1104 réponses à ce sujet

[Barquiel]

To be honest, I can't come up with a scenario where we have to make such a choice (unless the reaper war will last for decades).

[Dean_the_Young]

Warlocomotf wrote...

Dean_the_Young wrote...

Benezia willingly joined Saren because she knew he was going to do great evils, and she was willing to help if it led to a greater good (such as diminishing them later). If that's not the flaws of aggressive, nothing is. Likewise, her mindset was distinctly paternalist, so check that as well. And self-interested... yes. A mitigating a common threat that could endanger you as well is no less self-interested, especially when you can stand to benefit from it as well (as she would have had it worked).

Benezia risked her live, eand everything she owned as well as the lives of the students who wished to follow her- in hopes of setting Saren on a 'gentler path'.

Which conflicts with nothing I've said.

She did not seem intend on forcing Saren,

She was trying to shift him in a different direction of her own choosing. Don't fixate on 'force' as the only means of paternalism. Paternalism involves

and the Asari Councilor knew her- which means she was a big player under the Asari.

We've already agreed on that, yes.

The risk here far outweighed any possible personal gains she might have had- esspecially since all implies that she was very well off before this to begin with.

Actually, no: personal values of non-monetary values are also a point of personal motivations and self-interest. A person who is kind to others because they want others to be kind to them is still self-interested so long as that remains a motivation. Nor do potential costs-risks have to meet any minimum standard to be applicable: case in point, the entire business of mercenaries and career soldiers. Soldiers risk their lives and get paid money. It's rarely much money, and no matter how money is offered few people will accept any amount that costs them their lives... unless they have some other motivation they personally value. Some people risk their lives for money, whether for themselves or the ones they care about. Many for ideals.

There is no 'too much risk proves no self-interest' line to be passed. Your argument that, because Benezia faced risk it must disprove self-interest is flawed: her self-interest is not mutually exclusive with the public good (while if she succeeded she stood to reap significant gains as one with influence over a Spectre), while her refusing to risk her life does not necessarily prove to be in her own interests as she perceives them (she considers the harm Saren could do to herself and others as worth more than the risk to herself).

I mean, just to take an example, I jumped out of a perfectly good airplane five times for a glorified pin that says I jumped out of a perfectly good airplane five times. Parachutes are safe, generally, but why take the risk? It wasn't for money, or advancement, or even excitement.

I'm not sure what point you're trying to make here, could you elaborate?

You jump on the first thing you think disproves a generalization, whether it does or not, and ignore all other things.

You say it yourself, you shear your sheep. I see absolutely no evidence that the council was doing more than that.

'That' is what we're talking about. Believe it or not, most people don't like being treated like sheep.

Aria was thrown into that argument from your side of the bench. And frankly, I find Aria a perfect example!
Every species has it's extremes- and well, if Aria is that extreme for the Asari- I'd say that's very modest when compared to the kind of extremes that Humans go to.

I find your finding Aria a perfect example as a perfect example of what I said two points above.

Perfectly aware, but that doesn't mean that helping others is therefor automatically because of self interest.

Actually, it does. All decision making is based on what an individual considers most important to them. If you consider the feeling you get when you watch others suffer as worse than the feeling you get if you suffer, the decision to help others is... you guessed it.

Altruism is a mirage, given that most people are altruistic because it makes them feel good when they do it. There are only different phases of self-interest, of which Asari are no different from Humans.

Their governments look for their own interest (with wars and murders and a private team of assassins above the law), their merchants look for their profits (whether it harms other corporations/users or not), their power-hungry look to their own (by whatever tool comes to hand).

Modifié par Dean_the_Young, 21 août 2011 - 02:54 .

[Warlocomotf]

Dean_the_Young wrote...

snip

I'm going to respond to the gist of your arguments. But first I want to clarify something;
When I say "you shear sheep", I do not intend imply you treat people as sheep, what I mean is that having government is preferable to anarchy. The government then using funds gained through taxation can be spent towards infrastructure or similar "global interest" purposes.

If your argument is that "most people" prefer that government does not exist I challenge that argument. I do not believe it to be true.

Past that, your argument seems to mostly be that everything is self interest; from fraud to catching a bullet for someone because you couldn't stand living with the guilt or whatever. I know that in general lines this is true.

With that said, I don't think that was what the person meant when he/she said "show me an example of an asari that isn't self-interest/aggresive/patronizing". I think it's reasonable to assume the person meant either self interest at the cost of others, or self interest for purposes other than "that fuzzy feeling you get for doing good".

[TobyHasEyes]

The Asari found and uplifted the Hanar; an example then of Asari encountering another sentient species, one totally incapable of defending themselves, and rather than eradicate them (as you have suggested the Asari must have done in the past) they uplifted them and introduced them to the galactic community. You can hardly interpret them as having been exploited and being forced to accept Asari cultural norms (they maintain an extremely strong independent culture)

I also want to take you up on the idea that altruism is a mirage, stating that it is pursued because it makes people feel good.

Firstly, if it is the case that someone who spends their life helping others because it makes them feel good, what do we take from that? Somebody might pass up the chance to advance their own agenda because they would take more enjoyment from helping others? That hardly seems sinister, nor does it suggest that these are people who we can't co-operate with. If someone does not want to dominate me because they find it distasteful, it still means they don't want to dominate me

Secondly, the very idea that all altruistic intentions are delusions is a dated and rejected theory. Our long evolutionary history as social beings means that we have deeply engrained emotive urges towards helping others and our society, urges which do not necessarily help the individual expressing them. Furthermore. though these 'emotive urges' developed because they benefited survival, to suggest that the emotive motivation at the present is also survival-focused stems from a total disregard for the disconnect of process and product that occurs in the evolution of emotions

[Weskerr]

Dean_the_Young wrote...

Perfectly aware, but that doesn't mean that helping others is therefor automatically because of self interest.

Actually, it does. All decision making is based on what an individual considers most important to them. If you consider the feeling you get when you watch others suffer as worse than the feeling you get if you suffer, the decision to help others is... you guessed it.

Altruism is a mirage, given that most people are altruistic because it makes them feel good when they do it. There are only different phases of self-interest, of which Asari are no different from Humans.

Their governments look for their own interest (with wars and murders and a private team of assassins above the law), their merchants look for their profits (whether it harms other corporations/users or not), their power-hungry look to their own (by whatever tool comes to hand).

To add to Dean's argument, any professional psychologist will tell you that behavior is a function of self-interest and selfishness. Most economists would tell you the same.

[TobyHasEyes]

Weskerr wrote...

Dean_the_Young wrote...

Perfectly aware, but that doesn't mean that helping others is therefor automatically because of self interest.

Actually, it does. All decision making is based on what an individual considers most important to them. If you consider the feeling you get when you watch others suffer as worse than the feeling you get if you suffer, the decision to help others is... you guessed it.

Altruism is a mirage, given that most people are altruistic because it makes them feel good when they do it. There are only different phases of self-interest, of which Asari are no different from Humans.

Their governments look for their own interest (with wars and murders and a private team of assassins above the law), their merchants look for their profits (whether it harms other corporations/users or not), their power-hungry look to their own (by whatever tool comes to hand).

To add to Dean's argument, any professional psychologist will tell you that behavior is a function of self-interest and selfishness. Most economists would tell you the same.

 Most economists and psychologists from about 30 years ago; if you guys are going to claim that all intellectual authority supports your ideas you should really see how these areas are advancing and changing

 And to clarify, if your self-motivation takes the form of helping others and acting co-operatively, then the extent to which those people are self-interested in discussions such as this is meaningless

 The debate then goes
          - The asari want to dominate and conquer you
          - What makes you say that?
          - All behaviours are by definition motivated by self interest
          - What about those people who are motivated to help others?
          - They are also motivated by self-interest, as they help others because they enjoy it
          - But then, surely the asari might, out of a motivation of enjoying helping others, not want to dominate me?

  What answer do you give to that?

Modifié par TobyHasEyes, 21 août 2011 - 03:18 .

[Weskerr]

TobyHasEyes wrote...

 Most economists and psychologists from about 30 years ago; if you guys are going to claim that all intellectual authority supports your ideas you should really see how these areas are advancing and changing

Pyschology is most definitely advancing, but the basic tenet that self-interest determines behavior is the same now as it was 30 years ago as it was 80 years ago as it was 100 years ago.

The same thing for economics. Commerce and trade would not exist without self-interest. This applies to now as it did to any other time a society had developed an economy.

[TobyHasEyes]

Weskerr wrote...

TobyHasEyes wrote...

 Most economists and psychologists from about 30 years ago; if you guys are going to claim that all intellectual authority supports your ideas you should really see how these areas are advancing and changing

Pyschology is most definitely advancing, but the basic tenet that self-interest determines behavior is the same now as it was 30 years ago as it was 80 years ago as it was 100 years ago.

The same thing for economics. Commerce and trade would not exist without self-interest. This applies to now as it did to any other time a society had developed an economy.

 Economists wildly vary nowadays on whether self-interest is a determining factor by necessity or whether it can be changed, with the prevailing ideas being that humans are more flexible than that

 The reason that has not passed down to chancellors or people who influence these decisions is that self-interest is the easiest motivation for government's to access or manipulate; in other words a chancellor gives tax relief to donations not because he feels that donations are only made by people who will get an advantage from it, but because it is easier to manipulate self-interest than it is other human motivations

 And you haven't answered my final point, that if self-interest can take the form of chartity, co-operation and caring for others, then how can you claim that any form of universal self-interest guarantees domination and aggressive coersion?

Modifié par TobyHasEyes, 21 août 2011 - 03:29 .

[Warlocomotf]

Weskerr wrote...

TobyHasEyes wrote...

 Most economists and psychologists from about 30 years ago; if you guys are going to claim that all intellectual authority supports your ideas you should really see how these areas are advancing and changing

Pyschology is most definitely advancing, but the basic tenet that self-interest determines behavior is the same now as it was 30 years ago as it was 80 years ago as it was 100 years ago.

The same thing for economics. Commerce and trade would not exist without self-interest. This applies to now as it did to any other time a society had developed an economy.

However "everything is self intrest" is a semantics argument that really is not relevant to the context in which the Asari were accused of being self-interested. It is an evasion argument at best.

[JamieCOTC]

I'm kind of hoping for a "Beneath the Planet of the Apes" ending only on a galactic scale.

[Weskerr]

TobyHasEyes wrote...


 The debate then goes
          - The asari want to dominate and conquer you
          - What makes you say that?
          - All behaviours are by definition motivated by self interest
          - What about those people who are motivated to help others?
          - They are also motivated by self-interest, as they help others because they enjoy it
          - But then, surely the asari might, out of a motivation of enjoying helping others, not want to dominate me?

  What answer do you give to that?

Self-interested desires are always in competition with each other. The desire that wins out is usually the one that benefits you the most - unless you're a masochist and enjoy hurting yourself or just stupid or ignorant of the facts.

Edit: In any case, you're behaving in a way that your selfishness dictates.

Modifié par Weskerr, 21 août 2011 - 03:33 .

[TobyHasEyes]

Warlocomotf wrote...

Weskerr wrote...

TobyHasEyes wrote...

 Most economists and psychologists from about 30 years ago; if you guys are going to claim that all intellectual authority supports your ideas you should really see how these areas are advancing and changing

Pyschology is most definitely advancing, but the basic tenet that self-interest determines behavior is the same now as it was 30 years ago as it was 80 years ago as it was 100 years ago.

The same thing for economics. Commerce and trade would not exist without self-interest. This applies to now as it did to any other time a society had developed an economy.

However "everything is self intrest" is a semantics argument that really is not relevant to the context in which the Asari were accused of being self-interested. It is an evasion argument at best.

 Exactly

 An asari who acts to help others out of a desire to help others can be defined as self-interested because she is acting out her desire

 An asari who seeks to dominate others can be defined as self-interested because she wants to benefit from dominating others

 But it is claimed that the latter form is definately the case, yet deep-down self interest doesn't seem to support that view..

[BatmanPWNS]

I can't stand the Asari's and in reality I wouldn't be willing to sacrifice anyone but in a game I will watch them burn!

[TobyHasEyes]

Weskerr wrote...

TobyHasEyes wrote...


 The debate then goes
          - The asari want to dominate and conquer you
          - What makes you say that?
          - All behaviours are by definition motivated by self interest
          - What about those people who are motivated to help others?
          - They are also motivated by self-interest, as they help others because they enjoy it
          - But then, surely the asari might, out of a motivation of enjoying helping others, not want to dominate me?

  What answer do you give to that?

Self-interested desires are always in competition with each other. The desire that wins out is usually the one that benefits you the most - unless you're a masochist and enjoy hurting yourself or just stupid or ignorant of the facts.

 But that is a dumb interpretation of the situation; frequently throughout human history the desire that wins out is not necessarily the one that benefits you the most

 The person who could be a city banker and make millions, but chooses to use their intellect to have a career in international development because they enjoy helping others is not a masochist, nor are they stupid or ignorant

 They could have benefited themselves more with the career choice of a banker, but they chose another path.. whether that is out of a desire to help, or because they find helping others more satisfying, it is not an unbelievable or imaginary scenario, nor it is the sign of a masochist

Modifié par TobyHasEyes, 21 août 2011 - 03:40 .

[Warlocomotf]

Weskerr wrote...

Self-interested desires are always in competition with each other.

That's a claim you're going to have to substantiate. If that were in fact true, then you're saying that cooperation is... Well, what?

[rallyfan]

Yup

[RAF1940]

Barquiel wrote...

To be honest, I can't come up with a scenario where we have to make such a choice (unless the reaper war will last for decades).

The thread is totally hypothetical.

[RAF1940]

Nashiktal wrote...

SandTrout wrote...

Luc0s wrote...

and how is the quarian immume system a choice?

The quarian immume system is weak and as far as I know not a single book has contradicted or retconned that.

If you're messing with me, I'm too tired to tell right now. I meant that the Quarian immune system was lore, rather than an in-game choice. The point that this has not been changed by the books was what I was trying to explain.

I agree with this, but it raises a few problems, such as how far can you make choices not cannon (either way) until your main story unravels? It makes me worry about future games outside the trilogy, that we might be stuck with prequels.

This is something I've thought about extensively. How long until the storylines are so divergent, that BioWare couldn't possibly fit it all of the content for all of the possibler storylines?

The answer? 3 games.

[RAF1940]

TobyHasEyes wrote...

The Asari found and uplifted the Hanar; an example then of Asari encountering another sentient species, one totally incapable of defending themselves, and rather than eradicate them (as you have suggested the Asari must have done in the past) they uplifted them and introduced them to the galactic community.

True, but the asari aren't a "war species" anyway.

But who's to say humanity or the turians wouldn't "lift up" a species? Humans aren't evil.

[TobyHasEyes]

RAF1940 wrote...

TobyHasEyes wrote...

The Asari found and uplifted the Hanar; an example then of Asari encountering another sentient species, one totally incapable of defending themselves, and rather than eradicate them (as you have suggested the Asari must have done in the past) they uplifted them and introduced them to the galactic community.

True, but the asari aren't a "war species" anyway.

But who's to say humanity or the turians wouldn't "lift up" a species? Humans aren't evil.

 My point was in reference to the idea expressed by others in the topic that the asari only want to dominate and exploit. It was specifically to counter the idea that the size of asari territory means that during the past they probably took lands off other sentient beings that we do not know about; I'm suggesting that they could have easily done that to the Hanar but didn't

[Weskerr]

TobyHasEyes wrote...

Weskerr wrote...
Self-interested desires are always in competition with each other. The desire that wins out is usually the one that benefits you the most - unless you're a masochist and enjoy hurting yourself or just stupid or ignorant of the facts.

 But that is a dumb interpretation of the situation; frequently throughout human history the desire that wins out is not necessarily the one that benefits you the most

Okay let me clarify my dumb interpretation. As I said:

Weskerr wrote...
The desire that wins out is usually the one that benefits you the most -
unless you're a masochist and enjoy hurting yourself or just stupid or
ignorant of the facts.

The most beneficial pleasure (not from a hindsight perspective but from what you can determine at the moment) is usually the one that wins out. Not "necessarily" the one that wins out.
For example, your alarm clock wakes you up in the morning to get you up for a test you have to take in an hour. It may be more desirable for you to go back to sleep than getting up, but the desire to do well on the test and not fail it is more beneficial for you in the long run if you plan on using your grades to apply to other schools later or if you plan to pass your course. However, in some cases, the desire to go back to sleep is so overpowering that you decide to sleep through the test.

TobyHasEyes wrote...
 The person who could be a city banker and makes millions, but chooses to use their intellect to have a career in international development because they enjoy helping others is not a masochist, nor are they stupid or ignorant

Have you ever heard of the Pleasure Principle? It says that people behave and act in ways that maximizes pleasure and minimizes pain.
In relation to this principle, this person is doing what is most desirable for him, even if the latter job provides less money. If being a city banker would make him miserable even though it makes him rich, he is stuck in a job that neither maximizes pleasure nor minimizes pain, but does the opposite. It is then understandable that he would take the other job that he would actually enjoy doing.

The Pleasure Principle is the key to understanding why people are inherintly self-centered and selfish. If your belief about human nature is contrary to mine, then so be it. You said my interpretation is dumb, but I could just as easily call yours stupid and ridiculously naive. I won't and I don't do that because I respect your opinion even though I disagree with it.

[RAF1940]

TobyHasEyes wrote...

RAF1940 wrote...

TobyHasEyes wrote...

The Asari found and uplifted the Hanar; an example then of Asari encountering another sentient species, one totally incapable of defending themselves, and rather than eradicate them (as you have suggested the Asari must have done in the past) they uplifted them and introduced them to the galactic community.

True, but the asari aren't a "war species" anyway.

But who's to say humanity or the turians wouldn't "lift up" a species? Humans aren't evil.

 My point was in reference to the idea expressed by others in the topic that the asari only want to dominate and exploit. It was specifically to counter the idea that the size of asari territory means that during the past they probably took lands off other sentient beings that we do not know about; I'm suggesting that they could have easily done that to the Hanar but didn't

Ah, I apologize. I've just gotten back into the discussion, so I suppose I've stumbled upon people in mid-argument.

[jbblue05]

TobyHasEyes wrote...

The Asari found and uplifted the Hanar; an example then of Asari encountering another sentient species, one totally incapable of defending themselves, and rather than eradicate them (as you have suggested the Asari must have done in the past) they uplifted them and introduced them to the galactic community. You can hardly interpret them as having been exploited and being forced to accept Asari cultural norms (they maintain an extremely strong independent culture)

The Protheans uplfted the Hanar.

The Asari uplifted the Elcor

[Darth_Ravor]

Dean_the_Young wrote...

No.

[RAF1940]

jbblue05 wrote...

TobyHasEyes wrote...

The Asari found and uplifted the Hanar; an example then of Asari encountering another sentient species, one totally incapable of defending themselves, and rather than eradicate them (as you have suggested the Asari must have done in the past) they uplifted them and introduced them to the galactic community. You can hardly interpret them as having been exploited and being forced to accept Asari cultural norms (they maintain an extremely strong independent culture)

The Protheans uplfted the Hanar.

The Asari uplifted the Elcor

Oh yeah, this is right. Thanks for correcting that.