Linden and the Land's Reality

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Post by wayfriend »

iquestor wrote:I acknowledge that SRD has given no direct evidenct for either side, however using the evidence given, and his GI quotes, and applying Occam's razor, the Land is clearly real as described above.
You keep mentioning Occam's Razor. I do not think that word means what you think it means.

Occam's Razor is a heuristic that applies to our real world, or, more specifically, the world of scientific deduction. It doesn't apply to a fantasy world. In a fantasy world, any crazy thing can happen, and the theory with the most assumptions is as likely to be true as any other - because the author can write any dang thing he wants to.

But that aside, I am reduced to stumpednation as to how the Land being a dream requires more assumptions than the Land being real!!!
iquestor wrote:Why don't you state specifically exactly what you believe the Land is, so I can figure out what your stance is...
This wasn't directed to me, but I for one am only defending the stance that no stance can be defended. I think the Land is not Covenant's dream - it exists outside of TCs mind. (Which is my definition of 'real', for Malik's sake.) But I couldn't defend that position.
Malik23 wrote:The avatar idea doesn't sit well with me.
Covenant is not an avatar in the Land.

However, the old man in the ochre robe is an avatar of the Creator in the Haven Farm World.

One meaning of an avatar is the one we use when we set up an avatar on Kevin's Watch. It is a "representation", or a "symbol". And a symbol is always distinct from what it symbolizes. And it is always far less than what it symbolizes.

The old man is a symbol of the Creator, and the Creator's representative in the Haven Farm World. But he is far, far less than the Creator.

Which is precisely the opposite of Covenant. In the Land, Covenant is far, far more. His projection is "more", not less.

(Note that when Donaldson describes Covenant as "an avatar of flame", this is imagery, not literal. Covenent appears to be an incarnation of a holy flame - that is, he's bright and shiny and has lots of flames spewing about.)
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Post by iQuestor »

You keep mentioning Occam's Razor. I do not think that word means what you think it means.
Occam's razor means that based on a given problem, the simplest solution is usually correct. That is my understanding. I agree with you that it could not be applied within the fantasy world of TC's Haven Farm, but we, outside of this world looking in and discussing whether the Land is Real or Not based on evidence that the writer shows us (as well as his later musings), apply it because that is how we (the intended reader) do logic. I do think it is appropriate; I guess you disagree, and that's fine. This is my take on it.

Do you at least understand what I mean?

edit:
But that aside, I am reduced to stumpednation as to how the Land being a dream requires more assumptions than the Land being real!!!
OK I will try to explain:

My basic premises

1. The Land is self contained, whatever form it takes.
2. The land is not a single user dream.

The Land is self contained: It has a past, present and future. It has plants and animals and trees and beings and geography and a beginning. It has these things in some form, whether it is a dream or a place. Lets call all of the data in the Land, including all history and peoples and physical features, etc - lets call that X.

If the Land is real, is corporeal, exists as a place, then it is be self contained, and all the people and events, past and present in the Land are held there, and can thereby be independantly experienced by visitors, such as TC, Linden and Hile. In other words, X has one place to be; X is a one-to-many relationship with its visitors.

The only problem is translating TC and others to the Land from the world of TC. They all experience any of the dataset X they are confronted with. There is no 'data synchronization' problem of getting multiple people to have similar experiences; however these experiences are only just a small percentage of the total information stored in X. Lets call TC's experiences in the Land, the data of the Land he has experiences TCx , Lindens LAx, and Hile's HTx, etc.

The same can be said of a single person dreaming all of the events. If the Land is all in one persons dream, Then X is completely contained in that one person's dream, and we are satisfied. But this isn't so.

If the Land is a dream, it cannot be a single person's dream such as this. I say this because SRD has said as much; If he hadn't, then it could be one long dream by TC, and Linden and Hile are not real, or are not actual participants in TC's dream. I think this (not a single dreamer) is also supported by the fact that TC is dead in his own world; I see no evidence that dead people can dream in TC's world, so the dream would then have to be passed on to someone else after he died, which means Linden would also have to be both real and a participant in the original dream.

But this isn't the case as I have said, and I don't think anyone could argue effectively to me that the Land is a Single user dream, with no one else experiencing it; rather, it would have to be a dream which many people can participate in and be physically affected by, such as Hile, Linden, TC, the children of retribution, Roger, and Joan. This is in conflict with the self-containment premise I hold.

Then there is the problem with Foul and the Creator affecting the real world of Covenant, or at least the dream world of multiple participants in the same way; the avatar of the creator approaches Linden and Covenant; Foul affects the weather and causes lightning in the TC world that Linden, Roger, Sherrif Litton, and others also see. There is some form of communication with the children of retribution by Foul, SO now they must also be sharing in the dreaming. Then there is the problem of differing experiences of Linden and TC, and the history of the Land. With multiple dreamers, there is no one place to hold all of this information (X) to be experienced by different people. Either that, or we have to have synchronized dreaming. Could all of this be part of the fantasy world: of course it could. But , looking in from the outside, I think it is pertinent to apply the Razor to this and say a real Land makes a lot more sense to me.

in other words, X has no single place to be in a multiple user dream, and therefore we have a lot of problems synchronizing data, and then there is all of the data not yet experienced by the visitors, such as the past. This is a many-to-many rleationships, where X has to be distributed and synchronized to satisfy the independant observations by different visitors.

Well, I have probably confused more than satisfied, but I lack the means to express it another way. I am thinking in terms of software development, and that is probably my problem, at heart, i am too logical for this conversation. :(

I would like to point out again that I said SRD has not, and will likely not give us the direct evidence; I take my stand based soley on what I read in the books and also the Author's comments, which is done based on the evidence presented.

Wayfriend, is your stance that either side is not defendable, that it is intentionally left unresolvable by the Author? you tend to take both sides in different arguments, IMO. Also, how can you state TC is not an Avatar?
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Post by Relayer »

iquestor wrote:Occam's razor means that based on a given problem, the simplest solution is usually correct. That is my understanding. I agree with you that it could not be applied within the fantasy world of TC's Haven Farm, but we, outside of this world looking in and discussing whether the Land is Real or Not based on evidence that the writer shows us (as well as his later musings), apply it because that is how we (the intended reader) do logic. ...
Great discussion here!!!

I agree with you on the meaning of Occam's Razor. But the fact that it's used in science to determine that the simplest solution is usually correct does not mean that it always is. It's just a way to approach solving a problem, by starting with the simplest solutions first. And in this case, it appears that these are getting mixed up and you're arguing that since it's the simplest, it must be correct. Remember, we're talking about SRD here! When is anything done the easy way? :-)
iquestor wrote:I am thinking in terms of software development, and that is probably my problem, at heart, i am too logical for this conversation. :(
I work in the tech world, too, so I know where you're coming from... but the Land can't be viewed like a piece of software. Paradoxes are, well, paradoxical, precisely because we can't understand them logically. Is the Land real, or unreal? How can someone be in 2 places at the same time? Can Covenant see himself as powerful, or a leper? How are both Covenant and Bannor portrayed in Elena's sculpture? The way to answer all the paradoxes in the story is, at it's essence, the same... to go beyond trying to "figure it out" and come to an understanding that transcends words, transcends reasoning. One can try to explain it after they understand it, but the explanation never really suffices.

Try to tell someone why you truly love something, like your favorite piece of music, or a sunset... telling them how the notes string together, how the vocals and guitar harmonize, how orange the sky and clouds are, none of this conveys the essence of your experience, the feeling of being moved by it. The sunset just is beautiful. There's no way I can logically tell you why I love one type of music, and not another. Your favorite music just makes you feel a certain way; it's in your heart; it's your state of Being.

In the same way, Mhoram can't truly explain how he learns the RoD or what it means in relation to the Oath. He just knows. TC realizes it doesn't matter if the Land is real or not. Will the paradox of the White Gold save or damn the land? Likely, it will be both/neither and the question won't matter, all at the same time. 8)
"History is a myth men have agreed upon." - Napoleon

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Post by iQuestor »

I agree with you on the meaning of Occam's Razor. But the fact that it's used in science to determine that the simplest solution is usually correct does not mean that it always is. It's just a way to approach solving a problem, by starting with the simplest solutions first. And in this case, it appears that these are getting mixed up and you're arguing that since it's the simplest, it must be correct. Remember, we're talking about SRD here! When is anything done the easy way?
I agree with what you say, which is why I say that it is usually correct, and that in my opinion, the Land is real within the context of the story.

I also agree that it is not defined in the book, or by SRD, and won't be. I an just arriving at my own conclusion as to what the Land probably is based on the only way I know to approach the problem.

I also agree that the paradox is there, and if SRD doesn't define either side, than I guess neither can we define it, but only say what we think it is. I think this is WayFriend's point, and if any position is correct, that one is the best defended.
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Post by wayfriend »

That's kind of what I thought.

On the one hand, there's the idea that it's a weird sort of uber-dream, with a life of its own, such that multiple people can participate in it, and it may interact with our world through means other than dreaming. (Sort of like Nightmare on Elm Street, no?)

On the other hand, there's a parallel universe, complete with history, Laws, people, places, races, cultures, lore, etc., and a means for that world to interact with this world, and a means to project people into this world, and this world has a creator that walks around in the other world looking for people, etc.

What boggles me is that you find the second one requires LESS assumptions than the first one. Perhaps you think it is easier to create a parallel universe than it is to create a dream?
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Post by iQuestor »

What boggles me is that you find the second one requires LESS assumptions than the first one. Perhaps you think it is easier to create a parallel universe than it is to create a dream?
not a whole univese, just another world. Yes, I do think it is easier, or maybe I should say more likely. But then again, thats just me.
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Post by Avatar »

Awesome posts. I'm too lazy to cudgel my brain into providing even a reasonably comparably good one on this friday afternoon just before I leave work, so I'll just sit here impressed instead. :D

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Post by Relayer »

Something just occurred to me as I looked at the "Pictures of Revelstone" thread...

Why didn't Covenant think to carry a camera with him? He tries to prove the Land's unreality by not shaving, or he thinks about getting rid of his clothes or penknife. But if he came back/re-awakened and the camera had no pictures, there would be his proof.

And if the Land was a real place that he could be translated to, he'd at least have some incredible pictures that we could see :-)
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Post by Warmark »

Relayer wrote:Something just occurred to me as I looked at the "Pictures of Revelstone" thread...

Why didn't Covenant think to carry a camera with him? He tries to prove the Land's unreality by not shaving, or he thinks about getting rid of his clothes or penknife. But if he came back/re-awakened and the camera had no pictures, there would be his proof.

And if the Land was a real place that he could be translated to, he'd at least have some incredible pictures that we could see :-)
Seen as TC conditions change become the same as when he was summoned, you could say that as there were no pics on the camera when he entered the Land, there would be none when he leaves.
But if you're all about the destination, then take a fucking flight.
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Post by drew »

Taking a picture would have been the same as not shaving, so in the end when he decided to shave, he would have had to expose the film or something, so that he wouldn't have been able to tell if the pictures came out or not.

Remember in the end of the First Chrons...it didnt't matter if the Land was real or not...and it's not like he ever had time to pack a camera or something.
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Post by Relayer »

Warmark wrote:Seen as TC conditions change become the same as when he was summoned, you could say that as there were no pics on the camera when he entered the Land, there would be none when he leaves.
I agree, the conditions would be the same. But looking at the scans from the Atlas of the Land made me wish... :-)

I was also thinking about it from TC's viewpoint. He needed an answer. Maybe he would've thought to himself "if I have to go there again I'm gonna keep a camera with me so that when I'm summoned I can prove this isn't real"

Granted, in his state of mind that would be a stretch. :hithead:
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Post by PannionDude »

For amusement's sake I worked out a Sci-Fi explanation for The Land and the adventuers therein.

1. The Old Man (Creator guy) disappears on several occasions, simply vanishing while Linden or TC looks away. Thus, he or whatever agency he is representative of is capable of either disintegrating or moving person sized quantities of matter.

2. The Old Man returns after disappearing, displaying the same personality and manerisms. The strong implication is that the removal or destruction of the body is a temporary condition and fixable. If the body is being destroyed then it is within this agency's power to restore it. If it is being transported then it is within this agency's power to return it.

Given these powers the simplest concept is that the Land is another planet. When they go to the other Planet the Old Man transports them there bodily. He places a duplicate body within the Havens Farm world. Upon their arrival he gives them, before they awake, surgery which renders them far faster and stronger, able to act within the Land's insane time scale. It also gifts them with Health Sense. Upon the completion of their time in The Land the Old Man transports them back after surgery to return them to their pre-transport condition, once again switching them with their body doubles.

In this version the Old Man basically = Gantz.
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Post by iQuestor »

There is a precedent in TC's universe for a planet capable of sustaining life as we know it - TC's own world. So it isnt too far fetched to think there is another, albeit time scales are different.

I havent seen a precedent for a multi-user dream or whatever else people imagine.

I like it !
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Post by amanibhavam »

A very interesting discussion --- although I must say for me one of the strongest aspects of the whole septalogy (so far) is that it has made Covenant and me accept that it does not matter whether it is real or merely a dream...
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