BS: SPOILER What was happening on Earth at the End which I SPOILED for TnV

[Halbot42]

SPOILER
SPOILER JUST IN CASE
Sorry if i gave anything away but its really kind of minor to the end, thats why it was unclear and i asked, forgot how to do the spoiler thing too... also apparently i spelled spoiler wrong and it said spoiled, so just goes to show check your text 2x...
So i got that the vampires were taking over earth at the end, was that everyone elses take? but how did they get over the right angle autism thing?

[Patrick]

Halbot42 wrote: "So i got that the vampires were taking over earth at the end, was that everyone elses take? but how did they get over the right angle autism thing?"

I'm actually not sure it wasn't JUST the vampires. (view spoiler)[I see two possibilities. The crew talked about how earth's leaders themselves could be Vampire-like sociopaths who were basically automatons. Also, if the Captain was really in charge, maybe the AI were calling the shots. (hide spoiler)]

Either group could either be working with or merging with the Vampires.

I for one welcome our personality-free overlords as long as they don't glitter.

[Skip]

I don't even know that the vampire's took over the earth, it could have been that humanity evolved past the need for sentience, at least the way we would describe it.

I'm not sure if the theme of the book is that self-awareness was a dead end in our eventual evolution or that we have to be on guard for the increasing isolation that technology affords us, or we will end up like the Earth in the book. Either way I can't say I like it or care much for the point.

[Matthew]

Huh. I interpreted the ending completely differently. I was under the impression that the Vampires were once over taking, but have tailed back. I pictured all of the vampire discussions correlating way back into the past, like our 16th-18th century. Hundreds of years.

[Michael]

I'm not sure if the theme of the book is that self-awareness was a dead end in our eventual evolution...

In his afterword appendices, Watts said his idea was a kind of thought experiment, (view spoiler)[that the evolution of consciousness is inferior to mere intelligence, like humans vs. orangutans). (hide spoiler)]

Of course you don't like the idea. He points that out too ;)

[Mnchur]

I got the notion that the vampires took over. He mentioned several times about the vampires making a clicking noise, which he mentions hearing over the radio in passing at the end of the book.

[Dennis]

Siri specifically uses the word "genocide", which implies that vampires wiped out baseline society. Of course, he himself isn't sure of that.

[Skip]

Honestly, the ending felt so tacked-on that I couldn't get myself to care about it very much.

Which is the funny thing about Tom and Veronica's comments in the podcast - the spoiler really doesn't do anything to actually spoil the story.

(view spoiler)[It feels like the story should have ended with Siri unsure if anyone is getting his transmissions, and the editor or the publisher wanted a bigger ending. The ending doesn't really add to the theme, and it is one of several foreseeable possibilities. We see so little of the larger picture back on Earth that I don't feel any connection with the outcome. (hide spoiler)]

[Halbot42]

That was the point i tried to make after i ruined everything, the details of earth's fate were so vague and sort of tossed off in a couple paragraphs. So i crowdsourced it and things went badly, but after my drubbing i still wonder, how did they get over the fatal autism.

[Tim]

@Halbot42

I don't thing they do overcome the crucifix syndrome, but they do still have the "anti-euclidean" drugs. Remember that just because they don't have a conscious mind getting in the way doesn't mean they can't make the drugs still.

[Halbot42]

That makes sense i guess i just assumed the crash of humanity led to the end of drug manufacturing you're right no reason the vamps couldnt just make their own drugs.

[Tim]

Watts also went to great lengths to show that on Theseus at least there were almost no right angles anywhere. It was only during the climax, when the spine extended in that emergency moment, that a crucifix pattern appeared. I'm certain that given time many of the similar types of construction would be altered to fit. I also believe that the AI structures didn't particularly give a hang whether it was humans or vampires they served, if indeed they serve.

[Dan]

Interesting. I think when I got to the end of the book I sped up to actually finish it and didn't really grasp what they were saying about vampires taking over back home. BUT it makes sense with the evolutionary theme in the book.

The crucifix glitch was the weakness that got vampires wiped out, and now it can be treated with drugs. Consciousness/self-awareness is the weakness for humans, and "Heaven" was a big exploitation of that weakness; which let vampires get them.