Jᴀᴄᴜʀᴜᴛᴜ - Tʜᴇ Cᴀsᴛ Oᴜᴛ

...which will probably go nowhere

This started at the Amazon discussion board, here:
http://www.amazon.com/Fake-Reviews-Bewa ... tore=books

I am replying to Brian Conway (again), on the old argument that Ship was an AI, and hence the Dune universe is enriched by the addition of a murderous, humanity-betraying, insane AI as a threat to all of humanity (which was at that point safeguarded from any one threat).

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> "Ship sought to force Humanity to WorShip or perish."

And the whole point of The Jesus Incident is what WorShip means. My point still stands; control or realizing potential?


< "Seems to me the danger of Thinking Machines taking control of Humanity may have been on Frank Herbert's mind..."

You might notice that it is Ship, not the Ox, that takes control. Also, that Ship is more akin to a god than anything else. Ship exists on a whole new level than anything before it, which is made quite clear in the books - there is no fight against it, and it has no wish to eradicate mankind, nor keep them as pets or subjects. Except for its mechanical origins, there is no similarity to Omnious/Skynet, adn despite what your argumentation needs as a premise, The Jesus Incident is nothing like The Terminator or the Legend series.
Also, you may want to read "Without Me, You're Nothing" before you go on about what Herbert thought about the Skynet scenario - you might find yourself surprised and educated


> "That is an odd argument coming form someone who fails to accept that there may be multiple interpretations of key elements of Dune."

Please stop lying about my position. I have never claimed there is only one true interpretation, just that there is such a thing as a false one. One that claims that Alia believes that "you could never distrust a machine", while still fully knowledgable about how a machine turned on its makers and tried to wipe out humanity is, for instance, just plain wrong. (And stupid, and a mockery of Herbert's originals, of Herberts beliefs and thoughts and his fans who felt inspired by them).


> "Is it possible that, as he was thinking about how to wrap up Dune, he may have considered a Deus ex Machina approach for the end..."

Why would he? He was a better writer than that (Deux ex Machina is, on its own, a derogatory term, in case you have not noticed), and Dune was specifically about not trusting simple solutions and heroes to save the day - we have the guy saying this on the record, for christ sakes!


> "(a concept that had already been used and accepted in Sci Fi)."

What does this mean? Because someone else used this type of ending, Herbert must have considered it? WTF? Does this mean he considered an "it was all a dream"-ending too? A "they lived happily ever after"-ending too?
Speculating on that Herbert might have considered, based on what other, unrelated, persons wrote is just silly, sorry.


> "One of the most interesting things I read in destination void was how, when given the opportunity to revise it a decade later, Frank Herbert did revise it. He was not afraid to tweek things to fit his most current vision."

For the love of god, Brian! The foreword is clear that the book was updated on technical terms, and the story still follows the same basic premise and ending and... Just WTF?

Because Frank Herbert revised a story, it is ok for someone else to rewrite his other stories? Because Herbert incorporated new knowledge in a book himself, Anderson is free to invent "Paul joins the circus"-young-adult adventures and claim they are more correct than Herberts own books?

Please explain this to me, I have no clue how you believe that argument works...

> "I am voicing my opinion based on earlier conversations with you."

I gathered as much. However, you are plainly mistaken about my position, and you should not be expounding on it before you educate yourself.


> "1).Was Ship in control, or were humans using ship as a tool? (the premise of determining how to WorShip has nothing to do with Ship as a tool or an independent AI acting on it's own)"

Not a yes/no question, but I'll play. Ship was obviously in control.
However, your point that ship was a rogue AI bent on controlling humanity is still flat out wrong. Ship was more god than AI, and its goal was not eradication or control (yawn), but teaching WorShip.

> "2). Was Ship not committed to humanity learning how to WorShip or Perish?"

Yes. Hence, determing how to WorShip is, despite your claims to the contrary, quite important for grasping the novel. Also for categorizing Ship, quite important when you want to lump him in with Skynet...

> "3). Was Ship not a Deux ex Machina scenario (God out of the Machine)?"

No.

He was, somewhat like Paul is with regards to heroes in Dune, a reversion of and comment on, the Deux ex Machina. You should look the term up, seriously - where do you see Ship resolving the plot to everyones satisfaction for an easy and out-of-nowhere quick fix?
In Destination:Void, he is quite the opposite and is almost a Devil out of the machine. In The Jesus Incident, he instigates rather than solves the plot.



As for questions regarding your position, here is a list from the top of my head:

- How is the fact that Frank once revised his own story relevant to Andersons changes to the Dune universe, or to the present discussion?

- How is the fact that Deus ex Machina is used by other (SF) writers relevant to whether Herbert wanted to use it for his Dune chronicles?

- Do you think that Deus ex Machina means: A) A sudden, out-of-nothing solution to the plot or B) A plot element of some enormously powerful machine?

- Where did you get the weird idea that I do not accept multiple interpretations of Dune?

- Have you read "Without Me, You Are Nothing"?

- How can Andersons machines encircle humankind and threaten to eradicate it when Leto foresaw and arranged for mankind to be spread out beyond the reach of any one threat?

- Do you, having finished The Jesus Incident, believe that Ship's agenda is more similar to Omnious' or Leto II's?


Oh, and also (we would really like to see answers to these):

- When Alia thinks "you could never distrust a machine"? is she A) Aware that a machine once betrayed and almost killed mankind, but retarded to the level of a 2-year-old? B) Forgetful of basic facts of history, and momentarily without her OM or any memories of lessons learned from said OM? C) Living in a universe where there has never been reason to distrust a machine?

- When Leto says to Paul "this will be your first time off-planet" is he: A) Lying, despite the fact that Paul knows the truth? B) Telling what he thinks is the truth, but having accidentally forgotten all about how Paul once joined the circus? C) Telling the truth?

- Did you, sincerely, while reading the Dune chronicles, get the feeling that Pauls abilities of mass manipulation where because of: A) His upbringing as a mentat, a male Bene Gesserit and his charismatic father, or B) That he once joined some hypnotist in a circus?

- Did you, sincerely, when reading the Dune chronicles, think that "this fictional universe could really do with some ninja-star-throwing potted plants, some evil robots trying to kill everyone, an nigh-omnipotent goddess from the past that can save everyone, some water-worms, some even more awesome kind of spice with a really neat name if only I could think of one and maybe a vagina-delivered-disease that makes people fat that the Bene "Revenge-is-for-children-and-the-emotionally-retarded" Gesserit use for revenge"? Do you think those elements fit into the narrative Frank Herbert created?


PS: I am quite serious, Brian, I would like you to answer these questions. In fact, let's just go ahead and say that I am tired of posing these and others to you and that this discussion is over if you do not attempt to answer them.

Lundse wrote:...which will probably go nowhere.

Your "discussion" is with Brian Conway. Of course it will go nowhere.

I'm in the same boat right now in the Hellhole threads. I often wonder why I even bother.

TheDukester wrote:

Lundse wrote:...which will probably go nowhere.

Your "discussion" is with Brian Conway. Of course it will go nowhere.

I'm in the same boat right now in the Hellhole threads. I often wonder why I even bother.

Because you love to entertain us!

A tenner on BriBri not even trying to answer your questions.

I think he's posted something about refusing to answer here and submit himself to abuse.

Funny that he didn't have any qualms about logging in and commenting just a day or two ago...


I keep telling you: he's a coward. Waste of time & effort.

Lundse wrote:"Ship sought to force Humanity to WorShip or perish."

And the whole point of The Jesus Incident is what WorShip means. My point still stands; control or realizing potential?

I think you had won at this point...

I think he was just trolling - I challenged him to "Step His Game" in the Amazon Basement,
and I thought that was actually a pretty good try - it was almost subtle, using a different
Frank Herbert book to allude that the McDune7 was Frank's idea .... I tool it as an
obvious troll, and started to warn Lundse, but anything that draws back in the only one
of us who has the patience to actually post complete explanations to the pretards is welcome,
even tho we know they never seem to get it .... it's worth it for the "record" to have that stuff
floating around, and alot of time, Lundse's posts are valuable to me....

I still can't believe that one, after what—two or three days now? That would be more something like deus-qua-machina, maybe? (God-as-machine? Actually, machina-qua-deus, machine-as-god! )

Sounds like a Mexican beer.

Which reminded me of this from the other day:

NotGaryBusey (Not Gary Busey)
Go ahead and drink your Corona, but when the Dos Equis guy and I are laughing because you're sipping piss, don't come crying to us for limes
6 May

Talk about digging up an old thread:

http://www.amazon.com/review/R29D9E7X0K ... hisHelpful

Someone is trying to act all tough and smart.

Rob

And someone is gonna get a smarmy smackdown.