Crush on trial

James Wynn · 23 Mar 2005, 15:06 · from 2005-March.txt.gz

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From: thewynns at earthlink.net (James Wynn)
Date: Wed Mar 23 15:06:08 2005
Subject: (urth) Re:  Crush on trial
References: <000c01c52fe0$dcac8240$6401a8c0@TONYSPC>
Message-ID: <001801c52ffc$e3672920$60a3f63f@wynnhouse>

Tony Ellis wrote:
>>>And what about all the generations who *will* be born on Urth if the
>>>New Sun doesn't come? Not to mention all those born on all the other
>>>worlds to which humanity is transplanted after Urth dies. Don't they
>>>count?

Crush countered:
>>Who's to say humanity would have been transplanted?

>Master Ashe says.
>"At this time, many of your people are already gone," Master Ashe
>continued. "Those you call the cagogens have mercifully carried them to
>fairer worlds. Many more will leave before the final victory of the ice.
>I am myself, you see, descended from those refugees." TCOTA. Chapter
>XVII

>Humanity does not die if Severian fails to bring the New Sun. It is
>taken to better worlds, where it continues. Severian's murder of
>millions can't be said to preserve any more unborn
>generations than Ozymandias' murder of thousands.

Very good point, excellent reference. I can see how you can read it that way 
if you choose to. However, I understood "many of your people" to be a 
fraction of a small remnant of humanity surviving at the end of Old Sun's 
lifecycle, and I understood "better worlds" to mean "better than Urth is at 
the end of the Old Sun's life cycle." Green and Blue in "The Short Sun" are 
undoubtedly better than Master Ashe's world, but they are hardly paradises 
for the colonists. It seems to me that in Ashe's stream of time, many will 
die early and unfruitful as the Old Sun dies out, and humanity is finished 
as far as being a species with a significant future -- and the Hierodules 
are seeking a significant future for humanity. They'll hold on on the 
Typhon's and Tzadkiel's starcrossers and on a few scattered systems. 
Severian has seen both outcomes. He can examine them at any time. The New 
Sun is the outcome he chose. In "UotNS" he appreciates that others could see 
it differently. Perhaps if you were on Severian's ship, you would be among 
those trying to assassinate him like someone going back in Time to 
assassinate Hitler when he was a failed Art student.

But Sev CAN objectively analyze both outcomes. He's not a Stalin, Hitler, or 
Ozymandias killing multitudes to remake the world according to some vision 
in their own minds. He's a surgeon performing triage on a dying world.

~ Crush

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