#Life coaching with occam's razor wheel trial#

#Life coaching with occam's razor wheel trial#

The scientist is put on trial for attempting to halt progress, and is sentenced to death. The politician steps in and stops him from doing so. In a bid to stop the draining process, the scientist attempts to drain himself to overload the draining mechanism, which hasn't yet finished processing the dragon's emotion. The scientist sees this as unethical, as the vapor of insanity is being pushed off on other beings in the far off universe. The effects of this 'draining' leave the dragon in the shape of a man, shimmering like a wave (which is to be stabilized and brought back into a corporeal form), with all emotion becoming a vapor, which is then sent out through the stars via 'crosswhen', which is a sort of connection across space and time. The story's true center lies with the scientist and politician- 'draining' is removing emotion from a being, a project which is being undertaken with the politician's support, in a bid for them to remove all insanity from their race. Each of these threads are seemingly unrelated, but by the end of the story, they are built into a cohesive picture of what is going on. 5) A homeless man accidentally starting World War IV. 4) Pope Leo turning Attila at the gates of Rome. 3) An insane seven-headed dragon who is about to be 'drained' by a scientist and his politician friend. What the reader is given are different threads of a story: 1) A homicidal maniac living in the suburbs 2) A statue in a distant galaxy that looks exactly like the maniac. Still, it is a great piece of work, and as far as I know, one of the first uses of such storytelling methods. The only difference is 'The Beast' was a much simpler puzzle, with few threads to weave together. It left this sensation that I just wanted to keep going back through until it made sense to me. Both made little sense the first go around, but the impact of the feeling that something unusual is happening struck home hard. I find this very similar to the Instrumentality episodes of Evangelion.

And on the second reading, everything clicked into place. It made little sense to me on that first read, but I immediately recognized the method of storytelling as something unique. The first read was a little disappointing. While the term 'short story' applies to a wide range of story lengths, 'The Beast' was only a five minute read.

'The Beast' is not a long story by any means. Its been said that its reason for winning was self-evident once it was read, and I agree with that sentiment.

First published in 1968, 'The Beast That Shouted Love At the Heart of the World' won a Hugo Award for Best Short Story the next year. Evangelion leads me to Ellison, and Ellison leads me back to take a closer examination of the inspiration behind Episode 25/26. When I heard that Episode 26's name had something to do with a short story, I spent about a year searching on and off for it. I used to be much more infatuated with Evangelion than I am now, and I ravenously attacked anything to do with it. In a way, Evangelion led me to read Ellison. Those who have been waiting patiently will be happy to know I received the book that contains the story today. And for those of you in the habit of lurking on the IRC channel, you would know that I've been planning to read the short story, think about it compared to Episode 26, and analyze the comparison between the two. For those of you who didn't know, Episode 26's title comes from a short story by Harlan Ellison.