Losing Imitation

Lee Berman · 28 Dec 2010, 22:14 · from 2010-December.txt.gz

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From: severiansola at hotmail.com (Lee Berman)
Date: Tue, 28 Dec 2010 17:14:19 -0500
Subject: (urth) Losing Imitation
Message-ID: <SNT123-W49110B166B9CCB9DBEA6F4CF010 at phx.gbl>



>James Wynn: Actually, that's the opposite lesson of Dr Veil and of the evolutionary 
>loss of the carapace. If the abos are perfect imitations, then they must lose the 
>ability to shape-shift away from their imitation.
 
 
On this I must cite direct text as evidence:
 
 
>Aunt Jeannine: "If Veil was correct then you and I are abos from Sainte Anne, at least
>in origin...Do you think "he" was right?"
 
>Number Five: "I don't think it makes any difference.  He said the imitation would have to be 
>perfect, and if it is, they're the same as we were anyway".
 
 
>Aunt Jeannine: "Number Five, you're too young for semantics and I'm afraid you've been led
>astray by that word 'perfect'...The imitation could hardly have been exact, since human 
>beings don't possess that talent and to imitate them 'perfectly' the abos would have to lose
>it."
 
>Number Five: "Couldn't they?"
 
>Aunt Jeannine: "My dear child, abilties of every sort must evolve.  And when they do they must
>be utilized or they atrophy. If the abos had been able to mimic so well as to lose the power
>to do so, that would have been the end of them, and no doubt it would have come long before the
>first ships reached them...."
 
 
Thus inhumi on Urth, dream-travel be damned, cannot be perfect imitations of humans. They have the 
ability to shift back to their original form and have not, can not lose it, on basic evolutionary 
principles. (according to Auntie Gene anyway)
 
 
Of course Aunt Jeannine goes on to say:
 
>"veil, who wants a dramatic explanation for the cruelty and irrationality he sees around him, has 
>hung fifty pounds of theory on nothing".

 
I'm sure most remember that Aunt Jeannine IS Dr Veil. Hilarious that Wolfe has anticipated both the
wild theorists about his work and the conservative nay-sayers in one character. Which is he implying 
are the correct ones?

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