Zander: with your fire analogy, you're pretending there is no controversy: while there's no question that fire is created when you "begin" a fire, there is a large controversy about whether linking creates an entire universe. One efficacious objection is that nature tends to accomplish things the simplest way it can: and I'm not sure you fully appreciate the sheer enormity of creating an entire universe. It would be far easier for each universe to be a branch-off of possibilities in a kind of family tree of universes. So while right now I'm taking the creationist view until I can be confirmed as wrong, I can appreciate that there is a large question here and that the answer isn't that simple.
Sensei: I totally get what you're saying, and that possibility occurred to me. But we aren't sure that that analogy is accurate either... it's possible that even identical input would be followed by truly random input by nature. We aren't sure.
But consider the possibility that you're right: nevertheless, more factors than simply the words on the page might play into it. Perhaps, say, the times when you add a certain symbol to the page. For instance, say you write an age, but then something goes wrong a few months later and you troubleshoot the problem with a new series of symbols to negate the cause. In that case, the natural locus of the age created its own factor (over the fondness of time, mind you). The best example of this was Atrus' modifications to Age 5, Riven: he was constantly writing in order to save Riven from its own inherent contradictions. Thus, I'm pretty sure that simply copying down the descriptive book wouldn't just link to the exact same age as the book that was written over years of planning and then troubleshooting. Heck, even if everything was identical, it's possible that there's still two ages that happen to be identical in every way. In philosophy we call it the difference between being "qualitatively identical" and "numerically identical"; in other words, between being identical and being the same object. I've always wondered whether the multiverse theory allows for multiple identical universes... but even if it doesn't, the complications I've mentioned have almost made that possibility a misnomer.
But Sensei, your god-complex position is mine as well: the result of writers' hubris has nothing to do with the truth-value of the transporter school or the creationist school. It's one or the other. I just happen to hope that the transporter school is correct, as it better fits the spirit of linking, and makes it easier to educate our young with nonhegemonic thinking.
As for trapbooks, there still hasn't been an inconsistency - that is, two premises which cannot possibly be true at the same time - regarding this subject. I've heard rumours that the creators abandoned the idea, but nevertheless I want to dispel the rumour that they're contradictory to what we know about linking. What we see and hear in Myst and Riven is perfectly efficacious: we're not really sure what happens when you take a book and simply remove pages. And if what was described isn't impossible or contradictory to what else we know, then by definition there's no inconsistency. I mean, so be it if there is! I'll leave trapbooks behind if I must... but I continue to give the storyline the benefit of the doubt; it shows more respect for the writers, and it's more fun to speculate about how it could all fit together, rather than conclude that some mess-up has occurred.
And in that spirit, Hitana, I continue to recommend that we keep our explanations within the story, and not regarding its authors, unless it's impossible to do so, because of some contradiction. Fascinating points though.
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