{
  "export": {
    "source": "https://urth.darkrealm.vip/thread/urth/494",
    "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": 494,
    "subject": "Eidolons/Aquastors",
    "messages": 1,
    "voices": 1,
    "first": "1998-04-16T22:03:00+00:00",
    "last": "1998-04-16T22:03:00+00:00"
  },
  "messages": [
    {
      "message_id": "<urth-v0009-0739@digest.urth.net>",
      "from": {
        "name": "m.driussi",
        "address": "m.driussi at genie.geis.com"
      },
      "date": "1998-04-16T22:03:00+00:00",
      "subject": "(urth) Eidolons/Aquastors",
      "in_reply_to": null,
      "reply_link": null,
      "blocks": [
        {
          "kind": "text",
          "depth": 0,
          "text": "Reply:  Item #1149260 from URTH at LISTS.BEST.COM@INET02#\n\nMark Millman,\n\nFWIW I agree with you 100 percent.  Wolfe uses (or seems to use)\n\"aquastor\" and \"eidolon\" interchangeably.  However, at times in the\npast when I was trying to ferret out the different forms of \"ghosts\"\ninvolved (i.e., hairsplitting) I leaned on \"aquastor\" as being (1)\nmachine generated (as opposed to biological mind generated), (2)\nhaving physical presence; leaving \"eidolons\" to be the (1)\nnon-physical, beamed directly into the brain, seen by nobody else\nforms.  (In part I derived this from the essentially guardian angel\n\"individual companion/guides that nobody else can see\" machine\ngenerated ghosts of Cyriaca's tale [leading up to the founding of the\nLibrary of Nessus].)\n\n(I don't think that Severian on Tzadkiel was brought back as a\nbeamed-into-the-brain ghost, because I can't imagine whose brain\nwould be beamed-into in this case . . . Zak?  Seems circular and\nredundant.  I agree that he was a spirit that became more physical\nthe more he ate and the more time he spent in existence--kind of like\nthe phantom bowmen of Barsoom for sfnal reference, and the underworld\nshades drinking blood to work up enough energy to slap and tickle,\nanswer questions, that sort of thing, in classical mythology.)\n\nCrossing texts can lead to implosion, of course, but in the Soldier\nseries we have the case where ghosts/gods invisible to others yet\nseen by Latro =become= visible to others if he touches them.  To the\nway of thinking outlined above, this would be a case of an \"eidolon\"\nbeing converted into an \"aquastor\" or at least (if physical existence\nis more vaporous) a visible specter.  (The vocabulary we need for\nsuch fine detail would be a lexicon for spiritualists, mediums, and\nghost hunters.)\n\nIf the ghost-made-physical is the product of a biological mind (for\nexample, the Son of the Student in that tale), it is (or can be and\nhas been) properly termed a \"tulpas,\" as Wolfe knows (see \"Melting\"\nin CASTLE OF DAYS or GENE WOLFE'S BOOK OF DAYS), yet he choses not\nto use this term in the Urth Cycle.\n\nThese are all creatures along the same spectrum.  How we\nprovisionally define (and diferentiate from each other) ghost,\nphantom, invisible stalker, wight, wraith, etc., depends entirely\nupon the context in which we find them sharing the landscape (unless\nwe are ghost hunters or whatever).  (I find it interesting that\n\"ghost animated armor,\" a recognizable gothic ghost-type, is a role\ntaken in URTH OF THE NEW SUN by Sidero and his class of android\nsailors--yet there is no ghostliness about that particular ghost-in-\nthe-machine; it is \"just a robot\"!)  And again, I agree that the\ndifference between a beamed-into-the-brain ghost and a temporarily\nphysical ghost is probably only a difference in energy consumed (say\n1.5 volts for the first, 3 volts for the second), and there is\nprecious little difference between these \"machine generated\" critters\nand an autonomous spirit (like Jonas's spirit or the phantom Cat).\n\nRe: aquastors as agents of Yesodic governors.  This is interesting\nand leads to wondering about how, exactly, Yesod governs all of\nBriah; most specifically, how Yesod governs the solar system of Urth\nand Urth itself.  Because it seems clear (to me, at least) that Yesod\nis keeping probationary control over Briah . . . hence the need for\nthe Autarchial Test in Yesod, to lift the probation.  But the control\nthat Yesod exerts is not open, rather it is hidden by veils of\nmisinformation (the hierodules would rather be seen/feared as cacogen\n\"demons\" rather than worshipped/relied upon as extrasolarian\n\"angels,\" for example . . . rather like the thinking engines of\nCyriaca's tale, again).\n\nThere is what =might= be a hint in the one line: \"Such rituals are\ndivided into seven orders according to their importance, or as the\nheptarchs say, their `transcendence'\" (IV, ch. 28).  The \"heptarchs\"\nreferred to might very well be the planetary and stellar Yesodic\nviceroys controlling the key worlds (i.e., Sun, Moon, Mars, Mercury,\nJupiter, Venus, Saturn) of the Urth system; or they might just be\nsome much more Urthly wandering mystics (who only come to the\nattention of a fully initiated autarch preparing to take the journey\nto Yesod--i.e., the \"Lamed Wufniks\" of Borges's BOOK OF IMAGINARY\nBEINGS).\n\nFinally, the issue of dreams in TBOTNS turns out to be, as usual,\nmuch more open to interpretation than I originally thought.  For\nexample, I thought it was perfectly clear that on the night in which\nSeverian and Baldanders share a bed they accidentally share dreams,\nor more specifically, they trade dreams--that is: Severian has the\ndream of undines that propells Baldanders; Baldanders has the dream\nof the Matachin Tower that propells Severian.  (Whether agents\nactively beam one or both of these dreams is an open question;\nwhether Severian's special mind drags mundane mortals into the\ncorridors of time, vortex style, is another similar issue as well.)\n\nHowever, Peter Wright finds this reading to be impossible--there is\nno sharing of dreamspace and no crossing of messages in these\ncorridors of time episodes.  (To me this seems like a strong veer\ntowards Solipsism.)  Baldanders's \"horror\" at the Matachin dream is,\nto Wright, a polite fiction--since Baldanders really =does= have a\ntower more terrible than the Matachin, a fact which doesn't seem to\nbother Baldy in the slightest.  (So I try to argue that this\n=bolsters= the dream swapping argument--since Severian really is\nbothered by the Matachin reality, his dream would reflect this\nhorror, even if the dream was shown in the Baldanders dream theater.)\n\nAnyway.\n\n=mantis="
        }
      ]
    }
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}