(urth) The argument for Intractability

[Son of Witz]

yeah, I really don't think it's an either-or situation regarding Free Will and Intervention.  I have a hard time putting it into words, but it doesn't cause any schism for me.  It is hard to comprehend time from an "It's all happened already" perspective without feeling like we're just going through some motions.  I liken it to a book. it's already finished, yet we have to read our way through it.

That being said, I'm not trying to make an ironclad argument that it "MUST" be intractable, just that, from what's given in the text, I can't imagine it any other way, and it does seem to work well metaphorically.

I just realized, given the scene in Urth with the Chilliarch and the Smilodon, and Severian's mercy to the Chilliarch and friendliness with the Smilodon would SURELY have ended up in the Conciliator myth.  As Christ is sometimes represented as a lion, or as various sun gods are posed with a Lion, the Conciliator would probably be sometimes pictured with the smilodon.
too cool.  

~witz


>-----Original Message-----
>From: David Stockhoff [mailto:dstockhoff at verizon.net]
>Sent: Monday, December 22, 2008 06:30 PM
>To: urth at lists.urth.net
>Subject: Re: (urth) The argument for Intractability
>
>I doubt the question of free will vs intervention (by whoever) is entirely binary, however. I'd guess a more important point is that neither can be dismissed. 
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>Message: 1
>Date: Mon, 22 Dec 2008 14:39:22 -0800 (PST)
>From: Craig Brewer <cnbrewer at yahoo.com>
>Subject: Re: (urth) The argument for Intractability
>To: The Urth Mailing List <urth at lists.urth.net>
>Message-ID: <973085.82301.qm at web37606.mail.mud.yahoo.com>
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>The time travel question that you guys have been hashing out seems to me important to figure out when trying to interpret the books. And I think the question of Sev's "will" is actually important. Are we getting a story of a bad guy trying to become good? (Free will) Or are we getting a story of a guy learning that his personal will is better left to higher powers? (Omniscient, omnipotent God/gods/powers/etc.)
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>I'm personally with Jordon on this. The "time is like an ocean" idea allows you take both of the above ideas at once and have them overlap. You have the linearity of Sev's experience, but you also have the meta-temporal perspective in which the Hierodules can manipulate things (for the Increate?).
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>There's still the bigger question here for me of whether this is all a holy process or just a sham of a holy process. I'm reminded of one of the story's in the Pelerines' tent (from the soldier whose name escapes me) about the proud cock. The angel comes down and says he's going to punish the cock for being too proud. But it turns out that he's wrong, and the story ends with the angel admitting that, although he's closer to the Increate than the cock, he's still infinitely distant and can only guess at His will.
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>If the Hierodules are like the angel, how "holy" are their designs in the end?
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