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Post by Yin on Dec 22, 2008 8:00:56 GMT
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Post by Azeltir on Dec 22, 2008 8:12:27 GMT
Interesting. I wonder which part of that motivates schooling children? We haven't seen technological-singularity-type stuff being taught, so where does the god-seeking come in?
Ben
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Post by shadrach on Dec 22, 2008 8:15:21 GMT
so where does the god-seeking come in? My guess is that it has something to do with the alchemy motifs we've seen throughout the comic. I've always wondered whether alchemy would come more to the foreground in GC and, if so, how. |
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tetsamaru
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Post by tetsamaru on Dec 22, 2008 8:16:52 GMT
Well, as far as Alchemy and Technology go, Coyote's answer may actually be partly literal. Questions get raised with Artificial AI and creations of Homunculus and so forth.
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Post by biggerj on Dec 22, 2008 8:20:09 GMT
Maybe Coyote's knowledge of the basic goal of Gunnerkrigg Court is out of date. Maybe it was Man's endeavour to becoming God, but is now retired from cutting-edge dubiously-sane science and is currently in the field of education.
And another thing: isn't science in general, with its ultimate goal of absolute knowledge and mastering of the universe and its contents, Man's endeavour to becoming God? Maybe Coyote's referring to the reason why Gunnerkrigg Court was started in the first place (to find the answers behind the universe, rather than just settling for ethereal tenet, which basically says 'it just works, now shut up'), and not what it is now. In that case, it sounds about right.
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Dominic
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Post by Dominic on Dec 22, 2008 8:54:02 GMT
Annie looks... tired, in the last panel. I know I'd be, Coyote must be one tiresome fellow.
The "Becoming God" bit may have to do with the difference between the forest and the Court. In the Forest, Gods are ethereal beings - "it just works", as biggerj said - and Science may very well be an attempt to reach the same or similar powers through more mechanical means.
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Post by imaginaryfriend on Dec 22, 2008 9:01:27 GMT
And another thing: isn't science in general, with its ultimate goal of absolute knowledge and mastering of the universe and its contents, Man's endeavour to becoming God? I agree, though the philosopher in me would argue that science is only the organization (and testing) of knowledge/experience. To a being like Coyote I figure that the application of same that allows humans to fly or otherwise do things they couldn't do without technology would appear... uppity. Also I seem to remember (but am too lazy to Wiki it) but the highest goal of alchemy was to find a philosopher's stone, a substance that possessed such a purity of the force of creation that it could transmute other substances into more noble forms just by touching. I suppose that could be seen as usurping God's role in the creation process. |
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Post by Per on Dec 22, 2008 9:23:52 GMT
Very meta.
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Post by blackmantha on Dec 22, 2008 10:05:38 GMT
As enigmatic answers go, that isn't so bad.
If you ask the trans-humanists, the eventual purpose of technology is doing just that. And the court has been gathering various supernatural talents and creatures, so my guess is they're trying to get more control over ethereal phenomena. As for why they're educating children, I think it's their long-term planning. If the Donlans and Mr Eglamore are any indication, many of the staff are recruited from the alumni, and also it's a way of gathering aforementioned talents and creatures (like Zimmy and the fairies.)
What it doesn't explain is why Annie shouldn't trust them, which Coyote originally said was the very point of inviting Annie over.
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Post by Count Casimir on Dec 22, 2008 10:22:57 GMT
Have I mentioned lately that Coyote is AWESOME? That's pretty much EXACTLY what I would want to do if I were a god...perhaps that explains why I haven't yet been invited to the pantheon. Oh well.
And hey, Ysengrin actually did some light snarking. He's much more at ease in the woods than in the Court...although that's not saying much.
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eggie
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Post by eggie on Dec 22, 2008 11:45:53 GMT
I love this page.
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Mesías
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Post by Mesías on Dec 22, 2008 21:47:49 GMT
I love Annie's expressions in the last two panels. And probably she has to be more persuasive to get a less cryptic answer from Coyote.
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Post by Inugami on Dec 23, 2008 0:58:42 GMT
"Why, yes, Coyote. Now that you point it out, the sky IS a nice shade of blue today."
Something fairly obvious, but not always noticed. That is, Coyote's words open my eyes to what the Court is about... And I see nothing that surprises me.
Humans have always endeavored to become God, whenever they aren't attempting to remold God in their own image -- but usually, at the same time.
There are also sensible humans who are content with how things are. The "it just IS!" crowd.
Humanity takes both positions to extremes -- Learning and mastering is great, but so is relaxing and trusting.
Generally, the lay folk are so unconcerned that they often fail to stop the scientists from causing a disaster, and the scientists can find it rather hard to convince the lay folk of some of their more worthy finds.
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Post by emptypiro on Dec 23, 2008 2:27:48 GMT
imaginary, i do believe the primary goal was to transmute substances into gold.
also it looks like Coyote has eyes on his shoulders
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Post by King Mir on Dec 23, 2008 5:56:37 GMT
There are also sensible humans who are content with how things are. The "it just IS!" crowd. Humanity takes both positions to extremes -- Learning and mastering is great, but so is relaxing and trusting. Generally, the lay folk are so unconcerned that they often fail to stop the scientists from causing a disaster, and the scientists can find it rather hard to convince the lay folk of some of their more worthy finds. I have so many objections to this statement, I don't know where to start. Here's an unordered list: - Most scientist pursue science, not out of desire for fame, but because of the joy of discovery itself. If you want fame, science is not a good career choice.
- One consistent feature of humans is their passion. More often then not this is not directed towards science.
- While there strong contrasts between a modern scientific mindset, and a passive submissive one, it is not fair to pit them as opposites.
- Mastering has never been coupled with learning, except by accident. If you value control, the military is a better career choice then being a scientist.
- Scientists are quite apt at preventing disasters. All great technological disasters I can think of were cause by bad politics, not bad science.
- Religious zealotry is a better antithesis of "relaxing and trusting".
- There is a difference between a scientist, who tries to discover new things, and an engineer who seeks to do useful things with what we already know.
- An engineer does not do what he does out of pursuit of fame either.
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Post by Inugami on Dec 23, 2008 6:08:24 GMT
You read so much into my message that I don't know where to begin correcting you.
Suffice to say that I held neither "scientist" nor "layman" above the other. Each is a valid lifestyle. Each can be taken to unhealthy extremes.
I wasn't thinking of fame at all.
And there have been several Christian scientists. In fact, I do believe the Medieval Muslims were supposed to have a particularly learned scholarly class.
Spiritual beliefs and scientific curiousity are not opposed. A person can have both, either, or neither.
Perhaps I miscommunicated, mispoke, or otherwise said something foolish, but I meant none of what you think I did.
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Post by King Mir on Dec 23, 2008 6:55:02 GMT
I'm opposed to your splitting the world into the categories of scientists, who are "Learning and mastering", and layman, who are "relaxing and trusting." Neither of these categories are as you describe.
Fame was in reference to this statement "the scientists can find it rather hard to convince the lay folk of some of their more worthy finds." Attempts to convince the lay of the worth of findings would qualify as vanity, unless there is some other purpose to doing so.
I do not contest that religious belief in general is incompatible with science. My comment on religious zealotry did not mean to imply that religion is to be considered opposed to science.
I still see most of what I said as being in contradiction with what you said. EDIT: however, looking back I did interpret your post to contrast scientists with "relaxing and trusting" people, which may not be what you intended.
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Post by Tierra Y Libertad on Dec 23, 2008 18:21:29 GMT
This is a strip that makes me feel Coyote is Tom's alter ego.
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Post by Rasselas on Dec 23, 2008 23:09:05 GMT
All of the characters are his alter ego. Even Annie. Yes, I just called Tom a girl. :0
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Post by Per on Dec 23, 2008 23:30:31 GMT
You just called Tom a boxbot :0
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Post by eightyfour on Dec 23, 2008 23:32:01 GMT
And there have been several Christian scientists. In fact, I do believe the Medieval Muslims were supposed to have a particularly learned scholarly class. Heh, your usage of past tense makes me smile. That's probably not you intended to say, but I know for a fact that there are still a few religious scientists around nowadays.  Religion and science are not incompatible at all. It is radical/extremist views - on either side - who make it look like they are. There are reputable scientists who will tell you that "God" is the only logical answer to some questions, that cannot be answered in any other way, and never will be answered by human science. |
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Post by starburst98 on Dec 24, 2008 0:23:51 GMT
best example of pure science is the hadron collider, they made it just to see what happens when you make two atoms go REALLY, REALLY, (repeat x 10000000) REALLY fast and smash them into each other.
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Post by penguinfactory on Dec 24, 2008 1:24:20 GMT
.... Wuh?
I love how Tom parodies his own art style- the ilustration next to Coyote in the second panel gives abosultely no information at all, in contrast to the previous ones.
So what to make of Coyote's words?
Looking over it, there seems to be a general perception that the Court takes an overly "science for science's sake" view of things, discovering and exploring just to make themselves better (than the forest?) with no goal or practical application in mind (defintely not how real science works).
But no one at the Court actually acts like this. Maybe Jones and the Gillite inhabitant's opinions are wrong, or maybe the current Court residents are just blindly continuing with an endeavour started when the Court was founded, to make humans like Gods no matter what. This would explain the school- a new generation of students raised largely in the Court itself would be more likely to stick to the original plan without question than outside talent.
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Post by imaginaryfriend on Dec 24, 2008 3:11:45 GMT
The funny thing about scientists is that if you get a bunch of them interacting together they form a scientific community, and that community is by no means immune to any of the problems that plague other human groups, such as groupthink, factionalism and even irrational orthodoxy. I think that a lot of scientists today are still mired in an institutional 19th century materialism and that's where the whole idea that science and belief are antithetical comes from. If you think about it, a lot of the applied technology that we use today requires a great deal of faith; we trust our money to appliances and electronic pulses along wires, we take deadly poisons in precise amounts to cure disease, and some people even jump off cliffs trusting a few pounds of fabric and aluminum pipes to keep them from crashing. imaginary, i do believe the primary goal was to transmute substances into gold. Transmuting things into gold has been one of the most popular goals of alchemy for obvious reasons, but there's others. An elixir of immortality was another important one. Philosopher's stone was supposed to be a alchemical knowledge power-up, too. I figure all of those things are god territory in someone's view. The Wiki article on alchemy is pretty good and there's lots that applies to GC. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alchemy |
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Post by Max on Dec 24, 2008 4:49:55 GMT
Coyote should get his own cable new network on CNN. He seems so much more interested in showing off than actually telling what the story.
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Post by Rasselas on Dec 24, 2008 8:09:59 GMT
You just called Tom a boxbot :0 Gah!! I can never show my face around here again :0 |
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Post by zingbat on Dec 24, 2008 10:36:20 GMT
If you think about it, a lot of the applied technology that we use today requires a great deal of faith; we trust our money to appliances and electronic pulses along wires, we take deadly poisons in precise amounts to cure disease, and some people even jump off cliffs trusting a few pounds of fabric and aluminum pipes to keep them from crashing. Weeeellll, I don't know that they require *faith*. After all, there's quite a bit of collected evidence to show that those electrical pulses, poisons, and fabric are pretty dang good at what they do, and a lot of theory (also backed up by evidence) that explains why that's so. |
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Post by imaginaryfriend on Dec 24, 2008 11:58:00 GMT
Weeeellll, I don't know that they require *faith*. After all, there's quite a bit of collected evidence to show that those electrical pulses, poisons, and fabric are pretty dang good at what they do, and a lot of theory (also backed up by evidence) that explains why that's so. I think there's faith involved in all that stuff in a bunch of ways. True, there's plenty of evidence that applied technology gets us the results we seek more often than not. Here's the thing: Reality is complex and coercive. Outside of thought experiments and controlled lab conditions there's always a certain amount of risk. For example, if you go to the doctor and get a vaccine there are institutions and procedures in place to make sure that product is safe and effective... within a predetermined set of mathematical values that is never 0% or 100% certain of anything. Even so, people will go ahead and get the vaccine and believe that it will protect them from disease and that they won't be part of that .05% of who have a bad reaction. I think we humans have developed a great deal of sophistication with numbers to tell us how strong correlations are between events. Using that we can disprove some theories. However, some of those theories we can't now disprove we accept and interweave into stories we tell ourselves about how things work, including scientific laws, while others we reject because they don't mesh with the rest the way we'd like. We keep going this way because we believe that we're better off this way as opposed to not trying to figure things out in an orderly fashion and we're probably right... and that's faith in progress. |
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Post by Inugami on Dec 25, 2008 7:44:51 GMT
"Faith" and "belief" are not necessarily the same thing, though the words are often used interchangeably
The devil and his horde believe in God, but have no faith in Him.
Think of "faithful." It means "to be true; to be loyal; trusting and trustworthy."
A faithful husband is not one who believes he has a wife, but one who never betrays or abandons his wife.
The virtue of Faith as named among the seven is not believing in God, but in seeking to know God better, learning new things, casting out illusions, and holding firm to what you've learned of His character, despite the changing tides of mood or circumstance.
This is also applied to people -- finding the right people to trust, and trusting what you know of them, even if others spread lies and slander. Discerning for yourself rather than simply accepting the conclusions of others.
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Post by fjodor on Dec 25, 2008 19:08:23 GMT
And let's not forget that Faith is a pretty good album by George Michael!
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