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Chakobsa and Bhotani Jib

Posted: 26 Jul 2009 15:42
by chanilover
So I'm reading Dune again and this language is described as a so-called magnetic language.

What do you think that means?

Re: Chakobsa and Bhotani Jib

Posted: 26 Jul 2009 15:55
by SandChigger
It's about as meaningful as the "a mirabhasa language, honed phalange consonants and joined vowels" found later in Messiah.

In other words, not very. :dance:

Re: Chakobsa and Bhotani Jib

Posted: 26 Jul 2009 19:04
by SandChigger
In the interest of being slightly more helpful... ;)

Have you checked the Chakobsa article in The Dune Encyclopedia?

Or the short article on this page, by Alan S. Kaye, Ph.D. and John Quijada, who also wrote the Fremen language article in the DE?

They have a rather interesting interpretation of "magnetic": "...the first Bhotani Assassins had a mutant physical characteristic by which they were able to seek out their enemies via the natural magnetic and piercing eyes for which they have been justifiably depicted in later artistic and sculptural works."

(N.B. Kaye passed on last year or the year before, but Quijada is still active in the conlanger community. When I contacted him about their articles in the DE, he said that they had had no direct input from Frank Herbert himself, so all of their work and interpretations are original.)

Re: Chakobsa and Bhotani Jib

Posted: 03 Aug 2009 16:59
by chanilover
Can you summarise the article for me, I was just sort of wondering, I can't be bothered reading it all.

Re: Chakobsa and Bhotani Jib

Posted: 03 Aug 2009 19:57
by SandChigger
chanilover wrote:Can you summarise the article for me, I was just sort of wondering, I can't be bothered reading it all.
Maybe later, can't be arsed at the moment. ;)

(It's not all THAT long, really. But it is fanfic, that didn't make it into the DE even, and I'm not overly impressed with it.)

Re: Chakobsa and Bhotani Jib

Posted: 04 Aug 2009 03:03
by lotek
I was fascinated by the idea of a secret language as a kid, so reading about Chakobsa(or even House battle language) was cool)

One quick search on Google always being worth a try, I type the words "magnetic language" and the last link is a Google book:
Athanasius KIRCHER "The Last Man Who Knew Everything"
The link
Now that's already a good title!

I have many things to do today so I just have time to find and mark it, but I will try to see if there is some relevancy to your question, Chanilover :)

briefly it speaks of cryptography and machine language, funny coincidence.


It has this quote form Peirce(all right another google search then..)
"Every machine is a reasoning machine, in so much as there are certain relations between its parts, which relations involve other relations that were not expressly intented."
Peirce, "Logical Machines"
Now that's a thing FH could have said or used don't you think?

nb: I just hope I did not go too much off course from the original question with this!

Re: Chakobsa and Bhotani Jib

Posted: 05 Aug 2009 13:09
by chanilover
At last! Another answer in my FLOP thread. :lol:

Re: Chakobsa and Bhotani Jib

Posted: 05 Aug 2009 15:56
by lotek
glad to be of assistance(though even if I do speak decent english I'm not sure what a flop thread is_apart from the obvious)

Re: Chakobsa and Bhotani Jib

Posted: 30 Mar 2013 12:55
by Naïve mind
Chakobsa is an actual language, as noted here. It's worthwhile to read the entire thread, as it ventures into how "hunting languages" arise amongst superstitious cultures.