This is topic 1) Unmaker = entropy? and 2) Thrower decisions (Alvin Maker spoilers) in forum Discussions About Orson Scott Card at Hatrack River Forum.
1) I wonder if OSC thought of the unmaker as the entropy of the universe. I immediately thought of it when he first mention it, and as the book developed the idea further, it made even more sense. However, in that case I cannot fanthom how Alvin would make a difference (I have only finished the first Alvin book).
2) What would you do if you were in reverend Thrower shoes? Would you (1) Kill a 10-year-old boy because he is evil (would you kill a 10-year-old Hitler?) or (2) not kill him and live with the consequences, probably going to hell after you die.
[At that point I was actually a little disappointed with reverend Thrower. I was hoping that he would fix Alvin's leg and see the "angel" as what he probably is (i.e., evil).]
[edit: oops typo]
[ April 13, 2005, 08:55 AM: Message edited by: chracatoa ]
Posted by Orson Scott Card (Member # 209) on :
Absolutely the Unmaker represents entropy; or rather, he represents evil, but evil is seen in the Alvin universe as essentially entropic.
As for Thrower: No, it would be morally monstrous to kill the ten-year-old Hitler. He was guilty of nothing at that age, except perhaps ambition and a growing sense of injury. To prevent all the harm he would do? I don't think so. Hitler was not the only anti-semite in Europe, and there were others almost as ambitious as he. Do you KNOW for sure that the holocaust would have been completely prevented by killing Hitler at age ten? No? Then if you killed him, you'd be no benefactor, just a murderer.
You simply have to let wicked people prove their wickedness before you can punish them. A preemptive attack on Saddam made sense because he had already proven the fact that, given the opportunity, he would invade nearby countries and use poison gas against civilian populations. But preemptive strikes against countries or persons who have not actually committed any acts of war would be monstrous. (Acts of war, however, have long been defined to include mobilization and movement of an army toward a border. You don't have to let the other side fire the first shot; cf. Israel in 1967.)
Why didn't Thrower recognize his angel as evil? Because people who are committed to an idea have a very, very hard time admitted they're wrong. They keep assimilating new information into the existing mental framework, and only change when the cognitive dissonance becomes too great to bear. As long as you can still fit it in, then you're ok. This explains the persistence of creationism AND the stubborn failure of diehard darwinists to realize there are problems with his theory. There's always a story to explain everything without actually having to change your mind about anything.
The human ability to self-deceive is almost, if not completely, infinite. I TRIED to find a way to make Thrower see the truth, but I just couldn't see why he would have to. And until he actually HAD to, I could make him do it just because it seemed obvious to ME what his "Visitor" was.
Posted by chracatoa (Member # 7575) on :
quote:Do you KNOW for sure that the holocaust would have been completely prevented by killing Hitler at age ten? No? Then if you killed him, you'd be no benefactor, just a murderer.
That's how I feel. However, in Thrower's mind it was God himself who was asking him to do it. So either you do it or you are damned to hell. Unless...
quote: ...it seemed obvious to ME what his "Visitor" was.
... he figured it out.
Nevertheless, it was very interesting to see through his mind while he thought about doing it or not. And the fact that he was not able to do it actually proved it was witchcraft, which was definitely evil in the church eyes.
It is nice to have those kind of villains because they are not actuallly "bad", they only made poor decisions.
Posted by King of Men (Member # 6684) on :
If I might ask, what are the problems you see in Drawin's theory?
![[Smile]](smile.gif)