283 réponses à ce sujet

[burncykle]

William Adama wrote...

I never really understood the motive that went behind the mass genocides the Reapers periodically committed for the sole purpose of procreation... one would think that hyper advanced intelligences would be FAR more moral than those of smaller minds.

For example, human intelligence has allowed for empathy to be experienced which led to more pro social behaviours given to not only members of our own race but to members of other species as well.


They just seem too... Terminator to me. And don't respond by saying that Reapers are machines, they are ORGANICS mixed with technology so they infact should experience organic sentience albeit on a higher level.

Discuss.

Such as...........the human-caused extinction of hundreds of species, slavery, civil war, multiple world wars, genocide of entire races several times, the knowing destruction of our own planet, creation of life ending weapons, killing hundreds or thousands of innocent just to "send a message", and the killing of millions upon millions of people over whose rules they get to follow IF they survive?

1) Humans are a horrible example of ANY kind of empathy for life.

2) Intelligence does not equal sympathy for other life.

3) In fact, history shows that the most advanced civilizations we know of have also been the most destructive.

Modifié par burncykle, 15 mai 2010 - 12:46 .

[KitsuneRommel]

Tirigon wrote...

From our perspecitve that is so. But as Sovereign says in ME1: The reapers see organic life as a mistake that must be corrected. So from their perspective humans ARE indeed worthless.

As you said: They can BELIEVE that.

Doesn´t make it true.

Works for Reapers too really.

1) Humans are a horrible example of ANY kind of empathy for life.

2)
Intelligence does not equal sympathy for other life.

3) In fact,
history shows that the most advanced civilizations we know of have also
been the most destructive.

No we are not. Single persons/groups doing atrocious deeds doesn't mean the entire humanity is like that. We haven't seen any dissenting Reapers but that doesn't mean they don't exist. Maybe most of them don't agree with the genocide some of them are doing.

Modifié par KitsuneRommel, 15 mai 2010 - 03:10 .

[Noble 1]

William Adama wrote...

Pyromanen wrote...

Who says the reapers were not built and programmed to do this cycle of endless death and destruction by some truely twisted evil beings of über technology?

Again, if organics built and programmed the Reapers to do this... they must also be vastly intelligent beings as well.

And they should be able to empathize.

High Intelligence=/=High Empathy and Compassion.

You're thinking under the assumption that /\\Intelligence=/\\Empathy, which isn't even always true of humans!  What makes it so certain that a hyper-advance machine race such as the reapers would think even remotely the same way as (again, not all, only some) humans.  

Their minds are entirely different from ours.  Each is like a hive-mind intelligence, and can think millions of times faster than we can, and can comprehend the universe in ways we cannot imagine, so the assumption that they feel empathy as we do (Not even all humans do!) is an asinine one to make.

[Wildecker]

William Adama wrote...

Interesting that God tells them also not to murder or judge others... Jihad followers are not Muslims, they are fanatics that give religion a bad name. They do not follow the letter of the koran, they invent their own interpretations of it.

Ah. The koran does not exactly invite interpretation by non-theologists. However, you can always turn to an imam of your choice and ask him for answers. And then ... depending on your choice ... he may tell you that God demands you to do this or that.

Your starting point can be the simple question "The Koran tells me not to lie or steal. Does this apply only to muslims or am I also forbidden to lie to or steal from infidels?" To which your imam may respond that theft and lies are bad, independent of the target. So, your answer is NO.
BUT then he may just as well go on and explain that taking the spoils of war and deception are a perfectly legal part of warfare, and that any civilian out there who does support his government by paying taxes and electing politicians thereby becomes a cog in the great western war machine intent on eradicating the strife for faith, making him or her a combatant and therefore a legitimate target.  Turning your answer into YES, because it's no longer theft or lies but warfare. Not a simple YES, either - you practically owe it to God to steal from and lie to the infidels now.

Point: Religion - and morale - are not so simple.

Question: is killing people who were born physically and/or mentally handicapped good or bad?
Answer: Killing is bad, on the individual scale. Take a few steps back, see "the large picture" as some people demand, and killing the handicapped keeps the gene pool clean and preserves resources that the healthy members of your nation may need. So put a nice label on it - "eu-thanasia" means "the good death" - and suddenly you're no longer a monster but a visionary?

Wipe out the dominant race of the galaxy for no good reason? BAD. Especially if you're one of them.
Wipe out the dominant race of the galaxy before it can exterminate all competition, either physically or by drowning all others in its technologically superior culture? Errh ... not exactly nice, but acceptable on grounds of preserving variety?

Modifié par Wildecker, 15 mai 2010 - 06:36 .

[cruc1al]

Wildecker wrote...

Question: is killing people who were born physically and/or mentally handicapped good or bad?
Answer: Killing is bad, on the individual scale. Take a few steps back, see "the large picture" as some people demand, and killing the handicapped keeps the gene pool clean and preserves resources that the healthy members of your nation may need. So put a nice label on it - "eu-thanasia" means "the good death" - and suddenly you're no longer a monster but a visionary?

You make it sound like euthanasia means killing physically or mentally handicapped people without their consent just to preserve resources. Yeah, right. It must be carefully evaluated whether euthanasia is what the person would want, if you can't directly ask him/her. It's always done to minimise needless suffering, not to "cleanse the gene pool" or "preserve resources".

[Wildecker]

cruc1al wrote...

You make it sound like euthanasia means killing physically or mentally handicapped people without their consent just to preserve resources. Yeah, right. It must be carefully evaluated whether euthanasia is what the person would want, if you can't directly ask him/her. It's always done to minimise needless suffering, not to "cleanse the gene pool" or "preserve resources".

Not quite. There was a time when euthanasia was performed ... no, no nice talk anymore. There was a time when the mentally ill and handicapped were placed inside a bus that had its exhaust pipes redirected into the interior, and then driven around until they were all dead from carbon monoxide. All based on "If they could still think, they'd agree it's for the best of everyone involved."
At the very least it makes trained doctors and nurses available to tend to wounded soldiers instead of watching over man-shaped vegetables ...
And sure enough, dead people don't feel pain. Suffering minimized.

Modifié par Wildecker, 15 mai 2010 - 11:30 .

[cruc1al]

Wildecker wrote...

cruc1al wrote...

You make it sound like euthanasia means killing physically or mentally handicapped people without their consent just to preserve resources. Yeah, right. It must be carefully evaluated whether euthanasia is what the person would want, if you can't directly ask him/her. It's always done to minimise needless suffering, not to "cleanse the gene pool" or "preserve resources".

Not quite. There was a time when euthanasia was performed ... no, no nice talk anymore. There was a time when the mentally ill and handicapped were placed inside a bus that had its exhaust pipes redirected into the interior, and then driven around until they were all dead from carbon monoxide. All based on "If they could still think, they'd agree it's for the best of everyone involved."
At the very least it makes trained doctors and nurses available to tend to wounded soldiers instead of watching over man-shaped vegetables ...
And sure enough, dead people don't feel pain. Suffering minimized.

Sorry, I don't agree with that definition of euthanasia. Sounds more like murder to me, thank you very much.

[FluxDeluxe]

Adriano87 wrote...
Eso I agree with Executions of Murderers and Talebans) ... I hate those guys who say No execution NOwhere ! that's nonsense (or better to say bull****!)

"Talebans" what about other terrorists or is it just muslims you racist.

Executions are abhorrent, a true life term for murderers is enough. Go back to watching god t.v

back on topic

Trying to judge the reapers morals is pointless, we don't know the full picture yet, we don't know their true motivation, i get the feeling it's going to be something a little deeper than galactic domination.

[Tirigon]

KitsuneRommel wrote...

Tirigon wrote...

From our perspecitve that is so. But as Sovereign says in ME1: The reapers see organic life as a mistake that must be corrected. So from their perspective humans ARE indeed worthless.

As you said: They can BELIEVE that.

Doesn´t make it true.

Works for Reapers too really.

Of course not.

The difference is that I brought this up with regards to religious fanatics. These are still humans, albeit awfully stupid ones.

Reapers, however, are not human but totally alien beings. From their perspective things can indeed be different.

[Tirigon]

cruc1al wrote...

Wildecker wrote...

Question: is killing people who were born physically and/or mentally handicapped good or bad?
Answer: Killing is bad, on the individual scale. Take a few steps back, see "the large picture" as some people demand, and killing the handicapped keeps the gene pool clean and preserves resources that the healthy members of your nation may need. So put a nice label on it - "eu-thanasia" means "the good death" - and suddenly you're no longer a monster but a visionary?

You make it sound like euthanasia means killing physically or mentally handicapped people without their consent just to preserve resources.

I suspect Wildecker referred to the n@zi´s "euthanasia"  programs which were in fact nothing else but a nice word for mass murders committed on physically or mentally handicapped.

Yeah, right. It must be carefully evaluated whether euthanasia is what
the person would want, if you can't directly ask him/her. It's always
done to minimise needless suffering, not to "cleanse the gene pool" or
"preserve resources".

If you can´t directly ask someone whether s/he wishes to die you may not kill him - except if it is made clear that this person wishes to die, for example by a testament that says s/he wishes not to live when in coma or sth like that.

[Tirigon]

FluxDeluxe wrote...

Adriano87 wrote...
Eso I agree with Executions of Murderers and Talebans) ... I hate those guys who say No execution NOwhere ! that's nonsense (or better to say bull****!)

"Talebans" what about other terrorists or is it just muslims you racist.

Executions are abhorrent, a true life term for murderers is enough. Go back to watching god t.v

Ah well let´s get a lockdown for offtopicness........

YOU WANTED IT!!!

I must say, I think Death sentence is merciful compared to prison for life, so unless someone really deserves years of pain it is better to execute murderers. It protects society from them, costs less money AND is less pain for the delinquent.

[cruc1al]

Tirigon wrote...

FluxDeluxe wrote...

Adriano87 wrote...
Eso I agree with Executions of Murderers and Talebans) ... I hate those guys who say No execution NOwhere ! that's nonsense (or better to say bull****!)

"Talebans" what about other terrorists or is it just muslims you racist.

Executions are abhorrent, a true life term for murderers is enough. Go back to watching god t.v

Ah well let´s get a lockdown for offtopicness........

YOU WANTED IT!!!

I must say, I think Death sentence is merciful compared to prison for life, so unless someone really deserves years of pain it is better to execute murderers. It protects society from them, costs less money AND is less pain for the delinquent.

Depends on how you treat prisoners.

[KitsuneRommel]

cruc1al wrote...

Tirigon wrote...

I must say, I think Death sentence is merciful compared to prison for life, so unless someone really deserves years of pain it is better to execute murderers. It protects society from them, costs less money AND is less pain for the delinquent.

Depends on how you treat prisoners.

Exacly. Not every country is like China or USA (not that they are comparable). Besides the ciminal system is fallible. It's a question of whether you prefer "it's better that 10 guilty men go free than 1 innocent be punished" or "it's better that 10 innocent men suffer than 1 guilty man escape".

[FlyingWalrus]

I agree with most of what William Adama has said.

However, I must note that if my girlfriend bit my head off after copulation as praying mantids do, that would probably be considered murder.

[2pac Shakur]

William Adama wrote...


That is why WW2 was so important to western society, it was a war for freedoms. Hitler tried to impose his doctrine on the world and everyone fought him for their right to choose.

lol godwin'd

And it was not a war of freedoms at all. It was a war between 3 political ideologies. Hitler never wanted the world, he wanted Europe to pay for Germany after the treaty of versailles

The soviet union pratically conscripted their entire western civilian population to zerg rush the Germans. Soviet soldiers never fought for freedom

[Tirigon]

Adriano87 wrote...

Yes 3 Ideologies; Democracy, Faschism & Communism.
My job is to found a new one to order this Anarchy.

Take anarchy. Best for everyone.

[burncykle]

KitsuneRommel wrote...

Tirigon wrote...

From our perspecitve that is so. But as Sovereign says in ME1: The reapers see organic life as a mistake that must be corrected. So from their perspective humans ARE indeed worthless.

As you said: They can BELIEVE that.

Doesn´t make it true.

Works for Reapers too really.

1) Humans are a horrible example of ANY kind of empathy for life.

2)
Intelligence does not equal sympathy for other life.

3) In fact,
history shows that the most advanced civilizations we know of have also
been the most destructive.

No we are not. Single persons/groups doing atrocious deeds doesn't mean the entire humanity is like that. We haven't seen any dissenting Reapers but that doesn't mean they don't exist. Maybe most of them don't agree with the genocide some of them are doing.

These are not isolated incidents by single persons/groups.  These are actions in which EVERY human race and country is guilty of.  A detailed study of Human history shows that those amoung our species that do not agree with these kinds of actions are actually a small minority amoung the total count of peoples throughout our species history.

We like to think much more highly of ourselves than historical facts dictate as our true nature.

[KitsuneRommel]

burncykle wrote...

These are not isolated incidents by single persons/groups.  These are actions in which EVERY human race and country is guilty of.  A detailed study of Human history shows that those amoung our species that do not agree with these kinds of actions are actually a small minority amoung the total count of peoples throughout our species history.

We like to think much more highly of ourselves than historical facts dictate as our true nature.

I'm sorry but I would REALLY love to see a study of that.