Julia Jones wrote:
Are we perhaps missing the point of limiters - were they meant for
something
else entirely (question)?
A reliable source of plotdevicium...
No. Because it in actual fact it is acting as a plot inhibitor. Now you don't put something like that in a series unless it is there for a purpose.
However, that's not playing the game.
As I am about to demonstrate, what do you know about playing the game?
I think that it's likely the limiters were still relatively experimental devices, and that Gan was one of the beta-test guinea pigs.
There is no evidence at all in the series for this.
If so, the
behaviour modification being tested may not be the only one the developers had in mind as a long-term goal. It's possible that the limiters were an early step in a form of modification for dealing with people like Avon - people whose intellectual abilities are too useful a resource to lose if there's a way to salvage them, but who aren't going to co-operate of their own free will.
There is no evidence in the series to support this.
Unco-operative people can be conditioned, but that conditioning can be broken. It's also probably difficult and expensive, if they're still keeping a staff of Shrinkers. Perhaps the project group developing the limiters were not overly pleased about the development of Pylene-50 - their funding was cut after that...
None of this is supported by evidence from the series.
Julia Jones "Science is not about building a body of known 'facts'. It is a method for asking awkward questions and subjecting them
to
a reality-check, thus avoiding the human tendency to believe whatever makes us feel good." - The Science of Discworld
Yes. A lesson you have evidently failed to learn Julia.
Jenny
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