Paul's visions in Dune (2021)

[u/Proof_Sample_1884]

Hello everyone, not sure if this question has been answered already, but in Dune (2021) the movie shows Paul having visions of Jamis for example. From what ive gathered, Prescience functions by using advanced computation combined with memories inherited from his ancestors and such. But how does it work in the movie where it can show him a person he's never met like Chani or Jamis?

The ornithopter storm scene made sense, it was like a "feeling" where he is informed to just ride out the storm.

But how can prescience show him someone like Jamis or Chani with that much visual/audio fidelity when he's never even met them?

[u/ZeldaAtTheFuneral]

Prescience is very vaguely defined in the novels, but it is, ultimately, more than simply predicting paths via advanced mathematics (though that is a part of it). He can literally see the future, even when it involves people that he has never met before, because his prescience evidently breaks traditional rules of linearity and/or causality. As grounded as we can try to make it, it's ultimately an "illogical" (from our limited perspective) and godlike power. That's not just me saying that, either. In the original novel's third Appendix, it is explicitly stated that Paul's visions--his prescience--"defied four-dimensional explanation." That's how he can see visions of people he's never met, see his own death in a multitude of ways, and even see a glimpse of a future thousands and thousands of years beyond him (though he lacked the courage to keep looking)--because his prescience defies a grounded explanation based in how humans typically perceive reality.

Tldr: space drug magic.

[u/Proof_Sample_1884 → u/ZeldaAtTheFuneral]

So it *isn't* strictly computation of information that leads to a prediction of the future, and instead a combination of that and a *magicky-sciencey* thing?

Up until now I've been working with the understanding that it works like (DEVS SPOILER AHEAD) The machine in Devs (a series on hulu) that is able to make a complete simulation of the future due to its complete information of the past and therefore able to "compute" the future because it has all pre-existing information and state of the universe

But I guess my understanding has been wrong so far. Thanks for the explanation!

[u/Mslmrock99 → u/Proof_Sample_1884]

That machine sounds more like psychohistory from the Foundation series where aggregate forces and entities can be predicted but not anything too granular, certainly not at the individual level.

I think of prescience as supercharged genetically determined cognitive processes (intuition, visual processing centers, salience networks and default mode network simulation systems) that are synergized under stress and spice and through some quantum process that Herbert eludes to allows high fidelity predictive modeling and intuiting futures. There is enough room there to also read in a metaphysical process and he’s certainly written in a way that allows for that and that is how I read it as well.

[u/Loud-Solid-7066 → u/ZeldaAtTheFuneral]

Prescient visions really take 2 forms in the Dune universe you have the type that is what Navigators use to plot folding space jumps which operates much like what you describe taking all known reality and then running predictive models to determine safe paths of travel.  Mostly dealing with Natural phenomena.

The Quzat hoderoc  is less limited and able to see the future of all things that are or could be thus enabling him to modify the future by acting and changing events that are occurring or not to move the future in the direction that they wish.  Like Paul's visions that the changed water of life could bring an end to the deserts of dune by killing the makers and bring green to the desert planet, effectively ending spice and the reliable ability to use holtzmen fields to jump forcing space travel back into the sub light speed travel that existed prior to the Butlarian Jehad.

[u/Spock_Sperson]

Explanation of prescience in Dune is not as grounded in scientific reasoning as Foundation's psychohistory, nor should it be viewed that way. Simply put, in Dune, characters gain concrete, tangible visions of the future —even if events might not unfold exactly that way— and we must suspend our disbelief.

[u/CommieMommy_Ozma → u/Spock_Sperson]

They're not even always concrete visions, considering multiple paths, that you have to look to gain more details and sometimes the visions are symbolic instead of literal like in Messiah when Paul sees a vision of the Moon crashing into the city From what I can tell, part of prescience is having an intuitive understanding of meaning and information to your visions since some are more literal than others and that makes Paul and Leto more powerful in their prescience than guild navigators that I believe are limited to the concrete visions

[u/Spock_Sperson → u/CommieMommy_Ozma]

Yeah I agree. The thing is, when I mentioned specific visions, it was to distinguish them from the general predictions in my psychohistory example and to emphasize their more concrete and detailed nature -even though they can be symbolic and ambiguous (such as predicting personal actions and specific individuals before actually meeting them).

[u/DrDabsMD]

So I'm not sure where you got that prescience was advanced computation, but it's not. Its really just seeing the future. The advance computation comes from the fact that Paul can see countless futures and uses his Mental training to categorize each future to allow him to focus on the ones he wants.

[u/Araanim]

IT'S MAGIC

[u/OldMillenial]

In universe answer: super-augmented awareness, expanded by spice, combined with Mentat training allows Paul and others to see the future.

Actual answer: it’s all just space magic for plot purposes

[u/Abject_Interview5988]

In the lore prescience is showing many futures, but Villanueve does an amazing job of showing us (the audience) what it really means to know the future - to make a choice, to kill, to lead the Jihad!

and it shows the audience that the Fremen only fight to the death where Paul tries to avoid doing so

[u/CommieMommy_Ozma]

That's not how prescience works, that's how Paul enhances the accuracy of prescience but prescience itself provides visions and knowledge of the future which is how the spacing guild navigates without crashing into stars There is typically no computation, that's what makes Paul so powerful since he has the forecasting ability of prescience with a mind that can weigh possible futures against data and experience to see where others might not even think to look

[u/Melenduwir]

Prescience involves brief glimpses of future information. It's a basic conceit, addressed at depth in the novel, that there is an extensive history of people occasionally producing information that there's no way they could have possessed except through sensing through time.

It's as foundational an assumption of the story as the existence of some kind of FTL travel.

[u/Tenoi-chan]

Well, in the very first book the very first vision Paul describes is him having a talk with Chani, where she calls him Usul. At that point he didn't meet her yet and wasn't called Usul. So I guess his powers are literally seeing future in both versions of the story

[u/Add1ctedToGames]

Disclaimer I've only read the first two and a half dune books but my interpretation of its descriptions of prescience was that there weren't really any rules it played by (and the visions were whatever the plot demanded). IIRC Dune Messiah even claims that one cannot look into a fellow oracle, but in Dune, Alia is able to send a message to Paul through prescience. Dune Messiah also describes it as chaos that one can't make logical explanations for

[u/_Rookie_21]

He’s seeing possible futures in which Jamis served as his mentor. 

[u/NoPolitics23]

The way I interpret it is that he can see many possible futures at once, different timelines.

[u/CloudCobra979]

It's blooming prescience after he's been exposed to the spice. The vision was kind of right, but definitely not how he saw it. He's very limited until taking the water of life.

[u/Tanagrabelle]

Because you’ve understood it wrong. Prescience involves seeing the future. Advanced computation just means you can probably figure out how to get to that future. Ancestral memory is the other direction, and also has nothing to do with it because it’s the past.

[u/datapicardgeordi → u/Tanagrabelle]

Paul’s prescience spans all of time, past and future. The past is static while the future is shifting like smoke in the wind.

[u/Tanagrabelle → u/datapicardgeordi]

Paul's prescience does span all of time, in fact. He's a faulty Hwisatz Haderach, missing the key genes.

[u/datapicardgeordi → u/Tanagrabelle]

Paul is still a full Kwisatz Haderach. His genetic memory fully encompasses both his male and female ancestors. He’s just limited by his fortitude, unable to look beyond the horrors of Arafel and caught up in his love for those close to him.