Haha thanks.
Oh lord. I liked my genesis as argument idea so much that I tried to write up a clearer post about. It may just be more madness though.
My idea that the metaphysics of genesis bear some similarities to argument fits with some of what we've read of magic in Earwa.
Sorcerers are humans speaking with the voice of god. They can not bring things into existence with that voice the way the gods can but their power gives us an insight into the voice of god itself. It isn't farfetched to imagine that Earwa was born through something like magic and that the foundations of its existence are bound up in this voice of god. Furthermore, sorcery is often compared to argument in the books. Magi grasp the substrate of existence and “argue” for their vision.
Since the First Father, Men had always spoken to command the Ground. Since the Shamans, they had called and Reality had answered, a brother, a deceiver, an assassin.
They coax and convince reality to be what they say it is and it obeys, becoming their truth. In Earwa, reality can be argued into submission.
The gods created Earwa in a similar way. They willed it to be and it was. I think that this too was in some sense an argument. Existence emerged from the void because they asserted that it was so and they argued with each other about what it should be like. The sum of the convincing arguments stuck, becoming the rules and physics of Earwa. Existence is a statement or an argument made by the voices of the gods.
Arguments are chains of statements and justifications. A therefore B therefore C.
But the skeptical position continues to ask for further justifications and reveals that nothing can be satisfyingly justified. For any justification of a truth I can ask for a justification of that justification. It goes on in an endless regression. From wikipedia:
If we ask of any knowledge: "How do I know that it's true?", we may provide proof; yet that same question can be asked of the proof, and any subsequent proof. The Münchhausen trilemma is that we have only three options when providing proof in this situation:
The circular argument, in which theory and proof support each other (i.e. we repeat ourselves at some point)
The regressive argument, in which each proof requires a further proof, ad infinitum (i.e. we just keep giving proofs, presumably forever)
The axiomatic argument, which rests on accepted precepts (i.e. we reach some bedrock assumption or certainty)
The first two methods of reasoning are fundamentally weak, and because the Greek skeptics advocated deep questioning of all accepted values they refused to accept proofs of the third sort. The trilemma, then, is the decision among the three equally unsatisfying options.
In contemporary epistemology, advocates of coherentism are supposed to be accepting the "circular" horn of the trilemma; foundationalists are relying on the axiomatic argument. Views that accept the infinite regress are branded infinitism.
Earwa is an argument supported by foundationalism. The gods are the prime movers in the sense that they themselves are essentially the arbitrary axioms. They are platonic wills, or assertions to particular truths, floating in the void. They barely exist but that doesn't make them any less potent. This echoes one of the core insights of Bakkers Blind Brain Theory. Meaning, truth, our whole experience of existence, these things are illusions but they are powerful illusions.
The reality of Earwa is ruled by the axiomatic wills of the gods who support it. Everyone in it is a slave to their truth, even if, in the skeptical view, their truth is arbitrary. The Inchoroi seek to escape their truth by cutting Earwa off from the gods. But they can't easily do that because Earwa's existence rests on their axiomatic assertions. So the Inchoroi plan to use the No God to change the fundamental scheme of justification on which Earwa rests.
Earwa is an argument justified by the arbitrary assertions of the gods. The No God is intended to hijack their argument and graft a different epistemic scheme of justification onto it. Thereby cutting the gods off from Earwa and freeing the Inchoroi from their tyranny.
The gods are a foundationalist justification scheme. Suppose A. A therefore B, B therefore C, C therefore D. Or, suppose the manifold god, therefore the hundred hundred, therefore Earwa.
The No God is a circular justifications scheme. A therefore B, B therefore C, C therefore D, D therefore A, repeat. The No God is in Earwa, the No God exists, therefore Earwa exists, repeat.
Just as an antagonistic will can wrestle an argument away from you in day to day life, it is possible to wrestle Earwa away from the gods. It happens on a small scale any time a mage performs sorcery. Even though his tiny soul is nested within the argument itself, he can exert his will and effect the argument that is Earwa. The No God is a great will, like the gods. A titanic agency probably sewn together from numerous souls.