message 0025

• Tape-teaching/Creativity/The characters of Azi

>From: Lesley Grant <lgrant>
>Subject: cherryhlist
>Date: Tue, 3 Nov 92 9:56:04 GMT

> --------------------------------------------------------------------
> >From: Jo Jaquinta <jaymin>
> > >From: nancy ott <ott@ansoft.com>
> 
> > Are the azi creative?  They are generically human, so the
> > potential should be there.  Some of them are, such as Grant and
> > Florian.  But these "alpha" types seem to be less stable and resilient
> > (read: more like normal humans) than the run of the mill azi.  The azi
> > are designed personalities, so it seems reasonable to assume that a
> > great deal of creativity has been designed out of them.
> 	If one considers the azi to be the product of genetic engineering
> and social/information engineering then the "alpha" azi represent just the
> genetic end. Remember: Union genetically engineers its own citizens as well.
> The alpha types are the products of genetic experimentation brought up in
> a human environment. Thus socially they are human (and thus don't suffer
> from a loss of creativity).

	While alpha azi are more like normal humans, they are still
designed personalities. Socially they are azi, not human. Even Grant, the
most human like azi we are shown is quite definite about what he is. Remember,
even the alphas have had deep tape from the moment of birth -- a 'human' is
more or less explicitly described as someone who has not had this experience
(the case of the baby August, destined for Resuene security). 
	I'm inclned to think that tape can limit creativity -- Grant, who 
probably had relatively little tape (just enough to keep him 'non-human'?)
was very creative, having been trained to be by his 'father'. Florian and
Catlin, though were less creative, having had a lot of tape. This was, I think,
because tape focuses you on one particular thing. In F+C's cases, this meant
they could be really creative in matters of security, but I'd bet design, 
literature, art etc was meaningless to them. 

> 	Irregardless of weather tape physically inhinits ones learning process
> I would agree that social conditioning can overcome virtually anything. Today
> we take soldiers and put them through basic training to dehumanise them to the
> extent where they can kill other humans. If you look at the azi in Serpent's
> Reach we have humans with very differnt socialisations. I run a Traveller
> Role-Playing campaign with strictly no aliens. I take the lesson from
> Cherryh that humans can be socialised into creatures completely alien from
> our social perspective.

	Anyone got a good reason why Abban (Giraud's azi) tries to kill Ari?
Did Denys give him bad tape, or was he just suffering a good old human nervous
breakdown? I thought it was one of the saddest (and most telling about Reseune)
bits of the book when he was totally ignored at Giraud's funeral.


			Lesley