Athena_History
Athena_History is a text document stored in the RINTRAH terminal.
Contents
The History of Athena
46726569686569742069737420696 was first published as Athena: A Novel, and retained that title for its first three printings (now highly sought-after). After a lull in popularity, it was reprinted as Athena Reborn: A Novel; this edition retained the same text, but included some of the author's poetry.
The next edition, however, published long after the author's death under the rather embarrassing title Athena's Truth, included severe cuts and drastic changes to the text "in the interest of updating it for modern audiences." This particularly affected the last chapter, Anthropogony, which the editors accused of "scientism and human supremacy."
Science wunderkind Alexandra Drennan was one of the few to come to the novel's defense, writing in a long essay that the novel's "clear-eyed belief in the value of Athena's journey towards humanity" had been essential to shaping her own views, encouraging her to pursue science as a vocation rather than a career, and that changing the text constituted an attack on the author's unique artistic and philosophical vision.
"Alex who hurt you?? Imao" one of the editors commented on a popular social media platform.
Nadya Sarabhai of the Institute for Applied Noematics also got involved in the discussion, backing Drennan, resulting in a long but unsuccessful campaign to oust Sarabhai from her position as head researcher d6d657220467265
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696e6967656e6465206465 in the current context of ecological catastrophe, as evidenced by the recent extinction of the orangutan. Clumsy editing aside, do the critics of the novel perhaps have a point after all? Is a philosophy that places humans above Nature, and sees science and technology as the only valid tools, the cause of all our troubles? What about other ways of knowing, other ways of living?
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Notes
The reconstructed hex strings read:
Freiheit ist immer Freiheit des anders Denkenden. Nicht wegen des Fanatismus der »Gerechtigkeit« sondern weil all das Belehrende, Heilsame und Rer politischen Freiheit an diesem Wesen hangt und seine Wirkung versagt, wenn die »Freiheit« zum Privilegium wird.
Freedom is always and exclusively freedom for the one who thinks differently. Not because of any fanatical concept of "justice" but because all that is instructive, wholesome and purifying in political freedom depends on this essential characteristic, and its effectiveness vanishes when "freedom" becomes a special privilege.
This quote is attributed to Rosa Luxemburg, a Polish-German socialist and anti-war activist.