Sometimes though one has to doubt Lafferty's depth of philosophical understanding, when he writes stuff like this:      "We'll  do  it,"  said Gregory.  "Our world  has  become  something of a fat slob; it cloys; it  has bothered  me all  evening.  We  will  find  whether  purely  intellectual at-  titudes are of actual  effect. We'll  leave the  details to  Epikt,  but I  believe the  turning point  was in  the year  1323  when  John  Lutterell  came  from  Oxford  to Avignon  where  the  Holy  See  was then  situated. He  brought with  him  fifty-six  propositions  taken  from  Ockham's Commen-  tary  on  the  Sentences,  and  he proposed  their condemn-  nation.  They  were  not   condemned  outright,   but  Ock-  ham  was  whipped  soundly  in that  first assault,  and he  never  recovered.  Lutterell  proved  that  Ockham's nihil-  ism  was  a  bunch  of  nothing. And  the Ockham  thing did  die away, echoing  dimly through  the little  German courts  where  Ockham  traveled  peddling  his  wares,  but  he  no  longer  peddled  them in  the main  markets. Yet  his view-  point could have  sunk the  world, if  indeed, intellectual  attitudes are of actual effect."                               "We wouldn't have liked  Lutterell," said  Aloysius. "He  was  humorless  and  he  had  no  fire in  him, and  he was  always  right.  And  we  would  have  liked Ockham.  He was  charming,  and  he  was  wrong,  and  perhaps  we  will de-  stroy  the world  yet. There's  a chance  that we  will get  our  reaction  if  we  allow  Ockham  free hand.  China was  frozen for thousands of years by an  intellectual attitude,  one not nearly so unsettling as  Ockham's. India  is hypno-  tized into a queer stasis which calls  itself revolutionary  and which  does not  move --  hypnotized by  an intellectual  attitude.  But  there was  never such  an attitude  as Ock-  ham's."                                                        So  they  decided  that  the  former  chancellor  of Ox-  ford, John  Lutterell, who  was always  a sick  man, should  suffer  one  more  sickness  on  the  road  to  Avignon  in  France,  and  that  he  should  not  arrive there  to lance  the Ockham thing before it infected the world.             One may hold in his favor, that this is a world that has been already altered by one experiment, so the Ockham described here need not be the "real" Ockham. As Aloysius Shiplap says a few paragraphs earlier:                                      There is something amiss   here, though.  It  is as though  I remembered  when things  were  not  so  stark  with  Ockham,  as  though,  in  some   variant,  Ockham's  Terminalism  did  not mean what we know   that it did mean.