Pike's ghost

António Marques · 30 Nov 2011, 00:06 · from 2011-November.txt.gz

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From: entonio at gmail.com (=?UTF-8?B?QW50w7NuaW8gTWFycXVlcw==?=)
Date: Wed, 30 Nov 2011 00:06:21 +0000
Subject: (urth) Pike's ghost
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James Wynn wrote:
>
>>>> Gerry Quinn wrote:
>>>> If you can show an interpretation is wrong, you save others from being
>>>> misled by it. Seems a good reason to point out the problem.
>>>
>>> Dan'l Danehy-Oakes wrote:
>>> What do you mean by "wrong" and "misled?" These seem to assume that
>>> there is a True Interpretation and all others are wrong, where I think
>>> that texts in general and Wolfe's texts in particular are polysemous
>>> and subject to a multitude of (apparently) contradictory
>>> interpretations, all based on the text.
>>
>> entonio at gmail.com wrote:
>> It doesn't. 'X is wrong' is not the same as 'All but Y are wrong'.
>
> Perhaps, but if your method of proof is to assert that there is an
> alternate interpretation, then you aren't proving anything except that
> there is an alternate interpretation.

It can become entangled, no? When you point out actual problems with an 
interpretation and *then* people ask you for an alternative, they are 
the ones admitting the alternative as a method of 'proof' against the other:

- A says X in explanation of P
- B points out that X doesn't go well with 1 and 2
- A then asks for an explanation of P that has no problems with 1 and 2
- B provides Y, effectively showing that it's possible to explain P 
without clashing with 1 and 2

In that case, Y doesn't disprove X. It's 1 and 2 that disprove X. The 
role of Y is to show that it's possible to solve P in harmony with 1 and 
2. That is relevant because if no one could come up with a solution of P 
that wasn't invalidated by 1 or 2 or whatever, then it could be argued 
that the necessity of solving P anyway trumped the objections of 1 and 
2. (Though as I'll say below I don't think this last argument ever holds.)

I know it's fashionable here now to say that in a Wolfe story there are 
always explanations of type Y which are meant for the simple minded, 
with an X kept for those who aim higher. However, I don't see that 
that's the case. In my experience, yes, there are always commonplace or 
even somewhat elaborate type Y explanations, and there are often others 
which are not obvious, but they're not type X, violating 1 and 2, 
they're type W, looking at it all from a dazzling perspective but 
violating nothing.

(That's why, for instance, I think Marc's ideas, while possibly very off 
the mark, are going on about it The Right Way. And yes, I think many of 
yours do too. Or Ryan's.)

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