The truth about Fitz

[habu987]

I believe if Gard had meant to deny that outright she'd have denied it outright, and coy implications are not an outright denial.

But is her outright denial of denying it outright and usage of coy implications an outright denial of the supposition that our lore is the same lore that is in the DV, or would that be an outright denial that the lore is different? 

*My head hurts*

[the neurovore of Zur-En-Aargh]

But is her outright denial of denying it outright and usage of coy implications an outright denial of the supposition that our lore is the same lore that is in the DV, or would that be an outright denial that the lore is different? 

I'm operating on the basis that the DV is the same as our world, or our world's lore, unless actively shown otherwise.

[habu987]

I'm operating on the basis that the DV is the same as our world, or our world's lore, unless actively shown otherwise.

Well, we already know that the WG is around at the same time that other gods, such as Odin, are hanging around, so there is at least some difference in the lore. 

That train of thought starts bringing in real world stuff, and the potential for veering into TT area, so I'll cut my point off at that.

[Jared]

Well, we already know that the WG is around at the same time that other gods, such as Odin, are hanging around, so there is at least some difference in the lore.

Not sure what you mean. There are people that worship Odin today.

[the neurovore of Zur-En-Aargh]

Not sure what you mean. There are people that worship Odin today.

Yes, I know a few.

My point is that, from my admittedly limited discussions with some of those people, contemporary Asatru do not have it as a core component of their faith that other gods are false, while other gods being a priori false is a regular component of at least such bits of contemporary Christianity as i am familiar with.  (I had a Catholic schooling.)

Therefore, what Jim is doing in the DV is a fictional universe in which we have, thus far, seen one of the core cosmological axioms of Christianity been demonstrated to be untrue, and we have not seen anything similar with regard to the Aesir.

Therefore, it seems logical to me that there are grounds for considering it plausible that other axioms of Christianity might turn out untrue in the DV (to wit, the possibility that archangels lie) in ways there are not grounds for considering it plausible that axioms of other belief systems might turn out untrue (to wit, ever-virgin Valkyries.)  Jim seems to me to be treating the two mythoi on different scales.

[FFguy]

thank you for the answers Serack.

I am re-listening to the audio book now that I can focus on the finer details and not wanting to just get to the end .  Very good catch.  I have been waiting for Butcher to bring Tara back into the story.  She was too cool of a character to leave out in the long run.

[Jared]

My point is that, from my admittedly limited discussions with some of those people, contemporary Asatru do not have it as a core component of their faith that other gods are false, while other gods being a priori false is a regular component of at least such bits of contemporary Christianity as i am familiar with.  (I had a Catholic schooling.)

I understood, I was just pointing out to the other person that they were incorrect about today's RL lore not having Odin around. As another note to that, for the DV, it doesn't matter whether the lore is believed today, but whether it had been believed at all. I think Harry and/or told us that the old gods that no one believes go into the NN and dwindle. So Enki's probably running around in there. [If there are people that still hold to Sumerian beliefs today, just replace Enki with some placeholder deity that no one worships anymore.]


I do think, however, that if fae really truly can not lie (not sure if you've expressed doubt about that before), but let people believe things that are untrue, then it's not really consistent to say that the WG lets modern Christians believe that he's the only god, so he's lying.

[the neurovore of Zur-En-Aargh]

I think Harry and/or told us that the old gods that no one believes go into the NN and dwindle. So Enki's probably running around in there. [If there are people that still hold to Sumerian beliefs today, just replace Enki with some placeholder deity that no one worships anymore.]

Harry's told us that the old gods are in the NN and mostly dormant, in PG.  I think there's room for a serious grain of salt in how much that depends on human belief; partly because we have seen since that Odin for one is pretty active and I'm not seeing reason to suspect the DV having a large contingent of Asatru running around, partly because I'm not finding it easy to believe that if human faith is the principal power source for DV deities that the Hindu gods would not be active, but Harry lists them among the ones in the NN/dormant state, and partly because the minor Classical deity in the poisoned-beer story in Side Jobs seems to think the older gods were actively kicked out. 

I suspect that there may have been some single major event or spell or something that sent those other gods out into the NN and keeps them there.  I am tempted to suspect that of correlation with the coming of the Swords and the Denarians into the world.

I do think, however, that if fae really truly can not lie (not sure if you've expressed doubt about that before), but let people believe things that are untrue, then it's not really consistent to say that the WG lets modern Christians believe that he's the only god, so he's lying.

The difference there, fwiw, is that the Fae are not espousing a morality in which bearing false witness in all its forms is a bad thing.  The Fae are not doing something that is on their own moral terms wrong; the WG would seem to be.

[Arkham8]

New thoughts. Must revise theory....child of Hendricks....

and

(click to show/hide)

Marcone

. By cloning. Kind of like that one Super-boy is the child of Lex and Super-man 

[Jared]

The difference there, fwiw, is that the Fae are not espousing a morality in which bearing false witness in all its forms is a bad thing.  The Fae are not doing something that is on their own moral terms wrong; the WG would seem to be.

Where are you getting their moral terms from? Everything that I've seen Uriel say says that the WG doesn't enforce actions, people must have their own free will to choose for themselves. If the WG puts out the Bible that says "There are other gods, I'm just the best." and Christians choose to ignore those passages, how is that immoral by the WG morals that have been stated in the books?

[the neurovore of Zur-En-Aargh]

Where are you getting their moral terms from?

At risk of crossing threads, the Ten Commandments, particularly in this case the one about not bearing false witness.

[Jared]

At risk of crossing threads, the Ten Commandments, particularly in this case the one about not bearing false witness.

I think the point of disagreement here is your take on lies of omission. I disagree with that stance.

I don't think there's much to be done beyond agree to disagree here.

[Serack]

By the way, Jim said in the past week (I think it was at the NYC signing) that Uriel can't lie.  Well he can't unless he really changes his affiliations.

[Vairelome]

Bob mentions Archangels as being on the list of entities with full Intellectus.  If you combine that with the WoJ above, that Uriel can't lie (I'd more or less assumed that was true), you've got a difficult character to write--one whose every statement MUST accurately reflect the Dresdenverse as it actually is.

Note that Uriel's dismay over Jack's "three people Harry loves" lie is not a counter-example, due to the distinction between Intellectus and true omniscience.  Uriel had not previously considered that Jack might have lied to Harry, so he didn't know it had happened.  Intellectus requires that a question be brought to the mind of the entity in order for the answer to arrive with it.  True omniscience wouldn't require that (in theory, since it hasn't come up yet in the Dresdenverse).

I don't think it's possible for Uriel to make a statement literally without thinking about it first.  This would mean that Uriel knows with certainty the truth value of his every statement (Intellectus), and that the truth value is always positive (he can't lie).

[Hopefire]

I remain of the opinion that the White God is a different type of being than the other gods of the Dresdenverse. My theory is that the other gods are either a) similar in nature to gods in Neil Gaiman stories (they exist because humanity believes in them), or b) they're massively powerful beings that people are worshiping for one reason or another (the Red Court's leaders would be examples of this). I think that the White God is technically an Outsider, and the Dresdenverse is his realm.

I think that it says something that the White God has at least four - and perhaps once five - Archangels following him who seem to be more powerful than even heavy hitters like Mab.