Re-starting the Spice Cycle

[Freakzilla]

Does anyone have any thoughts about Leto II being mistaken about the necessity of re-starting the sandworm cycle?

New topic!

[leagued]

During a re-read of GEoD I started to question the necessity of re-starting the sandworm cycle for humanity's survival.
If we all, mostly, agree that the Golden Path ensured mankind's survival through a combination of spreading humanity further than ever before and breaking the Oracle's hold (Siona, no-globes), then what is the purpose of the sandworms?
The Ixian Navigation Machine provided the means for the Scattering, not Guild Navigators, correct?

Here is my theory:
Leto had to start the transformation so that he could safeguard the Golden Path for 4000 years and his vision showed him that humanity would need spice from a renewed sandworm cycle in order to fuel the Scattering. He had to oversee Leto's Peace to build mankind's desires to spread and to make them learn the lesson about heroes; all of that was correct. But the Ixian Nav machines were something that he did not foresee (his surprise in GEoD is, to me, fairly clear) and we know that he did not look beyond his reign except to know that the Path endured.
No-fields and INMs were something new, not part of his vision because they couldn't be; the first INMs being built w/in no-globes (or perhaps being self-no-fielding- separate theory). And so their creation, outside the Oracle's ability to foresee, changed the Golden Path. Leto II knows that it still survives and that's all the required so he didn't realize that the invention of INMs had fundamentally changed one of the foundations of the Path without breaking it.

Once INMs existed and had spread (scattered (small 's') by Anteac's attack, there was no longer a need for sandworms and spice because mankind could Scatter without it.

Does any of that make sense/hold water? Its not that Leto was wrong because until the moment INMs were created the spice was necessary; their creation was an unpredictable divergence; something that happened when Leto no longer was holding all the threads of fate.

Perhaps there's something in Heretics/Chapterhouse that I've forgotten that sheds light on why sandworms might still be necessary, if so, please shotgun this whole theory to pieces.

[leagued]

Son of a bitch; you beat me to it. Can my thread be combined here?

[Freakzilla]

Yep

[leagued]

much obliged

[inhuien]

If for no other reason, and I'm sure there are many. He clearly passes the mantle of stewardship of the Old Empire on to the Bene Gesserit who would be nothing without Spice and the Water of Life.

[Naïve mind]

Ozymandias.

[leagued]

Providing for the BG is about the one thing that I can think of really, provided the rest of my assumptions/logic holds water.
I do still believe that the INMs created a veer in the future that he didn't see and that it, along with Tleilaxu spice vats, obviated the need to restart the spice cycle.

The Ozymandias flew right over my head I'm afraid. Watchmen reference or classical Ozy? Or Apocalypse's stone scribe?

[Freakzilla]

I think he restarted it because it was useful but no longer a dependancy for the universe. It was no longer relied upon for space travel due to the INM and humanity seemed to be weened of of it for the most part durring the Famine Times. The BT technology could be easily lost, and nearly was, but with the BG seeding uncounted worlds with sandtrout there would always be a spice cycle going on somewhere.

[JustSomeGuy]

I think he restarted it because he got fucked up and fell into that river. I agree (for the most part) with what leagued/Freakzilla had to say.

Can't say I agree with this:

He clearly passes the mantle of stewardship of the Old Empire on to the Bene Gesserit...

Didn't Leto contemplate exterminating the Bene Gesserit? I'm pretty sure that he didn't pass "the mantle of stewardship" to anyone.


Well, I just felt like posting.

[Freakzilla]

Yes he did.

And I agree, post Scattering, there could only be a 'local' steward.

[Serkanner]

I think he restarted it because he got fucked up and fell into that river. I agree (for the most part) with what leagued/Freakzilla had to say.

Can't say I agree with this:

He clearly passes the mantle of stewardship of the Old Empire on to the Bene Gesserit...

Didn't Leto contemplate exterminating the Bene Gesserit? I'm pretty sure that he didn't pass "the mantle of stewardship" to anyone.


Well, I just felt like posting.

Dar-es-balat.

[Naïve mind]

The Ozymandias flew right over my head I'm afraid.

I meant to say that Leto II was, despite his many other qualities, not a very modest person. He may have thought of the spice cycle as a sort of ... personal monument.

[Freakzilla]

He did say that he would be ressurected, maybe the spice would be required for that.

[leagued]

The Ozymandias flew right over my head I'm afraid.

I meant to say that Leto II was, despite his many other qualities, not a very modest person. He may have thought of the spice cycle as a sort of ... personal monument.

Ah, that does make sense then. I kind of like the idea that Leto was to some degree so arrogant that any contemplation of the the GP where his final transformation was not required (ie where the actual mechanism that ensured survival was the creation of INMs and Tleilaxu spice and therefore a more secondary effect to his sacrifice) was almost unthinkable to him. It makes Leto a little more human, a little bit more of a God w/ feet of clay like his father.

[inhuien]

Why does he see the GP fail if he dies away from water?

[leagued]

Why does he see the GP fail if he dies away from water?

Yeah, I don't know.
Perhaps because he never looked into the future to find his death and just used his logic and his conviction that the cycle needed to restart whenever claiming that mankind was doomed if he died away from water.
Or perhaps the times that he had seen the GP fail without the cycle came from prescient forays made before the invention of the INMs. This would require you to accept my theory that INMs did not cause the break (bend might be better) w/ Leto's vision of the GP until the moment of their creation. If we think of INMs as just another Oracle and work on the premise that the Oracle creates the future rather than sees it, then perhaps the invention of the INMs could be thought of as a new Oracle creating a new future.
So, I can make my theory work with this problem, but I don't deny that it is a potentially large flaw. Again, its entirely possible that the spice cycle is necessary; I just can't figure out the why of it from my readings of the books.

[lotek]

I always felt the reborn worms were just a curiosity in Dune, kind of like a final joke from the God Emperor.

[leagued]

A conversation b/w Odrade and Duncan at the end of Heretics:

"I thought you deserved an explanation of the Mother Superior's design. It was aimed at the destruction of Rakis, you see. What she really wanted was the elimination of almost all of the worms."
"Great Gods below! Why?"
"They were an oracular force holding us in bondage. Those pearls of the Tyrant's awareness magnified that hold. He didn't predict events, he created them."
Duncan pointed toward the rear of the ship. "But what about..."
"That one? It's just one now. By the time it reaches sufficient numbers to be an influence once more, humankind will have gone its own way beyond him. We'll be too numerous by then, doing too many different things on our own. No single force will rule all of our futures completely, never again."

Is this the explanation? Did the worms continue to hold onto mankind, maintaining the Golden Path long after Leto's death; ensuring that the future where the Scattering succeeded?

[Frybread]

A conversation b/w Odrade and Duncan at the end of Heretics:

"I thought you deserved an explanation of the Mother Superior's design. It was aimed at the destruction of Rakis, you see. What she really wanted was the elimination of almost all of the worms."
"Great Gods below! Why?"
"They were an oracular force holding us in bondage. Those pearls of the Tyrant's awareness magnified that hold. He didn't predict events, he created them."
Duncan pointed toward the rear of the ship. "But what about..."
"That one? It's just one now. By the time it reaches sufficient numbers to be an influence once more, humankind will have gone its own way beyond him. We'll be too numerous by then, doing too many different things on our own. No single force will rule all of our futures completely, never again."

Is this the explanation? Did the worms continue to hold onto mankind, maintaining the Golden Path long after Leto's death; ensuring that the future where the Scattering succeeded?

Maybe the Old Empire, but I don't see how the worms could hold onto the people who, by the time of Heratics, had spread to other galaxies and maybe universes.

[leagued]

I think that's the general belief of what the Golden Path meant, that the Scattering drove mankind too far out to be controlled by the Oracle, but this quote is so far the only thing I've found about why Leto would have thought the worms necessary. The multi-universe aspect of the Scattering also, to me, would imply that not even a planet of worm-oracles dreaming the same prescient vision could hold all of humanity-- my concept of prescience is based on the Oracle holding a single universe (wave-form) collapsed but other universes would have to remain free of that control to prevent a complete breakdown of the laws of physics.

I haven't gotten to my CH:D reread yet, but I think they imply that the multi-universe concept is a theory, right? No is really sure if the no-ship moves to a new universe or stays in teh same one, right?

Does the BG plan to put worms on "countless" planets out in the Scattering threaten the GP? Wouldn't that just magnify the effect of worm-pearl-oracles throughout the universe(s)?

[Freakzilla]

I haven't gotten to my CH:D reread yet, but I think they imply that the multi-universe concept is a theory, right? No is really sure if the no-ship moves to a new universe or stays in teh same one, right?

"These speculations are useless," Bellonda muttered. "We don't even know if
Foldspace introduces us to one universe or many . . . or even an infinite number
of expanding and collapsing bubbles."
"Did the Tyrant understand this any better than we do?" Tamalane asked.
~CH:D

[lotek]

Gotta love the way Frank defuses speculation within the story.
No alien robots from the future past can do that.

[Deskepticon]

He did say that he would be ressurected, maybe the spice would be required for that.

Nope. Just a nullentropy tube full of ghola cells and a lack of imagination performed that miracle.

I agree the Spice was preserved solely to ensure the continuation of the BG. Leto said something to the effect of "the BG saw some of what humanity needed but they were wrong in their method. They could be so much more." (working from memory here) Extermination was the option if the Sisterhood showed a reluctance to change. i.e. - breed another KH, actively oppose Leto as they did his father, etc.

[Deskepticon]

A conversation b/w Odrade and Duncan at the end of Heretics:

"I thought you deserved an explanation of the Mother Superior's design. It was aimed at the destruction of Rakis, you see. What she really wanted was the elimination of almost all of the worms."
"Great Gods below! Why?"
"They were an oracular force holding us in bondage. Those pearls of the Tyrant's awareness magnified that hold. He didn't predict events, he created them."
Duncan pointed toward the rear of the ship. "But what about..."
"That one? It's just one now. By the time it reaches sufficient numbers to be an influence once more, humankind will have gone its own way beyond him. We'll be too numerous by then, doing too many different things on our own. No single force will rule all of our futures completely, never again."

Is this the explanation? Did the worms continue to hold onto mankind, maintaining the Golden Path long after Leto's death; ensuring that the future where the Scattering succeeded?

Good question. Leto's final moment was a vision of the GP. Could the pearls have locked onto this one memory? IDK.

I always thought the pearls were independent of one another - each dreaming their own crazy dream.