Merlin and Nimue

As for myself, Merlin's future (and all of Safehold's} is moot. After this many thousands of lines, the last one I have time or interest to read is M saying, "but you and I need to talk." I stopped reading Honorverse and now Safehold simply because I am tired of the homogeneous enemies. Humans vs. humans.

LTSciFiFan wrote:Not a reply but a question of clarification. What story/book did Nimue and Merlin (as characters but not humans) appear in? And NO not Arthurian. Webber's works.

need to check. merlin i'm sure was used for the ship's computer in the Excalibur alternative and that would be a logical place to look for nimue as well given its Arthurian title but i don't have a copy to check

Yes I think you are right.

LTSciFiFan wrote:Not a reply but a question of clarification. What story/book did Nimue and Merlin (as characters but not humans) appear in? And NO not Arthurian. Webber's works.

Merlin has been a main character for the entire Safehold series. Nimue shows up first in LAMA.

Don

DrakBibliophile wrote:Well, any love-affair/marriage between an immortal and a mortal would IMO end in tragedy for the immortal.

Merlin (or Nimue) would have to face the death of their lover/spouse by old-age while they live on.

Which would say that if anything Merlin should marry Nimue. I don't think DW wants to go that route, though.

evilauthor wrote:

Hildum wrote:Nimue's DNA sequence, and likely mitochondrial sequence, is in OWL's database. Remember, they were able to trace the ancestry of Cayleb and Paityr to specific colonists.

There's a difference between storing enough DNA information to uniquely ID someone, and storing the entirety of their DNA enough to create a whole new clone.

Sequencing the whole DNA (not merely to identify) is now down to $1k. (Down from the original 11 figures of the first time.) With TF tech I would expect it to be a routine medical test on newborns.

Also, I think Weber mentioned that Fed tech isn't up to recreating human beings from digital DNA records. If it were possible, there would have been no need to transport people in cryo from Earth. They could have used that same volume and mass to just carry copied personalities for whom new organic bodies could be constructed at whatever new colony was founded. Or just grow new colonists from scratch and have the first generation of Adams and Eves be raised by robotic servitors.

Does TF tech have the ability to put the personality into the body? Being able to grow a body doesn't replace cryo unless you can download the personality into the new body. Given the flawed handling of memory that we see them using I don't think they have that kind of tech.

The thing is with current tech we probably could create a human from a stored copy plus a donor egg and grow it in a host mother. (The result would have the mitochondrial DNA of the donor, though.) We don't have the kind of accuracy to make it a sane thing to do, though.

Loren Pechtel wrote:

DrakBibliophile wrote:Well, any love-affair/marriage between an immortal and a mortal would IMO end in tragedy for the immortal.

Merlin (or Nimue) would have to face the death of their lover/spouse by old-age while they live on.

Which would say that if anything Merlin should marry Nimue. I don't think DW wants to go that route, though.

Thats... all kinds of creepy.

Nimue (the original) found it creepy just to have an illegal conversation with her copy.

Direwolf18 wrote:

Loren Pechtel wrote:

Which would say that if anything Merlin should marry Nimue. I don't think DW wants to go that route, though.

Thats... all kinds of creepy.

Direwolf18 wrote:

Loren Pechtel wrote:Which would say that if anything Merlin should marry Nimue. I don't think DW wants to go that route, though.

Thats... all kinds of creepy.

Since when does incest apply to sex with yourself?

And the genetic argument obviously doesn't apply.

It wouldn't work, though--remember, Merlin is actually transgendered. He's a heterosexual female, he wouldn't be attracted to Nimue.

IMO not Incest but Narcissism.

Merlin and Nimue could be seen as the "Same Person".

Loren Pechtel wrote:

Direwolf18 wrote:


Thats... all kinds of creepy.

Since when does incest apply to sex with yourself?

And the genetic argument obviously doesn't apply.

It wouldn't work, though--remember, Merlin is actually transgendered. He's a heterosexual female, he wouldn't be attracted to Nimue.