{ "export": { "source": "https://urth.darkrealm.vip/thread/urth/1592", "note": "Exported from an unofficial mirror of a public mailing list. Copyright in each message remains with the person who wrote it. Email addresses are obscured as `user at host`, the form the original archive published. This file was rebuilt from parsed fields rather than retained headers, so it is faithful in content but not byte-exact.", "addresses": "obscured as 'user at host'" }, "archive": "urth", "thread": { "id": 1592, "subject": "Hollow men", "messages": 3, "voices": 2, "first": "1999-04-29T02:37:51+00:00", "last": "1999-05-03T00:08:14+00:00" }, "messages": [ { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Roy C. Lackey", "address": "rclackey at stic.net" }, "date": "1999-04-29T02:37:51+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Hollow men", "in_reply_to": null, "reply_link": null, "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": " Okay, Tony Ellis and William Ansley, do not agree with me. Fine. I have\nalready cited the relevant textual quotes in my \"Iron men\" and \"More on Iron\nMen\" posts, so there is no point it doing it again. I think we can all agree\nthat Jonas is/was an android that had been repaired with human parts? I hope\nso, because that's what the text says. The only real arguments seem to be\nover:\n\n (A) Are Jonas's metal parts hollow?\n (B) Relative sizes.\n\n (A) I have already given the citations from _Claw_ which suggest that\nthere is something unusual about Jonas's lightness. Sidero is an android.\nSidero is hollow. In chapter VIII of _Urth_ Sidero states how and why his\nkind came to exist; as protective hard coverings with superhuman attributes\nto be worn by the \"mates\". The mates come in all sizes, male and female. Sev\nmentions *several* difficulties fitting himself inside Sidero (chapter IX),\nbut never mind that. The real point is that *one size does not fit all*. Two\n\"slender\" androids are mentioned (their names, very likely, are Hadid and\nHierro, BTW). Now, given the fact that Sidero's kind have been in existence\nlong enough to have evolved human-like intelligence, it would be\nunreasonable, unnecessary, and without textual support to think that there\nwas a second order of androids on the ship built any differently than what\nwe are told by Sidero. Slender compared to what? The two are standing with\nSidero \"some distance apart from the rest of us\". If Sidero is \"massive\",\ntwo beings of average size might well look \"slender\" in comparison. The two\n\"slender\" androids must be hollow, too. Sev saw only a small fraction of\nTzad's ship. There is no reason to suppose that there are not other\nandroids, in a variety of sizes, all over the ship.\n\n Jonas served on a space/time traveling ship. Sidero said: \"There is only\none ship, the captain says. All the ships we hail between the galaxies or\nthe suns are this ship.\" Therefore, Jonas sailed on Tzad's ship. Jonas is an\nandroid. Therefore, Jonas was originally hollow, regardless of which size\nandroid he was.\n\n (B) See (A).\n\nRoy" } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "William H. Ansley", "address": "wansley at warwick.net" }, "date": "1999-05-02T15:25:33+00:00", "subject": "Re: (urth) Hollow men", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "subject", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "There has been a good deal of discussion about this thread and whether is\nit has any critical purpose or perhaps any purpose at all. I don't care\nabout that.\n\n(Although I feel an almost irresistible urge to demand that Jonathan\nLaidlaw apologize to me too, as the third and last of the \"'realists'\nattempting to\ndecide what kind of android Jonas was\" that he objected to in his by now\ninfamous \"thoughts on Nigel price's response\" posting. Not that it offended\nme, but I don't want to feel left out.)\n\nOne thing I would bet everyone agrees on, however, is that they are glad\nthis thread is over and done with. No such luck!" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "\"Roy C. Lackey\" wrote:\n Okay, Tony Ellis and William Ansley, do not agree with me." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "And you'll have to add David Duffy to the list, since he wrote:\nI think Jonas is made of\nhighly advanced light materials, but is not hollow. The Ship of UotNS is\nnot the only vehicle that has ever undertaken star travel (we have the\nWhorl as one counterexample)" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "\"Roy C. Lackey\" continues:" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Fine. I have\nalready cited the relevant textual quotes in my \"Iron men\" and \"More on Iron\nMen\" posts, so there is no point it doing it again. I think we can all agree\nthat Jonas is/was an android that had been repaired with human parts? I hope\nso, because that's what the text says. The only real arguments seem to be\nover:\n\n (A) Are Jonas's metal parts hollow?" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Not really. The argument, as I understand it, is that you think Jonas was\noriginally an intelligent, powered, armored space suit (IPAS) android like\nSidero. If I say that Jonas was never able to contain and protect a human\nbeing as Sidero (albeit unwilling) does Severian (I'll ask you to accept,\nfor the sake of argument, that Jonas would have agreed to do so) then it\ndoesn't matter if I say, \"Well, Jonas could have had hollow parts, to save\nweight perhaps.\" As long as I say Jonas was never an IPAS android, you will\nsay I'm wrong." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": " (B) Relative sizes.\n\n (A) I have already given the citations from _Claw_ which suggest that\nthere is something unusual about Jonas's lightness. Sidero is an android.\nSidero is hollow. In chapter VIII of _Urth_ Sidero states how and why his\nkind came to exist; as protective hard coverings with superhuman attributes\nto be worn by the \"mates\". The mates come in all sizes, male and female. Sev\nmentions *several* difficulties fitting himself inside Sidero (chapter IX),\nbut never mind that." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "No, let's mind it. You have referred to these difficulties several times as\nif they are telling evidence for your assertion, but you have left out an\nimportant piece of information each time. Here are the relevant passages\n(from the first two pages of Chapter IX, \"The Empty Air\"):\n\n---------------------------------\n...I snatched off my cloak and rolled into Sidero's open body. I did not so\nmuch as try to see what creature those wings bore until I had thrust my\nhead, with some pain, into his and could look out through his visor.\n\n...\n\nHis chest had closed tightly, and I struggled to get my legs into his,\npushing with hands braced against the hollows of his shoulders. If I had\nbeen able to take a moment more outside, I would have removed my boots;\nthen it would have been easy. As it was, I felt I had already fractured\nboth ankles.\n\n...\n\nMy sound leg had at last straightened itself. My lame leg ought to have\nbeen easier, because its muscles had shrunk; but I could not summon\nstrength enough to force it down.\n\n...\n\nI felt myself bent forward, as one sometimes is in wrestling; Sidero was\nsitting up. He stood, and in standing shifted my position just enough for\nmy lame leg to straighten. It was easy then to thrust my left arm into his.\nMy right entered what had been his own right arm equally easily, but\nemerged from the damaged brassard, protected only at the shoulder.\n---------------------------------\n\nI count two difficulties, or three, if you count each of Severian's legs as\na separate difficulty. But he had trouble getting both his good and bad leg\ninto the legs of the Sidero suit for the same reason: he has his boots on!\nNow I think it is pretty clear that the designers of an armored space suit\nwould not assume that the wearer would have boots on and would not make\nallowances for the extra room boots would take up.\n\nSeverian does have difficulty fitting his head into Sidero's head shaped\ncavity. I will speculate that this is because Sidero's head was designed to\nopen, just as his torso was, to allow a person to fit inside. But Sidero,\nnot intending to be worn by Severian, only opened up enough to let Severian\naccess his emergency repair controls. So Severian had to push his head\nthrough the neck opening of the Sidero suit.\n\nFinally, Severian is described as being able to fit both of his arms\ncompletely and both of his legs partially inside Sidero's chest cavity. Now\nthat, to me, indicates a pretty darn large suit of armor." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "The real point is that *one size does not fit all*." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "I won't deny you have a point here. It does seem likely that there would\nhave to be different sized IPAS's for different sized people. At least this\nwould have been true when the sailors were allowed to wear the IPAS's. But,\nfrom Sidero's testimony, it seems as if the IPAS androids had not allowed\nthat to happen for a long, long time. Therefore, if new IPAS androids were\nstill being built and their specifications were controlled by the IPAS\nandroids themselves, there would be no reason for the new IPAS's to be\ndesigned to fit a range of human sizes.\n\nIn fact (and here is a nice little present for you) if new IPAS androids,\ndesigned and built by IPAS androids, are being made and there is no longer\nany intention that human beings are going to use them as space suits, then\nthe internal cavity can be shrunk to a space too small for any human being\nto fit in, leading to a hollow Jonas who is too small to be a usable suit\nof armor. The cavity could be left out entirely, leading to a non-hollow\nJonas who is still, in a sense, the same kind of android as Sidero.\n\nPerhaps we can live in peace and harmony after all .\n\nOf course there is no support in the text for this. If Sidero and the\nothers are IPAS androids built to human design which have become autonomous\nafter the fact, which seems more likely, then my argument above doesn't\napply." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Two\n\"slender\" androids are mentioned (their names, very likely, are Hadid and\nHierro, BTW). Now, given the fact that Sidero's kind have been in existence\nlong enough to have evolved human-like intelligence," }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "You make it sound as if you are talking about biological evolution. That\nisn't what is going on here. The IPAS is a piece of engineering. Each\nsubsequent model has had new features added, including artificial\nintelligence. Depending on how long it took to develop, design and build\neach generation of IPAS, it wouldn't necessarily take very long for the\nintelligent form to emerge. Certainly, it would be a tiny fraction of the\ntime that biological evolution would take.*\n\n(Actually my acronym doesn't work very well in the passage above. The\nandroids started out as mere space suits [S] or armored space suits [AS].\nThen they became powered [PAS]. Finally the artificial intelligence\ncomponents were added to produce what I have been referring to as an IPAS.)" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "it would be\nunreasonable, unnecessary, and without textual support to think that there\nwas a second order of androids on the ship built any differently than what\nwe are told by Sidero." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "I just can't understand why you insist that there can only be one kind of\nandroid on the ship. People build many, many different kinds of machines\nall the time. Including machines that have similar external appearances but\nvery different internal mechanisms. Think of automobiles: internal\ncombustion engines vs. electric vs. fuel cell, etc. Wolfe, as an engineer,\nmust be especially aware of this fact. There would have to be unequivocal\ntextual support for your assertion of android singularity in the text\nbefore I could accept it. And I just don't think it's there." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Slender compared to what? The two are standing with\nSidero \"some distance apart from the rest of us\". If Sidero is \"massive\",\ntwo beings of average size might well look \"slender\" in comparison. The two\n\"slender\" androids must be hollow, too. Sev saw only a small fraction of\nTzad's ship. There is no reason to suppose that there are not other\nandroids, in a variety of sizes, all over the ship." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "I will admit that the passages in _Urth_ comparing Jonas and Sidero and\nother, slender androids on the ship are ambiguous. They must be or this\nwhole debate wouldn't have started. I think that the interpretation that\nTony Ellis and I give them more reasonable than yours. You vehemently\ndisagree. But I think you should at least consider that our interpretation\nis possible. And allow us to hold it without implying that we are\nunreasonable people who manufacture unnecessary complications while we\nignore the text." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": " Jonas served on a space/time traveling ship. Sidero said: \"There is only\none ship, the captain says. All the ships we hail between the galaxies or\nthe suns are this ship.\" Therefore, Jonas sailed on Tzad's ship. Jonas is an\nandroid. Therefore, Jonas was originally hollow, regardless of which size\nandroid he was." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "I simply don't agree that Sidero has been given reliable information here\nor perhaps he has not understood what he was told properly.\n\nI don't expect to change your mind with anything I have said above, Roy. I\nimagine that if we can agree to disagree, that will be the most I can hope\nto accomplish. In another post you said:" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "But I learned many years ago that\nreligious arguments are fruitless. Believers believe because what they\nbelieve cannot be proven, else it would not be a matter of faith." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Perhaps this applies to nonreligious arguments as well. It seems to in this\ncase. So why did I bother adding another round to this debate if I think\nit's fruitless? I have to support my faith, don't I?\n\nWilliam Ansley\n\n*Biological evolution doesn't apply to these androids unless they can\nreproduce themselves, have some kind of genetic material which can undergo\nspontaneous mutation and their varying offspring are culled by natural\nselection. I don't think there is enough support for any of this in the\ntext to make it reasonable to believe it is true." } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Roy C. Lackey", "address": "rclackey at stic.net" }, "date": "1999-05-03T00:08:14+00:00", "subject": "Re: Re: (urth) Hollow men", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "subject", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "William H. Ansley wrote:\nOne thing I would bet everyone agrees on, however, is that they are glad\nthis thread is over and done with. No such luck!<<" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": " Ah, you devil, you! I was going to let this thread die, however\nignominiously, but you have given me an excuse to revive it. Let me add that\nI appreciate your making the effort to look at the evidence, and citing some\nof it, rather than just dismissing it out of hand. The combined texts of\nboth our posts would be too long to quote the whole thing, so I will try to\nconfine it to the more relevant portions of yours." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "And you'll have to add David Duffy to the list, since he wrote:\nI think Jonas is made of\nhighly advanced light materials, but is not hollow. The Ship of UotNS is\nnot the only vehicle that has ever undertaken star travel (we have the\nWhorl as one counterexample)<<" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": " I did not mean to imply that Tzad's ship was the only interstellar or\neven intergalactic ship. Of course there were others, and the Whorl was one\nof them, as were the towers of the Citadel, but they were decidedly not the\nsame type as Tzad's ship. Tzad's ship was able to travel backwards and\nforwards in time, as well as outside of time and even the universe. Sidero's\nstatement that there is only the one ship should be taken, I think, to mean\nthat it is the only one of its kind, able to travel as and where it does." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": " (A) Are Jonas's metal parts hollow?" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Not really. The argument, as I understand it, is that you think Jonas was\noriginally an intelligent, powered, armored space suit (IPAS) android like\nSidero. If I say that Jonas was never able to contain and protect a human\nbeing as Sidero (albeit unwilling) does Severian (I'll ask you to accept,\nfor the sake of argument, that Jonas would have agreed to do so) then it\ndoesn't matter if I say, \"Well, Jonas could have had hollow parts, to save\nweight perhaps.\" As long as I say Jonas was never an IPAS android, you will\nsay I'm wrong.<<\n\n No I won't. You might even be right. We are not given enough information\nin the texts to establish the certitude of this or many, if not most, of the\nother conclusions people have derived from Wolfe's works which are not\nexplicitly stated in the works. To take but one example out of many: Tony\nhas concluded, elsewhere, that the prisoner in the cell near V.R.T. is\nV.R.T.'s mother. He may be right. But he can't *prove* it conclusively.\n(That was a back-handed compliment, Tony, believe it or not. )" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "to be worn by the \"mates\". The mates come in all sizes, male and female." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Sev" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "mentions *several* difficulties fitting himself inside Sidero (chapter IX),\nbut never mind that." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "No, let's mind it. You have referred to these difficulties several times as\nif they are telling evidence for your assertion, but you have left out an\nimportant piece of information each time. Here are the relevant passages\n(from the first two pages of Chapter IX, \"The Empty Air\"):<<\n\n" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "Finally, Severian is described as being able to fit both of his arms\ncompletely and both of his legs partially inside Sidero's chest cavity. Now\nthat, to me, indicates a pretty darn large suit of armor.<<" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": " In addition to the quotes you cited there is this, from the last page of\nch. VIII:\n\n\" ... debating what I might do and judging the cavity inside him. My belt,\nwith the knife and my pistol in its holster, would never fit, I thought; but\nwithout those I might go in well enough.\"\n\n His belt with weapons on it is a consideration in deciding whether he\ncan fit inside at all, so much so that he removes the belt, but, if the\nquestion of his boots was even a concern, he didn't mention it then. Farther\ndown the page:\n\n\" ... it seemed a mad idea, yet it would give me protection and a disguise,\nif I succeeded. I had worn armor often. Why not better armor?\"\n\n Clearly he regards Sidero, as far as his physical stature is concerned,\nas just a better suit of armor than he has been accustomed to. Sidero's size\nis not so far out of bounds as to give him pause to get inside. He wants\n\"protection and a disguise\" only from the people who had tried to kill him.\nHe had decided to get inside *before* he heard the sound of the great-winged\nbeing. And the clincher is this: after getting inside and struggling with\nSidero for control -- a contest which he wins, because he is a human -- he\nforces Sidero to go back and get his weapons and belt. He then puts the belt\non \" ... and buckled it around Sidero's waist without a thumb's width to\nspare.\" (second page of ch. IX) How much slack would there be in his belt?\nSix inches? Eight? Bulky, Sidero ain't." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "The real point is that *one size does not fit all*." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "I won't deny you have a point here. It does seem likely that there would\nhave to be different sized IPAS's for different sized people. At least this\nwould have been true when the sailors were allowed to wear the IPAS's. But,\nfrom Sidero's testimony, it seems as if the IPAS androids had not allowed\nthat to happen for a long, long time.<<\n\n Ch. VIII: Sev says: \"Do you mean the officers of this ship wear you like\nclothing?\" Sidero answers: \"Not often now.\" So it still happens, even if\nseldom." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Two \"slender\" androids are mentioned (their names, very likely, are Hadid\nand\nHierro, BTW). Now, given the fact that Sidero's kind have been in existence\nlong enough to have evolved human-like intelligence," }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "You make it sound as if you are talking about biological evolution. That\nisn't what is going on here.<<\n\n No, of course not. I referred only to their \"human-like intelligence\"." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "I just can't understand why you insist that there can only be one kind of\nandroid on the ship.<<" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": " On the penultimate page of ch. VIII, which is too long to quote here,\nSev is asked by Sidero to recount how the human race came to be. Sev gives a\nsynopsis, which serves to remind the reader of the changes that Zak is going\nthrough. Then Sidero, in turn, gives the account of his kind's origins. His\nkind includes Hadid and Hierro (see two pages earlier), who know more about\nit than Sidero,and who are, I believe, the two slender androids Sidero\nconsults with on the fourth page of ch. XIII. Sev wonders if those two \" ...\nwere nearer the captain and upper officers than Sidero ... \". At any rate,\nall three are \"volitional mechanisms\", accounted for by Sidero's android\ngenesis. No other kind of \"volitional mechanisms\" are mentioned on Tzad's\nship. (Yes, Ossipago is there, but he is not a member of the ship's crew, is\ndescribed differently in _Sword_, and serves an entirely different\nfunction.) In fact, only one other android is mentioned in the entire Urth\ncycle -- Jonas.\n\n I think Jonas has come from too far in Urth's past to be accounted for\nby travel by \"conventional relativistic processes\". But it's no problem if\nthe ship he was on that crashed was one of the \"tenders\" from Tzad's ship,\nsuch as Sev was on." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "I will admit that the passages in _Urth_ comparing Jonas and Sidero and\nother, slender androids on the ship are ambiguous. They must be or this\nwhole debate wouldn't have started. I think that the interpretation that\nTony Ellis and I give them more reasonable than yours. You vehemently\ndisagree. But I think you should at least consider that our interpretation\nis possible. And allow us to hold it without implying that we are\nunreasonable people who manufacture unnecessary complications while we\nignore the text.<<" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": " Acknowledged. All I ask is a fair hearing." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": " Jonas served on a space/time traveling ship. Sidero said: \"There is\nonly\none ship, the captain says. All the ships we hail between the galaxies or\nthe suns are this ship.\" Therefore, Jonas sailed on Tzad's ship. Jonas is\nan\nandroid. Therefore, Jonas was originally hollow, regardless of which size\nandroid he was.>" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "I simply don't agree that Sidero has been given reliable information here\nor perhaps he has not understood what he was told properly.<<\n\n Do angels lie? Do androids? I have always been given to understand they\ndidn't. Sev said Jonas lies, but that I attribute to his humanization. But\nthen Sidero is also undergoing humanization, which I have previously alluded\nto. But what purpose would be served by lying? If we can't believe the\ntestimony of angels and androids, then who *can* we believe? (That was a\nrhetorical question.)" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "I don't expect to change your mind with anything I have said above, Roy. I\nimagine that if we can agree to disagree, that will be the most I can hope\nto accomplish. In another post you said:" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "But I learned many years ago that\nreligious arguments are fruitless. Believers believe because what they\nbelieve cannot be proven, else it would not be a matter of faith." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Perhaps this applies to nonreligious arguments as well. It seems to in this\ncase. So why did I bother adding another round to this debate if I think\nit's fruitless? I have to support my faith, don't I?<<\n\n Amen. And at least you weren't falling asleep in church. \n\n Let me recast my position. I have no ego investment in establishing\nwhether Jonas was hollow in his metal parts or not. The text I have cited is\nmerely suggestive of it, as is the case with so much else in Wolfe's work.\nThe other things I have cited; that he is an android on the same order as\nthose on Tzad's ship; that he has knowledge of elsewhen in time; his\nutterances after being zapped in the Antechamber; his mention of searching\nthe seven continents for the Hierodules; various things he has said to Sev,\nand the rest of it, coupled with what Sev learns of Tzad's ship and the\nandroids there, all tend, in my view, to establish that Jonas was at some\ntime in his life a sailor on Tzad's ship. That is what I wanted to\nestablish in the first place.\n\nRoy" } ] } ] }