Brad Ideas - Book review: Anathem by Neal Stephenson - Comments

No, no, no!

Anonymous — Sun, 28 Feb 2010 12:50:52 -0800

1. You and Stephenson can't have it both ways. If you move people and objects *up* the Wick, you've transferred *information* up the Wick as well.
2. Why not instead that this ending is just one of many possible endings? That conforms to the many-worlds interpretation without needing such costly hypothesis that people in "other" (and that word itself begs the question!) be mindless.
3. No, maybe that happens in other worldlines.

Re: The Hylean Flow contradiction

Anonymous — Sun, 28 Feb 2010 12:40:09 -0800

I think you have this wrong. Its logical, within the strictures of the book, for Urnud to receive messages from Arbre. Urnud is downstream from Arbre in the Wick. The problem is of anything from Urnud reaching anything upstream of itself in the Wick. *That* violates the postulated one-way information flow.
The "physical" vs. "mental" distinction suggested by a previous post doesn't cut it. That's information too.

As far as I can see, it is

Anonymous — Wed, 30 Sep 2009 10:00:03 -0700

As far as I can see, it is physically impossible for Fraa Jad to be Enoch Root.

Firstly, we can rule out the possibility of an Earth Enoch traveling back in time to Arbre (or vice versa). When the Urnud use their new ship to try go back in time, they actually end up going up to a higher cosmos. Stephenson states very explicity that, at least in Anathem rules, that the cosmos forbids traveling back in time, to prevent causality violations.

Given that Jad can't move around in time, if he were Enoch, he'd have to travel from one to the other at some point. Jad lives in the Millenarian concent, which ostensibly has been sealed for almost 700 years. At the very least, we know he was there at least 100 years before Anathem, as he mentioned teaching his fid to thatch. If we compare the Arbre timeline to the earth timeline, we know that the Urnud arrived at Earth in ~2038 (Fifty years after Godel died, in 1978). In the Earth timeline, Enoch is accounted for from as early as 1655 (Quicksilver) to as late as 2000 (Cryptonomicron). The only issue is we don't know exactly how long ago the Urnud ship left earth. We know they've been traveling for ~900 years, and Earth was the third of five stops. Jules mentions his Great-Grandfather boarded the Urnud at Earth, which would likely be no longer than 200 years ago, even with increased lifespans. Say 200, and even if we allow 100 years from the time the Urnud reached Earth to the time that Jules's great grandfather boarded the ship, that would make the events in Anathem take place no later than 2338 A.D Earth Time. That would mean the Millenarian math was sealed in about 1600 A.D. Enoch couldn't have been there, he was in Quicksilver.

This leaves two possibilities: that some time between the end of Cryptonomicron and 100 years before Anathem (a window of about 200 years), Enoch found a way to transport himself to the Arbre causal domain without the Urnud's ship, managed to make himself look like a person from Arbre and eat Arbre food, and managed to gain entry to a sealed Millenarian math. Doesn't pass the Rake.

If not this, then the only possible argument is that Enoch and Jad could exist in both causal domains, somehow linked. But this doesn't really mean anything if they're not explicitly the same person.

Let's not forget that NS is a post-modernist

Tristan — Mon, 15 Dec 2008 17:34:15 -0800

Remember the name of the hero of Snow Crash? "Hero".

What's the Big Idea of Anathem? "Narratives".

I haven't had the time to fully wrap my brain arround what NS is getting at, but it does, I feel, have a lot to do with the act of writing itself. The ending of the book refers to the way an author must (usually) choose one ending. How do you write a satisfying ending, after all?

This is also a classic case of The Unreliable Narrator. The story is related to us by one Erasmus, and we are entirely at his mercy to believe that everything he says is "true." It felt true, to me. But remember what they taught us in school: All writers are liars.

For the record, I thoroughly enjoyed this novel, on so many levels.

The thousanders

brad — Fri, 05 Dec 2008 11:33:44 -0800

I find the thousanders to be a bit of a stretch. Yes, they are the best. But they can only publish their research to others outside their math — and even to other thousanders — every thousand years. While they would generate some useful work in their isolation they would also duplicate a lot of work and go down a lot of pointless dead ends that others have gone down already.

The idea of the thousanders contradicts the core truth about science, that it is collaborative. You read other’s papers and go beyond them. You repeat or invalidate other’s experiments. NS’s is trying to make the point that isolation from the distractions of the world could bring better science and philosophy, and that could be true, but I don’t see (in the real world) that requiring more than the decenarian maths. But it’s his book so he can make it work any way he likes. The thousanders develop their magic power not so much because they are thousanders, but because they have to solve the problem of nuclear radiation without any praxis.

The point of graduation

Yoik — Thu, 04 Dec 2008 18:20:04 -0800

You said:"surely he speaks of his research since then ... or what is the point of the graduation"

It depends on the point of having the different level Maths.

On the one hand it is clear that the Thousanders are the "best of the best" and are the likely place where the the most important new theoric discoveries are made, and apparently new praxics as well. The one-offs serve as universities for the burgers, and are apparently the least selective, with the others in between. From that point of view graduation makes a lot of sense as occurring when it is clear to the fraa or surr's peers that they no longer fit in at that level.

On the other hand, the Thousanders are the most intellectually dangerous, and (given your concentration camp idea) they are therefore locked up for the longest period. From that point of view graduation makes sense as occurring when the individuals look like they may make new discoveries.

The idea that all the levels accept infants bothers me, as it implies that they are taken in mostly to do the menial work. While there doesn't seem to be a lot of prejudice against those that fall back (a phrase that is only a partial opposite to graduate), it's something young Avout work to avoid. Most of the infants taken into the inner levels should expect that as their fate, while those who graduate to a new level are unlikely to do that.

From the way his world is constructed, Neal does not appear to believe in The Bell Curve, or at least that those conclusions don't apply to that particlular world. The Seacular world doesn't seem to suffer from the skimming of its gene pool into childlessness. Perhaps he believes that a randomly selected infant would have a decent chance to be a functional Thousander if he were raised among them.

Rhetors Vs. Incanters

fletch — Thu, 04 Dec 2008 10:55:11 -0800

Rhetors are simply not time travelers, cannot really change the past. Look at the word. Rhetor, as in rhetoric. The art of manipulating an audience through words. Logodhir clearly doesn't believe in the HTW stuff and fights it tooth and nail. The "Madam Secretary" (forget her name) calls the arguments between Logodhir and the others as "Third Sack politics".

So, Rhetors use words to alter the past.

Now Incanters really do something special. They see the branching of worlds happening as they move forward through time, and have the ability to choose which world-track which becomes *the* world track, the one we're following. How do we know this? Remember the keypad on the door of sphere #1? Jad says he "picked the numbers at random", a 1 in 10000 chance, yet the door opens. Why did the door open on the first try? Because he saw himself fail to open it in many world-tracks and chose one where he did open it. He quickly got shot and it all went to hell, so he chose another world track where he *didn't* open the door. Once he was satisfied that an agreement between the Geometers and Arbre could be reached, he then switched to a world-track that worked out where the negotiation / agreement was possible and worked out well for everyone (except himself. He is a Saunt in my opinion, through his self-sacrifice).

I guess I didn't see the chanting

brad — Tue, 02 Dec 2008 15:42:03 -0800

Yes, he does chant, but does he chant while doing his “magic.” It might just be part of their rituals.

As I read it, if Orolo discovered the ship just before Apert, and the Inquisitors shut down the Starhenge during Apert, it seems that they must have discovered it by other means. It is possible that Orolo told people from other maths about it at Apert, and that led quickly to a decision to shut down his starhenge, but that doesn’t make a lot of sense. It reads a lot more like, “We don’t want this getting out, shut down the starhenges” or “We don’t want any side research projects.”

As for contact, obviously there is some pre-apert investigation but I don’t think it happens very much before, just a little before. One question of discipline I find curious is graduation. Paphlagon graduates to the hundreder math, and presumably once there never speaks of anything he has learned since the last centennial — but surely he speaks of his research since then (he is not 100 years old) or what is the point of the graduation?

Orolo's discovery

Yoik — Tue, 02 Dec 2008 14:17:43 -0800

Orolo apparently discovered the ship just before Apert, the first textual evidence is Erasmas' dream that the clock was wrong. Similarly indirect evidence indicates that what he was doing was discovered (though not necessarily correctly interpreted) in the investigation that led to his being thrown back. I don't see any evidence for an independent discovery by someone else.

I have trouble with your phrase "should not" as the rules about communication are not clearly laid out. Orolo's mention of an expectation of being interviewed through a screen in the labyrinth prior to the centenial Apert about conditions extramuros, as well as the interview in which that occurs, make it clear that the rule is not a simplistic "no contact".

Fraa Jad certainly does chant, and in ways that Erasmas finds unusual and surprising. While there are obviously no details about how their praxis is performed, I see no support for the claim that "incanters don’t actually incant". You have to dispose of their name as well as the legend before you can approach that claim.

Not just good spin

brad — Wed, 26 Nov 2008 00:47:16 -0800

The way I read it, the Rhetors — and we see almost nothing about them, other than to learn that Logodhir and his pals probably are Rhetors, and that Rhetor-Incanter collaboration has done great things — probably also get their ability through polycosmic manipulation. But that’s just a guess, we don’t know where they get it, other than the fact that they developed it just before the 3rd sack, just like the Incanters.

Rhetors

scott — Tue, 25 Nov 2008 18:55:32 -0800

What's the problem with rhetors? The word itself seems to come directly from rhetoric (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rhetoric) and with millennia of practice it doesn't seem to much of a stretch to believe that these speakers could convince people that any description or story of the past is the truth. No magical time altering powers just very very good spin.

Unsatisfied

Trey — Tue, 25 Nov 2008 14:37:45 -0800

While I agree that there may be an element of anti-climax in my theories, I find the idea that we only see one of an infinite number of endings equally unsatisfying. Like you said yourself, what makes this Narrative so special then that it is the one we get to see. Is it because it has a "happy" ending? Who cares? What about the Narratives where everyone dies in a tragic war? What makes that any less special or real that the Final Narrative?

I can see we're just going to agree to disagree on this, and personally that is what I LOVE about NS and his books. He hints at so many things, but never comes out and gives definitive answers. Enoch Root and the power of the Solemnic Gold, being one example from the Baroque Cycle, and can anybody tell me really, for sure, what the hell happened at the end of Diamond Age? Didn't think so. In the end, final analysis, meaning, is left up to the reader, and my reading (the conclusions I draw), I don't think, can be any more or less true than what you take from the book. That is what makes NS such a special writer. Despite what people may say about the endings of his books, he leaves the answers to you, the reader, something most authors stopped doing a century or more ago.

Hell, maybe then I again I'm completely off my rocker and one of us is totally right and the other completely wrong. Or maybe were both wrong and the answer is something else entirely. Or (and see if this will blow your mind) maybe we're both right.............for the Narrative we're each in.

Time travel is boring

brad — Tue, 25 Nov 2008 12:29:39 -0800

While it’s possible they change the past, that is such an overworked trope of SF that I feel confident that this is not the intention. Time travel is, to put it simply, boring (and almost impossible to write well any more.) The Rhetor concept is new and more interesting.

It just makes no sense to me to to describe something in the book in a new and innovative way and have the hidden secret be that it’s just time travel.

Also, in your example, the Rhetor would have changed your own memories of the colour of the mobe so you would not be asking those questions.

I do like the theory that Erasmas keeps his memories of the lost narratives to convey intelligence where Jad can’t. That is of course very inconsistent with changing the past. If they changed the past, then nobody would have special memories (even though it is a cliche of bad time travel stories that the actual time traveller does.)

If it truly is people who can modify memories (or perhaps modify what narrative you came from, which is very similar to changing the past) then Erasmas’ story makes sense.

Disagree

Trey — Tue, 25 Nov 2008 08:32:24 -0800

I disagree, and here’s why. First the definitions from the book:
Incanter - a sub sect of the avout linked to the Halikaarnian orders who, according to legend, are able to alter reality through the incantation of certain coded words or phrases.
Rhetor - a legendary figure able to "change the past" through the manipulation of records and human memory.
However, remember that these definitions are imperfect, created by undereducated, superstitious saeculars, frightened slines. The definitions in the book reflect a saecular understanding of the Incanter & Rhetor powers.
Let’s say you are a deolater sline sitting in a room with an Incanter. Between you is a copper bowl with a scratch in the bottom. The next moment the scratch is gone. Wouldn’t it be your belief that the person on the other side of the table was some sort of sorcerer who just altered reality? Obviously, you haven’t studied in a math for the years it would take to fully study and understand polycosmic theory. You wouldn’t understand that he just shifted yours and his consciousness to a different cosmos where the scratch in the bowl never existed. To you it’s just magic.
Likewise, let’s say you are a different uneducated sline living next to a concent. One day you walk outside and your green mobe is now red, but it’s still yours. You know it is, because there is your jeejah charger inside, and the stain on the floor where you’re wife spilled her sugar water that one time, and your key works. You call your wife out she’s just as confused as you, so is the guy who rides to work with you everday, but you go to your job at the factory and everyone there swears up & down that your mobe has ALWAYS been red. You go to the dealership where you bought it, the paper work says you bought a RED mobe. You just know IT WAS GREEN. You have a suspicion that it’s the doing of those sneaky avout. They changed everyone’s memories of your GREEN mobe. They changed the records to say you bought a RED mobe. Just like the Incanter, what if they didn’t do exactly what you thought though? What if they really did go back in time and changed something, changed it so there were no green mobes on the dealer lot that day so you really did by a red one? The art is imperfect though, they can’t erase the original memories you have of the green mobe because you had direct interaction with it. You drove it to work every day. Your wife has ridden in it too, as has the guy that rides to work with you, but the people who just see you park it in the lot every once and a while…their memories change when the timeline changes. The Rhetors aren’t figuratively “changing the past” by changing memories of it. They are literally CHANGING THE PAST by changing the timeline.
I offer two pieces of evidence, in addition to the Dinosaur/Parking Garage I already mentioned. First, the sequence of events that passes at the end of the second to last Plurality of Worlds Messal. The members are discussing the one way flow of the Wick and comparing it to time. At this analogy Jad interrupts with his assertion that “Time does not exist.” Now I don’t think he saying time does not really exist, but saying that time does not exist in the linear, unidirectional form the other members seem to think it does. Further, I think this is a message to Lodoghir saying, “I know what you are. I know what you can do. We need to work together.” In fact, soon after this, a “moment” seems to pass between Jad and Lodoghir, where they seem to be about to come to some understanding, but before it can be put to words the messal ends. I posit that the Incanter/Rhetor alliance was formed later that night, and their plan developed. However, before the alliance/understanding can be revealed the next night, Vh’vaern is unmasked as Durand and everything goes to hell. Second, near the end, Raz, and the survivors of cell 317 have a rather cryptic conversation with Lodoghir aboard the DU, about Incanters and Rhetors working together. Realizing they’re probably under surveillance they’re smart enough to make it seem like they’re just “joking around,” when in fact they really are having a serious conversation with Lodoghir, in essence saying “We know what you are now, and what you did here.” Read those sections again and let me know what you think, keeping that slant in mind.
To answer your question about why NS doesn’t just come out and say what a Rhetor really does, remember that the book is written from a 1st person restricted point of view. The reader only knows what Erasmus knows, nothing more. It would be WAY out of character for Erasmus (with his obvious distaste of Procians…Ala now excepted) to seek out a senior Procian and acquire the entire background knowledge it would take to understand Rhetor capability. Plus, I think that would take another 600 pages or so of dialogue. NS’s editors let him get away with a lot, but I think that would be pushing it, don’t you?
Finally, I agree with you that Jad is in several cosmi at once. I over-simplified the Incanter ability there. I think Jad doing this in an attempt to sift through the possible outcomes to find the best path. “Jump” was probably the wrong verb to use when describing him moving himself and others between consciousnesses. “Sliding” to a different cosmos might have been better, or “finding.” I don’t know, how would you describe it?

Orolo's discovery

brad — Tue, 25 Nov 2008 02:31:01 -0800

He did discover the ship, but kept it to himself, and others made independent discovery. We don’t know who did it first.

Clearly there is some communication going on that should not be going on with thousanders, but this is not laid out in the book.

The incanters don’t actually incant, I think. That’s just their legend. Likewise the Rhetor power may be different too.

Book review: Anathem by Neal Stephenson

brad — Mon, 20 Oct 2008 13:46:40 -0700

The latest tome — and at 900 pages, I mean tome — from Neal Stephenson (author of Snow Crash, the Diamond Age and Cryptonomicon) is Anathem. I’m going to start with a more general review, then delve into deep spoilers after the jump.

This book is highly recommended, with the caveat that you must have an interest in philosophy and metaphysics to avoid being turned off by a few fairly large sections which involve complex debate on these topics. On the other hand, if you enjoy such exploration, this is the book for you.

Anathem is set on a planet which is not Earth, but is full of parallels to Earth. The culture is much older than ours, but not vastly more advanced because on this world scientists, mathematicians and philosophers live a cloistered life. They live in walled-off communities called Concents, with divisions within which only have contact with the outside world, and with each other, for one 10 day period out of each year, decade, century or millennium.

As such the Avout, as they are called, lead a simple life, mostly free of technology, devoted to higher learning. It’s a non-religious parallel to monastic life. In the outside “saeclular” world, people live in a crass, consumer-oriented society both like and unlike ours.

I give the recommendation because he pulls this off really well. Anathem is a masterwork of world-building. You really get to identify with these mathematical monks and understand their life and worldview. He really builds a world that is different but understandable.

One way he does this, which does frustrate the reader at first, is through the creation of a lot of new coined terms. Some terms are used without introduction, some get a dictionary entry to help you into them. The terms are of course in a non-Earth language, but they are constructed from Latin and English roots, so they make sense to your brain. Soon you will find yourself using them.

So, if you like clever, complex worldbuilding and the worlds of science and philosophy, this book, long as it is, is worth it for you. However, I will shortly talk about the ending. Stephenson has a curse — his world building is superb, and his skill at satisfying endings is not up to it. Anathem actually has a decently satisfying ending in many ways — better than he has done before. There is both an ending to the plot, and some revelations at the very end which make you rethink all you have read before in the book. This time, I find fault with the consistency of the metaphysics, and mainly because I have explored the same topic myself and found it very difficult to make it work.

It’s not too much of a spoiler to say that after we are shown this remarkable monastic world, events transpire to turn it all upside-down. You won’t be disappointed, but I can’t go further without getting into spoilers. You will also find spoilers in my contributions to the Anathem Wiki. That Wiki may be handy to you after you read the book to understand some of the complex components.