- "Talbot was a radical sceptic, to whom truth and even reality were rainbow-like epiphenomena with no ultimate meaning. In the silvery charm of his prose, everything solid flowed and ran and broke apart like mercury spilled from a barometer."
- —A description of Simon Talbot and his thoughts[src]
Simon Talbot was an Oxford philosopher in Lyra's world[1] who was hired by the Magisterium. He was described as the Magisterium's useful idiot.
Talbot believed that there was no truth at all and expressed his feelings in his book called The Constant Deceiver. One chapter in this book suggested that dæmons were merely 'psychological projections with no independent reality'.[1]
Biography[]
Simon went to Geneva when Lyra Silvertongue was 20 to report on the Magisterial Congress for the Journal of Moral Philosophy. He talked in the Salon des Étrangers with the Dean of the Court of Faculties, the Preceptor of the Temple Hospitallers, the Chaplain of the Synod of Deacons and the Executive of Thuringia Potash about the meeting.[2]
Whilst in Geneva, he met Malcolm Polstead, who claimed he was Matthew Peterson from the Baltimore Observer. Simon recognised him from his college and later reported him to La Maison Juste.[3]
Appearances[]
References[]
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 The Secret Commonwealth, Chapter 6
- ↑ The Secret Commonwealth, Chapter 14
- ↑ The Secret Commonwealth, Chapter 18