AI souls

maru · 08 Dec 2004, 13:09 · from 2004-December.txt.gz

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From: marudubshinki at gmail.com (maru)
Date: Wed Dec  8 13:09:11 2004
Subject: (urth) AI souls
In-Reply-To: <BAY102-F34FB19B2028782A6C930D986B60 at phx.gbl>
References: <BAY102-F34FB19B2028782A6C930D986B60 at phx.gbl>
Message-ID: <41B76D69.6060108 at gmail.com>

Y'know, I don't think that bit with Apheta is an isolated peculiarity- I 
recall, in one of teh Island stories, Dr. Island spoke to the patients 
in the same manner.  Seeing it twice leads me to think this is a mjor 
point, some sort of meaningful inversion.
~Maru

Chris wrote:

> Another statement of the obvious: the spirit/breath connection is 
> cross-cultural, definitely not strictly Hebrew (though it is certainly 
> important there). It's there, for example, in the greek - although I 
> don't think that the communication aspect was originally tied to 
> spirit in this way in the Greek tradition, though it may have been 
> associated later on. If I recall correctly Aristotle does sort of 
> place communication in a primitive "evolutionary" scale of mind, in 
> that supposedly creatures without the ability to hear lack the ability 
> to learn (and thus cannot proceed past a certain level of 
> consciousness). One assumes he hadn't met many deaf people, but 
> perhaps the point he was making there was metaphorical.
>
> I was always struck by Apheta's peculiar non-speaking-speech, and I 
> suspected that it reflects a general concept in some mystical 
> traditions about the second type of wisdom, apart from that sort of 
> logos that *is* in a positive sense and that we can speak of. You can 
> vaguely associate it with Taoism, Zen buddhism, or even stick within 
> the Hebrew or Greek traditions. In any event I was never really able 
> to tell if this was an essential thematic element, or whether Wolfe 
> just thought it was a nifty idea.
>
> -- 
> "You must not be soft, but cover yourself up; for you must discover an 
> intellection abstractional and fraudulent."
>
>> Dan'l wrote:
>> >It seems clear to me that Wolfe is suggesting that something
>> >like a soul happens at a certain level of complexity and
>> >especially of _communication_. The word he uses is "speech,"
>> >but I suspect that the word he is avoiding - and why should
>> >Wolfe not avoid key words and facts every bit as much as his
>> >own characters? - is "word," or rather "Word," _logos_.
>> >
>> >God speaks World into existence, and all the creatures in
>> >it; God then ensouls Man by "breathing" into his nostrils
>> >- but the Hebrew word translated as "breath" can as easily
>> >be translated "spirit" or "wind." And we speak with our
>> >breath.
>> >
>> >Speech is breath is spirit.
>>
>> Just so. And Wolfe goes out of his way to make Apheta and her kind 
>> have no
>> tongues. In Chapter XIX, aptly named "Silence", Apheta says:
>> --------------------------------------------
>> "You have listened to my voice for a long
>> while now, Autarch. Listen to this world of Yesod instead
>> and tell me what you hear, other than my words, when I
>> speak to you. Listen! What do you hear?"
>>       I did not understand. I said, "Nothing. But you are a
>> human woman."
>>       "You hear nothing because we speak with silence, even
>> as you with sound. Whatever noises we find we shape,
>> canceling those which are unneeded, voicing our thoughts
>> in the remainder. That is why I led you here, where the
>> waves murmur always; and why we have so many fountains,
>> and trees to stir their leaves in the wind from our sea."
>> --------------------------------------------
>>
>> Then she shows Sev that she has no tongue. What is Wolfe trying to 
>> say? Sev
>> then beds her, and from that bizarre union the New Sun is born, which is
>> himself. I'm so theologically confused!
>>
>> -Roy
>>
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