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[IxianMace]

Just wondering which of these are misspelt?

Maud'dib

Muad'dib

Sardaukar

Sarduakar

[Swordmaster_Duncan]

Just wondering which of these are misspelt?

Maud'dib

Muad'dib

Sardaukar

Sarduakar

The middle two are the correct spelling I believe, so, the top  and bottom words are misspelt.

[gunner154]

Muad'dib and Sardaukar are correct. Josh is right.

[Kiyouta]

Why couldn't Paul Muad'dib see both of his two children through prescience?

[MrFlibble]

Because Leto was prescient, and prescient people can't see each other in their vision - the same way Paul couldn't see Guild Navigators and, apparently, Count Fenring who was prescient as well (I'm not sure about Fenring though).

[Kiyouta]

Thanks!

[driftingcloud]

Because Leto was prescient, and prescient people can't see each other in their vision - the same way Paul couldn't see Guild Navigators and, apparently, Count Fenring who was prescient as well (I'm not sure about Fenring though).

I always thought that Paul saw the son but not the daughter. He knows he is going to have a son. If that is the case, it can't be because Leto is prescient. In fact, both twins are born awakened, like Alia, in the womb, because of Chani's excessive melange overdoses through the accelerated pregnancy.

I always thought it was Frank's way of saying, "Ha! Even prescience is fallible." Even prescience is not a perfect art, and that is the trap that Paul had gotten into, not seeing a way out of his reliance on the sight other than through his personal sacrifice. He saw his son was the solution, but he did not now all of the details of it. It's also as if he was so wrapped up in getting out of his trap that he missed such a critical thing right under his nose.

[MrFlibble]

Two children, Paul thought wonderingly. The vision had contained only a daughter. (p. 310)

The prescient ability is somehow different becuase of the gender of its wielder. This is why no female can be a Kwisatz Haderach, and even if Ghanima and Alia possessed the powers akin to those of Paul and Leto, they couldn't evade the oracular vision.

[Dante]

I was under the imression that it was related more to a specific genotype. In Chapterhouse for example, almost everyone has 'The Atreides Genes,' which allow the Bene Gesserit to avoid detection by the Honoured Matres, but force them to keep Scytale and Duncan in the No-ship. Leto therefore would have the specific genes, but Ghanima did not (the twins were not genetically identical after all, or they would have been the same gender).

[3ngel]

I quote MrFibble, i think it's more a question of gender than genotype.

Infact no female can be Kwuisatz. And Leto was more than a Kwuisatz so at major reasons Paul could not see him.

As i've said in another post, it's kind of power-jerarchy. Before Leto that was:

1) PaulMuadib

2) GuildNavigators

infact the Guild could not see Paul in the conspiration, but in the end we understand in the book (II) that Paul being a kwisatz could see the Guild conspirator.

After Leto the jerarchy became:

1) Leto

2) Paul

3) GuildNavigators.

Infact we see that Paul could not see Leto (could not see him with ghanima), but Leto could see better and further than Paul (including Paul himself) (final dialogue in book III).

[TMA_1]

I think that Paul was more of a mistake than anything. He was supposed to be the Kwizats Hederach, but because Jessica loved Leto so much, she disobeyed and inveriably tweaked the bloodline. Paul was something different. So when Paul had Leto in his changed state, with a fremen woman who was highly sensitive mentally, it miraculously occured that Leto had gifts which nobody could imagine. Once Leto took the changed water of life, he spawned into something a little greater than Paul. He knew though that in order to follow the Golden Path he would need to keep close control over humanity for an extended period of time, babying them and restricting them. In order to attain a level where one could live potentially for over ten thousand years, Leto did something that only Paul knew of, and that was taking on the sand trout synergistically becoming man and worm, the Divided God. The giver and the taker, the male and female, the man and worm, God and Man.

[piterdevries]

ok so feyd and margot have a child... where can i find it in dune?or in which book can i read about it?

[Dante]

'It' being the child? Nowhere, it is never mentioned again. Some theorise that the Harkonnen bloodline lives on through this union, but what is more likely is that it becomes just another Bene Gesserit gene pattern, monitored throughout the ages.

Unless you mean 'it' being the union itself, in which case it is breifly aluded to in Dune. A specific page reference may come later, if I can find my copy.

[Egeides]

The prescient ability is somehow different becuase of the gender of its wielder. This is why no female can be a Kwisatz Haderach, and even if Ghanima and Alia possessed the powers akin to those of Paul and Leto, they couldn't evade the oracular vision.

What do you mean there by "they couldn't evade the oracular vision"? How come, what's going on with that?

I always thought that my idea of how come Herbert's Kwisatz is necessarily a male to be uncomplete, that I'd need to think a bit about it. The genders in Herbert's novels are quite unusual and central.

[Crysknife]

The definition of KH is a male BG.  While some females had prescient abilities(Alia, Odrade), males were far more powerfull in that regard.  In fact, Alia became lost in her attempt to match Paul's vision.

It is never really explained why males are gifted.

[Egeides]

But the question is really why are only woman Bene Gesserit (easy one: intuition) and thereafter why only male end up being Bene Gesserit (intuitive) AND what it takes for Kwisatz.

I suspect something along the lines of a male version of "woman = intuition = BG". But how come woman get this mixed/blurry vision, not getting this rather male element while a male can get the female element (even if only one in 10 000 years).

The other aspect I see here is that Herbert portrays women as generally better (in BG terms at least), but only a male  can get the ultimate version. Leto and Paul are considered

[MrFlibble]

It is mentioned somewhere in Chapterhouse that females in general are less efficient as Mentats. If I'm not mistaken, this is because they're much more prone to emotions than men.

If we take into account that in some of the earlier books (Dune or Dune Messiah) the Kwisatz Haderach is defined as "the ultimate Mentat", the abovementioned fact might help understanding why no females could achieve such a degree of prescience as Paul and Leto did.

[Egeides]

But it does not explain why a few men can acquire the BG intuition, while no woman can acquire mentat capacity. Why should the Kwisatz, with its perfect genetics, be a male... when he is planned by an exclusive female-only group keeping women as their norm?

Female-only BG, male-only Kwisatz... are those old conservative (historical) discriminations applied strangely into the future?

[Egeides]

For everyone's poundering, I browsed a new forum with some nice discussions and the topic was addressed (http://boardserver.superstats.com/read.html?collapse=1&uid=2699178&u=MRAnderson&id=402&thread=393&f=1&u=MRAnderson):

I've always thought that they could look there...but they would go insane, become possessed, or die. That is, if they could overcome their fear. The women being the "givers" can not go to the place of the "taker" without losing themselves.

It keeps this historic habit of saying that "woman are more easily possessed/witches". It seems like a way to say that women do not aim at controlling (taking).

Any views about all this taker/giver thing?

[piterdevries]

can sum1 explain to me the golden path?  i really dont get it...

[MrFlibble]

After the enforced tranquility of Leto's Peace, the humankind burst through cataclisms like the Famine into the Scattering, thus ensuring its endless and limitless expansion into the universe, and ultimately, its survival.

[gunner154]

For everyone's poundering, I browsed a new forum with some nice discussions and the topic was addressed (http://boardserver.superstats.com/read.html?collapse=1&uid=2699178&u=MRAnderson&id=402&thread=393&f=1&u=MRAnderson):

It keeps this historic habit of saying that "woman are more easily possessed/witches". It seems like a way to say that women do not aim at controlling (taking).

Any views about all this taker/giver thing?

Logically, that means "But it does not explain why a few men can acquire the BG intuition, while no woman can acquire mentat capacity" no longer holds, because that means men should be better at either than women, be it being Bene Gesserit or being a Mentat. We cannot group all these things together as a whole and analyse them. Perhaps there are certain things unique to men that allow them to be KHs and certain things unique to women that allow them to be Bene Gesserits.

And it's "Cataclysm", not cataclism :)

[Dante]

It's more complicated than that. There have been female mentats (Bellonda) and male Bene Gesserit (Farad'n), though granted the latter was on a technicality and none would survive the spice agony. Had I read the books more recently I'd be able to give a greater insight, but I'm afraid I've all but forgotten the intricacies of the latter books. Waah.

Note to self: Reread Heretics and Chapterhouse.

[gunner154]

That's the thing about Dune: The constant need to re-read and re-re-read, somehow.

Good catch on Bellonda being a Mentat and Farad'n being Bene Gesserit. Forgotten those exceptions somehow :P

[MrFlibble]

Bellonda is not an exception. AFAIK, there are no restrictions to Mentat's gender, but Idaho remarks to himself somewhere in Chapterhouse (I'm looking through right now, if I come with the quote, I'll post it) that female Mentats weren't as efficient as male ones.