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Nicely put: "Quantum theory predicts that a vacuum is actually a writhing foam of particles flitting in and out of existence." The most apparent limitation of the sails of the S…
08 Jun 2011, 11:57
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Your reading is not illogical, in fact it's brilliant, but I think it's counterintuitive. And I read "blot" differently: 1. Mark or stain (something) * - the writing…
03 Jun 2011, 00:58
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This doesn't seem possible. What would such a large airship be doing inside the Whorl? And surely it is a ship that appeared tiny at first.…
02 Jun 2011, 02:57
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This is am excellent summary of Wolfe's attitude toward myth. Literally, to Wolfe, the story of Jesus/Christ is The Greatest Story Ever Told. You mention green and blue and I'd b…
31 May 2011, 11:48
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Is there wiggle room (in terms of Popular Mechanics-level 1970s theory) for a theory of black holes that makes them basically a reverse of (nonexistent) white fountains? That is:…
29 May 2011, 17:00
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Totally!…
28 May 2011, 23:18
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I think the main reason the NS/LS/SS universes differ slightly (maybe) is that Wolfe is too busy paying attention to the stories themselves to rack his brain to try to recall som…
28 May 2011, 18:36
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Well, Wolfe was in Korea, so regardless of the actual political system that created them (and their battle formations don't seem very Communist), one may imagine being impressed …
27 May 2011, 00:04
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Rudolf?…
26 May 2011, 15:56
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Let's all just follow the injunction of the Nazarene, updated for email: Mock not, lest ye be mocked! Unless someone's really begging for it, of course. ;)…
26 May 2011, 14:00
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Right. I'm sure there was circlejerking and more going on the Tower among the apprentices, since they grew up in what must have been literally a prison-like environment even though…
26 May 2011, 13:57
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How do we "know" this?…
26 May 2011, 11:12
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Right, it must be in the Student's story.…
24 May 2011, 18:43
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Indeed, and so does Wolfe (crunch, crunch, howl!).…
24 May 2011, 17:06
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The Antechamber always made me think vaguely of Plato's Cave, the way its inhabitants sit telling stories from a world they have never seen and know nothing of except from those st…
24 May 2011, 17:02
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Yes, and if they didn't we would have much less to talk about!…
24 May 2011, 16:08
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Actually, "bible thumpers" are people who are OVERLY familiar with the Bible. If the shoe fits .... ;)…
24 May 2011, 16:03
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"making clothes for the poor" Of course! I just read the wiki but did not make the connection. Dorcas made clothes for the poor; Agia buys rags and used clothing from the poor. I…
24 May 2011, 15:57
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You mean, because, known by the name Tabitha, she was raised from the dead by Peter.…
24 May 2011, 11:51
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--- On Mon, 5/23/11, Gerry Quinn <gerryq at indigo.ie> wrote: I think Wolfe would say that most of his puzzles have explicit solutions with adequate clues, but that is a difficult …
23 May 2011, 17:11
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Exactly.…
23 May 2011, 16:19
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Nice. Thanks Nicholas!…
23 May 2011, 12:09
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I think you're right: Wolfe's puzzles are fairly in the open. Hidden puzzles that are purported to exist, IMHO, just don't. As an example, I think the current discussion attempti…
23 May 2011, 12:07
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Right---thanks for rephrasing me! Yes, I meant those books. I am not sure if we are misunderstanding one another because you view those books as history and I do not. But consid…
23 May 2011, 11:58
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I disagree completely! The nice round number of Apostles was chosen by human "editors" and by tradition. The number 12 preceded the New Testament, much as significant parts of th…
23 May 2011, 11:48
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Not to be confused with the Twelfth Imam, of course .... Completely different!…
23 May 2011, 00:39
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Thanks Jason, that's helpful. Since Wolfe is no Lewis Carroll, although he is a fan, I think this is enough to explain why he might have settled on 17 as an "answer" to 12. I wo…
23 May 2011, 00:04
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Even better. Depends how you look at it. There are patterns among primes that I don't pretend to understand. But some primes may be rarer than others. I agree this is fiction, a…
22 May 2011, 22:28
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Basically the same point I made at 9:25 this morning. But I would like to see (though not necessarily hear) a band called "The Megatherians."…
22 May 2011, 19:09
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Right. I think the "meaning" of 17 in this case is rather self-contained: one communist Ruling Group is related to another, with a touch of Yellow Peril thrown in.…
22 May 2011, 18:06
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I failed to complete a thought in the below. I'll answer a question with a question: Q: Why are there 17 Megatherians and 17 Ascians in their ruling Group? Are they the same? A…
22 May 2011, 13:47
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I have my own theory. I always assumed that the form of the title "Lives of the Megatherians" was a simple imitation of Butler's "Lives of the Saints." Based on this, one would…
22 May 2011, 13:25
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Exactly my point.…
22 May 2011, 00:16
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Yes, yes, and yes.…
21 May 2011, 13:15
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Could "17" not have its own meaning as a number? It's several types of prime, and perhaps more to the point, it is a number that is not a traditional Magic Number: 3, 7, 9, 12, e…
21 May 2011, 02:04
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Of course---the tides themselves! In that case, there is no way any but the oldest mountains could be overwhelmed, but I think you're right---there is enough evidence in TBOTNS t…
20 May 2011, 11:32
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-I didn't know to take Dr Talos' play seriously the first time I read TBOTNS. -That's a decent hypothesis, but it seems to require more of a global upheaval than seems to be the…
19 May 2011, 21:05
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Then (a) what would be the "source" of the water (or rather of the energy that drives the water) and (b) since surely people still live in Tibet, was the Flood universal at all?…
18 May 2011, 23:31
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We don't know (a) how much pressure Abaia or Erebus' bodies can stand---we know zero about their physiology or technology (b) whether the flooding comes from plate shifting or ri…
18 May 2011, 11:44
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Yes, except there are four parts to the prayer. Parts 2 and 3 do seem sufficiently similar to be one Person, however, according to the Wolfean principle of mythic approximation.…
17 May 2011, 22:48
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Severian seems also to have gone from an old, near-dead slum area around the Citadel to a more lively part of Nessus; the areas are separated by a river and connected by a bridge…
17 May 2011, 22:40
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handwriting! that was it. Which means thumbs, I guess.…
17 May 2011, 22:37
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I took that bridge as a shopping mall, like the Ponto Vecchio. Apparently this one is open at night.…
17 May 2011, 11:32
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Like most of these Laws turn out to be. "... In 2003, scientists showed that some species of insects have gained, lost and regained wings over millions of years." That's a good e…
16 May 2011, 15:27
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Certainly Ultan would be a grammar nazi, and certainly the placement of "mostly" is ambiguous. But does all this address Ultan's joke? How do these strike you in terms of Ultan's…
14 May 2011, 12:37
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I assume it's "Master Palaemon teaches us apprentices, mostly." I think Ultan means the word "mostly" is misplaced, making it sound like Palaemon teaches "apprentices" as a subje…
13 May 2011, 11:47
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Writer _X_ is not derivative? Writer _Y_ is derivative? This makes no sense. All writers derive.…
10 May 2011, 11:40
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I've always assumed the second: that sovietism had won out. Oceana is presumably the most likely candidate for liberal democracy anyway; if either of the other two actually adopt…
08 May 2011, 17:13
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Not at all. The minimum is quite acceptable, as long as all the players are roughly equal under the law. Eliminating things like slave labor at gunpoint in the extraction industr…
01 May 2011, 23:30
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I see. But that's a practical matter, not a theoretical one. Certainly it's a problem, but if the conditions of horizontal and vertical nonexclusive democracy are met, then theor…
01 May 2011, 22:44
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