[Dunkelheit]

The existence of the gods and afterlife seems to make the Dunyain philosophy a fools errand (just ask Koringhus). But what if the Dunyain lived on Earth instead of Earwa? Is seeking to free yourself from the darkness that comes before a worthy goal?

Certainly living in ignorance and being at the mercy of unknown forces is not something to be desired. But I'm of the opinion that the Dunyain themselves are especially free either. From the very beginning we see Kellhus making people follow him by explaining and free people from the darkness that makes them act the way they do, in a way making them more like the Dunyain. But that just makes them more dependent on him, more enslaved. Likewise Kellhus himself is, or at least claims to be, completely controlled by his mission. This makes it seem like the Dunyain rather than being the freest people, are actually the most enslaved.

So are we doomed to be slaves no matter what we do?

[EDIT Madness: Title.]

[SmilerLoki]

Do we even have a purchase on self without drives that agitate our minds?

[obstinate]

So are we doomed to be slaves no matter what we do?

Depends on what you mean by slave. If you mean, "can you do something other than be the next step in the great physical chain of events that is our universe," then the answer is no, you can't. By that standard all people, and all things, are slaves. But if the word slave applies to everything in existence, then it seems to have little use. You may as well ask, "do we exist, while we exist?" Yes, indeed we do.

[Dunkelheit]

Depends on what you mean by slave. If you mean, "can you do something other than be the next step in the great physical chain of events that is our universe," then the answer is no, you can't. By that standard all people, and all things, are slaves. But if the word slave applies to everything in existence, then it seems to have little use. You may as well ask, "do we exist, while we exist?" Yes, indeed we do.

Woops, looks like I stumbled into the determinism argument, which wasn't my intention. Yes, I agree that we live in a deterministic universe and all that. What I tried to get at is more that in light of the Dunyain is freedom even a meaningful concept? And if not what should we do about it? Is it better to be a Dunyain than a regular worldborn?

To me it would seem terrifying if someone like Kellhus could just uproot my entire life and make me tool to their unknown agenda. But would really be the alternative? The only person who seems immune to that kind of influence is maybe Cnair, and he has his own troublesome philosophy.

[TLEILAXU]

Well, the essence of Dûnyain philosophy seems to be that even though we are slaves to what comes before (also regarding determinism and free will, keep in mind we could live in a probabilistic universe such that neither perfect determinism and free will exist), the fact that we are able to comprehend this could lead us to eventually becoming self-moving through mastering the Logos, even as everything we do in pursuit of this also is a product of what comes before.

[Woden]

But, men, we too are slaves and tools in the hands of unknown and unseen masters, at least I hope that they don't want to close the world and bugger us like sranc.

[Madness]

Since I precipitated Dunkelheit's creation of this thread, I should bring up Laplace's Demon - though, it sounds like Dunkelheit wants to know if the Dunyain philosophy really imbues them with any more "free-will" than the rest of us (scarequotes because I'm acknowledging the difficulty operationalizing that term for discussion).

[Wilshire]

Since I had to look it

Laplace's Demon:

We may regard the present state of the universe as the effect of its past and the cause of its future. An intellect which at a certain moment would know all forces that set nature in motion, and all positions of all items of which nature is composed, if this intellect were also vast enough to submit these data to analysis, it would embrace in a single formula the movements of the greatest bodies of the universe and those of the tiniest atom; for such an intellect nothing would be uncertain and the future just like the past would be present before its eyes.

From Laplace's Demon wiki, my bold.

Sounds like the Gods . Sorry, I'm off topic.

[Madness]

Lol, thanks, Wilshire.

[The Sharmat]

I feel I should point out that the current scientific consensus has abandoned (or rather, been dragged kicking and screaming away) from the concept of a perfectly knowable Clockwork Universe by revelations in physics. So I'm not sure this version of Dunyain philosophy is any more at home here than in Eärwa, it merely encounters different hurdles.