates between right and wrong and simultaneously assert that there is no free will?

That makes morality not just arbritrary, but something else entirely.

It also makes the Earwan god responsible for creating the no-god.

Oh yeh, I'm forgeting there's no responsibility cuz its all predestination.

This is getting pretty funny.

[Kalbear]

It's pretty simple, Curethan. And it's not a matter of predestination. It's a combination of programming and chaos theory.

Let's say that you have 100 different programs running amok. They can interact with each other and when they do they both are altered in some small way - perhaps one runs faster, the other slower, or one can do a better job of solving a math problem now. And after all that, there's someone overlooking these programs and picking and choosing which ones stick around and which are retired from the game.

Now, how the programs interact and when they interact is entirely random (or as random as a pseudorandom number generator can be), but they can only interact in certain ways. And the results are not entirely predictable. But the choosing algorithm that determines the health of the programs is objective.

And that's what we have here. Humans are base programs that are changed with every interaction with their environment; as Cnaiur notes, if he took a Scylvendi baby and raised in in Nansur, would it be a Nansurian? Of course it would. The morality of Earwa determines who is saved and who is damned, but most everything is influenced by things that came before. So if you were completely omniscient you could perfectly tell exactly where everyone was going to go beforehand.

Except no entity in Earwa or the Outside works like that.