(urth) silk horn
Dan'l Danehy-Oakes
danldo at gmail.com
Wed Dec 8 12:40:59 PST 2004
Chris,
While this is more of a riff on what you wrote than a driect response to it,
I should like to observe that a lot of the problems of identity in the solar
books (and 5HC) are extensions of real problems encountered today, where
neurobiology and psychology meet theology (specifically pneumatology).
Examples:
* V, abused as a child, develops a second personality as a protector.
This personality, V', is active about one third of the time, and has a
complex life of her own. V is unaware of the existence of V', and she
of him. Is there one soul or two present here?
* W undergoes neurological damage due to alcohol abuse, following
which he becomes aggressive, impatient, belligerent, and violent. Is
he morally responsible for his behavior - are his violent outbursts moral
sins?
* X undergoes a more severe trauma, resulting in functional amnesia;
all memories of identity and relationships vanish. She wanders off
and begins a new life as X', with a new husband,a job unlike her old
one, etc. Is this a separate person with a separate soul? Suppose
some other circumstance restores her old memories - what is the identity
of the personality who now has memories of being X and X'?
* Y is born profoundly autistic, unable to respond to other human beings
in any way. Y develops certain "savant" talents, such as the ability to
draw extraordinarily accurate and detailed pictures of any face he has
seen. Is he an ensoulled human being or a biological machine?
* In the near future, following a terrible accident, large parts of Z's body
are replaced by prosthetic devices, including parts of her central nervous
system. Is she human any more? If so, is she the same person she was
prior to the accident and prostheses?
It seems to me that problems like Severian-Thecla-Autarchs, Chenille-
Kypris-Scylla, and Rose-Marble are clearly extensions of these problems.
Gene Wolfe is using SF for its by now time-honored function of taking
real problems and exaggerating or isolating them to examine them more
closely.
As it happens, in this case, doing so makes the problems even more
problematic........
--Dan'l
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