Subject: (urth) The Claw

From: Roy C. Lackey <rclackey at stic.net>
Date: Mon, 18 Nov 2002 06:47:20 +0000

Marc Aramini wrote:
>>Perhaps the power of the claw - which is really the negation of time -
indicates where the vanished people have gone - someWHEN else.<<

A quibble about the Claw: it has been suggested often before that the Claw
(or Sev) worked by reaching back in time to a point before whatever malady
it was being used to remedy had come about. Restoring Dorcas to life by
returning her body to a time when she was still alive; healing Declan's
swollen abdomen by returning his body to a time before he had appendicitis.
But this doesn't work for Herena. She had "a withered arm no larger than an
infant's". In other words, it was a birth defect. There had never been a
time when her arm had been well and whole.

It also didn't work for Jonas. Sev couldn't even restore him to the
condition he had been in before he got zapped, much less reach back in time
to restore him to the way he was before his ship crashed. Didn't work for
Jolenta, either, though Sev had known her both before she was bitten and
before she was Jolenta.

-Roy

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From: Dan'l Danehy-Oakes <ddanehy at siebel.com>
Date: Mon, 18 Nov 2002 18:07:40 +0000

There are more posts in Roy C. Lackey's posts than are dremt 
of in your philosophy:

> It also didn't work for Jonas. Sev couldn't even restore him 
> to the condition he had been in before he got zapped, much 
> less reach back in time to restore him to the way he was 
> before his ship crashed. Didn't work for Jolenta, either, 
> though Sev had known her both before she was bitten and 
> before she was Jolenta.

I seem to recall some discussion of this in the past ... but ...
it seems to me that the common factor between Jonas and Jolenta
-- aside from their names beginning with the syllable "Jo" --
would consist in their both having an artificial nature (though
Jolenta _begins_ as a natural person, Doctor T. artifically
enhances her ... sort of the Pamela Anderson of posthistory). 

Perhaps the Claw (or Severian) cannot heal artificial persons,
but only natural persons ...

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From: Roy C. Lackey <rclackey at stic.net>
Date: Mon, 18 Nov 2002 20:21:05 +0000

>>Perhaps the Claw (or Severian) cannot heal artificial persons,
but only natural persons ...,<<

I, too, recall such discussion, and the artificiality factor may be valid
for the failures. What I was addressing, however, was the contention that
the Claw worked by reaching back in time to a point before the pending
problem. If the Claw's power was a function of time, why should the presence
of prosthetics present a problem? Would it not work for a man with a wooden
leg who was wounded woefully by a weapon?

-Roy

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