Star Maker (1937) by Olaf Stapledon is my favourite book. In the introduction to my edition of Star Maker, Sir Brian Aldiss recommends Winwood Reade's The Martyrdom of Man (1872), a book that influenced Stapledon and was very popular for a few decades after its publication, but is now sadly quite forgotten. I bought an 1896 edition on Ebay; it is the oldest book I own. The Martyrdom of Man is one of the best books I have ever read. I read the first half in Nottingham, and the second half on my Kindle (it is free from Project Gutenberg) during a two-day slow-boat journey down the Mekong river (the scenery was very repetitive: pristine jungle, untouched jungle, more jungle, oh look a slightly different kind of tree, more pristine jungle, I can imagine dinosaurs living here, more jungle, oh look the riverbank is sandier here, I feel like I'm in the Cretaceous, oh that tree is slightly taller than the others, jungle, jungle, jungle, oh look a wooden hut, jungle jungle jungle, trees trees trees, oh wow another boat moving quicker than ours, that tree's leaves are red, hey check out that jungle, etc). It tells the history of mankind quickly and concisely, with beautifully evocative Victorian prose. Vivid visions of history seemed to be flowing directly into my brain, as though I had voyaged back through time on the astral plane and was witnessing events first-hand, but at a very accelerated rate.
Fun fact: Sherlock Holmes is a fan of The Martyrdom of Man.
Reade mentions OTNOT, and gave me the impression that Lucretius was a sort-of Roman Richard Dawkins, with OTNOT being a combination of The God Delusion (2006) and The Magic of Reality (2011). I don't know how accurate this comparison is: I haven't read either The God Delusion or The Magic of Reality. OTNOT explains natural phenomena using scientific theories, and argues against superstition and religion.
The idea of a Roman Richard Dawkins surprised me: clearly I didn't know enough about history yet, and had not gotten over that prejudice towards the past, and is rooted quite deep in our society. At Loncon 3, I attended a panel discussion on historical accuracy in historical fiction, and learned that authors of the genre frequently have to make their stories less historically accurate to make it more in line with our modern conceptions of the past. The past is a foreign country, and that makes us racist.
Anyway, a few months after finishing The Martyrdom of Man, I spotted OTNOT in a 2nd hand book shop (Geoff Blore's Bookshop in Nottingham), bought it and added it to Mount Toread. Another few months later, I attended a talk by Sir Brian Aldiss in London. I bought his Helliconia (1985) trilogy to get signed; he also signed my Martyrdom of Man. Afterwards, I noticed that Helliconia opens with a quote from Lucretius, and I resolved to read OTNOT.
1 - Matter & Space
In which Luc tells us that superstition, caused by fear and ignorance, is responsible for a lot of evil, and there's only one way to fight it:
"This dread and darkness of the mind cannot be dispelled by the sunbeams, the shining shafts of day, but only by an understanding of the outward form and inner workings of nature."
He then goes on to explain that the matter is made up of atoms of different types in different arrangements, and that the Universe consists of atoms and empty space.
2 - Movements & Shapes of Atoms
Luc tells us that atoms are constantly moving; that the various properties of different materials are caused by varieties in the size and shape of atoms; and that atoms of different types can only be combined in a finite number of ways.
In the middle of his talk on atoms, he digresses to attack religion:
"In the face of these truths, some people who know nothing of matter believe that nature without the guidance of the gods could not bring round the changing seasons in such perfect conformity to human needs, creating the crops and those other blessings that mortals are led to enjoy by the guide of life, divine pleasure, which coaxes them through the arts of Venus to reproduce their kind, lest the human race should perish. Obviously, in imagining that the gods established everything for the sake of men, they have stumbled in all respects far from the path of truth. Even if I knew nothing of atoms, I would venture to assert on the evidence of the celestial phenomena themselves, supported by many other arguments, that the universe was certainly not created for us by divine power; it is so full of imperfections."
After finishing his atom talk, Luc then explains that there are probably other planets like Earth (!):
"Granted, then, that empty space extends without limit in every direction and that seeds innumerable in number are rushing on countless courses through an unfathomable universe under the impulse of perpetual motion, it is in the highest degree unlikely that this earth and sky is the only one to have been created and that all those particles of matter outside are accomplishing nothing."
And these other planets probably have life on them (!!):
"When there is plenty of matter in readiness, when space is available and no cause or circumstance impedes, then surely things must be wrought and effected. You have a store of atoms that could not be reckoned in full by the whole succession of living creatures. You have the same natural force to congregate them in any place precisely as they have been congregated here. You are bound therefore to acknowledge that in other regions there are other earths and various tribes of men and breeds of beasts."
And then he advocates the theory of biopoiesis (!!!):
"This follows from the fact that our world has been made by nature through the spontaneous and casual collision and the multifarious, accidental, random and purposeless congregation and coalescence of atoms whose suddenly formed combinations could serve as the starting point of substantial fabrics - earth and sea and sky and the races of living creatures."
3 - Life & Mind
Luc thinks that the fear of death is the root of all evil. Fear of punishment in the afterlife drives people to terrible things. Poverty is associated with death; therefore, the greedy and power-hungry are frantically acquiring riches in an attempt to distance themselves from the thought of dying. Good bit of ancient psychology there.
Luc then tells us that the mind and spirit are composed of atoms within the body. The mind and spirit are connected and composed of the same substance. The mind is the seat of consciousness, which thinks, feels, remembers, etc. The spirit is diffused throughout the body and controls bodily movement. The spirit sends sensation to the mind; the mind sends commands to the spirit. There are similarities between Luc's theories and what we now know of the brain and nervous system.
Mind and spirit, therefore, are material and die with the body:
"This vital spirit, then, is present in the whole body. It is the body's guardian and preserver. For the two are interlocked by common roots and cannot be torn apart without manifest disaster. As easily could the scent be torn out of lumps of incense without destroying their nature as mind and spirit could be abstracted from the whole body without total dissolution. So from their earliest origin the two are charged with communal life by the intertangled atoms that compose them. It is clear that neither body nor mind by itself without the other's aid possesses the power of sensation: it is by the interacting motions of the two combined that the flame of sentience is kindled in our flesh,"
Wine makes you drunk because it interferes with the union between mind-spirit and body. Epilepsy is caused by the mind-spirit being dislodged from its union with the body, causing great anguish and disruption to both. Minds can be damaged emotionally by events, and physically by injury. Pain and sickness are artificers of death, so the mind-spirit is mortal and will die.
"Conversely, we see that the mind, like a sick body, can be healed and directed by medicine. This too is presage that life is mortal. When you embark on an attempt to alter the mind or to direct any other natural object, it is fair to suppose that you are adding certain parts or transposing them or subtracting some trifle at any rate from their sum. But an immortal object will not let its parts be rearranged or added to, or the least bit drop off. For, if ever anything is so transformed as to overstep its own limits, this means the immediate death of what was before. By this susceptibility both to sickness and to medicine, the mind displays marks of mortality. So false reasoning is plainly confronted by true fact."
"If our mind were indeed immortal, it would not complain of extinction in the hour of death, but would feel rather that it was escaping from confinement and sloughing off its garments like a snake."
After all that we reach the subject of Death: something we don't need to worry about:
"So, when we shall be no more - when the union of body and spirit that engenders us has been disrupted - to us, who shall then be nothing, nothing by any hazard will happen any more at all. Nothing will have power to stir our senses, not though earth be fused with sea and sea with sky."
"If any feeling remains in mind or spirit after it has been torn from our body, that is brought into being by the wedlock of body and spirit, conjoined and coalesced. Or even if the matter that composes us should be reassembled by time after our death and brought back into its present state - if the light of life were given to us anew - even that contingency would still be no concern of ours once the chain of our identity has been snapped."
"If the future holds travail and anguish in store, the self must be in existence, when that time comes, in order to experience it. But from this fate we are redeemed by death, which denies existence to the self that might have suffered these tribulations. Rest assured, therefore, that we have nothing to fear in death. One who no longer is cannot suffer, or differ in any way from one who has never been born, when once this mortal life is usurped by death the immortal."
We should not care what happens to our body after we are dead, because we are dead:
"For if it is really a bad thing after death to be mauled and crunched by ravening jaws, I cannot see why it should not be disagreeable to roast in the scorching flames of the funeral pyre, or to lie embalmed in honey, stifled and stiff with cold, on the surface of a chilly slab, or to be squashed under a crushing weight of earth."
Then Luc points out that when people whine about dying, they go on about never seeing their family again, never feeling joy again, etc, instead of thinking that they'll never feel pain or sorrow again, whereas the ones living might be pained with grief until their own lives end. He then likens death to sleep:
"In sleep, when mind and body alike are at rest, no one misses himself or sighs for life. If such sleep were prolonged to eternity, no longing for ourselves would trouble us... Death, therefore, must be regarded, so far as we are concerned, as having much less existence than sleep, if anything can have less existence than what we perceive to be nothing."
Lucretius then asks us what we think Nature would say if it were suddenly personified and confronted with someone whining about dying; he suggests it might be something like:
"What is your grievance, mortal, that you give yourself up to this whining and repining? Why do you weep and wail over death? If the life you have lived till now has been a pleasant thing - if all its blessings have not leaked away like water poured into a cracked pot and run to waste unrelished - why then, you silly creature, do you not retire as a guest who has had his fill of life and take your care-free rest with a quiet mind? Or, if your gains have been poured profitless away and life has grown distasteful, why do you seek to swell the total? The new can but turn out as badly as the old and perish as unprofitably. Why not rather make an end of life and labour? Do you expect me to invent some new contrivance for your pleasure? I tell you, there is none."
And what might Nature to say to a very old person complaining about their encroaching death?
"Away with your tears, old reprobate! Have done with your grumbling! You are withering now after tasting all the joys of life. But, because you are pining for what is not and unappreciative of the things at hand, your life has slipped away unfulfilled and unprized. Death has stolen upon you unawares, before you are ready to retire from life's banquet filled and satisfied. Come now, put away all that is unbecoming to your years and compose your mind to make way for others. You have no choice."
We are then treated to a wonderful quote, which might be good on a tombstone or at a funeral:
"The old is always thrust aside to make way for the new, and one thing must be built out of the wreck of another. There is need of matter, so that later generations may arise; when they have lived out their span, they will follow you. Bygone generations have taken your road, and those to come will take it no less. So one thing will never cease to spring from another. To none is life given in freehold; to all on lease. Look back at the eternity that passed before we were born, and mark how utterly it counts to us as nothing. This is a mirror that Nature holds up to us, in which we may see the time that shall be after we are dead. Is there anything terrifying in the sight - anything depressing - anything that is not more restful than the soundest sleep?"
Luc concludes the book by explaining that afterlife myths are metaphors for things that happen in life, and really hammering his point that people should stop fucking whining about the fact they're going to die.
I would add two things to Luc's reasoning:
1) Fear of death increases survival, so evolution would naturally select for it.
2) The wide variety of afterlife beliefs around the world arise from a contradiction between two types of reasoning. We the living have not died, so experience tells us we never will, but we learn that all living things die, from which we infer that we too shall die. Inductive reasoning tells us we are immortal; deductive reasoning tells us we will die. An afterlife resolves this contradiction: sure, everyone dies, but you don't really die.
I do not fear the eternal sleep of death. I do not fear oblivion. I do not fear judgement in an afterlife.
I fear the last few minutes of a long, unfulfilled life.
My greatest fear is that, when I'm old and on my deathbed, I will look back on my life and be disappointed. I fear that, as my life flashes before me, my last thoughts will be something like:
"Fuck, I wasted that. I could've been a great person, who everyone loved; instead, I was a selfish dickhead. I could've chased my dreams; instead, I chose a boring, easy, reassuringly repetitive path through life. I could've done amazing things; instead, I spent my time watching reality T.V. and doing boring jobs. I had access to thousands of years of Earth culture and knowledge, but I spent my life researching the genetics of fruit flies and watching mediocre movies. I worked so hard for a big pile of money; I was good at my job, but I hated it. I lived on a huge planet but spent most of my time on a damp little island. I could've done so much, so easily, if I'd just told my doubts to fuck off, ignored my fears, faced the risks, and devoted my intelligence to living the full and varied life I wanted to live. All throughout my life I had opportunities that I could've taken, that I wanted to take but didn't. Why? Fear? Anxiety? Doubt? Conformity? There were so many moments when I faced the choice to live life fully or drag out a shallow, degrading existence; and I chose wrong. Fuck you, Past Me."
Those final few minutes would be an eternity of suffering.
As long as I continue living as I am now, carpe-ing the fuck out of my diems, etc, I will have no problem there.
"In sleep, when mind and body alike are at rest, no one misses himself or sighs for life. If such sleep were prolonged to eternity, no longing for ourselves would trouble us... Death, therefore, must be regarded, so far as we are concerned, as having much less existence than sleep, if anything can have less existence than what we perceive to be nothing."
Lucretius then asks us what we think Nature would say if it were suddenly personified and confronted with someone whining about dying; he suggests it might be something like:
"What is your grievance, mortal, that you give yourself up to this whining and repining? Why do you weep and wail over death? If the life you have lived till now has been a pleasant thing - if all its blessings have not leaked away like water poured into a cracked pot and run to waste unrelished - why then, you silly creature, do you not retire as a guest who has had his fill of life and take your care-free rest with a quiet mind? Or, if your gains have been poured profitless away and life has grown distasteful, why do you seek to swell the total? The new can but turn out as badly as the old and perish as unprofitably. Why not rather make an end of life and labour? Do you expect me to invent some new contrivance for your pleasure? I tell you, there is none."
And what might Nature to say to a very old person complaining about their encroaching death?
"Away with your tears, old reprobate! Have done with your grumbling! You are withering now after tasting all the joys of life. But, because you are pining for what is not and unappreciative of the things at hand, your life has slipped away unfulfilled and unprized. Death has stolen upon you unawares, before you are ready to retire from life's banquet filled and satisfied. Come now, put away all that is unbecoming to your years and compose your mind to make way for others. You have no choice."
We are then treated to a wonderful quote, which might be good on a tombstone or at a funeral:
"The old is always thrust aside to make way for the new, and one thing must be built out of the wreck of another. There is need of matter, so that later generations may arise; when they have lived out their span, they will follow you. Bygone generations have taken your road, and those to come will take it no less. So one thing will never cease to spring from another. To none is life given in freehold; to all on lease. Look back at the eternity that passed before we were born, and mark how utterly it counts to us as nothing. This is a mirror that Nature holds up to us, in which we may see the time that shall be after we are dead. Is there anything terrifying in the sight - anything depressing - anything that is not more restful than the soundest sleep?"
Luc concludes the book by explaining that afterlife myths are metaphors for things that happen in life, and really hammering his point that people should stop fucking whining about the fact they're going to die.
I would add two things to Luc's reasoning:
1) Fear of death increases survival, so evolution would naturally select for it.
2) The wide variety of afterlife beliefs around the world arise from a contradiction between two types of reasoning. We the living have not died, so experience tells us we never will, but we learn that all living things die, from which we infer that we too shall die. Inductive reasoning tells us we are immortal; deductive reasoning tells us we will die. An afterlife resolves this contradiction: sure, everyone dies, but you don't really die.
I do not fear the eternal sleep of death. I do not fear oblivion. I do not fear judgement in an afterlife.
I fear the last few minutes of a long, unfulfilled life.
My greatest fear is that, when I'm old and on my deathbed, I will look back on my life and be disappointed. I fear that, as my life flashes before me, my last thoughts will be something like:
"Fuck, I wasted that. I could've been a great person, who everyone loved; instead, I was a selfish dickhead. I could've chased my dreams; instead, I chose a boring, easy, reassuringly repetitive path through life. I could've done amazing things; instead, I spent my time watching reality T.V. and doing boring jobs. I had access to thousands of years of Earth culture and knowledge, but I spent my life researching the genetics of fruit flies and watching mediocre movies. I worked so hard for a big pile of money; I was good at my job, but I hated it. I lived on a huge planet but spent most of my time on a damp little island. I could've done so much, so easily, if I'd just told my doubts to fuck off, ignored my fears, faced the risks, and devoted my intelligence to living the full and varied life I wanted to live. All throughout my life I had opportunities that I could've taken, that I wanted to take but didn't. Why? Fear? Anxiety? Doubt? Conformity? There were so many moments when I faced the choice to live life fully or drag out a shallow, degrading existence; and I chose wrong. Fuck you, Past Me."
Those final few minutes would be an eternity of suffering.
As long as I continue living as I am now, carpe-ing the fuck out of my diems, etc, I will have no problem there.
