Yueh a Tleilaxu creation?


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Schu
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Yueh a Tleilaxu creation?

Post by Schu »

p62 of my version of Dune Messiah:
They produced killer-mentats. They'd produced a killer medic, overcoming the suk inhibitions against taking human life to do it.
So,

a) Little bit of writing that Frank might have regretted, or wanted to explain later?

b) Suk was actually meant to be a Tleilaxu creation?

c) The medic in question is not Yueh?

d) They actually meant that Piter, a twisted mentat of the Tleilaxu school, created Yueh with his twisted ways and managed to break his conditioning, hence making post-conditioning Yueh a Tleilaxu creation, but only by proxy?

e) some other explanation?

I think d most likely, or possibly a.

If it's c, who else could it be? Yueh was the first with the conditioning to ever break it, and quite likely, the last: the suk school obviously persisted (the Rabbi and the sisterhood) but the conditioning or boasts thereof probably disappeared as soon as Paul came to power and set the records straight.

B? I guess the Harkonnens could have commissioned the tleilaxu to create Yueh for the purposes of sending him to suk school, breaking him later and then getting him sent to the Atreides somehow. That seems less parsimonious than just breaking a regular suk though.
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Post by SandChigger »

Do you know Tony over on alt.fan.dune? ;)

It's kinda like that "neutral island" again: if FH had meant Yueh, why wouldn't he just have come right out and said so?

How about another possibility: at this point about 14 years have gone by since Yueh's betrayal ... plenty of time for the Tleilaxu (and everyone else) to have heard of it and allow their "unbridled curiosity [to] guide their actions." ;)

Otherwise, I'm inclined to suspect (a), oversight/mistake/undeveloped idea.

But kudos for noticing it and the creative rationalizations! :P
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Post by A Thing of Eternity »

I'm with Chig on this one, either his idea, or a mistake.

I think there's actually a fair bit of info in each of the books that look like FH had fleshed out, then removed in editing (for whatever reason) then missed removing some small part when he was editing, leaving us with something odd. For example, Farok's arm - it's likely that he wrote the scene initially with a two armed Farok, then decided later that he should be missing an arm. When he went back and changed this, he missed the line where Farok has both hands in his lap or somesuch - Voila, we have the infamous Farok inconsistancy.

Also, there's all the UK vs US edition discrepancies for Heretics and Chapterhouse which very clearly show a lot of last minute editing, in this case the messups resulted in two different versions of the books.
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Post by dunepunk »

I think Frank might've been simply fleshing out his world. He just gave us a list of things the BT make that could illustrate what they do and why they are so distrusted. He may have had something else in mind, but I think he mat have just been giving us more detail to make his world more believable.
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Post by Schu »

Baraka Bryan wrote:it's pretty clear that yueh's overcoming his inhibitions was due to his love for his wife and trying to preserve her life. nowhere does it suggest the tleilaxu had anything to do with it
Well, except for Piter being the one to work out how to manipulate Yueh, and his being created by the Tleilaxu. Otherwise I agree.

Like I said, I find it unlikely that he meant Yueh to actually have been bred by them. But the killer medic breaking his suk conditioning? sounds too much like yueh for that to be supposed to be anyone else, which is why I think d, but quite possibly a too.
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Post by SandChigger »

I completely get what you're saying, Schu, that you are immediately reminded of Yueh when you read that, but for me the phrase "killer-medic" doesn't exactly fit Yueh. It evokes more of a psychopathic doctor or "angel of mercy" patient-euthanizing nurse image.

Yueh did kill and orchestrate deaths, but his primary fame is as a traitor, no? ;)


(Forgot to add: Also, I agree that the BT taking credit for Yueh because he was twisted by Piter, whom the BT created is reeeeeally reaching for it. If I write a revolutionary program or some hit music or draw a picture that becomes famous on my MacBook, Apple can crow that it was "Made on a Mac!" but they can't claim that they made it.)
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On Yueh being a Memeber of the Tleixu

Post by Sole Man »

Wait, what edition of DUNE MESSIAH do you have? I don't recall reading that in my book...
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Post by SandChigger »

Why not go check your copy of the book first? Schu included the page number (62), so just look around before and after that in your copy. It's the scene where Hayt is presented to Paul by Edric. Alia is watching from a peep-hole.

(It was in my file version and my New English Library paperback. Page 62, as a matter of fact. Schu, is that what you have, the NEL paperback?)

Trust the book over your member, Sloey. [Edit: Whoa...that was a weird typo! :shock: I meant memory, or course.]

(Suk should be capitalized in the quote, that's the only discrepancy. ;) )
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Post by EsperandoAGodot »

Is that quote narration, or a quote? Who's saying it? What scene is it? It sounds like a quote that would come with the introduction of Scytale, and I'm inclined to believe its possible that common wisdom, by now, is that Yueh was a Tleilaxu creation. After all, how could a Suk doctor break his conditioning? :wink:
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Post by SandChigger »

It's from Alia's point of view.
Alia, watching from her vantage point, was touched by the ghola's air of diffidence. She detected nothing feigned. Something ultimately innocent shone from the new Duncan Idaho. The original had been worldly, devil-may-care. But this flesh had been cleansed of all that. It was a pure surface upon which the Tleilaxu had written...what?

She sensed the hidden perils in this gift then. This was a Tleilaxu thing. The Tleilaxu displayed a disturbing lack of inhibitions in what they created. Unbridled curiosity might guide their actions. They boasted they could make anything from the proper human raw material—devils or saints. They sold killer-mentats. They'd produced a killer medic, overcoming the Suk inhibitions against the taking of human life to do it. Their wares included willing menials, pliant sex toys for any whim, soldiers, generals, philosophers, even an occasional moralist.
She never knew Yueh directly, but given that she was Atreides and he the traitor who had betrayed her family, I think it rather unlikely that she would not name him if he were who was intended. (It's not entirely clear, since she had been conceived before the attack, whether she would have OM of Jessica's experiences then? When does the transmission of maternal OM cease, conception or parturition?)
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Post by Tleszer »

I'd assume it would be at conception because I don't think Jessica's egg would continue to gain memories at that point, but what do I know, I don't not know no science.
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Post by dunepunk »

SandChigger wrote:It's from Alia's point of view.
Alia, watching from her vantage point, was touched by the ghola's air of diffidence. She detected nothing feigned. Something ultimately innocent shone from the new Duncan Idaho. The original had been worldly, devil-may-care. But this flesh had been cleansed of all that. It was a pure surface upon which the Tleilaxu had written...what?

She sensed the hidden perils in this gift then. This was a Tleilaxu thing. The Tleilaxu displayed a disturbing lack of inhibitions in what they created. Unbridled curiosity might guide their actions. They boasted they could make anything from the proper human raw material—devils or saints. They sold killer-mentats. They'd produced a killer medic, overcoming the Suk inhibitions against the taking of human life to do it. Their wares included willing menials, pliant sex toys for any whim, soldiers, generals, philosophers, even an occasional moralist.
She never knew Yueh directly, but given that she was Atreides and he the traitor who had betrayed her family, I think it rather unlikely that she would not name him if he were who was intended. (It's not entirely clear, since she had been conceived before the attack, whether she would have OM of Jessica's experiences then? When does the transmission of maternal OM cease, conception or parturition?)
The transmission of OM continues until separation with the parent's body. In the case of paternal OM, this is when the sperm leaves his body, but with maternal OM, it does up until birth. I don't have any quotes handy, but I'm pretty sure that's how it works.
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Post by SandChigger »

Unfortunately, that's the sort of thing you do have to have quotes for. ;)

It's probably a moot question in Alia's case, though, because she was in telepathic contact with her mother during the WoL ceremony that made her a preborn. Maybe there was a bit of Sharing went on there, from mother to daughter, in addition to the normal genetic OM.

Even if not, Alia grew up with Jessica and Paul and knew their hate for Yueh. Why wouldn't she have named him in her thoughts?
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Post by Mandy »

I don't think it is such a stretch to assume that Alia is referring to Yueh, but that doesn't mean that she is. Perhaps the BT started producing "killer medics" after Yueh. Doesn't really matter.

The passages where the Baron discusses Yueh might be helpful in figuring this out.
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on Suk doctors

Post by Sole Man »

Look, Doctors heal people and make them better. Medics just comfort you while you die.

End of discussion.
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Re: on Suk doctors

Post by Tleszer »

Sole Man wrote:Look, Doctors heal people and make them better. Medics just comfort you while you die.

End of discussion.
And gunshot wounds to the head can be cured with CPR. :wink:
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Post by SandChigger »

Tleszer, can't you read?! He said end of discussion. :shock:

I'm not sure what discussion he's talking about, but so it goes. ;)
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Post by Tleszer »

I suffer from "SRS" aka Selective Reading Syndrome. How else do you think I was able to "read through" all of KJA & BH's prequels and sequels?

EDIT: by "selective" I mean reading every other paragraph so that the idiocy would not damage my brain... not too much at least. Actually, it could have been through my Will and by the juice of sapho.

Yeah, I don't know what discussion Sloey's talking about, but it clearly had nothing to do with Red vs Blue.
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On tlezer

Post by Sole Man »

*Has sadistic girlfreind coddle Tleszer's head*

You're not alone...There are places for people like you...who've read waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaayyy to much of the hacks to function right.

It's okay. Everything will be okay...
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Post by SandChigger »

And all shall be well and all manner of thing shall be well when the tongues of flame are in-folded into the crowned knot of fire and the fire and the rose are one.

;)
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Post by loremaster »

I think it is quite possible Frank intended us to think of Yueh here.

FWIW, yueh is a killer by his own admission i think, and i think there is also something somewhere in the books about "Suks cannot stand by and allow humans to come to harm", kinda assimovian.

I just think that A member of THE ATREIDES mentions a Killer Doctor, its kinda like a Bene Gesserit mentioning "that worm fella". To me you dont need a name.

On the other hand, Killer Doctor sounds like a typical tleilaxu juxtaposition of opposites a la "Twisted Mentat". Maybe it was a product available for purchase?
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Re: Yueh a Tleilaxu creation?

Post by Ziggy »

I must admit that this is one particular little snippit that has me scratching my head whenever I re-read Messiah. Whene I come across this one I my knee-jerk reaction is to think of Yueh, but it doesn't fit with the events that took place in Dune. The Baron / Piter making considerable effort in their schemes to subvert Yueh's conditioning. Yueh himself is surprised by his own feelings in wanting to take the Baron's life. On the other hand is it possible that the BT planted Yueh within a Great House as part of their own mischief? Maybe even engineering events that crossed his path with the Harkonnens? The Baron and Piter may then have only thought that they broke Yueh but he was already damaged goods. I do wonder if it was some musing of Frank's at the time that he intended to flesh out but never returned to. Or of course it could be referring to someone other than Yueh, or even a minor mistake a la the spontaneous limb regeneration.

Another question is if Yueh was the genuine article, is it possible to subvert the conditioning of all Suk's in a similar fashion? At the time, the Imperium certainly placed great faith in the Suk conditioning. Torturing a loved one seems like a fairly obvious lever and a little surprising that the Baron would have been the first to try this. So if we assume Tleilaxu involvement, perhaps their product required a trigger like Ghola memory awakening. The quote from Messiah is fairly specific that the Suk conditioning is overcome in their killer medic.

This one could drive you nuts. My money is on Frank throwing it in there to keep the reader on their toes and spark just this kind of debate!
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Re: Yueh a Tleilaxu creation?

Post by Freakzilla »

I don't know how I missed this before...

I think the quote is simply explained:

The BT made a killer mentat. The killer mentat made a killer doctor. Therefore the BT made a killer doctor, indirectly.

BTW, Alia would have had several years of memories of Dr. Yueh through OM of Jessica.
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Re: Yueh a Tleilaxu creation?

Post by lotek »

I don't believe the Tleilatxu had anything to do with the breaking of the imperial conditioning, of course they have a responsability since they produced Piter, but they didn't do it Piter did!

In my opinion, Piter was the best at what he did, a true genius of evil some might say and that's that.

Unless I am confronted with hard evidence the BT planted some sort of compulsion in Wellington I won't be able to agree with that postulate :)

Didn't someone here say something like "even if it's made on a Mac doesn't mean Steve Jobs did it"?
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Re: Yueh a Tleilaxu creation?

Post by Ziggy »

Perhaps Yueh's wife inadvertantly had a hand in the matter. His love for her may have been in part down to BG manipulation, a sort of lesser imprinting. An ironic twist of fate if she had been instructed to engineer such a strong sense of loyalty and devotion in her husband.
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