(urth) Shaving Clones
Chris
rasputin_ at hotmail.com
Sat Jun 25 16:48:16 PDT 2005
I do recognize that this plays on the biggest weakness of an attempted clone
theory, but then in a broader sense almost any constructive theory of this
kind from Wolfe's work has problems with "economy". Wolfe does not make it
easy to draw clean, economical interpretations of his stories (which is not
to say we shouldn't still *try* to be economical in our interpretations).
That said I would just take it as implicit that a theory like this faces an
uphill battle, and needs fairly strong arguments to be convincing, and leave
it at that.
Crush said:
> >I don't think it's unworkable, I just think it's significantly awkward.
>
>Yes, but you find it awkward because (I find this stunning) you
>found nothing particularly suspicious about Tussah's declaration
>that Silk was somehow his "son". I found the statement absurd.
This strays from my original point as far as the Wolfe quotation goes: if we
take it as granted that Wolfe was speaking figuratively, then the quotation
doesn't really provide usable evidence for any theory, yours or otherwise.
Yes, I can see how you could read it the way you do, but I can also see how
it can be read in other ways *even if your theory were correct*.
But you are correct in that I don't find it unreasonable for Tussah to
consider his chosen heir, who he has taken extraordinary effort to set up
and protect, as his "son" in a sense. It's just that this isn't my reason
for finding your reading awkward. I find it awkward because referring to
Typhon as "Calde" in a context where the term is sure to be taken as
referring to someone else flouts basic conversational rules - which is
obvious, and we agreed on from the beginning. And no, I don't take the
awkwardness to be decisive in ruling out your reading, because it's not
beyond Wolfe. I just don't see any possibility of a decisive interpretation
of that statement either way.
>And why go out of your way to have an embryo succeed you?
It has been too long since I read the Long Sun series to try to
psychoanalyze Tussah, and I doubt there's enough in the text to allow that
anyway, but possibly because he wanted an especially effective leader to
follow him? Because he cared for the people under his rule? Or possibly as a
final gesture of his own power beyond death, in choosing and maneuvering the
person who would carry on after him? (I would have to dig, but I seem to
recall Machiavelli putting a similar sentiment in the mouth of some
historical ruler or other). Maybe out of pure spite for his political
enemies, wanting to be sure his successor would be strong enough to
defeat/destroy them.
>And how did he know that Silk would become Calde'? After all,
>with his leadership skills, he might have ascended to the
>Ayuntamiento or succeded Quetzal?
This leads to an odd bit of speculation which I don't know whether there's
any solid evidence to be found, but... I seem to recall there is something
very odd towards the beginning of the Long Sun series, where someone has put
up a huge graffiti to the effect of "Silk for Calde!" long before Silk is
well-known or has done anything to attract public attention to himself. It
always seemed quite out of place. It seemed to me that someone, before the
story even begins, is preparing to maneuver Silk into taking over, and it is
a mystery as to who's behind it. Possibly agents secretly loyal to Tussah
who were left to watch Silk and push him into leadership when the time came?
>And since Silk's embryo came from the Whorl, how did his
>second set of parents get in the Mainframe?
>
>As I said, I didn't go trying to figure out how to get clones on Whorl.
>As I saw it, Wolfe left no other explanation.
All of the original Whorl colonists, including the ones in stasis,
originally came from Urth. Perhaps a couple of them were Silk's parents? It
wouldn't require that much of a stretch.
As an aside, Mainframe is a concept that always struck me as odd, and I just
don't see how it can possibly work as presented (or why its designer would
want to set it up that way). Which possibly points to some further secret
about the nature of Mainframe, but if so I haven't been able to place it.
> >Tussah was in charge of one city, among how many? Hundreds? I don't
> >think this provides any special reason to believe that Tussah is a clone
>of
> >Typhon.
>
>I did not say this as proof that Tussah was a clone of Typhon. I was
>responding to your assertion that Pas would prefer a clone of himself
>to lead the colonists rather than a clone of his son. I was agreeing with
>you.
Well, backing up from the question of Typhon's preferences for a second: in
the broadest terms, either Tussah's being a clone of Typhon was an intended
part of the plan for evacuating the ship, or it was not. If it was part of
the plan, then this suggests that the same thing would be true in the other
cities as well, implying lots of clones brought into play (though I am not
sure how that would work in a matriarchal city, for example). If it was not
part of the plan, then Tussah's being a clone of Typhon ends up being
incidental, and we are left with a big question of how/why this came about
that has no good answer.
>But the embryos *were* sent on the Whorl with the very intent that they
>would
>use their predispositions for leadership to make the colonies successful.
>That
>is stated explicitly. We know that.
Right. And this to me falls into a category of planning that is something
like: "give them good starting materials, and hope for the best." And that
does seem to be the way Typhon operated. What I don't see happening, though,
is a sort of micro-manipulation where Pas, from the beginning of the voyage,
says: "At time X I want a person with THIS set of genes in THIS particular
position."
But this is just another way of working on the angle that either having a
clone (Tussah) in place at that time is intentional, or it is not. If it's
intentional, it really stretches the bounds of what we can reasonably expect
Pas to have planned, even if he made the plan on the spot just before
decanting the clone. And this also does not seem to be a sensible or
workable way to plan things.
>Okay. For the record, we've moved off of Tussah and on to Horn.
>
>First of all, it was only a guess. Secondly, Horn was about 15. That makes
>his birth a good deal less than 10 years after Tussah's murder. Tussah, I
>presume, knew who was his "son not of his body". Everyone guessed he
>was already out there somewhere. It did't require special knowledge of
>their future at all.
Well, OK, here I should ask: if Horn was also a decanted embryo, do you
think his being present at the same manteion where Silk would eventually end
up was intended, or mere coincidence? If coincidence, what would be the
purpose of taking an exhorbitantly expensively embryo and dropping him into
a poor family, in a location where he is unlikely to get a great education
and where statistically he stands a greater chance of being killed in some
random accident or crime before reaching a reasonable age? If he's meant to
play some role, or be a backup, why not decant him earlier so that he could
be a more reasonable age when the time came?
On the other hand if he was meant to be there under the tutelage of Silk,
whoever put him there would have to have an unrealistically exact sense of
what was going to happen and when.
>THe text says that embryos had to be procured from the black market. They
>weren't easy to get. Why would you assume the person who did it could time
>it? I'm not certain any living person knew that Silk was the "son" or
>whether
>the son had died of measles at 10.
I agree, and this goes right along with what I was trying to get at. It
makes Horn's presence at that place and time even more inexplicable.
> >Lots of people in New Viron knew Horn first hand. And they get to see
>Silk's
> >body when Silkhorn returns to New Viron. I do not think Silk was so old
>that
> >a family resemblance would have been that impossible to discern.
>Especially
> >in a family that striking.
>
>Come on! You're telling me that anyone would recognize you as your father's
>son
>without the two of you compare side by side, even if one of your was
>paunchy
>and balding and the other was rail-thin, had long white hair, and a missing
>eye?
For the average person, perhaps not (but realistically, maybe). But we're
supposedly talking about someone for whom facial features are extremely
important, this is what I was getting at. If the "face of command" is
genetically passed on, then someone who actually has it will have certain
distinctive features, won't they? And if Horn didn't get the features, then
he wouldn't have had the face and uncanny leadership skills you assume him
to have. Though for the record I do not think Horn had any particularly
uncanny leadership skills other than having learned from a good teacher -
but then again, I don't think Horn is a clone either.
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