661 réponses à ce sujet

[Almostfaceman]

Tleining wrote...

@ Almostfaceman
why? We do know, that the Earth is outside of Alliance control, so all the Scientists we see either work for the Alliance (off-earth) or for one of the nations (sometimes on-earth).
We know that many achievements came from the Prothean ruins on mars (off-earth), and that some Prothean artifacts/Data-Discs are being sent to earth for further study.
To me, it makes sense that at least 50% of the Scientists work where the actual material is (off-earth). And those who study the Artifacts in Labs might have those where new artifacts are easily accessible (space stations). Like i said, personally 70% seems more likely, but without a dev-post saying otherwise, 95% is a possiblilty at least.

This whole thread is about theories we came up with (pulled out of nowhere), so i don't really see the problem.

No, this isn't about theories pulled out of nowhere. To quote a figure, you have to have codex entries.  Otherwise they have no basis in Mass Effect universe reality. And we do not know that Earth is outside Alliance control.  Earth governments founded the Alliance and are closely affiliated with the Alliance - per the codex.  The Earth governments cede their sovereignty to the Alliance in all matters galactic - per the codex.  None of this infers that there has been a massive scientific migration.  That most of humanity resides on Earth (per the codex) infers that the vast majority of scientific brain power still resides on Earth.  Now, what exactly in the story or in the codex leads you to believe that 95% or even 50% of scientists have migrated away from Earth?

Modifié par Almostfaceman, 06 avril 2011 - 04:48 .

[Rekkampum]

jon1991 wrote...

That would be an epic potential ending, so no, I wouldn't be pissed. What I WOULD be pissed off about is if you could NEVER save the Earth no matter what you do, or how many correct choices you've made.

I would love it if earth gets obliterated. It would take a huge blow to us, sure, but I don't think it would mean humans are endangered though, since there are plenty of colonies elsewhere.

[jamesp81]

Tleining wrote...

@ Arcian & Almostfaceman
you know, instead of accusing people of making stuff up, how i about supporting that with actual proof/quotes. If you know that he's wrong, just prove it to him.
Personally, i think 95% is a bit too high, i think it's more like 60-70%. But i haven't seen any official numbers on it. And 95 is stil possible.

Bekenstein is listed as being one of the Alliance's oldest, most populous colonies.  It's population is 5.4 million.  Eden Prime is of similar age and has a population of 3.7 million.  Terra Nova is also in this group and boasts a population of 4.4 million.  Terra Nova was the second colony established by humanity outside the solar system.

The three most populous colony worlds of the Alliance have a combined population of 13.5 million.  That's about 0.12% of the population of Earth.  These are the Alliance's largest, oldest, wealthiest colonies and they are NOTHING compared to Earth's wealth and population, not yet anyway.

[jamesp81]

Rekkampum wrote...

jon1991 wrote...

That would be an epic potential ending, so no, I wouldn't be pissed. What I WOULD be pissed off about is if you could NEVER save the Earth no matter what you do, or how many correct choices you've made.

I would love it if earth gets obliterated. It would take a huge blow to us, sure, but I don't think it would mean humans are endangered though, since there are plenty of colonies elsewhere.

This has been covered upthread.  Destruction of Earth at this juncture means the END of humanity as a galactic player.

[Whatever42]

Tleining wrote...

@ Arcian & Almostfaceman
you know, instead of accusing people of making stuff up, how i about supporting that with actual proof/quotes. If you know that he's wrong, just prove it to him.
Personally, i think 95% is a bit too high, i think it's more like 60-70%. But i haven't seen any official numbers on it. And 95 is stil possible.

I claim 99% of scientists are on Earth. Prove me wrong.

Modifié par Whatever666343431431654324, 06 avril 2011 - 04:49 .

[Tleining]

@ Almostfaceman
"That most of humanity resides on Earth (per the codex) infers that the vast majority of scientific brain power still resides on Earth."
*lol* that, right there, is a theory!!! Based on the "fact", that 95% of humanity are on earth, your theory is, that most of the brain power is their as well. To me, the fact that human achievements are based on prothean technology, means that most of humanitys brain power (at least in that field) should be based off-world, researching that technology.

Codex Entry Alliance: "The Systems Alliance is an independent supranational government representing the interests of humanity as a whole. The Alliance is responsible for the governance and defense of all extra-solar colonies and stations."
The Nations on earth govern themselves.

@ Whatever
no, why should i? If that's your theory, fine. It would be nice if you could elaborate a bit, why are they there and not off-world. As it is, you just made a statement, maybe with a theory behind it. Great, so what?

We don't have prove either way, so neither is automatically true. Treating others here with respect should still be possible, don't you think?

Modifié par Tleining, 06 avril 2011 - 04:56 .

[Almostfaceman]

Tleining wrote...

@ Almostfaceman
"That most of humanity resides on Earth (per the codex) infers that the vast majority of scientific brain power still resides on Earth."
*lol* that, right there, is a theory!!! Based on the "fact", that 95% of humanity are on earth, your theory is, that most of the brain power is their as well. To me, the fact that human achievements are based on prothean technology, means that most of humanitys brain power (at least in that field) should be based off-world, researching that technology.

Codex Entry Alliance: "The Systems Alliance is an independent supranational government representing the interests of humanity as a whole. The Alliance is responsible for the governance and defense of all extra-solar colonies and stations."
The Nations on earth govern themselves.

You didn't answer my question - what supports this "60-70"% of scientists being off-world?

That more than 95% of human population is on Earth and infers that the majority of scientists are on Earth is a theory based on something - not on nothing - which is what you originally said.  It is a sound theory that requires something more than Prothean ruins to disprove - now what in the story or codex can you base your theory on?

Yes, it's an independent government, that still has close - super close - ties to Earth.  I'm not sure why this concept is difficult for some people.  The Alliance is so closely tied (or affiliated) to Earth, that the Earth governments have ceded their sovereignty to it in all matters galactic. This is an extemely close and harmonious relationship based on this fact.  Can you point to anything that implies that the Alliance has seriously distanced itself from Earth?  I say no.  

[Nashiktal]

Size=/=number of scientists. So both of your arguments are flawed.

I WIN!

[Ice Cold J]

I'd be pissed if I were the only human left, but, if The Reapers are defeated, I won't care AS much.

It'd be KINDA cool if humanity was greatly reduced in number to save the galaxy. Still, I'm hoping to get as many people out alive as I can.

[Tleining]

@ Almostfaceman
yes i did answer your question. Scientific achievements come from researching Prothean artifacts. Prothean artifacts are found off-world. Based on that, my theory is that half of the scientists are where the Ruins are (Mars and so on). The rest either works in labs on earth or on space stations. If that's split evenly, 75% are off-world.
We know that Binary Helix and Exo-Geni do research on Noveria/Feros. So other research is done off-world as well.

Feel free to disagree with my theory, but just saying "that's not enough" does not make it so. And i'm not trying to prove your theory wrong, it's a nice theory, i like it. I just don't want you, or anyone else, telling me that this theory is better, and therefore right. Making every other theory wrong.

uh, i don't need to find prove that earth and Alliance have distanced themselves from each other. People who work for the Alliance are in the military, so they will go where they are told to go. And that won't be earth. So the Scientists in the Alliance will probably not be working on earth.

[Nashiktal]

I wonder how many scientists are working on collaboration projects with other races?

[Dean_the_Young]

Nashiktal wrote...

Size=/=number of scientists. So both of your arguments are flawed.

I WIN!

It's not a linear relationship (1:1 ratio), but there is a decided correlation between the size of a population and the number of specialists it can and would house.

To dismiss such a trend, dominant reasons why they should not hold are required. The burden of proof is one those who work against the norm: in this case, why most of Humanity's scientists should not be based on Earth and it's many established research centers, universities, and places of industry.

[CulturalGeekGirl]

Saphra Deden wrote...

CulturalGeekGirl wrote...

What if the only way to win against the Reapers is to put 5 billion humans into goo vats, and make us a couple of human reapers... ones outside of Reaper control? Would you do that? If you're truly machiavellian, truly Renegade, then the answer is YES, of course you would.

But then there's a problem: what if you could have won without making yourself a goo-reaper, but you made a goo reaper anyway? Now half of humanity is a monster, and the other half is a different kind of monster.  By going further than you have to, you lose in a different way. The key, then, is to determine exactly how far you have to go to win, and go only that far. If the only way to win is to abandon earth and nuke the site from orbit... then do that. If there's another way to win, don't nuke earth from orbit. Sometimes there is another way to be sure.

Better to have it and not need it than to need it and not have it.

And you've revealed the inherent weakness of your style of Renegade decision-making right here: you are willing to murder 5 billion humans in order to make a weapon, whether or not you have any reason to believe it is necessary. And what if the goo reapers took 7 billion humans to make? Or 10? Where do you stop?

What if it turns out the Reapers would only kill 1 billion humans before we'd manage to chase them off or stop them? You, Saphra Deden, have murdered 4 billion humans for no reason other than "just to be safe."  You have turned us into a reviled monster race for no reason, when taking a subtler tactical stance would work better.  That's the kind of Russian Roulette I'm talking about, and you're the one who wants to play the game.

I believe that turning humanity into a race known as power-hungry monsters who feed their own young into machines of pain and horror is a massive, long term risk worse than anything else we could do. You're willing to be ok with a 90% chance that we'll be hated and reviled for our crimes to give us a 5% higher chance of winning. But what if we were already going to win? Then you've made us a hated race for no reason at all, save your own hubris.

I used to not want to see earth destroyed. Now I think it would be interesting, narratively, if one of the Renegade decisions is whether or not to feed ten million humans into one of those goo vats, and the resulting monster ends up rendering Earth uninhabitable. I don't think Bioware would go that far... too bad for Saphra.

Modifié par CulturalGeekGirl, 06 avril 2011 - 05:35 .

[Almostfaceman]

Tleining wrote...

@ Almostfaceman
yes i did answer your question. Scientific achievements come from researching Prothean artifacts. Prothean artifacts are found off-world. Based on that, my theory is that half of the scientists are where the Ruins are (Mars and so on). The rest either works in labs on earth or on space stations. If that's split evenly, 75% are off-world.
We know that Binary Helix and Exo-Geni do research on Noveria/Feros. So other research is done off-world as well.

Feel free to disagree with my theory, but just saying "that's not enough" does not make it so. And i'm not trying to prove your theory wrong, it's a nice theory, i like it. I just don't want you, or anyone else, telling me that this theory is better, and therefore right. Making every other theory wrong.

uh, i don't need to find prove that earth and Alliance have distanced themselves from each other. People who work for the Alliance are in the military, so they will go where they are told to go. And that won't be earth. So the Scientists in the Alliance will probably not be working on earth.

As exhibited in various places in the game, Earth is "home base".  Exogeni for instance is based on Earth, and it's starting up human colonies and scientific research - but this is still a struggling enterprise.  Feros is one example of success (if you save it) and It's not even self-sufficient yet when we get there and that doesn't include the geth attack.  We explore in Mass Effect 1 and what do we see?  Small outposts - some scientific.  These scientific outposts report to a larger concern - and if it's human - it's based on Earth.  It would be logical to presume that the main scientific facilites are on Earth and that Earth sends out small groups to do research, and bring that research back to Earth to compile.  Earth is where the majority of scientists are - it's simply the most cost-efficient method.   and logical method.  Humanity is still expanding and still based on Earth.  Humans discover a prothean beacon on Eden Prime - does it stay there?  No, the scientists at Eden Prime are not set up for it to be be studied like it should be studied.  Could it be moved to Earth?  Of course - this is where Eden Prime gets a large part of its resources.  But it's not moved to Earth because Earth wants to show it will share the discovery - so the plan is to move it to the Citadel.

Earth is still the heart of humanity.  Scientists for the most part are going to stay there - if not for simple logistical reasons (it's expensive to ship groups of humans out into space) but also for societal reasons like "I don't want to leave my family I want to stay on Earth".

This isn't an effort to prove somebody "wrong" it's looking at the mass effect universe and making logical assumptions based on what we're told.

Modifié par Almostfaceman, 06 avril 2011 - 05:37 .

[Tleining]

Dean_the_Young wrote...

Nashiktal wrote...

Size=/=number of scientists. So both of your arguments are flawed.

I WIN!

It's not a linear relationship (1:1 ratio), but there is a decided correlation between the size of a population and the number of specialists it can and would house.

To dismiss such a trend, dominant reasons why they should not hold are required. The burden of proof is one those who work against the norm: in this case, why most of Humanity's scientists should not be based on Earth and it's many established research centers, universities, and places of industry.

i've never heard of that, mind giving a link? It's hard to dismiss a trend without knowing what that trend is actually saying

[Rekkampum]

jamesp81 wrote...

Rekkampum wrote...

jon1991 wrote...

That would be an epic potential ending, so no, I wouldn't be pissed. What I WOULD be pissed off about is if you could NEVER save the Earth no matter what you do, or how many correct choices you've made.

I would love it if earth gets obliterated. It would take a huge blow to us, sure, but I don't think it would mean humans are endangered though, since there are plenty of colonies elsewhere.

This has been covered upthread.  Destruction of Earth at this juncture means the END of humanity as a galactic player.

Well, that's kinda narrow then. While the Quarians lack a homeworld, their Migrant Fleet is still an impressive military force. Humanity isn't a static society like the other ME races, so while we would ostensibly receive a serious blow to our galactic strength, our need to innovate to survive would undoubtedly result in advances that allow us to compensate for this.

[Nicodemus]

I wouldn't mind what the OP suggests. In fact it would make more sense, Earth burns but is held up as a rallying cry for the rest of the Galaxy.

I'd like it even more if Udina is on Earth as it all burns around him.

[jamesp81]

Rekkampum wrote...

jamesp81 wrote...

Rekkampum wrote...

jon1991 wrote...

That would be an epic potential ending, so no, I wouldn't be pissed. What I WOULD be pissed off about is if you could NEVER save the Earth no matter what you do, or how many correct choices you've made.

I would love it if earth gets obliterated. It would take a huge blow to us, sure, but I don't think it would mean humans are endangered though, since there are plenty of colonies elsewhere.

This has been covered upthread.  Destruction of Earth at this juncture means the END of humanity as a galactic player.

Well, that's kinda narrow then. While the Quarians lack a homeworld, their Migrant Fleet is still an impressive military force. Humanity isn't a static society like the other ME races, so while we would ostensibly receive a serious blow to our galactic strength, our need to innovate to survive would undoubtedly result in advances that allow us to compensate for this.

The Quarians live a hand to mouth existence in abject poverty.  The majority of the Migrant Fleet is tramp freighters and whatever third-hand ships the Quarians could beg, borrow, or buy.  It is not a military force.  It's a defensive huddle that shelters what little remains of their people.

As I mentioned previously, the combined populations of humanity's very largest, oldest, and wealthiest colonies amount to considerably less than 1% of the human population.  Humanity cannot survive 98% or more of their race being killed and still remain a galactic power.  IT IS NOT POSSIBLE.  If Earth is destroyed, humanity will be damned lucky if they end up like the Quarians.  The most likely end that results from losing Earth is remaining human colonials are enslaved by the various Terminus systems thugs.

[Tleining]

@ Almostfaceman
were we ever told where Exo-Geni-HQ is located? It's possible that i missed something obvious (again), but i really can't remember.
However, the Cost-Efficiency is kinda what makes me think Scientists won't be on Earth. Why transport all the artifacts/people to earth, that's one more Relay you have to use. Instead base your Company on Arcturus Station or Elysium, and you cut down the costs. Sure, there have to be facilities on Earth to find new Colonists, but the rest would be somewhere else.

Also, in my experience, people, especially highly qualified specialists, go to where the best work/freedom-at-work is, and their families tag along. If i would have to choose between working on Earth or taking my Family to a beautiful colony like Terra Nova/Eden Prime, i would choose the colony.

[Almostfaceman]

Tleining wrote...

@ Almostfaceman
were we ever told where Exo-Geni-HQ is located? It's possible that i missed something obvious (again), but i really can't remember.
However, the Cost-Efficiency is kinda what makes me think Scientists won't be on Earth. Why transport all the artifacts/people to earth, that's one more Relay you have to use. Instead base your Company on Arcturus Station or Elysium, and you cut down the costs. Sure, there have to be facilities on Earth to find new Colonists, but the rest would be somewhere else.

Also, in my experience, people, especially highly qualified specialists, go to where the best work/freedom-at-work is, and their families tag along. If i would have to choose between working on Earth or taking my Family to a beautiful colony like Terra Nova/Eden Prime, i would choose the colony.

Exogeni being based on earth is mentioned in the conversations you have with the person from Feros (Shiala or a human if you killed Shiala) when she says that the Exogeni scientists left with what they could of the Thorian and took it back to Earth.

[Zulu_DFA]

jamesp81 wrote...

The colonies physically cannot provide the manpower needed to staff an Army and a Navy.  They don't have that many people.

Then it's a good time to make an army of clones.

jamesp81 wrote...

Those resources are being developed by Earth-based corporations (several mentions of these are made throughout both games, especially ME1) and operated by people trained on Earth.  The colonies do not have enough people with the right talents to do all this work, and this is after they're trained.

Most of the management work is done by computers ALREADY in real world. People are needed mostly for decision making and profit sharing.

jamesp81 wrote...

And, by the way, who is training them?  Since most of humanity's knowledge and educational institutions are on earth, losing Earth means losing most of the expertise to do this sort of stuff.

Most of the knowledge and educational institutions are there on the extranet. And the Arcturus Station. And Jon Grisson Academy. And expertise comes not the least from the experience, and over the last 30 years the Alliance has accumulated plenty of it in the colonies.

There is this thing with space colonization: it is good for survival. Namely, as long as Humanity resides only in its "craddle", it's like having all your eggs in one basket. One cataclysmic even cand destroy it. But as soon as space colonization becomes available, it only makes sense to put the most important "eggs" to as many "baskets" as possible, and as soon as possible. So it stands to reason that the Alliance has been deliberatlely carrying out this policy, and in just thirty years it became self-sufficient even without Earth.

Modifié par Zulu_DFA, 06 avril 2011 - 06:17 .

[CulturalGeekGirl]

jamesp81 wrote...

Rekkampum wrote...

jon1991 wrote...

That would be an epic potential ending, so no, I wouldn't be pissed. What I WOULD be pissed off about is if you could NEVER save the Earth no matter what you do, or how many correct choices you've made.

I would love it if earth gets obliterated. It would take a huge blow to us, sure, but I don't think it would mean humans are endangered though, since there are plenty of colonies elsewhere.

This has been covered upthread.  Destruction of Earth at this juncture means the END of humanity as a galactic player.

I'm not willing to give you this. (and bear in mind I don't think Earth will be destroyed... unless you screw up really, really badly. I am interested in seeing it as a "bad ending" but hope it's not too impossible to avoid said bad ending.)

Can we agree that it would seriously screw us over power-wise, and cripple us for a few centuries, but probably wouldn't end our potential forever?

I haven't seen you address one of my central points regarding an earthless, survivor humanity: war hero status (I scanned back to last night, my apologies if I missed it.) We're the only government who saw the Reapers coming, and we took a bullet for the rest of the Galaxy. The reverence for the Krogan after the Rachni wars, until they squandered their good-will, shows a galactic government that loves its heroes. They were given dozens of chances to make peace... an almost outrageous amount of effort was put foreword to try to avoid having to kill them all. The Genophage is, in many ways, proof of that.

If Earth was destroyed, this is how I'd see things going.

Earth is destroyed, but humanity makes a huge dent in the Reaper fleet. A few Reapers have been attacking other races, so they know that the Reapers were a threat to everyone. Humanity is seen as heroes, so they're allowed to keep their seat on the council, largely symbolically, despite their population that is now only in the hundreds of millions. Kicking a race off the council just seems like a dick move, if that race just took a bullet for your galaxy.  It also sets a dangerous precedent - don't like a council race? Destroy their homeworld and they'll get kicked off the council! 

Humanity is given a few more garden worlds than they would typically be given, in recognition of their "service." We focus on breeding, cloning, tube-babies, whatever it takes to get our population back in the billions. As our population grows, if we run out of garden worlds in council space, we start taking long-haul ships to fringe worlds. Nobody else is going to want this garden world that is four months travel from the closest Mass Relay, but all we want is a place to farm and breed.

There are a lot of worlds out there that are perfectly habitable, but strategically unimportant - the resources required to get to these worlds makes quick slaver runs on them unprofitable, but once you're there and have a seed colony set up, you can skimp on defenses and just not leave. It also helps if only the alliance government knows the locations of these worlds, which wouldn't be too hard to pull off. Some of these "island" colonies may be lost or raided occasionally, but those risks don't outweigh the benefits of a relatively isolated place to just gather your resources.

In ten generations or so, about 200-400 years, we might have a significant population, especially if the human norm becomes families of 4-6 kids. We're close enough to history to understand how to work that, and humans are well-suited and nostalgic about their agrarian past. Becoming the "farmers of the universe" isn't glorious, but it's a relevant living, and it lets us "peacefully" build our numbers again without looking threatening.

600 years later, our seat on the council is starting to look a lot less "symbolic," and we're a major player in the Galaxy again.

So yeah - if Earth is gone, we'll be pretty weakened for a few hundred years. But we're resilient and resourceful and we breed like rabbits. I think we'd be down, but not out.

[Almostfaceman]

Tleining wrote...

@ Almostfaceman
were we ever told where Exo-Geni-HQ is located? It's possible that i missed something obvious (again), but i really can't remember.
However, the Cost-Efficiency is kinda what makes me think Scientists won't be on Earth. Why transport all the artifacts/people to earth, that's one more Relay you have to use. Instead base your Company on Arcturus Station or Elysium, and you cut down the costs. Sure, there have to be facilities on Earth to find new Colonists, but the rest would be somewhere else.

Also, in my experience, people, especially highly qualified specialists, go to where the best work/freedom-at-work is, and their families tag along. If i would have to choose between working on Earth or taking my Family to a beautiful colony like Terra Nova/Eden Prime, i would choose the colony.

Cost isn't based on Relay usage - it's based on setting up facilites, food, housing, logistics.  Since the home base is Earth with all the already established facilities and communities that are also established to maintain those communities - cost efficiency goes down when you leave Earth.

The work, is on Earth.  They send small teams of scientists out, but it would be too expensive - and insecure - to set up small cities around those scientific teams.  It totally makes sense for the risk takers to volunteer - then the company picks those risk takers it can afford - and then those risk takers study and send back their findings to earth.  Earth is a secure location where the scientific community is based, and thus new discoveries can't be stolen as easily as if, say, they were left on Feros.

Based on the oldest colonies figures (posted in this thread) - less than 1 percent of humans population is out in space in colonies.  If only 2% of humanity is made up of scientists, that means the vast majority of scientists are on Earth.

[RogueWriter3201]

 There have been some fantastic, and frankly bewildering and disturbing, ideas in this regard as to how Earth might not come out of the Reaper Invasion even relatively unscarred. However, as to it being destroyed ala Vulcan in the Star Trek reboot? No. And I’m not saying there will not be a *possible* end scenario for something like this in ME3. In ME2 there was an option to have everyone die including the non-essential personnel onboard the Normandy, so BioWare isn’t afraid to give you the Super Tragedy ending. However, at their core, that’s just not BioWare’s style. 

When they make a Heroic adventure (and no one better kid themselves here, Mass Effect *is* a Heroic Adventure) the biggest, most detailed story branching endings will always be the Hero Ending, e.g. Wayne’s World “Super Mega Happy Ending”…or something close to it. So, basically, Earth getting wiped out? Not going to happen, at least unless you really *really* try to go down that road for whatever twisted reason you might have. 

In my eyes, the scenario that seems most likely is that, with Shepard bringing damn near the Entire Galaxy to save Earth from the Reapers, the last vestiges of mistrust left over from the First Contact War, along with Humanity’s personal viewpoint of being “We Iz Super Mega Awesome Leetz!” will dissolve as the Galaxy helps Humanity repair what damage was done, opening Earth to a new Era of involvement and progress with not just the Citadel Races but the larger galactic community as opposed to always trying to do it‘s own thing.

Groups like Terra Firma and, most importantly, Cerberus, will find themselves with little if any support for a Sole-Human agenda. Bottom line, Shepard’s climatic finale will almost certainly be a positive ending, so I don’t even have to entertain a notion like the one introduced by the OP. Still, as there are some who go for Epic Shakespearean Tragedy in their stories, it not a completely invalid question.

Modifié par glenboy24, 06 avril 2011 - 06:21 .