{
  "export": {
    "source": "https://urth.darkrealm.vip/thread/urth/2709",
    "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": 2709,
    "subject": "Alien Stones, spoilers 2",
    "messages": 1,
    "voices": 1,
    "first": "2001-06-29T14:16:12+00:00",
    "last": "2001-06-29T14:16:12+00:00"
  },
  "messages": [
    {
      "message_id": "<urth-v0030-0528@digest.urth.net>",
      "from": {
        "name": "Michael Andre-Driussi",
        "address": "mantis at siriusfiction.com"
      },
      "date": "2001-06-29T14:16:12+00:00",
      "subject": "(urth) Alien Stones, spoilers 2",
      "in_reply_to": null,
      "reply_link": null,
      "blocks": [
        {
          "kind": "quote",
          "depth": 1,
          "text": "Rostrum wrote:\nWhen the zombie empath shows up, the woman asks the aliens something like\n\"Is that my husband?\"  And they say something like \"The question is\ndifficult.  What is meant by 'is'?\"\n\nThe passage from the Bible is where the Saducees, who do not believe in\nthe resurrection, ask Jesus about a woman who has been widowed several\ntimes and remarries each time.  In the resurrection, whose wife is she?\n\nThus: Is the empath still her husband if he's dead?"
        },
        {
          "kind": "text",
          "depth": 0,
          "text": "Actually she asks \"Where is my husband?\"\n\nThis doesn't entirely invalidate what you are saying:they are still talking\nabout existence (either living vs. dead; animate vs. inanimate; corporeal\nvs. noncorporeal).\n\nPart of the way I've seen this Bible passage in context of the story is the\nanswer Jesus gives, that is, the rest of the passage, which is basically\nthat there is no marriage at the resurrection. In the context of the story,\nit seems to me that \"resurrection\" might also be taken as \"not-life,\" which\nincludes machine-based aliens (not biological life), zombie (alien repaired\ndead empath--biological tool), virtual reality captain/cadet (and maybe\neven empath--there's that part where Helen wonders if her husband was ever\nreally on the ship), to name a few.\n\nBut still, it is a strange angle for the captain who has just \"won the\nwoman.\" In fact, it might be only about her as a widow (not about the\nzombie or the aliens at all): that he \"has\" her now, but now is just a\nshort time compared with eternity, and it doesn't really matter (or \"count\"\nor \"register\") at the end of time (the resurrection).\n\nAnother important point: the passage comes up when they are both safely on\n_Gladiator_ and Helen has just told him that she had earlier on asked cadet\nWad about Daw--what Daw's childhood was like.  This sets up all sorts of\nweird loops.  If she assumes that Wad is a computer simulation based on\nDaw, then she =should= ask Wad about Wad's childhood.  If she thinks that\nWad is a persona worn by the ship's computer, then it is unclear how the\nship's computer could know enough about Daw's childhood to answer the\nquestion.  She asks the question as if Wad is a fellow cadet of Daw, a\nclassmate . . . which would make Daw a computer simulation based upon a\nfriend or twin brother.  But time and space play a part--which participant\nis real?\n\nThe fact that the cadet grows into the mold presented by the captain is\nclear.  But there may be a suggestion that the beautiful empath talking to\nthe cadet starts the obsession (for the same woman) in the cadet who then\ngrows into the captain.\n\n=The other symbols=\nP\nP-barred\nX (actually looks more like a teepee)\nX-barred\nO\n0 (looks close to O-barred)\n\n=mantis="
        }
      ]
    }
  ]
}