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Post by imaginaryfriend on Nov 14, 2019 0:22:18 GMT
Proposed topic for discussion: Is what Ysengrin wanted to do with Coyote's power really that different from what the Court is alleged to be doing (trying to become God or a god or something godlike)? Ysengrin's reply will be something along the lines of: He did not really want to become more than he was. All he wanted to do was to show the humans Coyote's true power, because Coyote is a God (so, in his twisted logic, he was serving his lord by killing him and taking his power to finally show it to the humans). Humans are supposed to worship and fear the divine Coyote, not trying to build a god themselves (sort of like some stories from the Old Testament - in this not perfect parallel Coyote would be the OT's God, and whatever the Court is creating would be either the Tower of Babel, or the Golden Calf - and Ysengrin possibly a Moses with huge anger issues). That might be what Ysengrin would say but he was clearly not happy with himself and even if all humans did respect and fear Coyote as the green folk of the Wood did that wouldn't change the things Ysengrin didn't like about himself; that probably being the case I do not think he would have refused Coyote's offer of a gift and though it may not have played out the same way I think it would have reached the same conclusion eventually. He, as "Loup", has said that he Ysengrin) wanted to use Coyote's power to "rise above humans" even if it meant killing him and taking his place... which means that he would be the one above humans where a god should be. Except for his lack of ability to control the Wood/be one with nature/whatever "Loup" seems very happy with himself. It was formsprung that "quite a lot" of the people of the Court are atheist or agnostic (even though a real "god" was just on the other side of the Annan) though some practiced organized religion and others probably had some spiritual beliefs. We don't know exactly what the Court is trying to do but presumably they are trying, either as a means or an end in itself, to gain power(s) that were traditionally held to be in the realm of the divine. Whatever they believe, if they are seeking "divine" power because they wish to use it "better" than the gods of the Gunnerverse do, or to change themselves so as to be above other humans, (which they probably are) that strikes me as being very similar to what Ysengrin/"Loup" wanted/wants. |
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Post by bicarbonat on Nov 14, 2019 0:23:53 GMT
Coyote wanted to experience death, so experiencing it twice must be better, yes? Given the stories about him, if anyone's has a vested interest in knowing what dying multiple times is actually like, it's Coyote. And this adds a new flavor or intrigue - because he's been other forms, but always only been wholly himself. He's also done forgetting his identity as a means of temporary death and departure from self; now he's trying being something different - something that isn't just himself in another guise. |
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Post by todd on Nov 14, 2019 0:31:08 GMT
Proposed topic for discussion: Is what Ysengrin wanted to do with Coyote's power really that different from what the Court is alleged to be doing (trying to become God or a god or something godlike)? Great question. Of course, we don't know if the Court is consciously trying to become godlike. It might be simply trying to incorporate the ether into its scientific world-view without realizing the effect it's having in so doing; it might not know, as Coyote does, just how much the ether can affect things. Indeed, we've seen this with Kat; she's becoming a robot-goddess but didn't set out to do so. She just wanted to build a more humanlike body for robots (first to help Robot after his old body got paper-clipped, and then for the intellectual challenge), and never intended to become the center of the robots' religion. (And also unwittingly complicated things for Annie and Reynardine when her curiosity about the arrow led her to include it in their switchback, without realizing the consequences.) This could be a parallel to what the Court's doing (though it might be a contrast and the Court really might intend to become godlike, after all). |
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Post by maxptc on Nov 14, 2019 3:06:01 GMT
I mean, what did he expect? Although I am asking myself, did Coyote know the bone would be returned before the water? Because had Loup gotten his paws on the water first (which, so my guess, contains the memory of giving away the tooth), the joke would not have worked. If Loup had gotten the water first, he wouldn't have used it until he got the bone back. He knew the bone held a memory of the waters nature, and he suspected it could be a Coyote trap. So it would have been a different joke, "haha you had the actual memory the whole time", but still funny. |
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Post by justhalf on Nov 14, 2019 4:59:34 GMT
For some reason, I thought we already knew the lake water was also a memory. I guess I was wrong? Probably because of the discussion here. People discussed the possibility of both the goose bone and the lake water being memory of something related to the tooth, which Loup didn't seem to be aware of. |
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Post by zbeeblebrox on Nov 14, 2019 5:07:55 GMT
Calling it now, the memory in the water is of the bone's true nature. Now we can call him Recursive Loup!
*Rimshot!*
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Post by pyradonis on Nov 15, 2019 10:27:36 GMT
Ysengrin's reply will be something along the lines of: He did not really want to become more than he was. All he wanted to do was to show the humans Coyote's true power, because Coyote is a God (so, in his twisted logic, he was serving his lord by killing him and taking his power to finally show it to the humans). Humans are supposed to worship and fear the divine Coyote, not trying to build a god themselves (sort of like some stories from the Old Testament - in this not perfect parallel Coyote would be the OT's God, and whatever the Court is creating would be either the Tower of Babel, or the Golden Calf - and Ysengrin possibly a Moses with huge anger issues). That might be what Ysengrin would say but he was clearly not happy with himself and even if all humans did respect and fear Coyote as the green folk of the Wood did that wouldn't change the things Ysengrin didn't like about himself; that probably being the case I do not think he would have refused Coyote's offer of a gift and though it may not have played out the same way I think it would have reached the same conclusion eventually. He, as "Loup", has said that he Ysengrin) wanted to use Coyote's power to "rise above humans" even if it meant killing him and taking his place... which means that he would be the one above humans where a god should be. Except for his lack of ability to control the Wood/be one with nature/whatever "Loup" seems very happy with himself. It was formsprung that "quite a lot" of the people of the Court are atheist or agnostic (even though a real "god" was just on the other side of the Annan) though some practiced organized religion and others probably had some spiritual beliefs. We don't know exactly what the Court is trying to do but presumably they are trying, either as a means or an end in itself, to gain power(s) that were traditionally held to be in the realm of the divine. Whatever they believe, if they are seeking "divine" power because they wish to use it "better" than the gods of the Gunnerverse do, or to change themselves so as to be above other humans, (which they probably are) that strikes me as being very similar to what Ysengrin/"Loup" wanted/wants. Funny question: If you are an atheist, how can you attempt to become God? Funny afterthought: Atheists claim no gods exist. Coyote (a god) claims he does not exist. Ergo, Coyote is an atheist. (And also he is a divine being reconcilable with an atheistic worldview, by not existing.)
Given the stories about him, if anyone's has a vested interest in knowing what dying multiple times is actually like, it's Coyote. And this adds a new flavor or intrigue - because he's been other forms, but always only been wholly himself. He's also done forgetting his identity as a means of temporary death and departure from self; now he's trying being something different - something that isn't just himself in another guise. Another thought: When Coyote still had the ability to take bodies, what would have happened, had he taken the body of an animal and waited for it to die / be killed (for example just taking a rabbit's body and seek out the nearest predator)? Or maybe he tried that out and was simply evicted back into his own body, not being able to experience death that way?
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Post by imaginaryfriend on Nov 15, 2019 11:20:44 GMT
Funny question: If you are an atheist, how can you attempt to become God? Funny afterthought: Atheists claim no gods exist. Coyote (a god) claims he does not exist. Ergo, Coyote is an atheist. (And also he is a divine being reconcilable with an atheistic worldview, by not existing.) I'm of the school of thought that says in order to sensibly make the claim "X does not exist" there needs to be at least a definition of X. Others might say that since any acceptable definition of X must contain contradictions therefore any statement about X is meaningless... which is more about shutting down discussion than winning the argument. In other words, it's fairly easy to show that a god wouldn't exist in the same sense as a chair would, at least not all the time. So what? If we discover a subatomic particle that doesn't exist in the same sense as a chair does, and some might argue we already know of several, should we not discuss it or act like we don't believe in it?  And this adds a new flavor or intrigue - because he's been other forms, but always only been wholly himself. He's also done forgetting his identity as a means of temporary death and departure from self; now he's trying being something different - something that isn't just himself in another guise. Another thought: When Coyote still had the ability to take bodies, what would have happened, had he taken the body of an animal and waited for it to die / be killed (for example just taking a rabbit's body and seek out the nearest predator)? Or maybe he tried that out and was simply evicted back into his own body, not being able to experience death that way? Probably the same thing that happened when he transformed into some other sort of body and died. The body would be left behind if Coyote left it, or it would be absorbed into nature and disappear without a trace like Ysengrin's original body if Coyote left without leaving the body. |
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Post by madjack on Nov 15, 2019 11:54:59 GMT
And this adds a new flavor or intrigue - because he's been other forms, but always only been wholly himself. He's also done forgetting his identity as a means of temporary death and departure from self; now he's trying being something different - something that isn't just himself in another guise. Another thought: When Coyote still had the ability to take bodies, what would have happened, had he taken the body of an animal and waited for it to die / be killed (for example just taking a rabbit's body and seek out the nearest predator)? Or maybe he tried that out and was simply evicted back into his own body, not being able to experience death that way?
Coyote's power is a bit different, since he didn't technically " take" them like Rey did. He probably wouldn't be able to get what he wanted because it wouldn't be his death he was experiencing. |
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Post by todd on Nov 15, 2019 12:56:49 GMT
]Funny question: If you are an atheist, how can you attempt to become God? You might see it as a vacancy that's there for you to fill. But, as I mentioned above, I'm not sure that the Court are consciously seeking to become God. This is Coyote's statement, remember. He knows more about the ether than the Court does, and would recognize that the logical outcome of the Court's attempts to study the ether would be the Court being able to control it - therefore becoming like gods. (Also, Coyote was seeking to affect Annie's perception of the Court for his own agendas.) |
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Earin
Full Member
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Post by Earin on Nov 15, 2019 14:04:13 GMT
. It was formsprung that "quite a lot" of the people of the Court are atheist or agnostic (even though a real "god" was just on the other side of the Annan) though some practiced organized religion and others probably had some spiritual beliefs. We don't know exactly what the Court is trying to do but presumably they are trying, either as a means or an end in itself, to gain power(s) that were traditionally held to be in the realm of the divine. Whatever they believe, if they are seeking "divine" power because they wish to use it "better" than the gods of the Gunnerverse do, or to change themselves so as to be above other humans, (which they probably are) that strikes me as being very similar to what Ysengrin/"Loup" wanted/wants. Regardless of the wider Court’s plans, applied theogenesis seems like a perfectly sensible (if risky) subject for a branch of the Court to be involved in. You want a small god that is like [thing]? Convince a few people it already exists. Create a believing engine whose only function is to believe in your pantheon. Have that believing engine pray to its gods for freedom. Have it reach for the sky and take flight. Sigh, and put together another one. |
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Post by imaginaryfriend on Nov 15, 2019 15:10:12 GMT
Regardless of the wider Court’s plans, applied theogenesis seems like a perfectly sensible (if risky) subject for a branch of the Court to be involved in. You want a small god that is like [thing]? Convince a few people it already exists. Create a believing engine whose only function is to believe in your pantheon. Have that believing engine pray to its gods for freedom. Have it reach for the sky and take flight. Sigh, and put together another one. I posted a while back about this but they could also be trying for "free" energy. They could also be trying to safeguard themselves against chaotic gods and the goofy etheric problems they cause (like, for example, a shrinking gene pool caused by people believing that super-jerks are all literally fathered by the devil) by dedeifying them. (antiaphotheosis?) |
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Post by Runningflame on Nov 15, 2019 19:26:34 GMT
Funny question: If you are an atheist, how can you attempt to become God? I refer you to Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality, in which Harry, an atheist, states several times that his goal is to "become god" (usually lowercase, I believe). More specifically, "To understand everything important there is to know about the universe, apply that knowledge to become omnipotent, and use that power to rewrite reality because I have some objections to the way it works now" ( chapter 20). I think the idea of "superhuman power" is the important part here ("omnipotent" may be an exaggeration). Coming back to Gunnerkrigg, Coyote's definition of "god" seems to involve power and the ability to do with it as one pleases. (Incidentally, from a Judeo-Christian perspective, seeking to become [like] God is--literally--the oldest temptation in the book. So as a theist, I'm not surprised that anybody, including atheists, would try to become G/god. Most atheists probably wouldn't put it that way, though.) |
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Post by todd on Nov 16, 2019 2:03:23 GMT
I still suspect that the Court don't even realize the full consequences of manipulating the ether and have no big plans for using it. I think they want to simply "quantify" it; they want to find a way to explain it as a scientific phenomenon rather than "it's just magic", so that it'll fit their world-view better.
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Post by imaginaryfriend on Nov 16, 2019 2:57:37 GMT
I still suspect that the Court don't even realize the full consequences of manipulating the ether and have no big plans for using it. I think they want to simply "quantify" it; they want to find a way to explain it as a scientific phenomenon rather than "it's just magic", so that it'll fit their world-view better. Even if they don't have big plans for the discoveries they make while experimenting with the ether I think the knowledge would be applied to big things eventually. If they don't share their advances with anyone else on Earth I'm sure that the new and improved technologies would be used to make the lives of the more (ahem) important people in the Court vastly more convenient and spiffy... |
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