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Notes -
This is a debate that we could probably have for years, but I like the idea that the Honored Matres were not running from machines and that the Butlerian Jihad wasn't even about Skynet-style enemies. Rather, the Jihad was about maintaining human significance and freedom in a future with AI (how speculative!) and the Honored Matres were running from MANY powerful factions in the Scattering, of which they were a relatively minor one. The latter would exemplify the success of the Golden Path: no power, not even the Honored Matres (who sweep the Old Empire in short order) can gain supremacy over all humanity after what Leto II did. The Scattering is the end of such threats. This wouldn't be the only way for the Golden Path to succeed, but it would be the most dramatic, as well as dizzying the reader with the thought that the Honored Matres are just a minor faction in what humanity has become.
This does raise the question of an antagonist for Dune 7. I like the idea of something like the advanced Face Dancers, who present more of a philosophical threat to humanity - a species that can adopt countless personalities, but is never truly any of them, like the difference between hearing a recording of your dead parent's voice and hearing them speak new words. AI as an enemy was already explored by lots of people by the time Herbert was writing the later Dune novels; I think he'd want something weirder and more original as an antagonist, just like the Spacing Guild, Bene Tleilax, Bene Gesserit, Honored Matres, and of course Paul Atredis.
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