Right then, so this was originally going to be directed at Curethan, but since he has left the thread I'll just post my thoughts, maybe he'll see them, maybe not. I realize it takes me a while to respond here, and this is primarily because my desktop computer only stays on for about twenty to forty minutes, if that, before just shutting off with zero warning. Thus, writing up long posts is a pain in the ass (at this point I'm just doing it in a word document and hitting "ctrl+s" every few seconds). I can use my Kindle, which is what I've mostly been using for browsing the interwebs at the moment, but that too is a huge pain in the ass to write anything of decent length. If I was writing what I just wrote here, but on my Kindle, I
might be done the first two sentences. It has an extremely annoying "auto-correct" feature, which is difficult to circumvent even when writing something more mundane, let alone a piece where every tenth word is Nonman or No-God or Sranc or some crazy shit that doesn't exist in the dictionary, even though I try to add them as I go along...but even this is very unreliable -- certain words seem to "stick", and others don't. For example everytime I start to type "google", fucking Gin'Yursis comes up, of all the random names for the damn thing to remember, and it seems very fond of reminding me that it has done so.
ANYWAYS
So over the last few days, I've actually pretty radically altered some of my thoughts on the metaphysics. This came through a combination of doing sporadic re-reads of semi-random parts from the books, and from re-reading old threads here, including the Thorstein's amazing write-ups, which I actually agree with largely, with some discrepancies.
To start with, I no longer think the gods are enforcing damnation per se, nor that they made up the rules of damnation in the first place. I do still believe, however, they are in no way worthy of any admiration, and that any plans/goals/missions to cut the bonds between the gods and the World (or just the Outside and the Wolrd) are, ultimately, a "good" thing. I use the word "good" lightly. To put it another, I think that shutting off the Outside is overwhelmingly beneficial to the sentient life of the Bakkerverse, human, Inchoroi, whatever.
I should probably outline my thoughts so as to better argue my point: I think Thorstein's ideas on the relation between quantum mechanics, and the concept in the Bakkerverse of the "circuit between watcher and watched being the foundation of reality", are pretty spot on. I already believed that the Bakkerverse is supposed to be, in a weird way, what our universe would be like if it was truly as anthropocentric as many religions (in this case, primarily Abrahamic ones) imagine it.
Earwa is, in perhaps a very literal sense, the center of the Bakkervese. We know that Earwa is special. Sorcery, it seems, can only be used there. In addition, we know the Bakkerverse is populated with non-human life, and these beings are very alien, which includes alien morals. And yet, the gods are incredibly anthropomorphic, as are the "rules of morality" that outline damnation. This means an entire universe of ensouled beings are being subjected to a purely anthropocentric set of morals, and being -- quite unfairly -- punished for it.
So, I think that the gods quite literally arose from the noosphere of Earwa's conscious beings (humans, who I suspect have always outnumbered Nonmen). Humans themselves aren't particularly special in-and-of-themselves, but Earwa is. The gods would have reflected whatever the noosphere of Earwa's dominant inhabitants held. Damnation, too, is a relfection of this noosphere, reflection of the collective consciousness of the Earwans.
I believe that the "circuit of watcher and watched" is what pins these things into existence. Ensouled beings, fragments of the God, watching each other (collapsing the wave function, if you will). This is why Cishaurim have no mark -- they've removed themselves from the circuit. This is why the gods can't see the No-God -- it was never part of the circuit of the to begin with. Once that circuit is broken, the rules no longer apply quite the same. The pin has been removed.
The problem is that the gods themselves are only interested in Earwa. They want the devotion of humans, Earwans, because they're the ones who matter. All the ensouled beings in the universe don't offer anything. Thus, they're never given revelations. They didn't have Inri Sejenus, or prophets. They're damned without even knowing it, because they could never know otherwise.
Again, I think all of this stuff really hits home for people who grew up with a religious background (particularly an Abrahamic one), as Bakker did. It this on all these ideas that would crop up. If Jesus is real, he revealed himself to humanity as to save their souls, then what about the entire universe of sentient beings that didn't have a Jesus? Who, by their very nature, could not have anthropocentric morals, and so are doomed to damnation? It's just as the Inchoroi said -- they were born for damnation.
This also ties into why the number 144,00 is important. One of the chapter quotes in WLW is from "The Third Revelation Ganus the Blind" (hey, there's that blindness again), and it says:
The last of the wicked stand with the last of the righteous, lamenting the same woe. One Hundred and Forty-Four Thousand, they shall be called, for this is their tally, the very number of doom.
So, what happens when the population is ed to 144,000? This is the goal of the Consult, so obviously it must be something related to the Outside, or the gods, and the blocking/closing/ending there of. I suspect that by reducing the population of Earwa's dominant collective consciousness (humanity)...something important happens. The boundaries between the World and the Outside break. The gods lose their power. I don't know exactly what, but I do think that's where this story is headed.
I'll post more about how I think the No-God fits into this later.
But I digress.
To loop back around to the whole "objective morality" thing, I don't feel like I have many other ways of explaining my feelings on it. It just...I don't know. What people here are describing as objective morality seems to have virtually nothing to do with actual morality. There are "rules" underwriting existence. These rules, when broken, lead to punishment. Some of the people in this universe consider these rules to be a moral-framework. Alright, cool. It's still not some objective morality. It just...it doesn't make sense. Morality transcends these notions. I wish Sci was posting on this thread, because back on westeros when this was being discussed, he gave a very succinct explanation of my feelings on it, but I have little hope of ever finding that particular random post.