questions on numbers

[spoke]

When Elida and Alvarian are talking in the prologue in CoS, there is mention of some numbers in secret. 24, 16, and 2000. And implications that this has to do with the Gentling of male channelers.

 

Obviously some of this has to do with the post-Aiel War where Reds were gentling men on the spot (Example Thom's Nephew). I understood that to be the 24.

 

but what of the 16, and 2000?

[Guest Tobes]

I believe that was Alviarin pointing out to Elaida that there were only 16 male channelers gentled on record. Saying that there were 24 would have opened up all sorts of legal consequences. Alviarin mentioning 2000 seemed to me to be just a bold, underlining of this danger.

[Sharaman]

Yes, 16 gentled on record; 24 in reality (the other 8 presumably including Thom's nephew Owyn). And yes, 2000 is an exaggeration to emphasis the difference.

[Luckers]

Yes, 16 gentled on record; 24 in reality (the other 8 presumably including Thom's nephew Owyn). And yes, 2000 is an exaggeration to emphasis the difference.

 

I dunno... I mean, look at it...

 

"Twenty-four is a dangerous number to speak aloud," Alviarin said with an ominous quiet, "as dangerous as two thousand. The Chronicles record only sixteen. The last thing needed now is for those years to rear up again. Or for sisters who know only what they were told to learn the truth. Even those you brought back hold their silence."

 

That doesn't seem a casual exageration--by which I mean were it an exageration she could as easily have chosen two hundred, or twenty-four thousand. But she doesn't, she states that the numbers twenty-four and two thousand are both specifically dangerous to speak aloud.

 

I have no answer to offer in replacement... but yeah I don't know, the word seems to precise for the two-thousand to have been a random number chosen to show that anything more than the sixteen recorded gentlings could be dangerous to speak aloud.

[Baletickle_to_da_face!]

I just reread that part actually, it seemed like a random number to me. I don't really agree with your reasoning Luckers. Isn't 2,000 exactly the kind of number you would expect for a generalized exaggeration? I mean, what number could she have said that wouldn't have sounded suspicious by that reasoning?

 

And lets remember, she's talking to Elaida, so if it was meant to have signifigant meaning, then Elaida would have had to understand(unless it was some kind of inside joke in Alviarin's little head, but she doesn't exactly seem like the type for that). And no matter how thorough the Red/Black Ajah was, that would be an impossible number to reach in the time that Elaida was involved in the whole mess, right?

[Luckers]

Isn't 2,000 exactly the kind of number you would expect for a generalized exaggeration?

 

Personally, no. I'd say one hundred. It's the next flat number above twenty-four, and is a significant enough increase to make the point.

 

Luckviarin: Twenty-four? You might as well say a hundred. Anything more than sixteen is dangerous you silly bint!

Elaida: What did you call me?

Luckviarin: I hate you so much.

 

Admitedly it's stupid to try to guess at what someone would go to with a randomly chosen number--but why two thousand? Because twenty-four has a two in it? Why not twenty-four thousand. The mind leaps to similar states when making these exagerations...

 

To be clear I'm being largely fanciful above. My main problem is more that reading that comment sounds to me like Alviarin is saying that the number twenty-four specifically, is dangerous. Not any number more than sixteen. Twenty-four. And then, therefore, two thousand.

[The Fisher King]

Yes, 16 gentled on record; 24 in reality (the other 8 presumably including Thom's nephew Owyn). And yes, 2000 is an exaggeration to emphasis the difference.

 

I dunno... I mean, look at it...

 

"Twenty-four is a dangerous number to speak aloud," Alviarin said with an ominous quiet, "as dangerous as two thousand. The Chronicles record only sixteen. The last thing needed now is for those years to rear up again. Or for sisters who know only what they were told to learn the truth. Even those you brought back hold their silence."

 

That doesn't seem a casual exageration--by which I mean were it an exageration she could as easily have chosen two hundred, or twenty-four thousand. But she doesn't, she states that the numbers twenty-four and two thousand are both specifically dangerous to speak aloud.

 

I have no answer to offer in replacement... but yeah I don't know, the word seems to precise for the two-thousand to have been a random number chosen to show that anything more than the sixteen recorded gentlings could be dangerous to speak aloud.

 

JMO, but I actually DID read this: I have no answer to offer in replacement... but yeah I don't know, the word seems to precise for the two-thousand to have been a random number chosen to show that anything more than the sixteen recorded gentlings could be dangerous to speak aloud. just the way its stated here.

 

 

Fish

[Demiandre]

The creation of the Black Ajah didn't happened two thousand years ago? Silly, I know

[Val Mickey]

Maybe 2000 years ago was the last time the Reds went on an illegal gentling rampage.

[NetSlider]

or maybe 2000 is the price (2000 gold pieces) to get free from the reds. now that i've said that out loud it sounds even more crazy to me.

[Kaznen]

Maybe the AS have "unofficially" genteled 2000 since the founding. That does average out to less then 1 a year, and maybe the AS in question had good reasons at the time.

 

But men are suppose to be brought back to TV to have that done to them.

 

Or maybe it was the number of men who "got away" and died before the AS could catch up with them.

[Phelix]

It could also be that 2,000 years ago a formerly Red Amyrlin betrayed Manetheren by halting support to the nation for her jealousy of its Queen (an Aes Sedai of the Green/Blue ajah, IIRC). Tetsuan (I think that was her name) was pulled down and replaced with a Blue, so it's not really all that dangerous to mention that 2,000... she might as well have said 1,000 then, because a thousand years prior Bonwhin was deposed for trying to manipulate Hawkwing and replaced with a Blue.

 

2,000 could also be a dangerous number because there are fewer than 2k Aes Sedai currently in the world, and that fact scares many sisters when they consider the Tower was built to hold 6k sisters plus all the Novices and Accepted who would eventually join their ranks. (Then again, I could be mis-remembering that, and there are fewer than 1k Aes Sedai...)