Bakker の Pacific Rim Job

[Sci-2]

Dammit, you're making me think that wracu are sentient machines again! (more than meets the eye!) Please stop! last time I asserted that I was embarassingly pwnd by the texts that seem to refute that supposition. It is so hard to let go of a theory. :-p

Well, HE did point out that the Inchoroi weapon races present a strategy for dealing with strong AI - leash them by making their goal seeking orient toward things you can provide.

Mallahet was eyeless when he delivered the message in Monmem. Nice try though.

I think if you have your eyes removed it maybe requires maintenance to keep them clean? Could that be where the blood comes from?

[Happy Ent]

One of the nice things about Rowling's Harry Potter is how normal and imperfect he often is, and replacing Harry Potter for a Mary Sue Kellhus figure actually undermines the Methods of Rationality experiment much more than it undermines the Harry Potter novels, imo.

To expand on that, many of the factions in Bakkerverse are indeed completely rational already. It would be difficult to write Achamian and the Methods of Rationality fanfiction, having the sorcerers of Atyersus systematically and rationally examine the boundary conditions of specific spells, because we assume that they’ve done exactly that for hundreds of years. Bakkerverse contains in-universe rationality, and it’s shown all the time.

The only way of making it funny would be Psatma and the Methods of Rationality.

Or make it about Scranc, but that would probably be too seedy even for fanfiction.

[Happy Ent]

Well, HE did point out that the Inchoroi weapon races present a strategy for dealing with strong AI - leash them by making their goal seeking orient toward things you can provide.

But I’m not sure the Wracu are originally constructed by the Inchoroi. I could imagine they’re a race that they just picked up along the way.

[Francis Buck]

Interesting possibility. It would at least potentially explain the topos stuff (although didn't Akka say that Wutteat can't die until...well now I don't even remember what until, so it's probably irrelevant, I was going to say "their makers" but that doesn't really make sense), although I suppose that could just have been an accident. It may not have even "activated" until they reached Earwa. Speaking of which, is it ever explained how the Inchoroi knew about Earwa in the first place? It wouldn't make much sense for them to have legends or whatever. Did they surmise that it must exist "scientifically"?

[Francis Buck]

So it does seem as though the dragons carry their own frame [or at least their bodies are enchanted], which makes sense since the idea of a non-magical being holding molten laughing [lava] in its flesh exceeds the plausible bounds of the Bakkerverse's rules.

Can someone expand on what you guys actually mean when you're talking about "frames" in this context.

[unJon]

Akka says the wight in the mountain drags his own frame with him so the Mim's chorae should have had no effect. There is no contradiction. Unlike say the ciphrang who are called into the world with the Daimos, without the frame of the Outside.

[Madness]

The Wight brings its own 'Frame' from the Outside into the World. Also, Bakker uses 'frame' in other works to suggest existence beyond what we perceive.

FB, you might enjoy The Inchoroi. Somewhere in there we theorize about how the Inchoroi find Earwa. Also, some good shit about damnation and the Outside, if I recall.

EDIT: Damn, unJon ;).

[Sci-2]

Frame basically means the surrounding reality.

Wutteat does say he exceeds his Makers. I think Wutteat is some original creature that the Inchies modified, but he was not produced in their machines/laboratories. That he has a soul suggests that to me.

Speaking of origins, here's a curious bit from False Sun:

Titirga Mithalara, they called him–the Giver of Mercy!–ironic renown for his ruthless extermination of his foes. He was certainly the most powerful Insinger ever born. And if what Cet’ingira said was true, the most powerful, period. No living Quya had the purity of his Recitations.

So Nonmen aren't born? Or perhaps they existed in their particular form since Earwa began, while men evolved from animals?

Also, I think the book after TUC will be called "The Awakened God". It's a spoiler for readers, but not so terrible for anyone who hasn't read the series yet.

[unJon]

Sci if nonmen aren't born then the womb plague doesn't make much sense.

[Sci-2]

Sci if nonmen aren't born then the womb plague doesn't make much sense.

Oh yeah, I just find the phrasing odd.

I was leaning more toward the idea that the Nonmen were created whole cloth when Earwa came into being, while men evolved.

Speaking of False Suns:

"Before the beginning, after the great war between Heaven and Hell, God created the Earth and gave dominion over it to the crafty ape he called Man. And to each generation was born a creature of light and a creature of darkness. And great armies clashed by night in the ancient war between good and evil. There was magic then, nobility, and unimaginable cruelty. And so it was until the day that a false sun exploded over Trinity, and man forever traded away wonder for reason."

-Carnivale

[unJon]

Not sure where I'm going with this, but . . .

What does Inverse Fire mean? An inverted fire. To invert something is to turn it upside down or maybe inside out. The inverse of a conditional in symbolic logic is obtained by negating both sides.

Bakker uses "inverse" only once in the books, the reference in TTT to the skin spies referring to themselves as Keepers of the Inverse Fire. Cnauir goes on to think that skin spies don't know what that means and get confuse when asked about their "keeping" of their "fire". With the revelation learned in TWLW I now assume this is due to the Inverse Fire being a kind of paradox that a non-souled skin spy cannot grasp rather than simple ignorance.

They claimed to be Keepers of Inverse Fire, though the merest question regarding either their “keeping” or their “fire” pitched them into confusion.

May be why skin spies are the keepers. Intelligent enough yet unaffected by the inverse fire. (Aside, I thought this reference was to an Invers Flame, but if so it has been changed in my Kindle edition.)

Cnauir then goes into an awesome remembrance where he inverts a tree ( this has to be author signaling!!)

As a child, Cnaiür had been fascinated by trees . . . . Sometimes he would stare at the bare trees for so long, they would lose their radial dimensions and seem something flat, like blood smeared into the wrinkles about an old woman’s eyes.

(Aside, has anyone done a review of the tree imagery in the books? So much there from the twigs to the entrances to mansions, etc. and IIRC Bakker on the Dead Seas board confirmed that the tree imagery was intentional and meaningful.)

The word "inverted" is used four times, all in AE.

1) Esmi POV in TJE when she's in the council chambe I envision as the Senate chambe in Star Wars. Described as being created to be an inerverted ziggarut of Xijoser, so that it could be tipped in and fit perfectly. Proyas once quipped "sometimes Men must reach down” when seeking the Truth.

2) TWLW Esmi POV worth quoting in full.

To sell intimacy is to be turned inside out, to make a cloak of your heart, so that others might be warmed. A soul could only be inverted so many times before it all became confused, inside and outside

If fire means soul then is the IF show your soul inside out? Is it the judging eye turned on yourself?

3) TWLW Mimara POV. A sharp intake of breath that sounds like an inverted shriek. Then some interesting imagery of the Nail of Heaven over Kosoter so that he looks like an unholy wraith and "a dark god come to punish for mere perversity’s sake." (Again author indicating what IF shows??)

4) Akka POV in TWLW after destruction of Library. The ruins above show like inverted cliffs and valleys.

Anyway thought some of this was interesting and wanted to get it out for groupthink.

What is an inverted fire? Or for what type of object or process is the description Inverse Fire apt? May speculate a bit later.

ETA: also the Kel looking through the fire to spy stuff and the old story of the shaman that plunges his face into the fire when a god tells him to. Maybe fires are some sort of portal in Bakkerverse. Maybe inverting that window means instead if seeing something, you let that something into you and FEEL or experience it?

[Sci-2]

Well we know it allows one to see the Outside. If the qualities of a fire are light + heat, the inverse fire might be dark + cold.

Alternatively, instead of providing illumination Inward the Inverse Fire illuminates the Outside, and that's the inversion?

Perhaps you look at the fire and it shows you Hell? Shae talks about what he sees, but also acts as if he'd directly experienced his impending damnation:

Experience shredded into a thousand strings, each clawed and burned and burned, sucked like bottomless bones. Agony. Anguish. Horror. Lament. Shame… Shrieking-thrashing-screaming through the throat of his every memory, innumerable and one, groaning-choking-vomiting, his every particle a unique agony, a bereavement, a weeping-howling-scratching out eyes that grew and grew to witness anew, while burning-blistering-breaking–

It defeated the tongue, the intellect, what he had seen. Nevertheless it was in him, every moment in him, if not at the centre of his care then beneath, a hole that endlessly gnawed at his gut…

Apparently it's akin to having the Judging Eye and looking into a mirror.

I don't know why the skin spies as [are] Keepers of the Inverse Fire, though you might be right that it requires the apprehension of paradox in some way. I do think there's some connection between the Aporos, what Mimara sees in the chorae, and souls.

[Francis Buck]

So does no one buy the possibility that the Inverse Fire is bullshit? As in, it's not really showing the truth, it's just a tool meant to trick people into believing they're dead by fucking with their brains (namely sorcerers, who are ostensibly guaranteed to be damned anyway, so they would always believe it). I was actually surprised about the aspect of ambiguity Bakker had there when I finally read TFS, since I had never noticed anyone talking about it. I mean I personally think it's probably legit, since we know that Hell and the Outside actually exist, but in that case it seems strange for Bakker to have the ambiguous element at all. Just to make us scratch our heads maybe? I think It would also kind of draw away from the power (in a literary sense) of the Inverse Fire if it's bullshit, not to mention making it kind of weird that the skin-spies would call themselves the keepers of it (which to me actually implies that it's more than just a way gain the allegiance of sorcerers). When was TFS released? Did it come out before TJE where it was made clear just how real and crazy the stuff with the Gods and the Outside was?

[Sci-2]

So does no one buy the possibility that the Inverse Fire is bullshit?

Yup, I'm with Titirga - it's a goad rather than a revelation.

I was actually surprised about the aspect of ambiguity Bakker had there when I finally read TFS, since I had never noticed anyone talking about it.

Heh, almost everything is ambiguous. Even the things I thought were direct quotes - like the God dreaming up the world - turn out to be in-universe speculation.

I mean I personally think it's probably legit, since we know that Hell and the Outside actually exist, but in that case it seems strange for Bakker to have the ambiguous element at all.

But the existence of the Outside doesn't prove the Inverse Fire does what it says on the label.

I'm sort of curious about the Hells. Essentially the gods use humans as toys/drugs, forcing souls through whatever subjective reality they choose to create? Perhaps some people are actually saved if they god the end up with isn't a total douche bag.

....the skin-spies would call themselves the keepers of it (which to me actually implies that it's more than just a way gain the allegiance of sorcerers).

The Inverse Fire gives you the experience of being damned. Shae decides this is real, that it has to be the future of his soul that he's experiencing.

But what if the Inverse Fire shows everyone what the Inchoroi who already died are experiencing?

When was TFS released? Did it come out before TJE where it was made clear just how real and crazy the stuff with the Gods and the Outside was?

I think it was after WLW actually?

[karaddin]

Yeah after WLW and the other atrocity tale as I remember. Does anyone think there's a chance of Titirga showing up again, be it in wight form or something else? I can't remember if where he falls is still ahead of the great ordeal (or akka and mim) or not. The whole thing with his washed mark seems etc seems like too much set up to only be seen in a short story.

Guess it could be set up for the metaphysics though rather than the character.

[kuenjato]

I think it was after WLW actually?

January 2012 (I just re-read the story a few days ago). WLW came out in spring 2011.

[Francis Buck]

Yeah after WLW and the other atrocity tale as I remember. Does anyone think there's a chance of Titirga showing up again, be it in wight form or something else? I can't remember if where he falls is still ahead of the great ordeal (or akka and mim) or not. The whole thing with his washed mark seems etc seems like too much set up to only be seen in a short story.

Guess it could be set up for the metaphysics though rather than the character.

I really, really hope Titiriga shows up again, though I've no clue how that could happen,and I'm not holding out much hope. He instantly became one of my favorite characters in the series, and all from one little short story. I've said it before but I think TFS was some of, if not the best writing I've ever seen from Bakker. My typical issues with his prose were literally non-existent. And both Shae and Titirga's characterizations were amazing, considering how little "screentime" they had. If this is indicative of what TUC will be like, then I'm ready to be floored.

And as you said, Titiriga's abilities, and the implications they have on the metaphysics, are pretty crazy. But yeah, I don't see him coming back unfortunately. More likely, I think, is the possibility that another character will show up in the series who possesses similar traits. Mimara's baby, perhaps, as a result of the Qirri? Or hell even Mimara herself at some point.

I wonder if the simple act of using the Psukhe can actually diminish someones mark, even if they use other sorceries such as the Gnosis?

[Sci-2]

IIRC Bakker's talked about a stand alone prequel.

Titiriga may show up there.

I wonder if the simple act of using the Psukhe can actually diminish someones mark, even if they use other sorceries such as the Gnosis?

Hmm, that's an interesting possibility. I actually think Titiriga's purpose in the greater narrative is to explain how Khellus will become immune to Chorae.

[Rhom]

IIRC Bakker's talked about a stand alone prequel.

Titiriga may show up there.

Hmm, that's an interesting possibility. I actually think Titiriga's purpose in the greater narrative is to explain how Khellus will become immune to Chorae.

In what order should I read the standalone prequel? :lol:

[Sci-2]

In what order should I read the standalone prequel? :lol:

Heheheheh...

Got an email from the guy who runs the author site today. (I'd mentioned the forum link had changed)

Was SO damn tempted to ask if I could just have a minute of Bakker's time...