I think it’s more about whether a cog in the machine is nothing? The Black Idol clearly doesn’t think she is literaly nothing. It wants her knowledge, her biomass, etc. And Julia obviously isn’t saying that she is worthless either.
But she *is* saying that she considers herself to be worth nothing, if she ends up as just part of the idol. It’s about the fallacies of composition/division. She has values that are different from those of the Idol, and those specific values tell her that she becomes nothing if she is absorbed into it, but worth something apart from it. Being a tool of the system is not the same as steering the ship.
And why shouldn’t she think this? To be alive is to be in conflict, to struggle, and the Black Mass actually embodies this as much as anything. From what we know, the God of Flesh is a mass-murdering, black-hearted machine. What better death than for its “children”, the species spawned from the Idol, to collectively decide to turn their back on it, and seal it beneath an eternity of disregard? There are other “wholes” to be a part of, without being some kind of recapitulation of the Borg.
Infinity minus one is still infinity, as is infinity plus one is still infinity. These indelible truths are what they are, but the one still knows it’s not the same with or without its whole.
So being part of a whole is nothing?
If one does not appreciate what it means to be whole and individual.
To put it another way, to be whole is to be individual.
I think it’s more about whether a cog in the machine is nothing? The Black Idol clearly doesn’t think she is literaly nothing. It wants her knowledge, her biomass, etc. And Julia obviously isn’t saying that she is worthless either.
But she *is* saying that she considers herself to be worth nothing, if she ends up as just part of the idol. It’s about the fallacies of composition/division. She has values that are different from those of the Idol, and those specific values tell her that she becomes nothing if she is absorbed into it, but worth something apart from it. Being a tool of the system is not the same as steering the ship.
And why shouldn’t she think this? To be alive is to be in conflict, to struggle, and the Black Mass actually embodies this as much as anything. From what we know, the God of Flesh is a mass-murdering, black-hearted machine. What better death than for its “children”, the species spawned from the Idol, to collectively decide to turn their back on it, and seal it beneath an eternity of disregard? There are other “wholes” to be a part of, without being some kind of recapitulation of the Borg.
To be alive is to be in harmony.
Infinity minus one is still infinity, as is infinity plus one is still infinity. These indelible truths are what they are, but the one still knows it’s not the same with or without its whole.
The one is many and the many are one.
Oh, now that’s intriguing… the Idol’s needing to actually consider *its own* nonexistence…
And she’s got the key!
cogito ergo sum