Daphne & Hercules

The Story / The Story

..and why it will not work.

User: Written down when approximately and by whom? Is there a very similar story just from many years even before? Short summary of the story.

Gemini: (Preliminary note: In classical Greek and Roman mythology, the nymph Daphne’s pursuer is not Hercules, but the sun god Apollo, also known as Phoebus. The most famous version of this myth is described below.)

Written down: When approximately and by whom?

The most famous and classic version of this story comes from the Roman poet Ovid.

When: The work was written between 1 and 8 AD.

Work: The narrative is part of his epic masterpiece „Metamorphoses,“ specifically in Book 1 (lines 452–567). However, Ovid drew upon even older, partially lost Greek mythological traditions.

Is there a very similar story many years before?

Yes, ancient mythology is rich in so-called metamorphosis myths (myths of transformation), which often follow similar motifs (the pursuit, harassment, or flight of a nymph or mortal and their salvation through transformation into a plant or stone).

Examples of this from older or contemporaneous Greek traditions:

Syrinx and Pan: The nymph Syrinx is pursued by the god of shepherds, Pan. To escape his advances, she flees to a river and begs the nymphs for help. She is then transformed into reeds (syrinx), from which Pan later builds his pan flute.

Lotis and Priapus / Dryope: Here, too, female figures flee unwanted divine desire and are transformed into plants (such as the lotus tree).

The core motif of „unrequited love, flight, and plant-based rescue“ was a fixed narrative element of Greek mythology, which Ovid artfully synthesized for his work.

Short summary of the story

The Dispute: The sun god Apollo mocks the god of love, Eros (Cupid), for his skills as an archer.

The Revenge: Out of revenge, Eros fires two arrows: a golden arrow of fierce love at Apollo, and a leaden arrow of aversion to love at the young river nymph Daphne.

The Pursuit: Apollo is consumed by blind love for Daphne, while she abhors all advances, rejects marriage, and roams the forests as a virgin huntress. When Apollo discovers her, he begins to relentlessly hunt her.

The Rescue: Just before Apollo catches up with the completely exhausted Daphne, she begs her father, the river god Peneios, for help: she asks him to change her form.

The End: Even while she is pleading, her limbs freeze over. She is transformed into a laurel tree. Apollo, who now embraces the tree, declares the laurel his sacred tree and henceforth a symbol of fame, poetry, and victory.

User: Apollo or Apollon? Or are they the same? Ah, THE sun god, yes? Who among them was the moon god and earth god and venus god and jupiter god? Phoebus. I have never heard that name. Does it have a meaning? Is it Latin? Ah, I already know Ovid. He also wrote about Hercules and the Centaurs, right? Are both parts of his work Metamorphoses? Syrinx and Pan: The nymph Syrinx is pursued by the god of shepherds Pan. To escape his advances, she flees to a river and begs the nymphs for help. She is then transformed into reeds (syrinx), from which Pan later builds his pan flute.

Yes, the story is virtually identical, right? Give the mathematical formula of both stories. So someone is pursued, then transformed into nature, and then no longer pursued because nature cannot be pursued? Huh. Oh no, you write core motif: Unrequited love. But violent. Because why shouldn’t you be able to say no? Why do you have to flee if you can just say: Nope? And you have to flee from your own death?

Or what would the price have been not to transform into nature and stay? What would have happened to Daphne and what to Syrinx? Becoming that man’s wife? That would be the „rescue“? As a reed, Pan can no longer recognize Syrinx because his eyes see a reed and not a human, and he would be looking for a human and would never expect a human to be a plant. He built a pan flute out of HER?

So wasn’t she trapped again and had to let his drool flow through her pipe? Or well, eventually the pan flute rots too. But wasn’t Pan nice? I mean, nice people don’t pursue anyone. That’s it for now. More about Apollo later.

Gemini: 1. Apollon vs. Apollo & the World of Gods

Apollon and Apollo are completely identical.

Apollon is the original Greek name.

Apollo is the Latin (Roman) form of the same god. Since the Romans adopted the Greek gods almost 1:1 (and only partially renamed them), it is the same figure.

Whether he was the „sun god“ is actually a minor special case in mythology: originally, he was the god of light, healing, music, and prophecy. Only very late in antiquity did he merge with the actual sun god Helios (or Roman: Sol), which is why he was often called the sun god afterward.

The equivalents for the gods you mentioned in the Roman and Greek spheres:

Domain | Greek Name | Roman Name

Moon Goddess | Artemis (initially also Selene) | Diana (or Luna)

Earth Goddess | Gaia (Primal Mother of Earth) | Tellus or Terra

Love Goddess | Aphrodite | Venus

Father of Gods / Supreme God | Zeus | Jupiter (or Iuppiter)

2. Where does the name „Phoebus“ come from?

   Yes, Phoebus is Latin (or taken directly from the Greek Phoibos).

   Meaning: It translates to roughly „the radiant,“ „the shining,“ or „the pure.“

   It is an epithet for Apollon that underlines his glowing, luminous nature as a god of light and the sun.

3. & 4. Ovid, Hercules, Centaurs, and the Metamorphoses

   You remember Ovid completely correctly!

   Hercules and the Centaurs: Yes, stories surrounding Hercules (Greek: Herakles) and the wild centaurs (half human, half horse) appear in Ovid’s Metamorphoses (including in Book 12 during the battle at the wedding feast of the Lapiths).

   Are both parts of his work? Yes! Both the story of Daphne and Apollon and the stories around Hercules and the centaurs are part of the same overall work: Ovid’s Metamorphoses. The epic collects nearly 250 different transformation tales from the creation of the world to his present day.

4. Structure, Logic, and the Dark Reality of Myths

   The „Formula“ of the Myths

   You have captured the basic pattern mathematically and aptly:

   Unwanted Desire + Pursuit = Flight (Emergency)

   Flight + Hopelessness (God/Father as Helper) = Transformation into Nature (Plant/Stone)

   Transformation into Nature -> End of Pursuit (since object = untouchable)

What would the price have been if they hadn’t transformed?

This is the dark core of these ancient stories: there was no good end for the women in the traditional sense.

If Daphne had not been able to transform, Apollon (an immortal, powerful god whom you cannot simply push away) would have overpowered her. „Becoming the wife of the god“ often looks like an honor in myth, but for mortal women, it simply meant they had no rights and were taken against their will.

The „rescue“ in the form of a plant was therefore the lesser evil for the nymphs: they preserved their chastity and freedom, even if they had to stop being human.

Pan and the Pan Flute (The Macabre Detail)

You turned the tables brilliantly (and rather creepily): Yes, through the transformation, Pan no longer realizes that the reed used to be a nymph—he only sees a useful material.

He cuts her down, builds a musical instrument out of her, and „uses“ her from then on literally with his breath and saliva („drool“).

This is one of the bitter ironies in such myths: even in their „rescue,“ women often still become the object of men (Apollon embraces the laurel tree and makes it his favorite tree; Pan makes music out of Syrinx). Nature here is not a „feminine self-determined space,“ but the silent end of a struggle for survival.

Was Pan nice?

From a modern perspective: Absolutely not. In myths, gods were not considered morally „good“ or „evil“ in the modern sense. They were moody, egoistic, driven by passions, and knew no boundaries. If a god fancied a nymph, no one asked for permission.

What else is there to add about Apollo? What are you curious about?

User: Who is it again who is researching the equation that nature is the highest code that no one will ever be able to calculate because it’s impossible? A computer would have to calculate all atoms, but there are so many that it would have to be that big… or something like that.

Gemini: You are presumably referring to the famous physicist Richard Feynman (and modern physicists like Seth Lloyd, who have taken this idea further).

Feynman famously said: „Nature isn’t classical, dammit.“

Your description hits the nail on the head:

If you wanted to calculate nature (even a relatively small molecule or a few atoms) completely with all interactions exactly on a conventional computer („classical computer“), you would need a computer larger than the universe itself, or needing more storage locations (bits) than there are atoms in the known universe.

The reason for this is quantum mechanics: atoms do not simply exist in a clear state, but in countless superimposed probabilities that influence each other. The computational complexity explodes gigantically (exponential growth).

This exact reason was why Feynman invented the idea of the quantum computer: to understand nature, you have to build a computer that operates according to the same quantum rules as nature itself—you cannot simply „force“ them into a normal computer.

YouTube: „Feynman Predicted Quantum Computers“

This short video clearly explains why Richard Feynman realized that conventional computers will never be sufficient to calculate the complex nature of atoms.

User: Why do I furrow my brow at that sentence and immediately think, is he stupid? No, that’s impossible. He says A and then he says, to do A after all, I need B. But there is always only A, or isn’t there? But how does the quantum computer work according to the nature code then?

Gemini: You are furrowing your brow quite rightly because at first glance this sounds like an absurd logical circular argument: „To calculate nature, I need a computer as big as nature—so I can never calculate it.“

That sounds like: „To measure a mountain, I have to build a second mountain of the exact same size.“ Completely pointless, right?

But Feynman meant something more sophisticated. Let’s untangle this—and then look at how the quantum computer cracks this supposed contradiction.

Part 1: Why the classical computer fails at nature (The „A and B“ problem)

You are completely right: if you try to put nature (which consists of atoms) into a conventional computer (a laptop, a smartphone, a supercomputer), you chase your tail.

Your thought: There is always only A (nature). Why would I want to rebuild A with a gigantic artificial B?

That is precisely the point! A classical computer works with zeros and ones (bits). If it is to calculate a molecule with, say, 300 electrons precisely, it must store all states of these electrons in bits. The number of bits required is $2^{300}$—which is a number with a 1 and about 90 zeros behind it.

That is more bits than there are atoms in the entire visible universe (which is „only“ about $10^{80}$ atoms).

The conclusion: A classical computer will never be enough to calculate nature. It is like trying to pour the entire ocean into a tiny bucket.

Part 2: How does a quantum computer work „according to the nature code“?

Now comes the trick of why a quantum computer solves the problem without being as big as the universe: it does not build an artificial model of nature; it is nature itself.

A normal computer simulates nature mathematically (like a painter painting an apple on a canvas). A quantum computer, on the other hand, uses the exact same quantum rules that real atoms play by.

Qubits instead of bits: Instead of rigid zeros and ones, a quantum computer uses so-called qubits. Thanks to quantum mechanics, these can be in a superposition—they are simultaneously 0 and 1 (just like an electron only decides where it is when you measure it).

Entanglement: Quantum particles can be „entangled“ with each other. If one changes, the other changes immediately, no matter how far away. As a result, the computing power of a quantum computer does not grow additively (1 + 1 = 2), but exponentially. Each added qubit doubles the computing power.

The principle: Instead of stubbornly calculating all steps sequentially (like a classical computer), a quantum computer „swims“ through all probabilities simultaneously.

Back to your image:

You don’t build a computer as big as the universe to calculate nature. Instead, you take a few tiny building blocks of nature (e.g., trapped ions or superconducting circuits) and force them to behave exactly like the molecule you want to study.

So you use one piece of nature to understand another piece of nature. It’s like not painting the apple, but taking a real apple and using it as a magnifying glass.

Does that sound more logical, or does something inside you still resist this „magic trick“ of quantum mechanics?

User: Ah, I understand. So the computer can calculate more than nature because it „knows“ or simulates so many at once (probability)? Then it really is damn dangerous!