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Why so late?

Posted: 22 Apr 2008 06:22
by SandChigger
Why does it take humankind 11,000 years to rid itself of the crutch of computers and AI?

Was AI a relatively new development that pushed the situation to a crisis?

Or were there other factors in it?

What do you think? ;)

Posted: 22 Apr 2008 06:56
by Freakzilla
I think it was probably crucial in early space exploration. I partially blame the stagnation of the Old Empire on that... and my parents.

Posted: 22 Apr 2008 08:18
by orald
Ordinary people need computers(and still do in the Duniverse, for data storage if not the computation capabilities), but it seems that in the Duniverse certain specializations came to be that eliminated the need for some of it, like mentats.

Frankly I don't understand your first sentence here- rid themselves?
IMO there was never any need for them to rid themselves of simple computers like ours, but it seems there was such a great hatered that even a calculator would've been mistrusted.

Posted: 22 Apr 2008 11:55
by SandChigger
It's rid someone of something, actually, used reflexively. "To make someone or something free of a troublesome or unwanted person or thing."

I think you've got the cart before the horse, Orald. Mentats arose because there was a need for computation and data storage but no longer any (or many) machines readily available for that purpose.

Freak, why do you think the (old) Old Empire was stagnant?

Posted: 22 Apr 2008 12:07
by Freakzilla
SandChigger wrote:Freak, why do you think the (old) Old Empire was stagnant?
Because we were told it was in Dune. This was what caused the need for Muad'dib's Jihad:

"I see in the future what I've seen in the past. You well know the pattern
of our affairs, Jessica. The race knows its own mortality and fears stagnation
of its heredity. It's in the bloodstream -- the urge to mingle genetic strains
without plan. The Imperium, the CHOAM Company, all the Great Houses, they are
but bits of flotsam in the path of the flood."

Posted: 22 Apr 2008 12:12
by Omphalos
There is also the possibility that very few wanted the machines gone in the first place. Imagine how hard it would be to get computers and machines from our hands today. Now multiply that by 11,000 years and God knows how many planets. The Jihaddis in TBJ had a huge task in front of them. Remember, this was not a war of humans vs. spider robots and stupid AI over the right to exist. It was a war of ideas against the "necessity" of using computers and machines in the first place. Ill bet that they had a hard fucking time wrenching those computers out of everyone's hands. Its not like most people would have willingly agreed to give up valueable tools. They had to be forced.

Posted: 22 Apr 2008 12:15
by Omphalos
Freakzilla wrote:
SandChigger wrote:Freak, why do you think the (old) Old Empire was stagnant?
Because we were told it was in Dune. This was what caused the need for Muad'dib's Jihad:

"I see in the future what I've seen in the past. You well know the pattern
of our affairs, Jessica. The race knows its own mortality and fears stagnation
of its heredity. It's in the bloodstream -- the urge to mingle genetic strains
without plan. The Imperium, the CHOAM Company, all the Great Houses, they are
but bits of flotsam in the path of the flood."
Exactly. This was one of the things I presumed when I wrote that article about The Golden Path long ago

Posted: 22 Apr 2008 12:29
by SandChigger
So you both think that stagnation was also one of the factors behind the Butlerian Jihad?

Posted: 22 Apr 2008 12:52
by Freakzilla
NO! Muad'dib's Jihad.

Posted: 22 Apr 2008 13:05
by Omphalos
In different forms, both. Before the TBJ people were relying on machines too much and were allowing their own natural abilities to atrophy because of that reliance. TBJ was about ending that risk and forcing humanity to make itself strong and self-reliant by ending the reliance forcibly.

But Paul's Jihad was a misguided attempt to correct the same things that The Golden Path would later be used for. Leto II came along afterwards and used the political structure that had been created by Paul's Jihad (a subjugated empire, subservient to Fremen power) to impose his Peace. But what he was fighting was economic and cultural stagnation that arose from monopolies and concentration of power in certain economic and other fourth-estate political organizations. That particular threat, a weakness which would have been capitalized upon by those using the potential Ixian Hunter Seekers, was what actually put the fate of humanity at risk. That is what I was talking about in that essay.

Posted: 22 Apr 2008 13:56
by orald
Omph, also that the imperium was connected everywhere, and the presence of prescients who could easily find anyone who tried to get away from it.

I know proper mentats were only there AFTER the BJ, but we know the BG already started forming around that time, combined with the fact that people so eager to develop humanity's skills would train and develop themselves first.
It's not that bright to get rid of all the machines before you can at least substitue them with people.

Posted: 22 Apr 2008 14:04
by Omphalos
orald wrote:Omph, also that the imperium was connected everywhere, and the presence of prescients who could easily find anyone who tried to get away from it.
Yes, of course. Thanks for pointing that out, orald.
orald wrote:I know proper mentats were only there AFTER the BJ, but we know the BG already started forming around that time, combined with the fact that people so eager to develop humanity's skills would train and develop themselves first.
It's not that bright to get rid of all the machines before you can at least substitue them with people.
.

Waiting for a better time never stopped people before. I'm betting that they wanted a clean sweep, then thought about how to correct for the loss of machines. As a matter of fact, in a masterpiece book by Cordwainer Smith, written the exact same time as Dune and dealing with almost identical themes, he called his revolution against machines "The Clean Sweep." I always thought that was what Herbert had in mind too.

Posted: 22 Apr 2008 22:19
by Rakis
Omphalos wrote:There is also the possibility that very few wanted the machines gone in the first place. Imagine how hard it would be to get computers and machines from our hands today. Now multiply that by 11,000 years and God knows how many planets. The Jihaddis in TBJ had a huge task in front of them. Remember, this was not a war of humans vs. spider robots and stupid AI over the right to exist. It was a war of ideas against the "necessity" of using computers and machines in the first place. Ill bet that they had a hard fucking time wrenching those computers out of everyone's hands. Its not like most people would have willingly agreed to give up valueable tools. They had to be forced.
Hmmm...must have been a massive Inquisition-like undertaking.

I don't remember if it was mention anywhere (besides the DE), but who or what power was at the helm of the BJ? :|

Posted: 22 Apr 2008 22:34
by Omphalos
Rakis wrote:
Omphalos wrote:There is also the possibility that very few wanted the machines gone in the first place. Imagine how hard it would be to get computers and machines from our hands today. Now multiply that by 11,000 years and God knows how many planets. The Jihaddis in TBJ had a huge task in front of them. Remember, this was not a war of humans vs. spider robots and stupid AI over the right to exist. It was a war of ideas against the "necessity" of using computers and machines in the first place. Ill bet that they had a hard fucking time wrenching those computers out of everyone's hands. Its not like most people would have willingly agreed to give up valueable tools. They had to be forced.
Hmmm...must have been a massive Inquisition-like undertaking.

I don't remember if it was mention anywhere (besides the DE), but who or what power was at the helm of the BJ? :|
Some dead baby.

Posted: 22 Apr 2008 23:02
by Rakis
Omphalos wrote:
Rakis wrote:
Omphalos wrote:There is also the possibility that very few wanted the machines gone in the first place. Imagine how hard it would be to get computers and machines from our hands today. Now multiply that by 11,000 years and God knows how many planets. The Jihaddis in TBJ had a huge task in front of them. Remember, this was not a war of humans vs. spider robots and stupid AI over the right to exist. It was a war of ideas against the "necessity" of using computers and machines in the first place. Ill bet that they had a hard fucking time wrenching those computers out of everyone's hands. Its not like most people would have willingly agreed to give up valueable tools. They had to be forced.
Hmmm...must have been a massive Inquisition-like undertaking.

I don't remember if it was mention anywhere (besides the DE), but who or what power was at the helm of the BJ? :|
Some dead baby.
Yeah, but who took the fight? Any info if there was a church-like power behind all this?

Although i like this idea of a Zombie-king-baby...

Posted: 23 Apr 2008 02:00
by chanilover
There were preacher-ministers during the Jihad, I just read the part in CoD where Leto is force fed spice essence and trips out, peeking in OM. The preacher-minister was someone who knew the machines and had serviced them. I vaguely remember one of the arguments in favour of the machines and computers ruling humanity, put forward by a prequel fan, was this reference to a preacher minister who had serviced the machines. "Serviced" doesn't mean "served". I'm taking my car in for a service on Saturday, that doesn't mean the car is my master.

Posted: 23 Apr 2008 02:23
by SandChigger
Maybe being a preacher, he preached to them?

Sunday services, in other words! :P

Posted: 23 Apr 2008 05:48
by orald
I'm a slave to the internets, does it count? :cry:

Re: Why so late?

Posted: 23 Jun 2009 22:12
by redbugpest
I think it is plausable that the Senior Herbert did have some kind of man machine war in mind. Let's face it, the evil robot theme was very popular in sci fi from the mid 30's on, and even Asmov, though not depicting them as evil robots cast them as being feared and hated by humans because they were so superior in so many ways.

Re: Why so late?

Posted: 23 Jun 2009 22:18
by SandChigger
It's only "plausable" because you're a fucking idiot who never understood the books any better than your lord and master KJA.

Re: Why so late?

Posted: 24 Jun 2009 07:06
by redbugpest
SandChigger wrote:It's only "plausable" because you're a fucking idiot who never understood the books any better than your lord and master KJA.
WOW - I just don't know what to say...

I just NEVER thought of it that way! I can the light now...

LOL

Re: Why so late?

Posted: 24 Jun 2009 07:12
by redbugpest
Baraka Bryan wrote:it says clearly in the REAL Duniverse that men used machines to enslave other men. not AIs with delusions of grandeur trying to take over the universe.

the BJ was not about an evil robot empire, it was about breaking humanity's dependence on machines.

retard.
Always has to come down to the nasty comments, doesn’t it...
The progression from Man controlling Man with machines to machines controlling man is a simple one that has been in Sci Fi forever. Men did use machines to enslave other men – the Titans used Omnius to rise to power, and as a result were themselves subjugated by the machines that they controlled.

Re: Why so late?

Posted: 24 Jun 2009 08:01
by Schu
Man, just because it's a nasty comment doesn't mean you're not a retard. Learn to accept your inner and outer retard, and you will be happy (but still retarded).

Re:

Posted: 24 Jun 2009 08:11
by Freakzilla
Rakis wrote:
Omphalos wrote:
Rakis wrote:
Omphalos wrote:There is also the possibility that very few wanted the machines gone in the first place. Imagine how hard it would be to get computers and machines from our hands today. Now multiply that by 11,000 years and God knows how many planets. The Jihaddis in TBJ had a huge task in front of them. Remember, this was not a war of humans vs. spider robots and stupid AI over the right to exist. It was a war of ideas against the "necessity" of using computers and machines in the first place. Ill bet that they had a hard fucking time wrenching those computers out of everyone's hands. Its not like most people would have willingly agreed to give up valueable tools. They had to be forced.
Hmmm...must have been a massive Inquisition-like undertaking.

I don't remember if it was mention anywhere (besides the DE), but who or what power was at the helm of the BJ? :|
Some dead baby.
Yeah, but who took the fight? Any info if there was a church-like power behind all this?

Although i like this idea of a Zombie-king-baby...
The Other Memory scene of the speaker durring the Jihad which Leto II treats us to reminds me very much of a church service, but I can't recall a specific religious organization being named.

It's my personal theory that the Bene Gesserit started it and organized it, from behind the scenes, of course.

Re: Why so late?

Posted: 24 Jun 2009 08:28
by redbugpest
Schu wrote:Man, just because it's a nasty comment doesn't mean you're not a retard. Learn to accept your inner and outer retard, and you will be happy (but still retarded).
Ass Sch! Excuse me - I sneezed! :o

Does it make you feel good about yourself to call me names?