House Absolute

Matthew Groves · 01 Dec 2008, 21:18 · from 2008-December.txt.gz

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From: matthewalangroves at gmail.com (Matthew Groves)
Date: Mon, 1 Dec 2008 15:18:47 -0600
Subject: (urth) House Absolute
In-Reply-To: <49344D67.7050006 at io.com>
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	<49344246.3010607 at io.com>
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	<49344D67.7050006 at io.com>
Message-ID: <39ed084f0812011318m6bac8f60ubc2504177bdc2bc9 at mail.gmail.com>

Why so snarky?  I said no such thing.  I don't object to counting years.
It's just that if one tries to calculate the age of Urth by the decay of
ruins or by geologic change, one is going to come up with contradictory
estimates depending upon which piece of the text one bases the measurement
on.  The "History of Urth" entry in the Lexicon makes a convincing case for
calculating the age of Urth based upon the precession of the equinox.  This
"Great Year" model is convincing to me, in part, because of how well it fits
in with the other metaphors and images of cyclicism in the text.  It puts
the Age of Myth (which we seem to be in now) at 20,500 P.S. (Pre-Severian --
thanks Dave.)

So all I'm saying is that 1) scientific calculations of the age of Urth are
bound to be contradictory, and 2) a calculation worth making should be
thematically relevant.

On Mon, Dec 1, 2008 at 2:47 PM, Jeff Wilson <jwilson at io.com> wrote:
>
> They relate to the reckoning of time in years, which you've just said is a
> mistake, so I won't burden you with this spurious notation.
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