_Permutation City_ Queries (Spoilers)
Jo Walton
Does anyone have any clues about the chapter titles?
Can anyone imagine how the "people" "born" inside Elysium got there - it
clearly wasn't in the way Peer is going to do it, or was it? I find the hints
in that section about the 7000 years we miss (7000 years. Just like that.)
fascinating, about the mores of the 3rd generation (appearing in public as
babbage engines?) and so on.
In a way Paul Durham is the ultimate solipsist - and I entirely sympathise with
Maria in thinking him mad. Even though by the meta-logic of the novel and the
order in which things are presented we know that it will work (after all,
nobody would write a book about someone doing this where it doesn't work?) I
find his obsession scary. His response to the question "What will you do when
all this is over" which is all in terms of what he will do *inside* the
simulation which, of course, prefigures his suicide, I found almost psychotic.
Does anyone like him?
The Autoverse. Is this based on a real programme - or have we not got to that
stage yet? Again this is something I find perfectly done in the novel - what is
introduced to us as a kind of time-wasting computer game becoming something
that changes the nature of reality - that rather trumps the effect of _Ender's
Game_....
--
Jo
**************************************************************
- - I kissed a kif at Kefk - -
**************************************************************
Help me run the Galactic Empire at Confabulation, Easter 1995
**************************************************************
Rob Leitman
Jo Walton <J...@kenjo.demon.co.uk> wrote:
>SPOILERS
>
>Can anyone imagine how the "people" "born" inside Elysium got there - it
>clearly wasn't in the way Peer is going to do it, or was it? I find the hints
>in that section about the 7000 years we miss (7000 years. Just like that.)
>fascinating, about the mores of the 3rd generation (appearing in public as
>babbage engines?) and so on.
I got the impression that they were created by spawning a copy of
occupants; with different environment, they will turn out differently.
(The problem with this idea is that all of a particular generation act
similarly.) Another possibility, is that people "wrote" their
children, the way we write software. I'm not sure if that is possible.
>The Autoverse. Is this based on a real programme - or have we not got to that
>stage yet?
I've seen people get that involved with Life, a vastly more simple
cellular automaton.
Rob Leitman
Craig Becker
Jo Walton <J...@kenjo.demon.co.uk> wrote:
>SPOILERS
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>Can anyone imagine how the "people" "born" inside Elysium got there - it
>clearly wasn't in the way Peer is going to do it, or was it? I find the hints
>in that section about the 7000 years we miss (7000 years. Just like that.)
>fascinating, about the mores of the 3rd generation (appearing in public as
>babbage engines?) and so on.
Well, there's a reference made to "ontogenesis software" at one
point, which I presume is how they did it. I'd imagine there were
many different ways to "reproduce" ones' self, but based on how
Peer could modify his persona, I'd guess that alot of it came down to
the mix'n'match of various personality "modules" and their parameters.
You could custom design a personality, or do a random mix, or a
random mix from two or more partners ("sex")...
Alternatively, I guess they could just copy themself minus memories
and let the "newborn" develop from there. Conceivably the residents
of Elysium spent alot of time experimenting with this kinda thing.
>The Autoverse. Is this based on a real programme - or have we not got to that
>stage yet?
I asked Egan this exact same question. Unfortunately, the answer is
"no". Have to give Egan credit for writing about it in such a way
that it really, really sounds real.
Craig
--
-- Craig Becker, Object Technology Products (512) 838-8068 Austin, TX USA --
-- Internet: (work) jlpi...@austin.ibm.com (home) jlpi...@bga.com --
-- IBM TR: jlpi...@woofer.austin.ibm.com IBM VNET: JLPICARD at AUSVM1 --
-- "They want to own the light!" --
Mike Scott
J...@kenjo.demon.co.uk "Jo Walton" writes:
MORE SPOILERS
>Does anyone have any clues about the chapter titles?
>
My interpretation:
'Rip, tie, cut toy man' is used in chapters involving Durham-the-copy,
who is obviously the toy man in question.
'Toy man picture it' is Durham-the-copy waking up back in the real
world, and seemd fairly appropriate.
'Can't you time trip' is used for Peer's fifteen minute repeating loop,
which is indeed a time trip.
'Rut city' is used for Peer's little hobbies in Permutation City, and
really needs no amplification.
'Remit not paucity' is perhaps the most mysterious, and most commonly
used, but may be freely paraphrased as 'think big', which is certainly
appropriate.
I trust that no one here needs to have it pointed out that they are all
anagrams or partial anagrams of 'Permutation City'.
Greg Egan himself lurks here, and may well have a clue or two himself
about what they mean.
>Can anyone imagine how the "people" "born" inside Elysium got there - it
>clearly wasn't in the way Peer is going to do it, or was it? I find the hints
>in that section about the 7000 years we miss (7000 years. Just like that.)
>fascinating, about the mores of the 3rd generation (appearing in public as
>babbage engines?) and so on.
I felt that the Elysians spent a lot of time writing improved software,
quite possibly including 'build-a-person' kits. After all, they had
enough computer power at their disposal...
>In a way Paul Durham is the ultimate solipsist - and I entirely sympathise with >Maria in thinking him mad. Even though by the meta-logic of the novel and the
>order in which things are presented we know that it will work (after all,
>nobody would write a book about someone doing this where it doesn't work?) I
>find his obsession scary. His response to the question "What will you do when
>all this is over" which is all in terms of what he will do *inside* the
>simulation which, of course, prefigures his suicide, I found almost psychotic.
>Does anyone like him?
God, no. He's a repellent character. But was his suicide *really* a
suicide, or was it just the necessary corollary of getting Durham into
Elysium. If you have a matter transporter that works by duplicating the
original and then destroying it, is it murder to run a person through
it?
>The Autoverse. Is this based on a real programme - or have we not got to that
>stage yet? Again this is something I find perfectly done in the novel - what is >introduced to us as a kind of time-wasting computer game becoming something
>that changes the nature of reality - that rather trumps the effect of _Ender's
>Game_....
Cellular automata have a way to go yet to reach that level of
sophistication. In fact, I consider the development of autobacterium
lambertii to be the second most dubious extrapolation in the book.
>**************************************************************
>Help me run the Galactic Empire at Confabulation, Easter 1995
>**************************************************************
Sorry, I have a prior engagement :-)
--
Mike Scott || Confabulation is the 1995 UK national SF convention
Mi...@moose.demon.co.uk || Mail Con...@moose.demon.co.uk for more details
Jo Walton
Mi...@moose.demon.co.uk "Mike Scott" writes:
> In article <795821...@kenjo.demon.co.uk>
> J...@kenjo.demon.co.uk "Jo Walton" writes:
>
> MORE SPOILERS
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> >Does anyone have any clues about the chapter titles?
> >
> My interpretation:
>
> 'Rip, tie, cut toy man' is used in chapters involving Durham-the-copy,
> who is obviously the toy man in question.
>
> 'Toy man picture it' is Durham-the-copy waking up back in the real
> world, and seemd fairly appropriate.
>
> 'Can't you time trip' is used for Peer's fifteen minute repeating loop,
> which is indeed a time trip.
>
> 'Rut city' is used for Peer's little hobbies in Permutation City, and
> really needs no amplification.
>
> 'Remit not paucity' is perhaps the most mysterious, and most commonly
> used, but may be freely paraphrased as 'think big', which is certainly
> appropriate.
This is the one that really threw me - think big, referring to Maria's refusal
to believe Durham's delusions? Hmmm
> I trust that no one here needs to have it pointed out that they are all
> anagrams or partial anagrams of 'Permutation City'.
Duh <mouth drops open and Jo scratches head with teaspoon> you're right. They
are. Well well well, I must be even stupider than I always thought. So even the
chapter titles have come from the dust. Wow.
> Greg Egan himself lurks here, and may well have a clue or two himself
> about what they mean.
But I hope he's too busy writing something new :)
> >Can anyone imagine how the "people" "born" inside Elysium got there - it
> >clearly wasn't in the way Peer is going to do it, or was it? I find the hints
> >in that section about the 7000 years we miss (7000 years. Just like that.)
> >fascinating, about the mores of the 3rd generation (appearing in public as
> >babbage engines?) and so on.
>
> I felt that the Elysians spent a lot of time writing improved software,
> quite possibly including 'build-a-person' kits. After all, they had
> enough computer power at their disposal...
OK, a new thought on this. Maybe the 2nd generation was copies of themselves,
tweaked in various ways - like Peer was going to do it. Then maybe they with
this 2nd generation created a "build a person" programme which produced people
who all have something in common - at least an awareness of their shared
generation and a tendency to pretend attitudes.
> >Does anyone like him? <Durham>
>
> God, no. He's a repellent character. But was his suicide *really* a
> suicide, or was it just the necessary corollary of getting Durham into
> Elysium. If you have a matter transporter that works by duplicating the
> original and then destroying it, is it murder to run a person through
> it?
There's a time machine in one of George R.R. Martin's short stories which does
this, but leaves you with a rather inconvenient dead body, rather stressing the
point. Yes... but I think it was suicide. Whether he "needed" to die to make
sense of the memory of the copy and the seed or not. And I don't think he did.
The first copy "toy man" to do the experiments is aware of another Durham
continuing without sharing his memories and experience. No, he thinks he will
become the copy and that's all he wants. Selfish bastard, he doesn't care what
the inconvenience and trauma finding the body will do to Maria, because she's
"really" in Elysium too. Despite continued existence - and the same applies to
the other Founders.
> Cellular automata have a way to go yet to reach that level of
> sophistication. In fact, I consider the development of autobacterium
> lambertii to be the second most dubious extrapolation in the book.
I'm sure for me it's a case of being blinded by fireworks and convinced from a
position of ignorance, as the closest I've come to that is playing "Sim Earth".
Not even if Lambert spent all those years - all that computing power?
--
Jo
**************************************************************
- - I kissed a kif at Kefk - -
Mike Scott
J...@kenjo.demon.co.uk "Jo Walton" writes:
>> I trust that no one here needs to have it pointed out that they are all
>> anagrams or partial anagrams of 'Permutation City'.
>
>Duh <mouth drops open and Jo scratches head with teaspoon> you're right. They
>are. Well well well, I must be even stupider than I always thought. So even the
>chapter titles have come from the dust. Wow.
Perhaps you should take another look at the poem which introduces the
book, as well.
Nancy Lebovitz
>
>Does anyone have any clues about the chapter titles?
They're anagrams of each other, but I haven't been able to get any more
than that out of them.
>
>Can anyone imagine how the "people" "born" inside Elysium got there - it
>clearly wasn't in the way Peer is going to do it, or was it? I find the hints
>in that section about the 7000 years we miss (7000 years. Just like that.)
>fascinating, about the mores of the 3rd generation (appearing in public as
>babbage engines?) and so on.
>
It could have been simulated sexual reproduction--I bet that at least
some people would have tried that. I also bet that, with effectively
unlimited computing power and that strong nostalgia for the material
world, a lot more would have been done to simulate a world with
quantum underpinnings. In fact, even without the nostalgia, I think
people would be designing worlds bassed on the "real" world for
the fun of it, and probably discovering that they didn't know
enough about physics to decide which theories were the "right"
ones. It sounds like a lot more fun than making 100,000 table
legs.
>In a way Paul Durham is the ultimate solipsist - and I entirely sympathise with
>Maria in thinking him mad. Even though by the meta-logic of the novel and the
>order in which things are presented we know that it will work (after all,
>nobody would write a book about someone doing this where it doesn't work?) I
>find his obsession scary. His response to the question "What will you do when
>all this is over" which is all in terms of what he will do *inside* the
>simulation which, of course, prefigures his suicide, I found almost psychotic.
>Does anyone like him?
No, though I sympathize with him somewhat. Does anyone think he might
count as a Coyote trickster/creator?
>The Autoverse. Is this based on a real programme - or have we not got to that
>stage yet? Again this is something I find perfectly done in the novel - what is
>introduced to us as a kind of time-wasting computer game becoming something
>that changes the nature of reality - that rather trumps the effect of _Ender's
>Game_....
>
I agree that the Autoverse was some of the best stuff in the book--but I
think there'd be a lot more than 72 Autoverse junkies, even if a better
universe-building cellular automata were invented.
Did the explanation of where that infinite (or at least ever-expanding)
computing capacity came from make any sense at all?
Nancy Lebovitz (nan...@universe.digex.net)
NEW EDITION of the calligraphic button catalogue available by email!
Jonathan Evans
In article <3mtur5$b...@universe.digex.net> nan...@universe.digex.net (Nancy Lebovitz) writes:
>In article <795821...@kenjo.demon.co.uk>,
>Jo Walton <J...@kenjo.demon.co.uk> wrote:
>>SPOILERS
>>
>>Does anyone have any clues about the chapter titles?
>
>They're anagrams of each other, but I haven't been able to get any more
>than that out of them.
They look like they might fit nicely with the "poem found in a lunatic asylum"
at the very beginning, but they aren't actually lines from it. Are there by
chance anagrams in that as well?
Hmm. Anagrams. Rearrangement of patterns. Dust theory, anyone? Might the
chapter titles flag which "pattern" we're inside at any time? Greg Egan, are
you reading this? Any hints?
>>Can anyone imagine how the "people" "born" inside Elysium got there - it
>>clearly wasn't in the way Peer is going to do it, or was it?
>>
>It could have been simulated sexual reproduction--I bet that at least
>some people would have tried that. I also bet that, with effectively
>unlimited computing power and that strong nostalgia for the material
>world, a lot more would have been done to simulate a world with
>quantum underpinnings.
Nice idea, but a) just after Maria is awakened, Paul explicitly states that
this has not been done - that everyone's still using "behavioural models"
instead of quantum theory - and b) if this *had* been done, the result would be
internally self-consistent, quite likely more so than the Autoverse, and the
Autoverse catastrophe would probably not have happened.
I'm not explaining this very well, am I? A problem endemic to the book in
questions; the ideas are so vast and complex...
Let's try that again. The Autoverse prevailed because the logic it was built
on was stronger and more consistent than Elysium's; its' world was ground to a
finer detail. But if atomic and quantum-level simulation *had* been done,
it would have been a stronger and more viable pattern than the Autoverse,
and hence would not have been "taken over".
If I'm still clear as mud, let me know and I'll try again.
Did you catch that throwaway line about Shaw - one of the "cut-off" Founders -
having *hundreds of millions* of descendants?
That "descendant" thing really rankled. Given they only have behavioural
models, *how*? Some complicated form of TVC pattern sex? Damfino. I count
that as a major flaw, though I'm willing to be convinced otherwise.
>>In a way Paul Durham is the ultimate solipsist - and I entirely sympathise with
>>Maria in thinking him mad. Even though by the meta-logic of the novel and the
>>Does anyone like him?
>
>No, though I sympathize with him somewhat. Does anyone think he might
>count as a Coyote trickster/creator?
I don't like him either, but I think you're right; right from the start, he's
willing to create and play tricks on *himself*. He's never morally torn. He's
so *certain* about everything...
Although I think I like him more than Peer. Peer's way of life is so
rational, so reasonable, so entirely self-contained, and yet so *repulsive*.
Programming yourself to be happy? Eliminating character traits you don't
have? It's as if Alex in A Clockwork Orange had performed his behavioural
therapy on himself. (I wonder what Kubrick would do with Permutation City...)
>>The Autoverse. Is this based on a real programme - or have we not got to that
>>stage yet? Again this is something I find perfectly done in the novel
>I agree that the Autoverse was some of the best stuff in the book--but I
>think there'd be a lot more than 72 Autoverse junkies, even if a better
>universe-building cellular automata were invented.
Well, we never got a clear view of the *other* entertainments that were
jockeying for the public's QIPS. Maybe they make the Autoverse look staid and
boring. (Which would take work.)
>Did the explanation of where that infinite (or at least ever-expanding)
>computing capacity came from make any sense at all?
Yeah. But only a little.
I was reminded of Brin's Glory Season, where he points out that a sufficiently
advanced game of Life (the computer game most often seen as a screen saver) is
a very powerful computer if used effectively.
Given the dust theory - that the universe can be viewed merely as an infinite
collection of random patterns - I can *vaguely* conceive of a random pattern
which, in, um, "pattern-space", acts as both a Turing machine (it can compute;
see, say, Penrose's _The Emperor's New Mind_ for more details) and a von
Neumann machine (it can construct; more to the point, it can construct copies
of *itself* out of the, um, ahem, "raw material" around it.) That's the T and
the V. The C is Egan's invention, but theoretically less important; it just
makes the T and V valid in six-dimensional pattern-space.
(I am having difficulty believing I just wrote that last sentence.)
I think I'll be posting a spoiler-free review of _Permutation City_ and
_The Diamond Age_ soon, once I finish the latter; (might be some compare-and-
constrasting there) so I'll leave most of my general comments out for now.
I will say that I thought PC to be a brilliant but seriously flawed book.
Much like _A Fire Upon The Deep_, I thought the ideas were far more compelling
than the writing; I thought all characterization outside Paul and Maria
ranged from "sketchy" to "totally unconvincing"; and even accepting that
the Elysians had offspring, I have a lot of reservations about the idyllic
way Elysian society is presented.
That said, it's an extraordinary work. While I'm well-read, I'm certainly not
exhaustively so; but I think it's possible that _Permutation City_ opens up
new mental territories, entire philosophies, that did not exist before the
publication of "Dust".
Incidentally, I think "Dust" is a better story than "Permutation City" is a
novel.
Jon
Barry Johnson
BUT I can't find it anywhere.
My question is: How long ago was it written and is it still in publication?
--
To doubt everything or to believe everything are two equally convenient
solutions; both dispense with the necessity of reflection. - H. Poincar‚
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Barry Johnson b...@clark.net
Mike Scott
nan...@universe.digex.net "Nancy Lebovitz" writes:
>Peer was a murderer--maybe this indicates a general lack of ability
>to respect consciousness, even one's own.
No he wasn't (though he may have been a suicide) - I think you mean
Thomas Riemann.
Jon Evans
Shamelessly following up my own post,
In article <3mu3ss$1...@hppadbk.waterloo.hp.com> ev...@waterloo.hp.com (Jonathan Evans) writes:
>In article <3mtur5$b...@universe.digex.net> nan...@universe.digex.net (Nancy
Lebovitz) writes:>>In article <795821...@kenjo.demon.co.uk>,
>>Jo Walton <J...@kenjo.demon.co.uk> wrote:
>>>SPOILERS
>>>
>>>Does anyone have any clues about the chapter titles?
>>
>>They're anagrams of each other, but I haven't been able to get any more
>>than that out of them.
>They look like they might fit nicely with the "poem found in a lunatic asylum"
>at the very beginning, but they aren't actually lines from it. Are there by
>chance anagrams in that as well?
>Hmm. Anagrams. Rearrangement of patterns. Dust theory, anyone? Might the
>chapter titles flag which "pattern" we're inside at any time? Greg Egan, are
>you reading this? Any hints?
Sorry. Read that as "permutation" of patterns...
the chapter titles are anagrams of "Permutation City".
Almost-but-not-quite-off-topic:
Very early in the book, Paul uses "Abulafia" for a password. It's a name
I've run across before - specifically, in Eco's _Foucault's Pendulum_, where
Abulafia is the name of Jacopo Belbo's computer. Anybody know where this
name comes from, and why it's being linked to information retrieval?
(It might be documented in _FP_, along with most of the history of the
species, but then again it might not; exhaustive reference explanations from
a novel which begins with a passage of untranslated Hebrew do not seem
terribly likely).
Jon
Ian Young
Jon Evans <JEME...@ELECTRICAL.watstar.uwaterloo.ca> wrote:
>Very early in the book, Paul uses "Abulafia" for a password. It's a name
>I've run across before - specifically, in Eco's _Foucault's Pendulum_, where
>Abulafia is the name of Jacopo Belbo's computer. Anybody know where this
>name comes from, and why it's being linked to information retrieval?
Introductory quotation of Chapter 5:
And begin by combining this name, YHWH, at the beginnning alone, and
examine all its combinations and move it and turn it about like a
wheel, front and back, like a scroll, and do not let it rest, but when
you see its matter strengthened because of the great motion, because
of the fear of confusion of your imagination and the rolling about of
your thoughts, and when you let it rest, return to it and ask it,
until there shall come to your hand a word of wisdom from it, do not
abandon it. v
--- Abulafia, _Hayyê ha-Nefes_, MS München 408, fols. 65a--65b
Emmet Obrien
>I've heard alot of good things about this book and I'd love to read it,
>BUT I can't find it anywhere.
>My question is: How long ago was it written and is it still in publication?
edition is due this coming October. It's only just come out in mass market
pb here, last week or so, so it shouldn't be too expensive to order.
Emmet
--
I have a very stimulating relationship with humans and enjoy working with
them.
Nancy Lebovitz
Jonathan Evans <ev...@waterloo.hp.com> wrote:
>I'm joining this conversation late, as I only read PC two days ago...
>
>In article <3mtur5$b...@universe.digex.net> nan...@universe.digex.net (Nancy Lebovitz) writes:
>>In article <795821...@kenjo.demon.co.uk>,
>>Jo Walton <J...@kenjo.demon.co.uk> wrote:
>>>SPOILERS
>>>
>
>>>clearly wasn't in the way Peer is going to do it, or was it?
>>>
>>It could have been simulated sexual reproduction--I bet that at least
>>some people would have tried that. I also bet that, with effectively
>>unlimited computing power and that strong nostalgia for the material
>>world, a lot more would have been done to simulate a world with
>>quantum underpinnings.
>
>Nice idea, but a) just after Maria is awakened, Paul explicitly states that
>this has not been done - that everyone's still using "behavioural models"
>instead of quantum theory - and b) if this *had* been done, the result would be
>internally self-consistent, quite likely more so than the Autoverse, and the
>Autoverse catastrophe would probably not have happened.
I think you're right in terms of the plot, but I was arguing that
the Copies' behavior was implausible--I don't think that people would
have so little desire to replicate the physical world.
>I'm not explaining this very well, am I? A problem endemic to the book in
>questions; the ideas are so vast and complex...
>
>Let's try that again. The Autoverse prevailed because the logic it was built
>on was stronger and more consistent than Elysium's; its' world was ground to a
>finer detail. But if atomic and quantum-level simulation *had* been done,
>it would have been a stronger and more viable pattern than the Autoverse,
>and hence would not have been "taken over".
>
You're probably right--though it would have been interesting if attempts
to do quantum-level simulation showed that this universe is also a
construct.
>If I'm still clear as mud, let me know and I'll try again.
>
You're clear--I just think you were answering a different argument
than the one I made.
>>>In a way Paul Durham is the ultimate solipsist - and I entirely sympathise with
He created a lot more reality than the average solipsist, though. :-)
>>>Maria in thinking him mad. Even though by the meta-logic of the novel and the
>
>>>Does anyone like him?
>>
>>No, though I sympathize with him somewhat. Does anyone think he might
>>count as a Coyote trickster/creator?
>
>I don't like him either, but I think you're right; right from the start, he's
>willing to create and play tricks on *himself*. He's never morally torn. He's
>so *certain* about everything...
>
>Although I think I like him more than Peer. Peer's way of life is so
>rational, so reasonable, so entirely self-contained, and yet so *repulsive*.
>Programming yourself to be happy? Eliminating character traits you don't
>have? It's as if Alex in A Clockwork Orange had performed his behavioural
>therapy on himself. (I wonder what Kubrick would do with Permutation City...)
Peer was a murderer--maybe this indicates a general lack of ability
to respect consciousness, even one's own.
>>>The Autoverse. Is this based on a real programme - or have we not got to that
>>>stage yet? Again this is something I find perfectly done in the novel
>
>>I agree that the Autoverse was some of the best stuff in the book--but I
>>think there'd be a lot more than 72 Autoverse junkies, even if a better
>>universe-building cellular automata were invented.
>
>Well, we never got a clear view of the *other* entertainments that were
>jockeying for the public's QIPS. Maybe they make the Autoverse look staid and
>boring. (Which would take work.)
>
Interesting point, though old pastimes tend not to disappear.
>>Did the explanation of where that infinite (or at least ever-expanding)
>>computing capacity came from make any sense at all?
>
>Yeah. But only a little.
>
>I was reminded of Brin's Glory Season, where he points out that a sufficiently
>advanced game of Life (the computer game most often seen as a screen saver) is
>a very powerful computer if used effectively.
>
>Given the dust theory - that the universe can be viewed merely as an infinite
>collection of random patterns - I can *vaguely* conceive of a random pattern
>which, in, um, "pattern-space", acts as both a Turing machine (it can compute;
>see, say, Penrose's _The Emperor's New Mind_ for more details) and a von
>Neumann machine (it can construct; more to the point, it can construct copies
>of *itself* out of the, um, ahem, "raw material" around it.) That's the T and
>the V. The C is Egan's invention, but theoretically less important; it just
>makes the T and V valid in six-dimensional pattern-space.
>
I think I'm getting a handle on the idea. However, if self-replicating
systems form out of the dust, then "launching" any particular system
is redundant--Permutation City and the Autoverse (and all possible
variations on them) already existed.
>(I am having difficulty believing I just wrote that last sentence.)
>
>I think I'll be posting a spoiler-free review of _Permutation City_ and
>_The Diamond Age_ soon, once I finish the latter; (might be some compare-and-
>constrasting there) so I'll leave most of my general comments out for now.
>I will say that I thought PC to be a brilliant but seriously flawed book.
>Much like _A Fire Upon The Deep_, I thought the ideas were far more compelling
>than the writing; I thought all characterization outside Paul and Maria
>ranged from "sketchy" to "totally unconvincing"; and even accepting that
>the Elysians had offspring, I have a lot of reservations about the idyllic
>way Elysian society is presented.
I think that there would be a lot of processing power theft in that world,
and various forms of vampirism and cannibalism among the Copies, but I'm
so sick of cyberpunk that I'm just as glad that Egan chose to write
about a fairly civilized society.
Nancy Lebovitz
Jonathan Evans <ev...@waterloo.hp.com> wrote:
>>Peer was a murderer--maybe this indicates a general lack of ability
>>to respect consciousness, even one's own.
>
>And yet his concern for Kate was genuine. On the other hand, this was a
>conscious choice on this part; on the gripping hand, if it *wasn't* genuine,
>he would have chosen to delete that part of his personality, or at least not
>keep it as one of the long-term constituents.
>
>Also, Riemann was a murderer too, (actually, I don't remember Peer being a
>murderer, but I'll take your word for it) and while he went stark raving mad,
>he was still more...human than Peer.
Oh, dear--I may have the two of them confused. Please do *not* take
my word for it. (I still remember a particularly embarassing incident
over on alt.fan.heinlein when someone mentioned a plot incident in
_Friday_ that was quite seriously discussed as part of the novel
for days until a poster said "Hey--I don't remember that in the
book"--and the plot detail turned out to be from a Haldeman novel.)
>
>>>>Did the explanation of where that infinite (or at least ever-expanding)
>>>>computing capacity came from make any sense at all?
>>>
>>>Yeah. But only a little.
>>>
>>>I was reminded of Brin's Glory Season, where he points out that a sufficiently
>>>advanced game of Life (the computer game most often seen as a screen saver) is
>>>a very powerful computer if used effectively.
>>>
>>>Given the dust theory - that the universe can be viewed merely as an infinite
>>>collection of random patterns - I can *vaguely* conceive of a random pattern
>>>which, in, um, "pattern-space", acts as both a Turing machine (it can compute;
>>>see, say, Penrose's _The Emperor's New Mind_ for more details) and a von
>>>Neumann machine (it can construct; more to the point, it can construct copies
>>>of *itself* out of the, um, ahem, "raw material" around it.) That's the T and
>>>the V. The C is Egan's invention, but theoretically less important; it just
>>>makes the T and V valid in six-dimensional pattern-space.
>>>
>>I think I'm getting a handle on the idea. However, if self-replicating
>>systems form out of the dust, then "launching" any particular system
>>is redundant--Permutation City and the Autoverse (and all possible
>>variations on them) already existed.
>
>Well...I'm iffy on that. It reminds me of the "an infinite universe must
>contain everything you can imagine" fallacy.
I don't think they're equivalent--the Dust contains everything computable,
which probably means many things that you can't imagine, but also may
fail to include many things that you *do* imagine. However, it would
include you imagining anything that you can imagine....
>
>Even if *everything* exists, the "subjective" Paul wasn't in the right place.
>To get to them, he had to put himself in the Garden-Of-Eden configuration.
>It's less "creating" something than "stepping to another pattern that
>intermingles with your own".
So it's an effort to get continuity?
>
>>I think that there would be a lot of processing power theft in that world,
>>and various forms of vampirism and cannibalism among the Copies, but I'm
>>so sick of cyberpunk that I'm just as glad that Egan chose to write
>>about a fairly civilized society.
>
>Grin. I see what you mean. I don't view it so much as "cyberpunk", though,
>as "decadence" - the inhabitants of Elysium can have literally anything they
>imagine. In time I can see many of them growing bored of being gods and
>trying their hand at something challenging - like tackling one another. I'd
They *do* tackle one another, but they limit themselves to politicking
and fraud.
>think at the very least there'd by "god wars," where each side gets one
>tribe on a planet with strictly defined parameters and limits to divine
>intervention. But I can also see at least one of the Elysians playing Loki
>to Paul's Odin. (On the other hand, they *did* have the Autoverse - without
>that distraction, the new G-o-E configuration is more likely to have this
>happen.)
Arthur Hlavaty
: Very early in the book, Paul uses "Abulafia" for a password. It's a name
: I've run across before - specifically, in Eco's _Foucault's Pendulum_,
: where
: Abulafia is the name of Jacopo Belbo's computer. Anybody know where this
: name comes from, and why it's being linked to information retrieval?
Abulafia was a Qabalistic philosopher. Philip K. Dick once claimed to be
channeling him.
--
Arthur D. Hlavaty hla...@panix.com
Church of the SuperGenius In Wile E. We Trust
Jonathan Evans
>>>I think I'm getting a handle on the idea. However, if self-replicating
>>>systems form out of the dust, then "launching" any particular system
>>>is redundant--Permutation City and the Autoverse (and all possible
>>>variations on them) already existed.
>>
>>Well...I'm iffy on that. It reminds me of the "an infinite universe must
>>contain everything you can imagine" fallacy.
>
>I don't think they're equivalent--the Dust contains everything computable,
>which probably means many things that you can't imagine, but also may
>fail to include many things that you *do* imagine. However, it would
>include you imagining anything that you can imagine....
Ow. You're making my head hurt.
You do sound convincing, though.
>>Even if *everything* exists, the "subjective" Paul wasn't in the right place.
>>To get to them, he had to put himself in the Garden-Of-Eden configuration.
>>It's less "creating" something than "stepping to another pattern that
>>intermingles with your own".
>
>So it's an effort to get continuity?
Exactly.
(Wasn't there a book with an AI named Continuity?)
(Oh yes, Mona Lisa Overdrive. Never mind.)
>They *do* tackle one another, but they limit themselves to politicking
>and fraud.
Fraud? Paul & co. were deceiving the others, granted, but they did have
awfully good reasons to do so.
One of the things that irked me about _Permutation City_ is that Egan gave
us this fascinating society, basically by authorial fiat, and immediately set
about destroying it without any description of where it came from, what it
did, what the conflicts were within it, etc. I think the destruction /
re-creation - um, call it the Ragnarok of Elysium - would have had more
impact if we'd spent a couple more chapters in Permutation City, maybe seeing
examples of exactly what third-generation types *did* with their infinite time
and processing power.
>Nancy Lebovitz (nan...@universe.digex.net)
Jon
"Brain the size of a planet, and here I am counting to ten."
Mike Arnautov
|> nan...@universe.digex.net "Nancy Lebovitz" writes:
|>
|> >to respect consciousness, even one's own.
Hmmm... You sem to be confusing Peer with that geram bloke.
I must say, for me the Peer thread of the narrative was perhaps the most
interesting one. I know some readers simply shudder at it ("how can
*anybody* contemplate doing such things to himself!"), but they miss the
point that their viewpoint is not applicable to Peer. Egan makes an
excellent attempt to try to step into the shoes of an immortal Copy who
fully acceptts the reality of beaing a Copy.
The scene on the scyscraper where we initially meet Peer is
breathtaking. It has all the qualities of a deep dream. How many other
books do you know which can boast anything like that?
Further on, Peer raises some *very* interesting questions. E.g. his
perception that he is finite and hence no longer immortal when the
compute-power available to him is finite. Also his ultimate fallback
solution of contemplating successive integers in turn leaves me
scratching my head over the question of whether information can be
created out of nothing.
--
Mike Arnautov
mla...@ggr.co.uk
Alan Scott
: Very early in the book,
[_Permutation City_, by Greg Egan, BTW]
: Paul uses "Abulafia" for a password. It's a name
: I've run across before - specifically, in Eco's _Foucault's Pendulum_, where
: Abulafia is the name of Jacopo Belbo's computer. Anybody know where this
: name comes from, and why it's being linked to information retrieval?
: (It might be documented in _FP_, along with most of the history of the
: species, but then again it might not; exhaustive reference explanations from
: a novel which begins with a passage of untranslated Hebrew do not seem
: terribly likely).
While looking over my wife's shoulder, I ran across this explanation in
Karen Armstrong's _A History of God_, p. 250 of the Alfred A. Knopf 1993
edition:
"We can see the psychological acuity of Kabbalah in the work of the
Spanish mystic Abraham Abulafia (1240-after 1291). The bulk of his work
was composed at about the same time as _The Zohar_, but Abulafia
concentrated on the practical method of achieving a sense of God rather
than with the nature of GOD itself. These methods are similar to those
employed today by psychoanalysts in their secular quest for enlightenment."
The section on him goes on for another two pages; the gist of it seems
to be that Abulafia was an almost psychoanalytical thinker who was highly
critical of then-current Christianity, and developed meditative and
yoga-like methods of getting closer to God, including something very like
free association. The connection doesn't seem to be so much with
computers per se, but rather with how humans may be able to unlock hidden
information about themselves by means of, among other things, "the
_Hokhmah ha-Tseruf_ (The Science of the Combination of the Letters),"
which could be seen, I suppose, as an oblique reference to computer
passwords but which seems more to me like a combinatorial analysis of the
Names of God a la Arthur C. Clarke.
I commend the original reference to you if you'd like to find out a
little more about this guy; I seriously suspect that I'm not doing him
(or Karen Armstrong) justice with this brief excerpt and synopsis.
--
Alan P. Scott (as...@agora.rdrop.com)
"I've seen the future--I can't afford it."
--ABC, "I Wanna Be A Millionaire"
Nancy Werlin
>..I ran across this explanation in
>Karen Armstrong's _A History of God_, p. 250 of the Alfred A. Knopf 1993
>edition:
>
> "We can see the psychological acuity of Kabbalah in the work of the
>Spanish mystic Abraham Abulafia (1240-after 1291). The bulk of his work
>was composed at about the same time as _The Zohar_, but Abulafia
>concentrated on the practical method of achieving a sense of God rather
>than with the nature of GOD itself. These methods are similar to those
>employed today by psychoanalysts in their secular quest for enlightenment."
>
> The section on him goes on for another two pages; the gist of it seems
>to be that Abulafia was an almost psychoanalytical thinker who was highly
>critical of then-current Christianity, and developed meditative and
>yoga-like methods of getting closer to God, including something very like
>free association.
Skimming can be dangerous -- you somehow missed, or neglected to mention, a few
quite essential items. First, for anyone who hasn't heard of The Zohar and
Kabbalah, let's be clear that Abulafia was a *Jewish* mystic and a
Kabbalist (the Zohar is a classic work of Jewish mysticism). Like all
Jewish mystics, he had a very strong background in Talmud, etc. (Jewish
mystics considered it dangerous to play with mysticism unless you had
the proper credentials first.) And I think you're mistaken that
Abulafia was critical of "then-current Christianity." I don't think he
paid much attention to it, though he may have kept up with mystical
trends; it was Judaism upon which he was focused, in his own Yogic way.
Second, part (though certainly not all) of Abulafia's fascination for
so many, including Umberto Eco, is that fact that he was in many ways a
*nut*; e.g., thought he was the messiah. Of course, in the area of
mysticism, this isn't necessarily a disadvantage.... In any event,
Armstrong's discussion of Abulafia is a good intro (she's great, isn't
she?); for still more info see Gershom Scholem's MAJOR TRENDS IN JEWISH
MYSTICISM.
Nancy Werlin
NWe...@ix.netcom.com