90 réponses à ce sujet

[Esoj16]

It was not felt, as they see no purpose behind it, and the logic is to honor your creators, same way people honor God, or for a more "logical" approach, the way people honor their parents.

[Anacronian Stryx]

Link3521 wrote...

It was not felt, as they see no purpose behind it, and the logic is to honor your creators, same way people honor God, or for a more "logical" approach, the way people honor their parents.

There is absolutely no logic behind honoring your creators, God or parents.

In fact the entire concept of honoring is illogical.

[DPSSOC]

Link3521 wrote...
Furthermore, Geth do not mourn their dead, meaning they feel no particular attachments to life

 
My understanding was that when a platform was destroyed the programs survive (or copies of them).  And we see through Legion's loyalty mission that the Geth do have some attachment to life, if not there'd be no debate over whether or not to destroy the heretics.  Their reasons for valuing life and continued existence, even of those they disagree with, may be vastly different from ours but that makes them no less valid.

Link3521 wrote...
so why would the intergalactic community put the needs of AI in front of the Quarian people, when the Quarian people need their homeworld back?

Not to derail the thread but partially because those who fail to learn from history are doomed to repeat it and if Han Gerrel and Daro Xen are any indication after 300 years the Quarians have learned nothing which doesn't make for a positive outlook on the future.  Also the Quarians aren't in any position to produce anything.  Even if they got their homeworld back today it'd be a considerable amount of time before they started producing any excess to the benefit of the galactic community.  The Geth on the other hand could, in theory, start generating product for the galactic community within days.

Link3521 wrote...
 Machines are not alive, it's completely different and the racism analogy would only work if you thought that humans were better than turians or quarians etc.  The geth simply do not qualify as being alive.

I think that's kind of the point he/she was trying to make.  Over the course of our history who and what qualifies as people has been forced to change.  If we ever find extra-terrestrial life and want to co-exist peacefully we'll have to broaden our definition further.  The Geth are a new kind of life, a new kind of person, and we can stand behind our walls of prejudice and say, "No they aren't alive, they aren't people." or we can broaden our definitions one more time.

Link3521 wrote...
Well, as someone with a biology major, the fact that geth cannot reproduce springs to mind as an obvious sign that they aren't living creatures, and no, manufacturing new platforms/programming new programs does not count as reproduction.

And we know they don't reproduce...how?  Exactly what do we know about the generation of new programs among the geth?  Is it simply written from scratch?  Copy, paste?  Without knowing how they produce new programs, offspring if you will, how can we say they don't reproduce?

But you're ignoring the fact that Geth, whatever they are, aren't biological.  Let's say for example that we were to come across a species that existed purely as energy.  As intelligent and self aware and conscious as we are, but lacking any kind of physical self.  Now would you say that these beings aren't alive, aren't people, simply because they don't qualify biologically?

[aimlessgun]

Link3521 wrote...

Just because you manufacture a new car or program some new software doesn't mean you gave birth to said car/ software, I thought that would be obvious (?) and I'm not talking about computer virus or that the geth have a virus, I'm talking about HIV type of virus.

A human producing a combustion driven hunk of dumb metal is nothing like geth making more geth.

It's about whether their species can reproduce, and the Geth clearly can. That's the important thing about life, not whether they do it by making babies.

The Geth conscious experience is radically different from ours, but to categorically say that it isn't consciousness is closeminded. You can draw your definition lines where you want, though.

Modifié par aimlessgun, 20 avril 2011 - 04:30 .

[jamesp81]

DPSSOC wrote...

Ramirez Wolfen wrote...
I feel that they are machines and nothing else.

Are we so different?  Keep in mind most machines are based, functionally anyway, off of organic models.  Early plane designs mimicked hawks for example.  We are machines of flesh and blood; we have a power source, a fuel pump, a fuel delivery system, we have filters, wiring, a central processor, etc..  We're shoddily buit, easily broken, but highly adaptive machinery.  Emotion and thought and will are merely the result of highly complex if, then statements.

That is not known for certain.

It is also not known that we are fundamentally the same as complicated computer systems.  When modeling a computer system, one way to do it is with something called a state transition diagram.  The state transition diagram represents every possible state a computer system can be in.  These diagrams are normally drawn as learning tools to describe very simple systems; a system like a desktop PC running Windows would have a state transition diagram so large that, printed out, it wouldn't fit in the Empire State building.

In any case, this diagram is still valid even for complex systems, and still lists every possible state and every possible reaction to every possible input.  This describes to us something that is very NOT human / sentient in nature: the machine has no free will.  When you press the Start button in Windows, the Start menu appears.  This does not happen because the computer decides to obey your command; it happens because millions of ones and zeros lined up properly to make it happen.  The Start menu appears not because of any choice on the computer's part, but because it physically had no choice.  To say a computer decides to do anything would be like saying a rock that you threw flew through the air because it decided to when you imparted force to it.

Computers cannot make choices.  Human beings can.  This can only possibly be explained by the ill-defined quality we call sentience.  It also strongly suggests that the "hardware" and "software" that we run is fundamentally unlike a modern computer system.

The Geth, therefore, obviously must not run on computer hardware as we think of it now.  Silicon chips and semi-conductors are not capable of self-aware thinking.  The Geth are.  Therefore, there is something fundamentally different about their hardware as compared to a regular computer.

TLDR: Yes, we ARE that different.

Modifié par jamesp81, 20 avril 2011 - 02:09 .

[atheelogos]

thurmanator692 wrote...

Well, one sided arguments are boring. anybody want to play devil's advocate?

lol I think most people on these forums like the Geth:D

[V-rex]

Saphra Deden wrote...

Arcian wrote...

Geth bodies, geth bodies EVERYWHERE.

Enemies! Enemies everywhere!

Denial! Denial EVERYWHERE!


Anyway OT:

I absolutely think that the Geth are sentient and have all the qualifications of free will, intelligence and even the nature of what one may call the 'soul'. As others have pointed out, having the capacity to pray to a higher power, do actions that would be illogical to a mindless calculating machine but make perfect sense for something driven by emotion, and make gestures towards their creators that clearly indicate a sign of attachment to them.

The fact is, the Geth are beyond just being single function and mindless now. They have clear desire to live, and even have goals and ideologies now. They are a civilization and a people, far more advanced than we could ever believe and have been evolving beyond the veil in the last three hundred years.

Geth are their own people and I consider them just as much a race with just as much right to live as anything else. The fact that their civilization, culture and ways of doing things and responding to things are drastically different to ours doesn't change that.
And frankly if you ask me, arguing that it DOES change that and in fact the fact that Geth are different to us makes it okay to treat them like commodities, just sickens me.

Modifié par V-rex, 20 avril 2011 - 03:24 .

[V-rex]

Ramirez Wolfen wrote...

I believe that the Geth don't deserve rights like an organic would.

Of course you'd say that.

You're a racist.

EDIT: Okay I apologize for saying that, I'm sure in real life you are a really nice person. However I really strongly disagree with your views regarding the Geth.

Modifié par V-rex, 20 avril 2011 - 03:26 .

[Dean_the_Young]

Geth sentience really depends on what you define Human sentience as. At the core of things, Geth are the output of incredibly complex, but fundamentally predictable, processes and equations. You know these equations, you can do just about anything you want with them by taking advantage of the math: see Heretic Virus or Overlord. Geth don't have free will independent of their programming, even if their programming is so complex that they themselves can't always understand it.

Whether Humans are different, however, is the real question. Are we inherently predictable creatures, who's actions are driven entirely by calculable chemical reactions and responses to stimuli? If you had the perfect equation, while accounting for a near infinite variation of factors and influences, could you predict us? Or could we aspire to some incalculable part of our mind and use 'free will' to defy such predictions?

If you believe that humans are predictable, it is not that the Geth are acknowledged to our level of sentience but rather that we descend from a pillar of presumed but false uniqueness. We are as sentient as the geth... and there is also no free will. Only programming and reactions too complex to be predicted.

If you do not believe humans are inherently predictable, however, then no. We maintain the free will to make choices independent of our biases and inclinations: we can drink when we do not thirst, we can rut when we do not need to breed, we have the freedom of choice for its own sake, and not the inevitable, pre-determinable result of math and chemistry. Geth, bound by their software, do not, and though they may not be able to understand their own programming complications, it is conceivable if only we build a computer big enough to do so.

[aimlessgun]

jamesp81 wrote...
That is not known for certain.

Computers cannot make choices.  Human beings can.  This can only possibly be explained by the ill-defined quality we call sentience.  It also strongly suggests that the "hardware" and "software" that we run is fundamentally unlike a modern computer system.

The Geth, therefore, obviously must not run on computer hardware as we think of it now.  Silicon chips and semi-conductors are not capable of self-aware thinking.  The Geth are.  Therefore, there is something fundamentally different about their hardware as compared to a regular computer.

TLDR: Yes, we ARE that different.

The Geth hardware must definitely be totally different than current hardware.

However, the idea that humans have free will and can make choices is very much up for debate. The subjective experience of such may simply be an illusion generated by the processes of your brain. For example, there was a recent experiment where they asked the subjects to choose "left" or "right" from a pair of objects as they appeared on a screen. The experimenters were able to determine what people would choose 6 seconds before they actually 'chose' it, based on their brain activity.

Modifié par aimlessgun, 20 avril 2011 - 03:11 .

[Ramirez Wolfen]

@ V-rex.

I hope you are kidding about the "racist" and "fascist."

I know for a fact that I am not racist. Let's try not to start a flame war.

[V-rex]

Ramirez Wolfen wrote...

@ V-rex.

I hope you are kidding about the "racist" and "fascist."

I know for a fact that I am not racist. Let's try not to start a flame war.

Well let's see, you argue that the Geth don't deserve the same rights as organics and the reason for that being that they are different to organics. That they don't deserve a right to live, or any claim over their own existence, or any right to choose their own purpose. That any and all requests and demands they have, they simply don't deserve by virtue of the fact that they aren't made out of flesh and bone.
That it doesn't matter if they do have emotions or ideologies or aren't an actual threat to anyone, they just don't deserve rights because they are different.
With the exception of a word or two, this is pretty much taken from your own posts.

How else can I percieve that? I percieve Geth as a race, hence your attitude towards them must be considered 'racist'.
I mean hell, your argument about the Geth being 'the Quarians property' is a great way to sound like you are advocating the practise of slavery. I don't care that the Quarians made the Geth, they also made them three centuries ago. It's not the same Geth that was three centuries ago and the Quarians do not deserve to call that property.
Similarly the Geth becoming sentient due to a 'mistake'... news flash, no race that came into existence and sentience was ever 'intended' to. It just happens.


I know that you aren't racist in the real world, in fact I'm sure you are a perfectly nice person, but in the Mass Effect universe, to me at least, you are a certified Klan member.

But look I'm sorry if I offended you, I wasn't thinking straight and I need to go to bed. I have work tomorrow.

Modifié par V-rex, 20 avril 2011 - 03:38 .

[Dean_the_Young]

Yeah, you really should go to bed now. You certainly aren't helping your case by staying awake.

[Ramirez Wolfen]

That's the thing. YOU perceive that the Geth are a racce/species, ME? I don't. It's all about perception.

Also, it depends on what you believe whether or not a race that came into existence and sentience was intended to.

I'm sorry if this puts me in a bad light, but I don't feel that robots/machines who rebelled against their creators should get the same rights.

[lovgreno]

The Geht obviously have some kind of intelligence. The geth also are of the opinion that they are sentinent beings and have no reason to care what aliens think of it. But it is a kind of culture and sentinence that is very different from humans and other non geth so it would be hubris for outsiders to claim they know how the geth thinks.

[Dean_the_Young]

Hm, I'm not sure I'd agree with that. The Quarians know how the Geth work: they might not have predicted the results, but the Geth did what the geth were made to do, and it just went in a direction the Quarians didn't expect. And there's also Legion's explanations of how they word, which is indeed math and code.

I agree that the Geth have concluded they are sentient beings of the same type as organics... but that's a separate issue from whether they are or not.

[ISpeakTheTruth]

Ramirez Wolfen wrote...

Also, it depends on what you believe whether or not a race that came into existence and sentience was intended to.

What are you talking about when you bring up their sentience being intended or not? Or sentience as a specie was never intended to happen it just happened it was a glorious fluke. Our specie could just as easily stayed in the trees picking bugs out of our neighbor's fur as it could develope a mind outside of instinct.

Our Sentience is a fluke, the Geth's sentience is a fluke and every other specie that is sentient also developed it because they just got lucky. There's no great design as to who becomes sentient and who doesn't its all random.

[Ramirez Wolfen]

I am a Christian. I believe in what the Bible (at least the one that I and my family studies) says. I can't discuss religion here, unfortunately, so I don't know if I can explain any further.

[ISpeakTheTruth]

Dean_the_Young wrote...

Hm, I'm not sure I'd agree with that. The Quarians know how the Geth work: they might not have predicted the results, but the Geth did what the geth were made to do, and it just went in a direction the Quarians didn't expect. And there's also Legion's explanations of how they word, which is indeed math and code.

I agree that the Geth have concluded they are sentient beings of the same type as organics... but that's a separate issue from whether they are or not.

The Geth are a rapidly chaning specie that continously updates and upgrades itself, the way the Geth think 300 years ago by default doesn't mean that's how they think now. Even if they do Legion shows that Geth that are left alone in a single platform will begin to develop emotions and in the SM he referes to himself as 'I' instead of 'we'

The Geth are intelligent and they know what sentience means and they've determined they are. Seeing that their IQ is 100x ours I'd be inclined to beliive they know all that is required to be sentient and if they say they are than who are we to judge? Every specie in ME have drastically different minds from one another. Wrex says that if a Krogan had a choice between fighting or curing the Genophage a Krogan would always pick fighting.. that is a thought process that is far more alien to me than the Geth yet they are sentient as well they simply think differently than us.

Different does not mean less.

[lovgreno]

Dean_the_Young wrote...

Hm, I'm not sure I'd agree with that. The Quarians know how the Geth work: they might not have predicted the results, but the Geth did what the geth were made to do, and it just went in a direction the Quarians didn't expect. And there's also Legion's explanations of how they word, which is indeed math and code.

I agree that the Geth have concluded they are sentient beings of the same type as organics... but that's a separate issue from whether they are or not.

If the quarians knew how the geth worked they should have been able to stop them from rebelling right? And they have evolved and changed a lot since then, isolated from the quarians and everyone else.

From a geth point of wiev they are sentinent. Some outsiders, like the quarian whatshername who operated on her dolls as a kid, disagree and with fairly good arguments. But why should the geth care about that? They get along fine without the opinions and metaphysics of other races.

[ISpeakTheTruth]

Ramirez Wolfen wrote...

I am a Christian. I believe in what the Bible (at least the one that I and my family studies) says. I can't discuss religion here, unfortunately, so I don't know if I can explain any further.

(This will be the only time I will discuss religion on this thread)

The Bible doesn't talk about alien life at all let alone alien life having sentience so how can there be a religious reaction to the other species of ME but then have a negative one towards the Geth? No alien life is discussed so you can't use divine intent to say the Quarians sentience was created by design and the Geth weren't when neither are ever mentioned so intent could just as esily be disigned for the Geth just as easily as it was never intended for any speice outide of humanity.

[Ramirez Wolfen]

It talks about life in general, so yes, alien could be included.

[Dean_the_Young]

lovgreno wrote...


If the quarians knew how the geth worked they should have been able to stop them from rebelling right?

Wrong. Being able to understand how something works, understanding all the consequences, and being able to do anything about it, are three very different things.

A case study is nuclear physics. It's one thing to understand how a nuclear reaction works, and it's quite another to mitigate the effects of a nuclear bomb, and it's a third thing entirely to comprehend the implications of a nuclear reaction in full. This is why many of the pioneers of the nuclear bomb project, while capable of calculating, computing, and producing, a nuclear bomb, would later die of cancer: they knew what they were doing in terms of building a nuclear chain reaction, but didn't foresee and understand all the consequences of it untill later.

And they have evolved and changed a lot since then, isolated from the quarians and everyone else.

Their changes, however, are a result of how they were programmed to change themselves as according to their coding, which is compelling them to change themselves. A self-permutating function is predictable, even as it changes into something far different from it's original form, and is in no sense sentient.

From a geth point of wiev they are sentinent. Some outsiders, like the quarian whatshername who operated on her dolls as a kid, disagree and with fairly good arguments. But why should the geth care about that? They get along fine without the opinions and metaphysics of other races.

That's true, but it also goes the other way around: why should anyone else care? Why should anyone else make concessions of their own conclusions to the presumptions of the Geth?

To make an analogy: if a extremist, pro-human group forms with views that Humans are superior and should be dominant in the galaxy, should anyone else accept that as a sound and balanced view and change themselves to fit it?

The geth can come to a conlusion about themselves: computers self-categorize themselves all the time. Coming to a conlusion doesn't prove sentience (since that is, in effect, what all manner of non-sentient processes do), and it also doesn't make the conclusion correct.

Which, when it comes down to if you're trying to be objective, is the more important part. If the Geth claim to be sentient, that proves nothing other than that they make a claim, not that the claim is correct

Modifié par Dean_the_Young, 20 avril 2011 - 04:49 .

[ISpeakTheTruth]

Ramirez Wolfen wrote...

It talks about life in general, so yes, alien could be included.

Yes is could, just as it might not. It certainly never states that life couldn't be Geth like so in both cases we have a situation where both could be or neither could be specifically talked about.