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<pre wrap="">I think that analysis is correct. Foreknowledge is one thing, but throw in interventionism and you have something to chew on, both in theology and in (science) fiction. Time travel in TBotNS is critical to the plot, but I don't consider it the main event---it is not simply a "time travel" story at heart. Nor is it intended as a time-paradox puzzle story---we're told enough that we should be able to figure it out without getting very elaborate.
One reason I resist the 2-Severian theory is that it is unnecessary (from an authorial perspective), which is to say it is not strictly needed to avoid paradox and in fact would render the Hierodules redundant; another is that it is too showboaty and gimmicky. The rest of the cosmology is probably best not thought about.
However, I still want to hear more corpse-in-the coffin theories!
P.S.: I don't know Jack of Eagles, but I'm amazed that someone else has read The Third Policeman.
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Message: 2
Date: Mon, 15 Dec 2008 17:56:07 +1000 (EST)
From: David Duffy <a class="moz-txt-link-rfc2396E"
href="mailto:David.Duffy@qimr.edu.au"><David.Duffy@qimr.edu.au></a>
Subject: Re: (urth) Science catches up to the New Sun
To: The Urth Mailing List <a class="moz-txt-link-rfc2396E"
href="mailto:urth@lists.urth.net"><urth@lists.urth.net></a>
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</pre>
<blockquote type="cite">
<pre wrap=""><span class="moz-txt-citetags">></span>
<span class="moz-txt-citetags">> </span>On Sun, 14 Dec 2008, David Stockhoff wrote:
<span class="moz-txt-citetags">> </span>Agree to all that. I think one way to summarize it is to say that the
<span class="moz-txt-citetags">> </span>cosmological scheme of TbotNS is a literary device, like time travel
<span class="moz-txt-citetags">> </span>itself.
<span class="moz-txt-citetags">></span>
<span class="moz-txt-citetags">> </span>As such, it arbitrarily closes off certain possibilities and elides others.
<span class="moz-txt-citetags">> </span>This is similar to the standard problem already pointed out with
<span class="moz-txt-citetags">> </span>branching-timeline models: unless some Overseer is judging the value of all
<span class="moz-txt-citetags">> </span>lines, all lines must exist, even if the likely ones vastly outnumber the
<span class="moz-txt-citetags">> </span>unlikely. So one must simply ignore what doesn't fit.
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</blockquote>
<pre wrap=""><!---->
* * *
The time travel paradoxes are very similar to many theological paradoxes
eg perfect foreknowledge in general, that of Jesus in particular with
respect to his actions; as well there is the idea of working in mysterious
ways (someone recently gave an example from CS Lewis -- Ransomes name, one
also taken up later by Kurt Vonnegut ;)). I think Wolfe comes back to
them because he thinks they are somehow relevant, rather than just cool.
Specifically, if we live in a universe run by an actively inverventionist
god, then all these issues have real consequences and real solutions,
some of which may be accessible to entities at a higher level of
development than poor old present-bound humans.
In BotNS, FTL and time travel go together as they should.
If you can construct a suitable closed loop involving yourself, you are
then cut off from the First Cause -- most such loops, starting at _The
Third Policeman_ are hellish.
The BotNS loops are more healthy, as presumably they are connected
backwards as well as forwards ?
Master Ash's discussion and fate remind me of the model in _Jack oF
Eagles_. One character in that book tells the hero he believes he is in
a low probability future. Folks might remember that Blish has there being
a canonical reality, but it is the average of all the subpaths taken. The
heroes action leads to a shift in that mixture.
Back to work, David Duffy.
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