The Money Tree

[Andromeda]

[/cHello all

I thought this would be the best place to bring to your attention
a corruption of beauty.-

The Money Tree
There is a place near here, which is a natural place of beauty, it houses
many waterfalls, woodlands and hills. However, in the midst of it all lies
The Money Tree.

Every exposed piece of the tree has been covered in copper coins so that
none of the bark is visible anymore, it is considered to be like a wishing
well and to knock in a coin will bring luck or a wish to the perpetrator.

I think I know what the council of Lords would make of it!

Maybe the love of money is the ROOT of evil!

I would appreciate any opinions on this matter

Thanks AD.

[Avatar]

Welcome. A very interesting first post. The tree will either survive and the bark will grow back over the coins, or it will not.

Would I do it or think that the doing is a good idea? No.

--A

[Xar]

Welcome indeed! It is indeed a corruption of beauty, but we can take comfort in knowing that nature is stronger than mankind, and it is likely the tree with simply swallow the coins, rather than the other way around. This does not change the fact that it is a horrible custom, though!

[Andromeda]

Thankyou for your answers, you could almost sence an evil intent behind
it. The sad thing is that people who have visited to see nature encourage thier kids to add to it.

I personaly feel there is an intent behind it, but I know this will be controversial.

Very interesting site by the way.

[Avatar]

I doubt that there is any intent other than people's indifference to anything that is not themselves.

I mean, I doubt some evil mastermind somewhere planned it just to get rid of the tree.

As Xar said, the tree will likely overcome the man-made items.

--A

[Zarathustra]

Money is a placeholder for human power. Human activity. Human will transposed into reality. It's a symbol of value, of esteem. It is a way to make something as ephemeral and ethereal as human desire a concrete fact of existence. THAT is magic. It makes fantasy real. In this sense, it's the most beautiful thing we've ever created. Why shouldn't it be a symbol of wishes coming true? That's literally what it does.

If you think money is the root of all evil, PM me and I'll send you an address where you can mail your paycheck. I'll be glad to cleanse your soul by relieving you of this evil.

[Andromeda]

Money can't buy me Love!!

Love is the real power that preserves, Perfect love lasts etenally and
is unlike white gold - flawless.

Have you not read the books?

Money's power is limited and full of flaws

[Zarathustra]

Have I not read the books?!? You're new here, so I'll let that one slide.

Money is like white gold or the Staff of Law: it empowers the will of the user. In the hands of someone evil, it empowers evil desires. In the hands of someone good, it empowers good desires. It's a tool. It is neutral. The person who weilds it is the one who "colors" it with their own nature.

Like white gold, it has the power to save or damn humanity. In judging the outcome, we must at what people do with money, not the money itself.

Money is human action and desire magnified. It also magnifies love. Money can buy a child a happy Christmas, or a starving child a bowl of rice. Or a vaccine.

[iQuestor]

Have I not read the books?!? You're new here, so I'll let that one slide.

Money is like white gold or the Staff of Law: it empowers the will of the user. In the hands of someone evil, it empowers evil desires. In the hands of someone good, it empowers good desires. It's a tool. It is neutral. The person who weilds it is the one who "colors" is with their own nature.

Like white gold, it has the power to save or damn humanity. In judging the outcome, we must at what people do with money, not the money itself.

Money is human action and desire magnified.

so true.

[Zarathustra]

One last point: Donaldson made a lot of money with these books. He has sold millions of them. He also killed 10s of thousands of trees getting them into print. The Chronicles of Thomas Covenant are one big Money Tree.

[Marv]

If you think money is the root of all evil, PM me and I'll send you an address where you can mail your paycheck. I'll be glad to cleanse your soul by relieving you of this evil.

I think you've offered to relieve half the watch of their paychecks and/or possessions at one time or other!

[Zarathustra]

I think you've offered to relieve half the watch of their paychecks and/or possessions at one time or other!

And yet no one has taken me up on the offer . . . strange.

Really, I find this entire thread to be an exercise in irony: we're talking about a man who makes his living selling vast quantities of dead trees with little black marks on them. And then we use those black marks to justify arguments against both money and the perversion of trees?

[High Lord Tolkien]

The Lords, Giants and the people of the Land used trees for all manners of things.
They just weren't stupid and wasteful about it.
Christmas trees, for example, would have really pissed them off I bet.
Books though?
I bet they made them, used them and loved them.

And Andromeda, you never mentioned if the tree was damaged in anyway attaching the coins.
I can think of a number of ways it could be done with no harm to the tree.

[Prebe]

The symbolism fails to tie the dead money to the living tree which I suspect is the idea. It fails to make money natural (or a characteristic of the biological world, and not just a human product). Combine that with a profound and naïve wish of having an in-exhaustible source of money.

[wayfriend]

Samual R Delaney's Tales of Nevèrÿon has the best philosophical explanation of money I ever enjoyed reading. I wish I could put the whole thing here ... but the essence was something like ... money is the opposite of value; where money is, something of value once was, or will be in time, but it's not there now.

[Zarathustra]

Samual R Delaney's Tales of Nevèrÿon has the best philosophical explanation of money I ever enjoyed reading. I wish I could put the whole thing here ... but the essence was something like ... money is the opposite of value; where money is, something of value once was, or will be in time, but it's not there now.

I can see that. After all, I said it was a "placeholder." It's a symbol of value, an expression of trust--faith that others will accept this symbolic token of value. The worth of this green paper is entirely in the minds of humans. But really, you could say that about anything. Nothing has inherent value. It only becomes valuable once someone judges or finds it valuable. And that estimation is always a relative quantity. So the only way money is different is that it takes this judgement to the level of the abstract. The symbolic. The metaphorical. It's the one metaphor we all treat as reality. The "most real" metaphor.

[Avatar]

Great posts Malik. And hilarious.

--A

[Andromeda]

And Andromeda, you never mentioned if the tree was damaged in anyway attaching the coins.
I can think of a number of ways it could be done with no harm to the tree.

[Avatar]

Don't you wish you could edit other people's posts?

Anyway HLT, it was said that the coins were hammered into the bark IIRC.

As Malik pointed out Andromeda, and as you yourself allude to, it's in the wrong hands that things become dangerous or corrupt.

--A

[Andromeda]

Yes, sorry about the bad formatting, I have to rush these things!!



I'll just say the tree doesn't look healthy - it has no green things growing on it. But if it has a spirit thats far worse.

When it comes down to it people crave power, money is something that they can see and get hold of, but it isn't personal power - how many times do you hear of people winning the lottery and ending up being miserable - because its love which brings the best happiness and excitement in life, and also the greatest beauty.

Money is something that you can control (especially if you have a fair amount), however we can't control real love because it is dependant on free will !

People kill for money and they kill for love, its the power which destroys them, its when they lose the power and it turns against them.

On a similar thread to the money tree - is not nuclear POWER similar to the illearth stone in some ways. Its dug up from deep within the earth, and again its done for financial gain - and look what it does if used in the wrong hands - it devastates the land and corrupts nature.

Sorry I can't go into more detail, but my use of the net is limited!!

Fear not for there is also love in the world