[TUC Spoilers] Ajokli and the metaphysical whodunit

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MSJ

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« Reply #165 on: October 24, 2017, 11:29:21 pm »
Quote from:  SmilerLoki
As I stated earlier, we probably understand the word "prodigy" very differently.

I should also add that even prodigies are not the best of the best in everything, this is completely unrealistic. Everyone has their own fields of expertise and weak sides.

Definition- prodigy

Quote
a person, especially a young one, endowed with exceptional qualities or abilities.

Its simple, thats the definition, in this case not so much a child but a person. If i remember correctly and id live ro find Bakker's quote, he makes it clear that the Anansurimbor line is heads abobe the rest of the Dunyain.

And, i dont get why you want ro seperate the Dunayain, but not the Nonmen and Inchoroi from Man.... It makes little to no sense. Besides, to me, im not differentiating between any of the above. Point blank, Kellhus was the most powerful, knowledgeable "person" to set foot on Earwa. You make a distinction between the Dunyain and the rest of Earwa, but not Nonmen and Men? It stated multiple times that a Quya mage is practically unbeatable by a Man. The translocation cant and others with two 3 utterals, was spoken by Akka as a thing of legend. Kellhus, basically reinvebted the wheel when it came to sorcery. I dont understand your argument here, other than the fact that you want to argue something.
“No. I am your end. Before your eyes I will put your seed to the knife. I will quarter your carcass and feed it to the dogs. Your bones I will grind to dust and cast to the winds. I will strike down those who speak your name or the name of your fathers, until ‘Yursalka’ becomes as meaningless as infant babble. I will blot you out, hunt down your every trace! The track of your life has come to me,

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« Reply #166 on: October 25, 2017, 01:26:12 am »
Its simple, thats the definition, in this case not so much a child but a person.
Sure, but the fact is, it's not that rare. It's about top 0,2-0,3% of every trade (more likely 0,2 than 0,3). It's also very arbitrary (something unique to an outsider is not that unique to a professional, so the term becomes a bit overused). Take chess, for example. There are, even now, prodigious chess players. They achieve consistent top results, but they lose like everyone else and don't win every competition they enter. There is no unique unbeatable person in any field, it's not how it works. I really can't see Kellhus this way.

But I understand if you want to, it's used in fiction, certainly.

If i remember correctly and id live ro find Bakker's quote, he makes it clear that the Anansurimbor line is heads abobe the rest of the Dunyain.
We should just ask him about it again at some point. I'm in no hurry, though.

And, i dont get why you want ro seperate the Dunayain, but not the Nonmen and Inchoroi from Man....
This, at least, I can answer in detail.

I set the Dunyain apart from every other race in Earwa because of how easy they outshine everyone. The Mutilated somehow grasped the nature of the Inchoroi and their Ark and subsumed the Consult with all of its Nonmen while being taken prisoner and tortured, not to mention they gained operational understanding of the Tekne devices the Inchoroi themselves weren't able to restore. Since I see Kellhus as a top-notch Dunyain, but still a Dunyain, his mastery of the Metagnosis that leaves every Quya far behind is another testament to the abilities of the Dunyain. If that's not enough, there is also the case of Serwa. That's two fields the Dunyain have mastered at the level superseding that of the founders of those fields.

Speaking of the difference between Men and Nonmen, it isn't that high in my eyes. Men made the No-God a reality. The cunning of Men broke the Barricades. Titigra was hailed as the greatest sorcerer to ever draw breath, and he was a Son of Men (at the time when their sorcerous mastery could've been compared to that of their teachers). Maybe Nonmen do surpass Men in general, but when we talk great minds, the difference doesn't really seem to be there. It's the same with the Inchoroi. They were more or less evenly matched with Nonmen, and couldn't finish their own designs to shut the world until Men came along. Aurang and Aurax were cowered by Kellhus and the Mutilated respectively, the same way the Dunyain cower everyone they come across, be it Men or Nonmen.

Then there is that titbit from Koringhus about the Dunyain having unique brain structure. He even compares it to that of an artificially created weapon race. It's compounded by the fact that the Dunyain evolved almost to the point of being incompatible with Men (as you mentioned, they need "the right womb", and it doesn't seem to be an easy thing to find as the Glossary entry "Zikas" suggests). Furthermore, the Whale Mothers pretty much look like they belong to another species altogether.

All of this tells me that they are actually very different, and they bred themselves specifically for intellect, which is what we're discussing. They are also preternaturally strong. Proyas even mentions when he is strung up and Kellhus pulls him up that it's Kellhus's strength that should've first alerted him to the inhuman nature of his prophet. So far, the superiority of the Dunyain to all other races is demonstrated consistently. They are orders of magnitude above everybody else, considering how easy they dominate people.

I actually can accept that, since it took some thousands of years of dedicated breeding and also is reinforced by Earwan metaphysics (the world of the Second Apocalypse is meaningful, and so zealously striving for their goal changed the Dunyain in a way impossible in our world).

Basically, where you see Kellhus and more generally the Anasurimbor line as special, I see the Dunyain as special. Though the Anasurimbor line also has significance, I presume.
« Last Edit: October 25, 2017, 01:28:58 am by SmilerLoki »

MSJ

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« Reply #167 on: October 25, 2017, 07:47:53 am »
Quote
Then there is that titbit from Koringhus about the Dunyain having unique brain structure. He even compares it to that of an artificially created weapon race. It's compounded by the fact that the Dunyain evolved almost to the point of being incompatible with Men (as you mentioned, they need "the right womb", and it doesn't seem to be an easy thing to find as the Glossary entry "Zikas" suggests). Furthermore, the Whale Mothers pretty much look like they belong to another species altogether.

Incorrect. He says that the found where the soul lies in the brain. And, that the Sranc are without it. Deducing that that is where the soul lies. If you need me to, ill quote the passage.
“No. I am your end. Before your eyes I will put your seed to the knife. I will quarter your carcass and feed it to the dogs. Your bones I will grind to dust and cast to the winds. I will strike down those who speak your name or the name of your fathers, until ‘Yursalka’ becomes as meaningless as infant babble. I will blot you out, hunt down your every trace! The track of your life has come to me,

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« Reply #168 on: October 25, 2017, 05:14:57 pm »
Incorrect. He says that the found where the soul lies in the brain. And, that the Sranc are without it. Deducing that that is where the soul lies. If you need me to, ill quote the passage.
As far as I remember, he says that too, yes.

But I was talking about this passage:
Quote from: R. Scott Bakker, "The Great Ordeal", Chapter 8, "Ishuäl"
After the Brethren had thrown back the Shriekers’ first assault, they had pried opened the creature’s skulls. They had been careful to take captives, both for the purposes of interrogation and study. The Neuropuncturists quickly realized the Shriekers weren’t natural. Like the Dûnyain, their neuroanatomy bore all the hallmarks of artifice, with various lobes swollen at the expense of others, the myriad articulations of Cause branching into configurations alien to all other earthly beasts. Structures that triggered anguish in everything from lizards to wolves elicited lust in the Shriekers. They possessed no compassion, no remorse or shame or communal ambition …
Again, like the Dûnyain.

Wilshire

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« Reply #169 on: October 25, 2017, 07:06:18 pm »
I'll have to go back through this more later, but a few quick things.

That quote in TGO of their brains being physically similar (in that they are un-natural) is awesome. Can't say I remember it at all.

The Dunyain are basically the natural evolution side of the tekne weapon races, and yeah, they're definitely over powered in all things by at least one order of magnitude.

The Anasurimbor line is mentioned in text, at least in the case of Koringhus, to be prodigal - to me meaning superior in many ways to the rest of the exception Dunyain. There is also, sorry no quote from me either but its floating around [sigh], mentions from Bakker that Kellhus was also a prodigy. From this, people (me included) tend to extrapolate backwards because we have so few data points to go from, and assume that the rest of the Anasurimbor line tends towards prodigal status.

Probably worth noting, but maybe not here, the Dunyain as described to us are similar to autistic savants in their intellectual capacity and gaps in social awareness. Basically a breeding program that selected for autism, with training to overcome the anxieties and other social issues (legion within) associated with it. This is very amusing to me.
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« Reply #170 on: October 25, 2017, 08:04:40 pm »
I'll have to go back through this more later, but a few quick things.

That quote in TGO of their brains being physically similar (in that they are un-natural) is awesome. Can't say I remember it at all.

The Dunyain are basically the natural evolution side of the tekne weapon races, and yeah, they're definitely over powered in all things by at least one order of magnitude.

The Anasurimbor line is mentioned in text, at least in the case of Koringhus, to be prodigal - to me meaning superior in many ways to the rest of the exception Dunyain. There is also, sorry no quote from me either but its floating around [sigh], mentions from Bakker that Kellhus was also a prodigy. From this, people (me included) tend to extrapolate backwards because we have so few data points to go from, and assume that the rest of the Anasurimbor line tends towards prodigal status.
When Koringhus recalls saving his son he says something about picking the one that "smelled most like Anasûrimbor, the most promising of the twelve germs".

Probably worth noting, but maybe not here, the Dunyain as described to us are similar to autistic savants in their intellectual capacity and gaps in social awareness. Basically a breeding program that selected for autism, with training to overcome the anxieties and other social issues (legion within) associated with it. This is very amusing to me.
More like the other way around if you ask me, breeding for restrained and self-aware psychopaths.

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« Reply #171 on: October 25, 2017, 11:48:37 pm »
@SmilerLoki, i stand corrected! ;)

I still sont see whybit would matter if Dunyain are closer to Tekne weapons race. Kellhus dispatchex Aurang with ease and Sacarreess couldnt touch Aurang. So it stands that Kellhus is the greatest sorcerer in the world. I also say the smartest moat knowledgeable, which is how he came to be ssmuch a great sorcerer.
“No. I am your end. Before your eyes I will put your seed to the knife. I will quarter your carcass and feed it to the dogs. Your bones I will grind to dust and cast to the winds. I will strike down those who speak your name or the name of your fathers, until ‘Yursalka’ becomes as meaningless as infant babble. I will blot you out, hunt down your every trace! The track of your life has come to me,

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« Reply #172 on: October 26, 2017, 01:34:05 am »
@SmilerLoki, i stand corrected! ;)
I so liked the scenes with Koringhus I can almost quote them from memory, so no wonder that passage stuck in my head!

I still sont see whybit would matter if Dunyain are closer to Tekne weapons race. Kellhus dispatchex Aurang with ease and Sacarreess couldnt touch Aurang. So it stands that Kellhus is the greatest sorcerer in the world. I also say the smartest moat knowledgeable, which is how he came to be ssmuch a great sorcerer.
The point of that quote is, Dunyain breeding worked, making them more than Men. That was brought up in answer to your question why I think they deserve to be put in a separate category when intellect is concerned.

Thinking about Kellhus and his abilities now, I compare him to other full-blooded and fully-trained Dunyain (because the Mutilated exist, which has bearing on further developments in Earwa). On this my views are as follows: he is in their top 0,2-0,3% by virtue of being a prodigy, but he is not alone in those percentages. This is a realistic outlook on the distribution of talents in a given population, and so I use it as a baseline for the Dunyain population, too. Since we have little information about what other Dunyain do during the events of the series, I consider calling Kellhus the best and smartest premature. I fully expect to get new and exciting revelations precisely about the abilities of other Dunyain (again, because the Mutilated exist). In that regard, my narrative spider-sense is tingling. Additionally of note is the fact that, however it happened, in the confrontation with the Mutilated Kellhus lost.

There is also the matter of the Boy, but he isn't fully-trained, so I expect him to be significantly weaker than the Mutilated or Kellhus. Though I'm not objecting to surprises here, obviously.

Lastly, someone being the best (the smartest, the most powerful, etc.) in everything is completely unrealistic. Someone being without fail the best in something for a significant amount of time (and not just winning one competition, two competitions, or even three competitions) almost never happens, and when it does, it speaks more about luck than anything else. You can see that in sports, in chess, in LoL or StarCraft, whatever strikes your fancy. But it's even more complicated than that. Let's take being the smartest. There are countless avenues of applying your smarts, and they all take time. When you put that time in math, you fall behind on chemistry or trickery. But it's more complicated still. Math is a vast field, and you don't actually learn it in its entirety, you work only on some subjects, inevitably at the expense of others. When you don't think about something, people who do become your betters in those matters. This happens even if you are actually smarter than them and would've achieved better results were you putting your time in their subjects. But your time is limited, you are not omniscient and can do only so much. This is why Kellhus needed to be taught the basics of sorcery, for example. That subject was too advanced (not to mention dangerous) to try to discern by himself and have a chance against trained practitioners afterward.

As Bakker says, Kellhus is one intellect, two hands.

But let's take another example. Say there is a long-range shooting discipline where your results are consistently 98-100% accuracy. You are great, you win competitions fairly often. Your closest rival has only 93-95% scores. Now, imagine there is a shootout, where we for the sake of simplicity disregard luck, speed, difference in mental states, etc. Everything except accuracy. You have 98-100% chance to shoot your opponent dead. But they have 93-95% to do the same to you. This is what I'm talking about when I say some differences are negligible. Your opponent is inferior, but in a confrontation they still present 93-95% chance of death, which is game over, no more you. And this is just one opponent. That's how I see Kellhus looking at a confrontation with other Dunyain even if he considers his abilities superior.

So this whole line of thinking about someone being the smartest or the strongest looks a bit childish to me. I don't think it helps our understanding of the series, because so far Bakker consistently demonstrates admirable adherence to a realistic outlook in things he doesn't explicitly call and show as supernatural (the terms he uses for it vary, of course). Supernatural things work however he wants them to, obviously.

So, if Bakker says Kellhus is the strongest sorcerer, I understand that very generally. It wouldn't mean to me that he would invariably win every sorcerous confrontation. It wouldn't mean there aren't those who wield comparable power (though they probably would need to be Dunyain). It would mean he knows more and can do more than other sorcerers, yes. But not all knowledge is (immediately) practically useful and not all knowledge helps in battle. Not all skills and sorcerous techniques do. And even having superior knowledge doesn't mean knowing everything. For example, Kellhus wasn't able to equip the Great Ordeal with flying chariots, because he "hasn't plumbed the secrets of Mihtrulic".
« Last Edit: October 26, 2017, 08:21:40 pm by SmilerLoki »

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« Reply #173 on: October 29, 2017, 08:06:45 pm »
This is where they bring up "the Art of human extinction, not the fact" matter. I should note that I didn't interpret it as them being ecologically conscious.

True enough. Interesting.

Quote from: R. Scott Bakker, "The Unholy Consult", Chapter 18, "The Golden Room"
“Where you immersed yourself in the Tekne, took up the generational toil of recovering what the Inchoroi have lost, I mastered the Daimos, plundered the Houses of the Dead.”

Hmm...

I attribute the stomp to Kellhus, but being already on the verge of full possession and falling into it shortly after. Here is how it looked like:
Quote from: R. Scott Bakker, "The Unholy Consult", Chapter 18, "The Golden Room"
“And yet you forget,” Anasûrimbor Kellhus replied, grinning.
His reflection raised a knee, stamped a sandalled heel down ...
A cataclysmic thump, mazing the obsidian polish with concentric fractures, resounding through the mountainous bones of the structure, where it reverberated and returned to rock them all ...
Without uttering a word of sorcery.

Following that he talks about the Gnosis and the Daimos (the quote before this one) and only after that goes full Ghost Rider.

Interesting... I do need to pay closer attention to the end of the canon artifact when I come back to my "Reading the..." thread.

This is really unfortunate and probably explains a suspicious lack of innovation in the genre.

+1

(except maybe the Survivor, who didn't do much for the plot)

Well, he's an unsettling cipher for the Mutilated, at least.

There is also, for example, a possibility of someone being insignificantly inferior to Kellhus for all narrative means and purposes. It's a way to continue the Dunsult line, which would be interesting to me.

The Boy?

Bakker, Bakker, Bakker!!!!

Lmao. That's great.
« Last Edit: October 29, 2017, 08:09:45 pm by Madness »
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« Reply #174 on: October 30, 2017, 12:06:57 am »
(except maybe the Survivor, who didn't do much for the plot)

Well, he's an unsettling cipher for the Mutilated, at least.
By the Survivor not doing much for the plot I meant he wasn't part of many narrated events, not that he didn't have a role. He had several, all of which are important. He is one of the reasons I consider the Mutilated so important, certainly.

The Boy?
This is what I currently think about the Boy:
There is also the matter of the Boy, but he isn't fully-trained, so I expect him to be significantly weaker than the Mutilated or Kellhus. Though I'm not objecting to surprises here, obviously.

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« Reply #175 on: November 01, 2017, 07:26:02 pm »
Just a couple of general notes here and i am curious as to whether anyone else has run across this. I have a couple of friends that i introduced to RSB years ago and they just finished TUC - and its fair to say that they are deeply confused. Deeply. They are more casual readers. They have never been on this board, or Westeros, or any reddit AMA for this, etc.

RSB can obviously write however and for whomever he wants, but, i think he overestimates his clarity. To that point - did the collective hive mind ever figure out the obvious thing RSB said we were all missing? If so, i havent seen it.

I feel like we are all experiencing a bit of epistemological closure and are falling down the rat hole of speculation. I love world building as much, if not more so than the next guy (you should have seen the D&D campaigns i made/illustrated/planned out) but when the character motivations/plot require so much post hoc parsing i worry that maybe we and RSB are getting a little lost in the forest for the trees.

in the end i think the GR is an event horizon and we effectively really dont know jack shit more after TUC than at the beginning of the book regarding Ajokli and Kellhus. I have this vague feeling that RSB is just screwing w/us and that TNG series will also end w/o remotely any sort of resolution. I am not really clear on why TNG is even being written tbh. Im fine w/the dunsult winning and TNG reaping humanity. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

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« Reply #176 on: November 01, 2017, 07:53:39 pm »
Yeah that sounds about right.

These books will never be commercially successful because they are, well, written in a way that's totally inaccessible to a casual reader. Not because they are 'too dark', or 'too philosophical', or 'too deep' - there are plenty of books are the more of any of these things and are still greatly successful.

It seems the books were written for those jokers (me) who wanted to spend a few dozen, or a few hundred, hours analyzing it. There's so much going on that a surface level reading just won't get you to a satisfying place, and so much obfuscation that a deep reading won't get you there either. This, I believe, was a stylistic choice to some degree. Meaning its not like it was an accident. That said, I think Bakker believed he was far more clear than he was. Unfortunately, his vision was for things to remain a big mystery until the bitter end, so there was no way for him to really gauge if he was being 'too mysterious'.

So I'd disagree that we are getting lost in the forest for the trees. That's the whole idea. Obviously, that's going to drive some away, and it doesn't mean that only 'smart' people will 'get it', nor does it make it better/worse writing. "It is what it is", the rest is just how we feel about it, right?

Regarding TNG, there's a good chance you are correct. Those still hoping for a tell-all final installment will probably be disappointed, again, and will probably have a cool little book burning party and feel personally assaulted by the lack thereof - including some people here.

As for why TNG? Hard to say. The obvious answer is that "its a trilogy and TNG is book 3". Probably also Bakker still has stuff to write, stories to tell, threads to tie together (or not), etc. In my head though, it'll be a meandering path, with plenty of forks, mostly leading to nowhere, with scraps in worldbuilding strew about to make things a bit more clear for the folks who are still bothering to piece it all together. There's clearly a much larger World that's still behind the veil, especially if you've looked at any of the (imo poorly written) short stories. Bakker could probably write in the TSA universe until he dies and still have mysteries left untold.

YMMV, but I'll happily be along for the ride.
« Last Edit: November 01, 2017, 07:56:10 pm by Wilshire »
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« Reply #177 on: November 01, 2017, 08:20:44 pm »

Regarding TNG, there's a good chance you are correct. Those still hoping for a tell-all final installment will probably be disappointed, again, and will probably have a cool little book burning party and feel personally assaulted by the lack thereof - including some people here.

That group will include me, I'm sure. I'll be sure to send you photos of me feeding my copies of TSA into the bonfire.

Nice snark, Wilshire. But I'm pretty used to ambiguous resolutions. Modernism is not exactly a new game, you know. On the level of feeling personally assaulted,  it ranks level with watching a car driving ahead of me with its blinker on for mile after mile. Annoying, but that's life.

Cheers!
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« Reply #178 on: November 01, 2017, 09:28:58 pm »
The thing is is as Wilshire hit the nail on the head. If you like these books, you like tying together the mysteries and how things work in the world. Another nail on the head, I doubt we'll get a whole lot of clarity on that front.

I'm not a smart dude. I don't give a rat's ass about Blind Brain Theory and what not. Crash Space....just don't give a shit. I really don't. And, i won't fake like I know what I'm talking about when it comes to it, either. The thing is, is Bakker will have missed the $$$'s If he would just give a little resolution. I know he's trying to push his theories and such, but man, this series would be an all time great if he gave us that. He's missing out fellows, not us.

I can deal with it. I see, somewhat, what he is trying to do. I didn't have a bossy and throw the book at the end of TUC, matter of fact I think it took me a few days to even post anything. I needed to process what I just read. Usually, I don't have to do that with a book. So, it could be a good thing. Its all in hiw you digest it. Being a philosophy geek or just a run of the mill fantasy guy, I don't think makes much of a difference processing the end of this book.
“No. I am your end. Before your eyes I will put your seed to the knife. I will quarter your carcass and feed it to the dogs. Your bones I will grind to dust and cast to the winds. I will strike down those who speak your name or the name of your fathers, until ‘Yursalka’ becomes as meaningless as infant babble. I will blot you out, hunt down your every trace! The track of your life has come to me,

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« Reply #179 on: November 01, 2017, 09:47:48 pm »
@Rot: Dude, I'm all in! When do we begin your D&D game? Can I be an evil fe-male Sorcerer/Assassin? If not, I'll be a male Bard.

@Wilshire: You're right. For me, this series has provided the greatest disparity of intrigue/surprises from the inane of anything I've read ( so much out there, the "surprise" ending is idiotic and completely made up - no litigate progression from the plot ). His expression of "evil" psychology amazes. For me, these strengths outweigh the convolution/obscurity and taxing naming conventions. I guess that's what any read comes down to, does the work overcome the author's imperfection/weaknesses for you. Even the bible is loaded with contractions and God wrote that  ;). But you're right, it's a matter of taste if you want to go on this PON journey and be left without closure ( I'm fine with it never ending, I want more books! ). I've had a ton of fun reading this thing and I felt that way before I came to this forum with my tail between my legs on some things I couldn't figure out.

@Beard: Sing it, brother! I'm guessing your response would be touching for Bakker  ;D

@MSJ: I'm with ya, would love to see this cat haul the dough in on this, but not sure an "ending" is the ONLY thing that would do it and maybe even other business transactions in lieu of ending it as well.
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