this post was submitted on 03 Mar 2024
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chapotraphouse
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Does Hitler even register on the scale 8000 years later after events like the Butlerian Jihad?
Not really, when Paul makes the comment the people around him have no idea what he is talking about
As I recall it was him teaching back into his own genetic memory and recalling something that would be for the benefit of the reader, while also demonstrating the gulf between him and Stilgar
Yeah this scene is Paul musing and Stilgar trying his best to keep up. It should be mentioned that at this point Stilgar is Paul's chief advisor. He's the governor of Arrakis and a highly learned man who's an expert on stuff like galactic history. He has no idea who Genghis Khan or Hitler are. He probably has no idea what Earth is. In fact, when Paul says that Genghis Khan killed 4 million people, Stilgar asks if he killed that many people with laser guns. He's confused and thinks these historical figures killed that many people by themselves.
Paul explains Hitler and Genghis Khan killed people through subordinates, Stilgar's no longer impressed because he simply doesn't get it. He can't conceive of such a distant past, but for Paul it's a very clear memory he's explored in his genetic lineage.
This is a good point. I think the movies forget how alien paul is after he goes tgrough the ritual.
Maybe third reich guy becomes an archetype that replaces the current roman empire guys.
Rome actually existed for centuries and had a lasting impact. The Nazi guys will only ever be like Confederate lost causers.
Pretty sure the Rome guys aren't in it for the impact or how long it was around, just how frequently the history channel has a WEAPONS OF ROME special.
THE GLADIUS!
THE PILUM!
THE SCUTUM!
that's it. series over.
Stay tuned for our next series SECRET WEAPONS OF THE ROMAN EMPIRE
Did Diocletian approve the construction of a garrum-powered flying saucer?
Was Carthage wiped out by a Roman nuclear bomb?
Greek Fire: Napalm or death ray?
The Jihad wasn't originally even a war, that was some bland Skynet ass shit the author's son put in. The Jihad was originally a philosophical reckoning of the dependence on machines humanity was developing and a rejection therein. Dune still has computers and technology far advanced compared to what we have but nothing that thinks like a human.
All of which makes more sense when one remembers Herbert lived in a pre-9/11 world where the people who knew the word Jihad would also know it means struggle and doesn't necessarily refer to a holy war.
It's still wild to me that the successors actually made the Butlerian Jihad about a war with AI. I thought it was quite obvious that thinking machines didn't mean machines with thought and cognition, rather they were simply tools that reduce the amount of thinking people did.
That wasn't the original intention? I thought that was a core part of the series, that the task of computation was put to people, the mentats, after they swore off Turing machines altogether?
When Dune was written, the most terrifying computers out there were conceptually like HAL 9000: a machine that acts like a human. The battle with HAL isn't a balls to the wall sci-fi war against AI but a man trying to survive a malfunctioning machine on which there is too much reliance. That's not even subtext, HAL straight up is given too much conflicting responsibility and fails because it is a machine. And while 2001 came out after Dune, it's kind of a useful mark of the zeitgeist at the time towards computers.
The Butlerian Jihad is straightforwardly based on Darwin Among The Machines, an essay by Samuel Butler, which more or less argues we should be anprims because otherwise we constantly cede responsibility and power to machines and eventually will find ourselves inferior to them. It's not a "Ooh, Skynet" argument like Herbert's son made it, it's a human supremacy over nature argument. What are we if not supreme over all other forms? What is the hierarchy if humans aren't at the top?
Herbert, as a world building exercise because computers are boring, decided to have a reason there aren't any smart computers in Dune. Of course they still have Turing machines, or otherwise nobody could fly a thopter or operate a spice harvester or dew factory or the myriad spacecraft. But being smart is reserved for humans and having giant brains is reserved for Mentats, and even they're shown to be very fallible. Piter dies because he didn't think the Duke would be a threat, Hawat fails as the Duke's Mentat because he couldn't imagine Yueh was the traitor until his dying breath.
We thought the massive starships controlled by human navigators and with 100% analog control systems were a cool world building idea, but actually herbert was just boomer brained.
Sounds like the usual late 60's concern with bureaucracy and standardization.