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All good, Roy. Few additional things...<br>
<br>
<blockquote cite="mid:00ad01cbc95d$1d451800$89d24a0c@rclackey"
type="cite">
<pre wrap="">Roy C. Lackey-
The first of these is that spirit travel is exactly that; the spirit of the
subject makes the journey, not the flesh.
</pre>
</blockquote>
<br>
A person in soul travel lighter but he still has mass. He is subject
to gravity. He also bleeds and receives harm. When the Rajan is
climbing the rock-face in RttW as inhumi are attacking he says:<br>
<br>
"Here I am tempted to write that the cliff-top appeared suddenly
above me, for that was how it seemed to me. The truth, of course,
was considerably more prosaic--I [...] had climbed altogether about
three times the height of the tower, and so so had reached it. I do
not believe I could have done it in the body that lay sprawled on
the floor of Judge Hamer's sellaria. Fortunately, I did not have to;
the weight I lifted--clawing, sometimes, with bleeding fingers at
the red rock-face--although it felt real, was substantially less
than my true weight."<br>
RttW, Chapter 9, Before My Trial<br>
<br>
<br>
Secondly a person in soul travel is--from the perspective of other
humans--entirely human. Even an experience as intimate sex, his true
nature would not be detectable. Jahlee seduces men guards on Urth.
When she begins to try to seduce Hide, the Rajan says:<br>
<br>
"Honesty compels me to tell you that Jahlee is not an inhuma at
present. She is a human being here, exactly as we are, and I believe
for the same reason. But if we return to our real whorl, and I
believe that we will, she will be again what she was before we came.
"<br>
IGJ page 319<br>
<br>
<blockquote cite="mid:00ad01cbc95d$1d451800$89d24a0c@rclackey"
type="cite">
<pre wrap="">Roy C. Lackey-
When Quetzal died on Horn's lander his body reverted to its natural inhumi
shape, the reptilian horror that caused Moorgrass and Nettle to scream
(EXODUS, 381).
</pre>
</blockquote>
<br>
"Returns to it's natural state" only from the perspective of humans.
In fact, they never really change. Inhumi wear make-up and costumes.
The rest of the ruse seems to be performed by something of a
"glamour" such as Gideon Chase used in "An Evil Guest". Krait
presents this ability as nothing more than a common, low-rent
illusion. But his ability to come off as human with only a shirt and
pants, or the ability to hide even his presence to selected people
in attendance during a conversation with the resurrected HORN
suggests it is a more advanced ability than that--although founded
on similar principles. The inhumi cause others to see them as they
want to be seen as Krait explains:<br>
<br>
"<font><a>Krait nodded. “You said you thought he was an old man, and
you were angry because he had tricked you. You told me some
trooper shot and killed him.” I nodded. <br>
“Did you see his corpse?” [...] Did he look like an old
man then?” [...] He didn’t look like an old man anymore, did he?
He couldn’t have.” <br>
I shook my head. <br>
“What did he look like?” <br>
“He looked like you.” <br>
When Krait said nothing, only transfixing me with his
hypnotic stare, I added, “He powdered his face, and painted it.
Like a woman. We found the powder and rouge in a pocket of his
robe. So would I if I had those things, just as I wear this
shirt and these pants, which I took from you. The eyes see what
the mind expects, Horn. Babbie there, lying still with a green
twig in his mouth, could make you think he was a bush, if you
were expecting to see a bush.” <br>
“The young siren you call Seawrack doesn’t see me the way you
do.[...] Knowing that, is it so hard for you to believe that at
times she doesn’t hear me <i>at all</i>? [...]If she’s
listening, she hears you alone, Father. Only the murmur of your
voice. She probably thinks you’re talking to yourself, or to
your hus.” <br>
</a></font>~ OBW, Chapter 10, Seawrack's Ring<br>
<br>
u+16b9<br>
<br>
<br>
<br>
On 2/10/2011 1:59 PM, Roy C. Lackey wrote:
<blockquote cite="mid:00ad01cbc95d$1d451800$89d24a0c@rclackey"
type="cite">
<pre wrap="">Most of the following was written months ago in the context of another
argument, but I decided it just wasn't worth the effort to pursue at the
time. I trot it out now because it has some relevance to current
discussions.
I am going to lay out some not-so-random textual conditions imposed on those
who dream/spirit travel.
The first of these is that spirit travel is exactly that; the spirit of the
subject makes the journey, not the flesh. This is explicitly stated by
Silkhorn the first time he went to Urth with Jahlee and Rigoglio. This may
seem just too obvious to mention, but maybe not. "We are spirits here.
Watch." (IGJ, 320) He then proceeded to shape a sword that looked like the
one Horn had on Green, out of nothing. Other weapons, garments, the gold he
gave the _Samru_ captain on Urth, etc., were not real, none of it. These
objects could also be made to disappear, like the slug gun Hide had in
Maliki's village on Green. The ability to conjure objects out of nothing was
not peculiar to Silkhorn; Hoof and Hide also did it.
The spirit travelers themselves are not real, not real in the sense that a
stone or slug gun or table are real. Physical objects such as these cannot
be transported between the start and destination locations. One of the
consequences of spirit-only travel is that the travelers -- whether human or
inhumi -- can eat food at the destination location , but it is a pointless
exercise because they have no digestive system. This is *expressly* stated
by Silkhorn, in a paragraph too long for me to copy out, on page 266 of
RTTW.
Another consequence of spirit-only travel is that the travelers, because
they are not real, can and do violate other natural laws of physics. This is
demonstrated many times in the text, such as when Jahlee walked right
through the locked door of her cell in the Matachin tower (ibid, 267), and
when Silkhorn and Hoof walked right through the Curtain wall at the Citadel
to get to the necropolis (ibid, 395).
We have the examples of Rigoglio and other humans who died at the
spirit-travel destination, but their bodies back on Blue did not die, they
just lost their animating spirit. We have no example of an inhumi who died
at the spirit-travel destination, but Fava's body on Blue did.
When Quetzal died on Horn's lander his body reverted to its natural inhumi
shape, the reptilian horror that caused Moorgrass and Nettle to scream
(EXODUS, 381). This demonstrates that Quetzal did not get to the LSW by way
of spirit travel; his body was his real body, not a spirit-travel body.
There is no textual justification to suppose that the rules that govern
spirit travel were any different for the Neighbors.
-Roy
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