A macro-view of the GP

[SandChigger]

This seems to have gone over well.

[Freakzilla]

Or, to sum up all my arguments:

If the GP is about technology and goods and management... why HoD and Ch:D take place in the old Empire's core instead of on the scattered worlds (where all the good-stuf(TM) from technology and production and breeding and chaotic organization are)?????

I don't think the events in HoD and CH:D have anything to do with the GP. Well, they do as would everything in humanity after The Scattering, but they are not critical to its continuation. I like to think of them as the story of the death of the Old Empire. Dune is gone and all the old factions with it. Even the BG continue only as a hybrid. I assume that some of the scattered BG cells will succede in recreating the spice cycle but with technology there's really no need unless you're already addicted.

Oh, and the quote you may have been thinking of:

There's no single set of limits for all men. Universal prescience is an empty myth. Only the most powerful local currents of Time may be foretold. But in an infinite universe, local can be so gigantic that your mind shrinks from it.

[Schu]

I have a slightly different view. I remember an exchange like this:

Hwi: and the Fish Speakers?
Leto: they teach survival.
Hwi: oh, the survivors!

So I thought that their offshoot (the Honoured Matres) were indeed the survivors, but they needed the help of the BG to truly survive (being taught to shrug off a Futar's scream, to survive biological attack and just to be able to govern themselves without making a gigantic mess of things.

So I consider it a survival thing. The main protagonists are trying their hardest to survive rampant HM attacks, and as we see more an more, the HM are themselves just trying to survive (otherwise they wouldn't have come back to the old empire) and the amalgamation of the two have a chance of survival against the NFD enemies.

[Tleszer]

That would have been epic yet still true enough to the vision that FH had laid out throughout Dune. Even if there were a "Terminator" vibe, FH would still have included the human element as being part of the conquerors rather than just being the victims of robot-brutality, considering that Dune is also the story of the evolution of humankind/human mind along with technology (sans AI).

[Freakzilla]

That would have been epic yet still true enough to the vision that FH had laid out throughout Dune. Even if there were a "Terminator" vibe, FH would still have included the human element as being part of the conquerors rather than just being the victims of robot-brutality, considering that Dune is also the story of the evolution of humankind/human mind along with technology (sans AI).

ya if the empire were to come to ruin, FH would do it in a very intricate manner.. instead of amassing a huge army with FTL, fuel-propelled ships

It'd happen between books.

My point was, no matter what happened to the BG or the Old Empire, the GP still remains.

"I BEQUEATH TO YOU MY FEAR AND LONELINESS. TO YOU I GIVE THE CERTAINTY THAT THE
BODY AND SOUL OF THE BENE GESSERIT WILL MEET THE SAME FATE AS ALL OTHER BODIES
AND ALL OTHER SOULS."

"WHAT IS SURVIVAL IF YOU DO NOT SURVIVE WHOLE? ASK THE BENE TLEILAX THAT! WHAT
IF YOU NO LONGER HEAR THE MUSIC OF LIFE? MEMORIES ARE NOT ENOUGH UNLESS THEY
CALL YOU TO NOBLE PURPOSE!"

"WHY DID YOUR SISTERHOOD NOT BUILD THE GOLDEN PATH? YOU KNEW THE NECESSITY.
YOUR FAILURE CONDEMNED ME, THE GOD EMPEROR, TO MILLENNIA OF PERSONAL DESPAIR."

[Frybread]

How do you all think the no-ship and its inhabitants would have been handled in Dune 7?

It appeared to me that Sheanna had planned to start another spice cycle on another planet. Also, there was still the question about the religion that had formed around her before she escaped Chapterhouse.

I don't know what Frank had planned for Duncan, Teg, or the Jews. And I have no idea what he would have done with Scytale and his nullentropy capsule.

As far as the Old Empire, it seemed the Bene Gesserit/Honored Matres would be preparing for a confrontation with the NFD.

[Freakzilla]

How do you all think the no-ship and its inhabitants would have been handled in Dune 7?

It appeared to me that Sheanna had planned to start another spice cycle on another planet.

There were uncounted BG cells sent out into The Scattering too.

Also, there was still the question about the religion that had formed around her before she escaped Chapterhouse.

I think just about anywhere Sheena lands she's going to gather a following.

I don't know what Frank had planned for Duncan, Teg, or the Jews.

The New Fremen

And I have no idea what he would have done with Scytale and his nullentropy capsule.

As far as the Old Empire, it seemed the Bene Gesserit/Honored Matres would be preparing for a confrontation with the NFD.

I think by hybridizing with the BG that became a moot point, no more worrying about biological warfare or screaming futars.

[Frybread]

How do you all think the no-ship and its inhabitants would have been handled in Dune 7?

It appeared to me that Sheanna had planned to start another spice cycle on another planet.

There were uncounted BG cells sent out into The Scattering too.

Also, there was still the question about the religion that had formed around her before she escaped Chapterhouse.

I think just about anywhere Sheena lands she's going to gather a following.

I don't know what Frank had planned for Duncan, Teg, or the Jews.

The New Fremen

And I have no idea what he would have done with Scytale and his nullentropy capsule.

As far as the Old Empire, it seemed the Bene Gesserit/Honored Matres would be preparing for a confrontation with the NFD.

I think by hybridizing with the BG that became a moot point, no more worrying about biological warfare or screaming futars.

The Jews becoming like the ancient Fremen was a possbility, especially since Sheanna would be their leader and she, being a Dune native, probably had OM of the Fremen and (maybe) their Reverand Mothers.

[mrpsbrk]

Or, to sum up all my arguments:

If the GP is about technology and goods and management... why HoD and Ch:D take place in the old Empire's core instead of on the scattered worlds (where all the good-stuff(TM) from technology and production and breeding and chaotic organization are)?????

I don't think the events in HoD and CH:D have anything to do with the GP. Well, they do as would everything in humanity after The Scattering, but they are not critical to its continuation. I like to think of them as the story of the death of the Old Empire. Dune is gone and all the old factions with it. Even the BG continue only as a hybrid. I assume that some of the scattered BG cells will succede in recreating the spice cycle but with technology there's really no need unless you're already addicted.

So, if i follow you, the Scattering is the "winners" and whatever it is that remains on the old galaxy center is the "losers". They already have had their butts kicked and we are now just about to see their final and total burial. Is that what you mean?

Further, in your depiction, the GP is already done, finito, accomplished, grade A+, well done, accolades to all, and whatever happens ever after does not matter for Our Great and Sublime Lord God Leto the II won forever and ever and ever?

(I kid, i kid... )

Do you know a comic book named "The Invisibles" by Grant Morrison? It has a whole issue that tells the story of one canon-fodder soldier that had been shot ages before, complete with his childhood memories and fears and hopes and why in the end he was bad bad bad and he served the Dark Force but even so he didn't deserve to die. I guess one of the Austin Powers movie had a take just like that too.

Well, i find this a very amusing fictional device but... i just don't see Frank doing it.

I happen to agree with you, that HoD and Ch:D are NOT about the Golden Path, but i disagree that it is just, like, a "tales of Beedle the Bard", that is, something that is on the same universe but is not really part of the main show.

I think the GP kind of "ends" in the sense that it is not the vanguard of human evolution any more, it is no longer the "crest of the wave". And i DO think the crazy people at the nullship at the end are it.

Put it this way: if "Our Lord God Leto the II" was at the nullship He would not be bored ever!

And i say this because, the way i see it, FH was a guy who would be very annoyed about writing something that was not what he believed to Very Important (TM) just to sell some more books. Though he wrote Messiah... But well, that's what i feel not some real respectable analysis...

Oh, and the quote you may have been thinking of:

There's no single set of limits for all men. Universal prescience is an empty myth. Only the most powerful local currents of Time may be foretold. But in an infinite universe, local can be so gigantic that your mind shrinks from it.

No, it was something else, i'm almost sure it was a dialogue between Leto and Moneo, i've been searching but no luck... Maybe it isn't, maybe it is not in GEoD... If i find i'll share

[SandChigger]

The Golden Path doesn't "end", but once it's established it becomes irrelevant.

It's the background against which (or stage on which) the drama of the rest of human evolution is acted out.

So get over the Golden Path already. It's no longer important.

[mrpsbrk]

The Golden Path doesn't "end", but once it's established it becomes irrelevant.

That was kinda like what i meant by:

I think the GP kind of "ends" in the sense that it is not the vanguard of human evolution any more, it is no longer the "crest of the wave". And i DO think the crazy people at the nullship at the end are it.

But on the other hand, maybe the details of how exactly the GP connects with HoD and Ch:D are still not completely understood -- what exactly does the GP provide to the guys at the nullship? In which senses Taraza was right and wrong about nullifying the "pearls" influence? And so on and so forth...

[SandChigger]

what exactly does the GP provide to the guys at the nullship?

Again, I think you're creating an issue that doesn't exist. The GP has nothing to do with one single group of people. Nor, by the point in time when they escape from Chapterhouse, can one group of people affect the GP.

In the early stages, someone like Teg, who could see no-tech and people with the Siona gene, might have threatened one of the two supports of the GP, but by the time the Scattering got good and going, no way. And he came along 1500 years too late.

The people on the no-ship, the inhabitants of the Old Empire, all the people in the Scattering — they all have their own destinies to work out, all largely independent of one another. But the destiny of one single group is not that of the entire species. The GP has nothing for individuals.


I remain unconvinced that prescient vision itself constitutes a future-changing act, so I don't see what intentional influence unconscious "pearls of awareness" embodied in non-sentient animals could possibly have. (As part of the cycle of life that creates the spice, the worms could influence the behavior of people interested in the spice. As remnants of the "Divided God" and objects of either veneration or hate, they could also influence people's actions — like Taraza was prompted to goad the HMs into destroying Rakis. But in no case would anything people did be a result of a conscious, intentional plan by the worms. In my view, at least. )

[Freakzilla]

what exactly does the GP provide to the guys at the nullship?

Again, I think you're creating an issue that doesn't exist. The GP has nothing to do with one single group of people. Nor, by the point in time when they escape from Chapterhouse, can one group of people affect the GP.

In the early stages, someone like Teg, who could see no-tech and people with the Siona gene, might have threatened one of the two supports of the GP, but by the time the Scattering got good and going, no way. And he came along 1500 years too late.

The people on the no-ship, the inhabitants of the Old Empire, all the people in the Scattering — they all have their own destinies to work out, all largely independent of one another. But the destiny of one single group is not that of the entire species. The GP has nothing for individuals.


I remain unconvinced that prescient vision itself constitutes a future-changing act, so I don't see what intentional influence unconscious "pearls of awareness" embodied in non-sentient animals could possibly have. (As part of the cycle of life that creates the spice, the worms could influence the behavior of people interested in the spice. As remnants of the "Divided God" and objects of either veneration or hate, they could also influence people's actions — like Taraza was prompted to goad the HMs into destroying Rakis. But in no case would anything people did be a result of a conscious, intentional plan by the worms. In my view, at least. )

More simply: the 'nullship" is their GP.

But as with all technology/evolution, it will be [superceded] which will cause feedback/evolution again.

Its a race between invention and catastrophy.

[SandChigger]

True enough.


I guess I just don't like the idea of reducing the term "Golden Path" down to something we can apply in the case of an individual or group (of whatever size). So the no-ship is their only means of salvation, or sole method of survival, or whatever.

[mrpsbrk]

what exactly does the GP provide to the guys at the nullship?

Again, I think you're creating an issue that doesn't exist. The GP has nothing to do with one single group of people. Nor, by the point in time when they escape from Chapterhouse, can one group of people affect the GP.

I meant something in the lines of: what does "writing" provide to the guys at the Large Hadron Collider? You know, the LHC is not about language (lit-crit), but they would not be there if it wasn't for it. In the same vein, the nullship-band is (will be) not about GP, but they would not be there if it wasn't for it.

The GP (by any other name) is part of the context -- and therefore part of the toolkit -- of anyone living after it. What you do with it... another story.

That is why i think it is relevant that HoD and Ch:D happen in the old-gallatic centre... I think GEoD is FH's tale of "what you have to do to grow up", and the latter novels would be his "what you do once you're there". And it makes sense that we are not on the scattered regions, to me at least.

[Freakzilla]

If any of them dies, that is a required event, no more... It was just
that all of them could not die.
~Leto II

[SandChigger]

The GP (by any other name) is part of the context -- and therefore part of the toolkit -- of anyone living after it. What you do with it... another story.

And this is what I meant: the words are English and spelled and used correctly but this makes no sense to me.

[mrpsbrk]

When Leto is talking to Moneo after the Duncan was killed:

Leto stared down at the man. "We are myth-killers, you and I, Moneo. That's the dream we share. I assure you from a God's Olympian perch that government is a shared myth. When the myth dies, the government dies."

"Thus you have taught me, Lord."

"That man-machine, the Army, created our present dream, my friend."

Moneo cleared his throat.

Leto recognized the small signs of the majordomo's impatience.

Moneo understands about armies. He knows it was a fool's dream that armies were the basic instrument of governance.

As Leto continued silent, Moneo crossed to the lasgun and retrieved it from the crypt's cold floor. He began disabling it.

Leto watched him, thinking how this tiny scene encapsulated ..fostered the essence of the Army myth. The Army fostered technology because the power of machines appeared so obvious to the shortsighted.

That lasgun is no more than a machine. But all machines fail or are superceded. Still, the Army worships at the shrine of such things -- both fascinated and fearful. Look at how people fear the Ixians! In its guts, the Army knows it is the Sorcerer's Apprentice. It unleashes technology and never again can the magic be stuffed back into the bottle.

I teach them another magic.

I just, kinda, think this says: no, the GP has nothing to do with tech.

As in, more tech, less tech, who cares?

The passage is right after He first (i think) says Siona can disappear from His prescient vision, and calls her "an unique phenomenon" and "the new while I am the accumulation of all that is old"...

[Freakzilla]

Without the technology of the Ixian Navigation Machine and the Genetics (technology) of the Siona Gene the GP would never have got out of the starting gate.

[mrpsbrk]

Without the technology of the Ixian Navigation Machine and the Genetics (technology) of the Siona Gene the GP would never have got out of the starting gate.

About the "Siona Gene", i had the impression that she was, in the words of Tank, "Holes? Nope. Me and my brother Dozer, we're both one hundred percent pure, old fashioned home-grown human, born free!...Right here, in the real world."

Like in, sex.

And about the Ixian navigation... nah.

[A Thing of Eternity]

Without the technology of the Ixian Navigation Machine and the Genetics (technology) of the Siona Gene the GP would never have got out of the starting gate.

About the "Siona Gene", i had the impression that she was, in the words of Tank, "Holes? Nope. Me and my brother Dozer, we're both one hundred percent pure, old fashioned home-grown human, born free!...Right here, in the real world."

Like in, sex.

And about the Ixian navigation... nah.

Huh?

I follow what you're saying about the Siona gene having been achieved through pure breeding technique.

But how could the GP have come about without the Ixian Nav machine? Even if it somehow could have, in the books it was an absolutely central piece of the GP.

[mrpsbrk]

Oh, and the quote you may have been thinking of:

There's no single set of limits for all men. Universal prescience is an empty myth. Only the most powerful local currents of Time may be foretold. But in an infinite universe, local can be so gigantic that your mind shrinks from it.

No, it was the part bolded below. I took the liberty to quote at length (oh, shoot, i admit, i love quoting FH) because it seems to me to have something to do with the present topic, but then again, all of GeOD has, so...

"For what do you hunger, Lord?" Moneo ventured.

"For a humankind which can make truly long-term decisions. Do you know the key to that ability, Moneo?"

"You have said it many times, Lord. It is the ability to change your mind."

"Change, yes. And do you know what I mean by longterm?"

"For you, it must be measured in millennia, Lord."

"Moneo, even my thousands of years are but a puny blip against Infinity."

"But your perspective must be different from mine, Lord."

"In the view of Infinity, any defined long-term is shortterm."

[mrpsbrk]

I am still not quite sure if that:

The GP (by any other name) is part of the context -- and therefore part of the toolkit -- of anyone living after it. What you do with it... another story.

And this is what I meant: the words are English and spelled and used correctly but this makes no sense to me.

is a way of asking me to re-explain my own take on the GP, but, well, let's go for:

My own macro-view of the Golden Path

I do, for starters, believe Siona's test is hugely over-valued as "explanation to the GP". In there we see hideous machines killing people, or something to that effect, which could lead us to a defensive take on the GP, as in "the GP is defending humanity from something", but i do believe that is incorrect. The baddie machines she saw were one of the many ways we could derail the GP, not the enemy. I do believe Siona's experience is not an explanation but just sensitizing.

"You have felt your past," he said. "Now, you must be sensitized to your future, to the Golden Path."

I said it already, but: i do not believe the Golden Path to be a reaction, either against something or about something. I think it is a building.

Specifically, i think it is the building of an attitude.

"For what do you hunger, Lord?" Moneo ventured.

"For a humankind which can make truly long-term decisions."

I think the Golden Path is Leto's attempt at building this one humankind -- or force it down our throats if need be!

That's why the argument about Infinity crops up when Leto is discussing the GP. For example, one of the first things he says to Siona on their trek through the desert is for her to look around and feel herself in the middle of an infinite of dunes.

Now to develop this attitude, you must be able to pull yourself above your own barriers:

"Do you know the key to that ability, Moneo?"

"You have said it many times, Lord. It is the ability to change your mind."

So, for example, the GP would require us to NOT DEPEND on any single resource, be it melange, technology (in it's various guises), absolute concepts, a big leader, power, possessions and so on and so forth. Any of those dependencies impede you to change, they lock your understanding into pre-defined tracks.

That is why i believe neither the INM nor the no-tech nor the Siona Gene to be very important to the GP.

{To make it more... dramatic, think of the path Paul took to power: in many ways he learned to not depend on anything, and to transform his (and other's) dependencies into strength -- but the drama is that, in the end, we learn he has not been able to shed his first and more painful need -- his ego-trip into the Leader Role. He let go of many things just in order to hold stronger onto one thing -- thereby keeping himself locked inside his own castle.}

To try to sound less like a koan, the GP is the maturing of humankind. I find it intriguing that intermingled with the chapters of Siona's test we have the chapters where Duncan is raving mad about Fish Speaker homosexuality. And Moneo's answer is just: man, grow up! Leto latter also has almost the same answer to Siona when she turns to sex instead of survival...

"You have taught me valuable things," Moneo said. "All of us try to evolve, but if something blocks us, we can transfer our potential into pain -- seeking it or giving it. Adolescents are particularly vulnerable."

Dependencies, just like fear, lead to an encroaching attitude. They make you tense up -- which in turn causes pain and stress. They create problems. Leto once says to Moneo that he never turns his back on danger. Fear and beliefs are ways to turn your own back on danger.

This basic attitude, is the same attitude of the violence-dependant military, which is also another constant topic in GEoD. That our incapacity to change our minds leads us to use violence, which in turn bring us back into the fear feedback loop. This feedback loop is exactly the same one that leads to unrestrained violence.

So, i do not think the GP is against any other enemy but ourselves. It's disabling the self-destructiveness that is part of humanity. And it is not about protecting humankind against it's self-destruction, but about teaching it to not self-destruct -- subtle difference, maybe, but crucial.

Being that GEoD was published around the 80's, i believe the GP is also a sermon against self-destruction, as in cold-war and Mutually Assured Destruction.

But FH understands that refraining from violence is no cure for the "Pharaoh disease". It is not enough to embrace peace. It is not enough to make ourselves into monks. It's not enough to "dismantle all nuclear weapons". You need to understand violence and deal with it. You must outgrow your own fears and barriers.

This is the teaching that, in my opinion, is the GP.

This teaching also happens to be the one that sets you free.

You can find it in some philosophers, in a rare politician, in the best of wise men and in this or that great persons you find by chance. But it is always personal, and the attempt to take this attitude from the individual to the collective is always dangerous and difficult.

In my opinion, Leto proposes to do exactly that.

The desire to expand and to travel and to see new things (AKA Scattering) would be just a consequence. An unavoidable one, but just a consequence nonetheless. Also, after humankind had learned that lesson, with or without INM they could go wherever they wanted. It would also be able to face whatever enemy that could ever appear, looking it in the eyes.

That is what i mean when i say GEoD is FH's way of saying "what you have to do to grow up".

It is also very, very interesting to see, in one of the Duncan chapters between the Siona-test chapters, how he can see the shackles that bind Moneo, and he says to himself: i was like this. He redeems there, to me, Stilgar becoming a slave at the end of Dune.

Do not bother to find me quotes where Leto says "the GP is the survival of mankind", i do know them and i DO NOT agree they do disprove my point of view here. Also, i do not require anyone to agree with me, and i reserve all of you the right to believe me a moron ;-)

The realization of what I am occurs in the timeless awareness which does not stimulate nor delude. I create a field without self or center, a field where even death becomes only analogy. I desire no results. I merely permit this field which has no goals nor desires, no perfections nor even visions of achievements. In that field, omnipresent primal awareness is all. It is the light which pours through the windows of my universe.

-The Stolen Journals

[SandChigger]

Well, I'm sure that will be really interesting when I finally read all of it.

I don't think you're a moron, but I do think you're overthinking the meaning of the Golden Path, mistaking it for some philosophical "way" or "tao" to some end other than the simple survival of the human species.

But, hey, it's your interpretation! Go with it.

[SandChigger]

Right. So I'm home and I've had a wee nap and some dinner and even watched the tail-end of a bad German drama about a time-traveling couple who video-filmed Jesus in his crypt. Now what was it you were on about?

I do, for starters, believe Siona's test is hugely over-valued as "explanation to the GP". In there we see hideous machines killing people, or something to that effect, which could lead us to a defensive take on the GP, as in "the GP is defending humanity from something", but i do believe that is incorrect. The baddie machines she saw were one of the many ways we could derail the GP, not the enemy. I do believe Siona's experience is not an explanation but just sensitizing.

You do have the quaintest take on things, you know?

Of course it's "a sensitizing". Leto sensitizes Siona to the necessity of his GP by showing her a possible future in which it does not apply. And yes, it is a human-created extinction. But NO, it is not a "derailing" of the GP. Because once established, the GP can never fail. It cannot be "derailed". The danger is before it is established. Leto wants Siona to be a willing participant in his designs. So he tests her just as he tested her father Moneo and unnamed generations of Atreides before them.

That is why i believe neither the INM nor the no-tech nor the Siona Gene to be very important to the GP.

Well, you can believe that if you choose, but I think it's nonsense.

The desire to expand and to travel and to see new things (AKA Scattering)

Is that what you think the Scattering was? Touristy wanderlust?

with or without INM they could go wherever they wanted

And just how do you think they would have managed that without the INM? Kidnap a few Navigators and hijack some Heighliners?

I think you're right about Leto wanting humanity to mature and learn to free itself of dependence on limited resources and charismatic messiahs, that those things were important for its long-term survival and evolution and therefore related to the GP or a further unfolding of it. But neither survival nor evolution would be possible without the factor of physical dispersion (Scattering) and initial invisibility to prescience (Siona Gene, no-tech).

I guess I just don't get this desire to limit or rank this or that as THE most important part of the Golden Path. But whatever floats your boat.