(urth) Abaia and the undines

[Steve McCann]

This is a little tangential, but just thought I'd share: this thread
re:Abaia has reminded me strongly of an artwork by Adriane Fleet:
http://kitsunenoir.com/blog/2008/12/10/the-desktop-wallpaper-project-featuring-adrian-fleet/
-s

On Thu, Dec 11, 2008 at 11:55 AM, David Stockhoff <dstockhoff at verizon.net>wrote:

> Witz---
>
> Two thoughts:
>
> First, I am not sure Severian's thought needs to refer to a black hole. It
> sounds to me like what happens at the heart of a normal star. There is
> immense pressure and matter becomes plasma.
>
> Second, it just happens to be true that Jerry Pournelle is a nutjob and his
> theory is impossible.
>
> But it raises a good point, and what scraps of Lexicon Urthus I can read
> suggest parallel thinking. And that is this---that, IF Wolfe intended Urth
> to be of great age (millions of years) so that he could depict the sun as
> red and dying (as depicted in The Time Machine), THEN he would have had to
> deal with the problem of its ballooning into a red giant, eventually
> swallowing all 4 inner planets) in around 5 billion years---because that's
> the Main Sequence evolutionary path for a yellow star with the sun's mass,
> and that's how long it would take. He could have dealt with this in the
> following ways, by:
>
> -Ignoring stellar physics and making shit up, or convincing us that Urth is
> 5 billion years older
> -Suggesting that humans or Hieros plugged a hole in the Sun to stop its
> evolution
>
> -Imagining that some unlikely event arose RANDOMLY to knock the Sun off its
> normal course of evolution
>
> -Appealing to myth to force some other kind of ending to the Sun
>
> I think the first is obviously out and I see little evidence for the
> second, though it's possible. Nowhere is the worm in the Sun linked to crime
> or punishment or the Hieros, and we know that when they brought the Fountain
> (a white hole), they had to physically drag or throw it. There's no record
> of a black hole passing Urth. Freezing the Sun's evolution would save Urth,
> not kill it.
>
> (No idea what is supposed to happen when the 2 holes meet---would they just
> cancel each other out and let the Sun go on for another 5 billion years?
> Presumably; having a white sun would destroy life on Urth just as surely as
> a black sun.)
>
> But the last two work very well with one another and with the text. First,
> there is a Black Worm or Wolf or Panther or Dragon eating the Sun in every
> mythology. It's one of the main reasons for a hero to arise and go forth to
> die in combat with powerful beings to save the dying land. Second, there has
> always been speculation about the possibility of a spontaneous black hole
> developing in (or a very small one falling into?) the Sun. It's unlikely for
> it to actually happen, but it's a solid sci-fi explanation for bringing a
> mythical element into the story. And one way to summarize TBotNS is that it
> does exactly that over and over---not science fantasy but science MYTHOLOGY.
>
> Finally, it lets Wolfe set the story whenever he damn well wants to, and
> Urth can grow cold and die long before any stellar physicist can complain
> that the proper evolutionary track has been violated.
> BTW, I have a mostly-cleaned-up PDF of all 5 books. Shall I send you this
> PDF?
>
> ------------------------------
>
> Message: 2
> Date: Wed, 10 Dec 2008 23:21:44 +0000
> From: "Son of Witz" <sonofwitz at butcherbaker.org>
> Subject: Re: (urth) Abaia and the undines
> To: "The Urth Mailing List" <urth at lists.urth.net>
> Message-ID: <W4996120908111691228951304 at webmail9>
> Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1"
>
>
> I too have a hard time buying any of the explanations of where the text
> clues us into any astroengineering.
>
> along that line of reasoning, the Old Autarch's dialogue could possibly add
> some support.  From the "Autarch of the Commonwealth chapter in Citadel:
>
> We know the Hierodules are behind the Autarchy.  When the Autarch says "we"
> he probably means the Hierarchs and the state.  So, it could be that the
> condemnation is that they were held in barbarism.  That they were
> 'condemned' to a lesser evil than that of Erebus's brand of evil.
>
> Also, Severian says in Urth XII
> "I felt my consciousness falling in upon itself as the matter does in the
> heart of a star"
> the combination of these two bits of text may support the final potential
> explanation that the Lexicon Urthus gives for why a black hole might be in
> the heart of the sun.
> """""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""
> "Finally there is a theory of how there might already be a black hole in
> the heart of our star...Among the many possibilities presented by Pournelle,
> one seems especially germane: "there's a black hole of around 1% of the
> Sun's mass dead center in our star, and the Sun shines because matter
> falling into the hole gives off energy; there's no fusion in there at all"
> """""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""
>
> Now, I don't know much about this stuff and had never heard that theory.
>  Given that it's not common knowledge (as far as I know) its' interesting
> that Severian, of limited education, would just sort of understand this as a
> common explanation of what goes on in the heart of a star.  This makes me
> think that Wolfe is probably buying into this theory, at least as far as
> BoTNS is concerned. Which, would, it seems make the black hole a natural
> event, just as entropy of the universe is a natural event.
>
> ------------------------------
>
>
>
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