[TUC Spoilers] Metaphysics of the Second Apocalypse

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Dunkelheit

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« Reply #30 on: August 02, 2017, 10:12:09 am »
As I see it, unifying the darkness that comes before with the Absolute stands severely at odds with Dunyain philosophy.

I do too, but I don't think Dunyain philosophy is completely compatible with the Earwa as we know it. So some things needs to get prioritized over others. Kellhus seems to fokus on awareness and mastery, trying to make himself more like (or greater than) the gods. The the Mutilated focus more on the self-moving part, and dedicates themselves to making the self-moving soul (and self-moving universe?) even if this thing has no awareness whatsoever and makes them into servants rather than masters.

That's how I understand it. In the Q&A thread Bakker says that Kellhus goes for pure subjectivity, sapiens without cognition. While the Mutilated goes for pure objectivity, cognition without sapiens.

SmilerLoki

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« Reply #31 on: August 02, 2017, 10:23:11 am »
I'm presently considering it. I'm not yet ready to voice my views on the matter since many of them are unformed.

SmilerLoki

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« Reply #32 on: August 04, 2017, 10:10:25 pm »
The Gods, anthropomorphism, and the No-God. So far the acting Gods in the series are exclusively human Gods. There are no Nonmen Gods that take action, no Inchoroi Gods, only human Gods. Let's consider this from the Outside perspective. The Gods are Eternal and everywhere, having no ontological limits, only intentional distinctions defining their nature. This means that any other, non-human Gods, should likewise be eternal and omnipresent. Yet there is no evidence of them. This leads me to think that the universe of the Second Apocalypse is entirely anthropomorphic. Only human existence is connected to the Gods, and they define each other through a kind of loop (the Gods exist forever and influence humans, humans worship the Gods that influenced them, giving rise to said Gods, then the Gods influence humans, and so on).

This is a bit hard to grasp. Humans have ontological perspective of things, while the Gods have Eternal perspective. Being created somewhere in the timeline, the Gods then exist for the whole of that timeline, ensuring their own creation. The Gods act without time restrictions, so every action they take was always taken, is always taken, and will be always taken. When the universe somehow changes without the knowledge of the Gods (say, by the No-God), the Gods instantly populate new timeline differently. It accounts for any changes made, and also accounts for their previous actions (for example, Sorweel wasn't the White-Luck Warrior v. 2.0 while the first Warrior wasn't thwarted by Kelmomas, but the first Warrior was thwarted, so Sorweel was always meant to supplant him now that Yatwer is aware of the first Warrior's failure, and this turn of events already is incorporated in the timeline; at the same time, the first Warrior always existed, and so from Yatwer's perspective always should have existed, even if doomed to fail) The No-God, then, represents a different timeline, the one where there is no Gods. Their connection to the world and humans is severed, the loop of that connection is collapsed, and in the wake of this collapse another context arises, on which the Gods have no bearing whatsoever since in that context they do not exist nor have ever existed. If the Gods and their worshippers represent the dichotomy of consciousness and unconsciousness, then the No-God creates a context of "non-consciousness", which renders the aforementioned dichotomy meaningless. Among other things, this makes me think that the "blessed one hundred forty-four thousand" wouldn't just live normal (if horrifically tortured) lives; some kind of metaphysical transformation would be forced upon them.

This also explains the No-God's effect on the Gods. His non-consciousness is beyond the context of their existence, and so they can't do anything about it, can't even directly comprehend the possibility of the No-God's existence. It lacks any kind of connection to the Gods that would allow them to interact with it or even perceive it. When the No-God acts, the Gods are indeed witless, robbed of the ability to even comprehend the action taken. In this way, the No-God already is a seed of new metaphysical universe. Presumably, it needs more "parts" to fully "create" this new universe, and that's where the 144k come in. But the No-God can't use them if there are more people alive, since they are a part of the existing context, the "Gods context". So that context needs to be weakened.

That's roughly what I got for now.
« Last Edit: February 14, 2022, 11:31:51 pm by SmilerLoki »

Baztek

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« Reply #33 on: August 04, 2017, 10:15:16 pm »
Right, precisely, the Gods can't see the No-God because the No-God is THEIR darkness that comes before, ie the abyssal God of Gods pre-shattering, albeit in a "tekne babby's first absolute" kinda way

SmilerLoki

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« Reply #34 on: August 04, 2017, 10:17:30 pm »
Right, precisely, the Gods can't see the No-God because the No-God is THEIR darkness that comes before, ie the abyssal God of Gods pre-shattering, albeit in a "tekne babby's first absolute" kinda way
Yes, it ties in nicely.

Baztek

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« Reply #35 on: August 04, 2017, 10:40:28 pm »
And if we wanna go further, the disenchantment of Earwa by the No-God represents nothing but the modern disenchantment of reality by nihilism, technology, science, materialism, the belief that the root of everything is an empty godless nothing.

This seems obvious but what I'm getting at is the Inchoroi are not simply shutting Earwa off from the Outside but shutting it off from the very idea of an intelligence, an agency/mind behind existence, and in for Earwans the void is a small price to pay for a nature thoroughly spiritually castrated. Better nothing in the woods at night than demons, ghosts, witches.

SmilerLoki

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« Reply #36 on: August 04, 2017, 10:45:38 pm »
This seems obvious but what I'm getting at is the Inchoroi are not simply shutting Earwa off from the Outside but shutting it off from the very idea of an intelligence, an agency/mind behind existence, and in for Earwans the void is a small price to pay for a nature thoroughly spiritually castrated. Better nothing in the woods at night than demons, ghosts, witches.
So far I see the same, and it sheds some light on the No-God's behavior, which is simultaneously rational to the point of being sapient, but completely lacking the sense of self, intentionality.

Baztek

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« Reply #37 on: August 04, 2017, 10:57:21 pm »
Because the No-God is the pure void of the subject, the de-substantialized nothing the subject becomes after you deny the existence of the soul, the primacy of consciousness, its privileged position in the universe, etc.

Sounds like I'm saying the opposite of what I just posted but this is what ties it together: the  materialist assertion (Badiou, Zizek, even mysterians like McGinn) believe the subject/consciousness fundamentally is this pre-ontological void. And what is literally the first in-universe quote in the entire series? Ajencis saying "the soul is that which precedes everything"

Boom.

SmilerLoki

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« Reply #38 on: August 04, 2017, 10:58:52 pm »
I now wonder about how the No-God and Oblivion are related to each other.

Baztek

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« Reply #39 on: August 04, 2017, 11:05:08 pm »
Imo the God of Gods is oblivion. Recall the line from Fanim scripture: "and it was as death"

It's just I think Mimara does see through something, idk, truly transcendent in that nothing while fedora tippers like the Inchoroi, Dunyain, etc. just can't reach that far

SmilerLoki

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« Reply #40 on: August 04, 2017, 11:07:38 pm »
Imo the God of Gods is oblivion. Recall the line from Fanim scripture: "and it was as death"
There is logic in it, isn't it?

It's just I think Mimara does see through something, idk, truly transcendent in that nothing while fedora tippers like the Inchoroi, Dunyain, etc. just can't reach that far
The Judging Eye, I need to think more about.

littlegrice

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« Reply #41 on: August 05, 2017, 12:34:39 am »
All Mimara saw was the black coffin, right?  is that significant, the fact that there was no judgement of the No-God?
Well, he no talkie good like me and you, so his vocabulistics is limited to 'TELL ME...' and 'WHAT DO YOU SEE?' and, 'WHAT AM I?' Exclusively in that order.

Baztek

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« Reply #42 on: August 05, 2017, 12:43:06 am »
Well I'm talking about her seeing through her chorae, where oblivion peeled back to reveal a light. Did she really see the No-God with the JE?

SmilerLoki

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« Reply #43 on: August 05, 2017, 12:45:37 am »
All Mimara saw was the black coffin, right?  is that significant, the fact that there was no judgement of the No-God?
I'm not clear that that was all she saw, but her seeing nothing would make sense in the framework of the No-God having no intentionality. Sin comes from premeditation, and the No-God is completely ignorant without a sense of self.

SmilerLoki

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« Reply #44 on: August 05, 2017, 12:46:30 am »
Did she really see the No-God with the JE?
She did, at the very end of TUC, through the holographic Kellhus.