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I find it really, really difficult to believe that the Dunyain, ancient or modern, did intend to just stay in Ishual for all eternity with the Project... o.O
I agree. But what was their purpose? A war against the gods? Go all Philip Pullman and kill God and free humanity from heavens tyranny.
"Dunyain - A severe monastic sect that has repudiated history and animal appetite in the name of finding enlightenment through the control of all desire and all circumstance. Though the origins of the Dunyain are obscure (many think them the descendants of the ecstatic sects that arose across the Ancient North in the days preceding the Apocalypse), their belief system is utterly unique, leading some to conclude their original inspiration had to be philosophical rather than religious in any traditional sense.Much of Dunyain belief follows from their interpretation of what they consider their founding principles. The Empirical Priority Principle (sometimes referred to as the Principle of Before and After) asserts that within the circle of the world, what comes before determines what comes after without exception. The Rational Priority Prince asserts that Logos, or Reason, lies outside on the circle of the world (though only in a formal and not an ontological sense). The Epistemological Principle asserts that knowing what comes before (via Logos) yields "control" of what comes after.Given the Priority Principle, it follows that thought, which falls within the circuit of the before and after, is also determined by what comes before. The Dunyain therefore believe the will to be illusory, an artifact of the soul's inability to perceive what comes before it. The soul, in the Dunyain world view, is part of the world, and therefore as much driven by prior events as anything else. (This stands in stark contrast to the dominant stream of Three Seas and Ancient North thought, where the soul is taken to be, in Ajencis's words, "that which precedes everything.")In other words, Men do not possess "self-moving souls." Far from a given, such a soul is an accomplishment for the Dunyain. All souls, they claim, possess conatus, the natural striving to be self-moving, to escape the circle of before and after. They naturally seek to know the world about them and so climb out of the circle. But a host of factors make outright escape impossible. The soul men are born with is too obtuse and clouded by animal passions to be anything other than a slave of what comes before. The whole point of the Dunyain ethos is to overcome these limitations and to become a self-moving soul - to attain what they call the Absolute, or the Unconditioned Soul.But unlike those exotic Nilnameshi sects devoted to various other forms of "enlightenment," the Dunyain are not so naive as to think this can be attained within the course of a single lifetime. They think of this, rather, as multi-generational process. Quite early on they recognized that the instrument itself, the soul, was flawed, so they instituted a program of selective breeding for intellect and dispassion. In a sense the entire sect became a kind of experiment, isolated from the world to maintain control, with each prior generation training the next to limit of their capabilities, the idea being that over millenia they would produce souls that could climb furthur and furthur from the circle of of before and after. The hope was that eventually they would produce a soul utterly transparent to Logos, a soul capable of apprehending all the darknesses that come before" (TTT Glossary, p549-550)."History (Dunyain) - The movement of human events through time. The significance of History for the Dunyain is found in the fact that past circumstance dominate and determine present actions, such that individuals continually find themselves "coming after," which is to say, at the mercy of events over which they have no control. The Dunyain believe that utter detachment from history is a necessary precondition for absolute awareness" (TTT Glossary, p 565-566).Copied this from TTT Glossary. Sorry for any mistakes.This might help us in our current speculative purposes. Bolded is my initial cherry-picking - trying to help and recognize my biases. It reflects my opinions on their need to control all circumstance and the interpretation and selection of principles by generations following the ancient Dunyain. Also, much of what is written here, reflects in a major way the conversation happening in The Dunyain and Buddhism, which blew up after KRST IS joined the Second Apocalypse.
The whole thing says you must first know everything that has come before in order to escape the cycle of before and after. But then right at the end, the dunyain chose to isolate themselves from history as it was deemed that being apart of it subjected you to its control. Not to know all history and therefore come before it, but to remove themselves from it to stop its influence.This does not sound like the rest of the entry. Did the original dunyain deem that the use of magic would subject them to some kind of inescapable linkage to the chain, as history was seen?
Running out of source material for our use, Wilshire... Not to mention, as we've noted, that it's all subject to ambiguity and debate. I agree with you about the History (Dunyain) entry. But maybe the ancient Dunyain weren't so informed yet and the founding principles were incomplete. Perhaps, the Pragma have not isolated themselves, or certain adepts, from the world as the others are led to believe.
Quote from: WilshireInto the realm of almost pure speculation now. A fun place to go, since we've gone about as far as possible without.To me there must be some kind of hierarchy. There simply must be, if nothing other than age and accumulation of experience separating out the casts. Still though, someone or some group must control the training. Probably the elders, the wisest, the most experienced, the best of the best. Like I said, even if all things were almost equal, age for the dunyain may be the main factor separating these categories, as the young must be taught.Following the inner logic of the shortest path means that every trained Dunyaini should, given the same set of circumstances take the exact same actions. If they can't do that they are failures. What need is there for hierarchy?
Into the realm of almost pure speculation now. A fun place to go, since we've gone about as far as possible without.To me there must be some kind of hierarchy. There simply must be, if nothing other than age and accumulation of experience separating out the casts. Still though, someone or some group must control the training. Probably the elders, the wisest, the most experienced, the best of the best. Like I said, even if all things were almost equal, age for the dunyain may be the main factor separating these categories, as the young must be taught.
All paths are not equal. This is the lesson of the Thousand Thousand Halls. Those Dunyain who are not equally prepared by the same set of training die in the Labyrinth. Also, the Pragma have the ability to shape "circumstances" within Ishual. So they could always conceal a greater set of circumstances, no? Hierarchy of informatic availability?
Like Herbert's Mentat, or a broader example: any spy network. They are only as good as the information they receive. Doesn't matter how much information you are receiving if it is all false. False information leads to false conclusions.Everyone in Ishual is taught, from birth until some later point of 'absolute' knowledge. You cannot simply just "know" everything, it takes time and energy. If you want to teach a child, say, advanced multivariable calculus, you would start with basic skills (algebra mainly) until he or she was ready for the next step. Thus the millennial task, the training, the need for a hierarchy. Some form of control must be exerted to properly teach and mold each new generation of Dunyain. Carnal pleasures must be squashed, minds must be trained, emotions extinguished, bodies mastered. In Ishual, I'd imagine that measure is unceasing. One does not suddenly become all knowing, all Dunyain. Each achievement is overshadowed by the achievements to come.Without some trickle down of information, everyone would go "mad" like Kellhus "did". Information overload is apparently possible even for the Dunyain. The most elder Dunyain, the ones with the most experience, would be the only ones who have had enough time to fully be able to comprehend their own task. This, again, necessitates the need for some hierarchy.
I think the idea of 'ruling' the nonmen would have to be adjusted in wording. That's an end in itself sort of goal, which is nothing to do with Dunyain. As the Maithenet ('scuse the spelling) passage says about him and it applies to the rest of the Dunyain, they have no interest in power for it's own sake.
Unless that power furthered the Project. Unless the absence of that power caused an end to the shortest path.
That's not 'ruling', as I understand the word. 'Ruling' isn't a means to an end word, in how it commonly seems to be deployed. On the other hand Scott might use that word in the book if it were the case and he describing. But I think it's use would obscure the subject matter.
Everything is a means to an end if the subject is Dunyain. Did Kell set out to rule the three seas? By your argument, no, because his goal was to save the world (or something like that). But does he rule? Yes. He is the leader of the whole shebang. Ruling is just as easily a means to an end as it is the goal, it just depends on what the original goal of said ruler is.
I would say he does not rule. He rules no more than a chess player rules his pieces.I guess I'm trying to preserve the word 'rule', in a way, for it's familiar human feeling. I can't think of old, benevolent kings 'ruling' and consider Dunyain 'ruling' in the same way.To sweep the pieces from the board would be nothing. While even a tyrant king clutches his property with a fierce want.
I'd have to disagree with you there, but I see your point.
The end, I think, Wilshire, is that we can safely conclude that world domination, if only for control and exclusion of variables, is part of an eventual Dunyain plan based on the... generous readings of ambiguity we've done here?Thought I'd verb some a little more adjective on these nouns.So I've been thinking about the Dunyain, Consult, Kellhus triad and the quest for Ishual - one we undertake from Achamian's perspective.The Consult have been hunting the Ancient North for twenty some odd years, searching for any word of the Dunyain. They've gotten pretty much the same intel as Cnaiur, Achamian, and the world got as of The Thousandfold Thought and the Compendium - excepting the Consult has full range in the North.How long would it really take the Consult to find Ishual? This opens up into discussions of the relations between the Consult and the Nonmen? Are there boundaries?I'm going to guess that in force, the Dunyain would do little more than surprise the Consult, even with the Thousand Thousand Halls.Thoughts?
