695 réponses à ce sujet

[humes spork]

Dessalines wrote...

Even a synthetic organism like Legion know that the Reaper's must be destroyed, and never does it state the Reapers logic is correct.

Legion makes, to the best of my memory right now, two value judgments in the course of the trilogy.

1. All life has the right to self determination.
2. Shepard's applying organic morality to the rewrite/destroy choice is wrong.

Legion, and by extension the geth since it is a chosen representative and avatar of the consensus, is highly non-interventionist and pluralist.

The geth have never come to the conclusion that all life must be destroyed.

Nope, they just had the choice forced on them by the quarians. They merely defended themselves, which they hold as a right reserved to lifeforms as corollary to the right to self-determination.

Catalyst never stated synthetics become chaotic without organics to serve, or that their order comes from organics to serve.

It shouldn't have to. By that point, you should already have an understanding of this fact through talking to Legion and EDI. That it doesn't nevertheless is on BioWare's head for cutting those parts of the dialog with the Catalyst out (which they did, according to the Final Hours app).

The main point is that they do not plant any life. Since they do not plant any life, and they only take away life, then sooner or latter, they will be no life in the galaxy.

Ian Malcolm said it best: life will find a way. The Reapers needn't sew the galaxy for life to exist, they merely need prune it of life that threatens further growth. To use metaphor, the grass in your yard doesn't die when you mow it, it keeps growing until you have to mow it again.

[GorrilaKing]

Most of what I would have wanted to say has been said here already and probably better than I could.
I just want to mention that I personally have a serious problem with the notion that organic life is somehow more valuable than synthetic life. I am sorry, but by what objective margin?
If there is no higher intelligence above both organics and synthetics ( a kind of divinity or ascended intelligence), then there is no objective margin since the universe doesn't give a damn.
So basically the Catalyst, itself synthetic, puts more value into organic life than synthetic life - thereby invalidating its own logic since it, as a synthetic life-form, has found a purpose in "protecting" organic beings. Instead of destroying all organic lifeforms which synthetics are prone to do, given its reasoning. The Catalyst might have been organic once but it and the Reapers are synthetics now! The very existance of the Cycle proves the reasoning behind it moot!
Now if only the god-child would fall into its own logic-hole...*sigh*

[Cazlee]

People who believe the logic is circular believe the reapers are the cause and not the solution to a problem that spans billions of years and galaxies.

People that don't believe the logic is circular accept the possibility that the reapers are the solution and not the cause of a problem that spans billions of years and galaxies.

Modifié par Cazlee, 26 mars 2012 - 08:38 .

[weltraumhamster89]

It may be mathematically logical, but the premise is just a load of crap.

[Cazlee]

I'm pretty the logic was present in ME2 because when I heard it in ME3 it was already no surprise.

[LegacyOfTheAsh]

GorrilaKing wrote...

Most of what I would have wanted to say has been said here already and probably better than I could.
I just want to mention that I personally have a serious problem with the notion that organic life is somehow more valuable than synthetic life. I am sorry, but by what objective margin?
If there is no higher intelligence above both organics and synthetics ( a kind of divinity or ascended intelligence), then there is no objective margin since the universe doesn't give a damn.
So basically the Catalyst, itself synthetic, puts more value into organic life than synthetic life - thereby invalidating its own logic since it, as a synthetic life-form, has found a purpose in "protecting" organic beings. Instead of destroying all organic lifeforms which synthetics are prone to do, given its reasoning. The Catalyst might have been organic once but it and the Reapers are synthetics now! The very existance of the Cycle proves the reasoning behind it moot!
Now if only the god-child would fall into its own logic-hole...*sigh*

I don't really see it that way. If the Catalyst put a higher value on us than synthetics then it would simply wipe the synthetics out when they tried to wipe us out. It is "protecting" us from synthetics not putting us in a better position that the synthetics. This does beg the question of what ends up happening to the synthetics in other cycles after advanced organics are wiped out? We know what happend during the Prothean's cycle with the Zha'til but that's about it.

[GorrilaKing]

LegacyOfTheAsh wrote...

GorrilaKing wrote...

Most of what I would have wanted to say has been said here already and probably better than I could.
I just want to mention that I personally have a serious problem with the notion that organic life is somehow more valuable than synthetic life. I am sorry, but by what objective margin?
If there is no higher intelligence above both organics and synthetics ( a kind of divinity or ascended intelligence), then there is no objective margin since the universe doesn't give a damn.
So basically the Catalyst, itself synthetic, puts more value into organic life than synthetic life - thereby invalidating its own logic since it, as a synthetic life-form, has found a purpose in "protecting" organic beings. Instead of destroying all organic lifeforms which synthetics are prone to do, given its reasoning. The Catalyst might have been organic once but it and the Reapers are synthetics now! The very existance of the Cycle proves the reasoning behind it moot!
Now if only the god-child would fall into its own logic-hole...*sigh*

I don't really see it that way. If the Catalyst put a higher value on us than synthetics then it would simply wipe the synthetics out when they tried to wipe us out. It is "protecting" us from synthetics not putting us in a better position that the synthetics. This does beg the question of what ends up happening to the synthetics in other cycles after advanced organics are wiped out? We know what happend during the Prothean's cycle with the Zha'til but that's about it.

But still you have a synthetic lifeform NOT killing all life in the galaxy.

[Cazlee]

@GorrilaKing

Synthetic life can always be rebuilt. Organic life... ?
Well there is Shepard, but he's half-synthetic now.

Modifié par Cazlee, 26 mars 2012 - 09:04 .

[terdferguson123]

The disconnect between players and what the OP is saying, is that many people are not able to see the difference between an irrational solution and one that does not make sense. The Catalyst certainly does make sense, it's not that difficult to understand, he is preventing galactic extinction by destroying the root of the problem. The problem is, that people see this as genocide, which it is, and they immediately think that it's stupid or doesn't make sense. They are mixing morality into the equation which causes them to not see the difference between an irrational solution and one that doesn't make sense. However, there is a big difference. Good post OP, sorry you are getting so much hate from people who can't seem to tell the difference between irrational logic and non-logic.

Modifié par terdferguson123, 26 mars 2012 - 08:58 .

[LegacyOfTheAsh]

GorrilaKing wrote...

LegacyOfTheAsh wrote...

GorrilaKing wrote...

Most of what I would have wanted to say has been said here already and probably better than I could.
I just want to mention that I personally have a serious problem with the notion that organic life is somehow more valuable than synthetic life. I am sorry, but by what objective margin?
If there is no higher intelligence above both organics and synthetics ( a kind of divinity or ascended intelligence), then there is no objective margin since the universe doesn't give a damn.
So basically the Catalyst, itself synthetic, puts more value into organic life than synthetic life - thereby invalidating its own logic since it, as a synthetic life-form, has found a purpose in "protecting" organic beings. Instead of destroying all organic lifeforms which synthetics are prone to do, given its reasoning. The Catalyst might have been organic once but it and the Reapers are synthetics now! The very existance of the Cycle proves the reasoning behind it moot!
Now if only the god-child would fall into its own logic-hole...*sigh*

I don't really see it that way. If the Catalyst put a higher value on us than synthetics then it would simply wipe the synthetics out when they tried to wipe us out. It is "protecting" us from synthetics not putting us in a better position that the synthetics. This does beg the question of what ends up happening to the synthetics in other cycles after advanced organics are wiped out? We know what happend during the Prothean's cycle with the Zha'til but that's about it.

But still you have a synthetic lifeform NOT killing all life in the galaxy.

All that proves is that the Catalyst sympathizes with organics (on some twisted level), not that it places us before synthetics.

[AlexMBrennan]

Indeed. Whilst it not quite the same, I would have thought that the popularity of Zeroth Law Rebellion* would have made such threads unnecessary. And yeah, it's the alien morality that causes people to misunderstand (we care more about the millions of people being goo-ified and less about bacteria that might never get a chance to evolve and discover spaceflight)

T => T = T
F => T = T
F => F = T
T => F = F (this is the only case of invalid reasoning)

I don't think "F => T" is valid reasoning.

Modifié par AlexMBrennan, 26 mars 2012 - 09:05 .

[taelus.calimshan]

[quote]sydranark wrote...

[quote]taelus.calimshan wrote...

In logic there are essentially 3 states.  True, False, or Undetermined (different people use different words for this one).  I think you're mistaking evidence for absolute proof.  
[/quote] 

True, False, and Unknown. However, Unknown cannot be applied to this. If there is evidence proving one way or the other, it cannot be unknown. For example, if I say there is a giant cupcake in another galaxy, this is unknown. There is no evidence for or against it. However, if I say "all dogs are fish," this is clearly false. Unless I have sufficient evidence to prove otherwise in all scenarios of dogs, my statement will remain false. I could alter my phrase to say, "some dogs are fish," in which case I would have to apply it to only some dogs. 

The reapers are not doing this, they are not killing some advanced civilizations, they are killing all advanced civilizations. They are not saying some synthetics will eventually kill some primitive lifeforms, they are saying that all synthetics will eventually kill all lifeforms. 

This is a hasty generalization, a fallacy, a false statement. It isn't unknown: there is evidence for it and against it; therefore, it is known. And since saying "all" doesn't really apply to all (it is not true in all scenarios), the premise is false. 
[/quote]

Evidence for or against does not constitute proof or disproof, without which the boolean value remains unknown.  They've created a statement that cannot be known.  The word "eventually" means that any evidence to counter the assertion can always be buried with the phrase "it hasn't happened yet, but it will".  The statement cannot be proven true and it can't be proven false.  It also can't be disproved to be either of those things, which is different, but only slightly so.  That means that it's unknown and can be operated on using assumptions that cannot be disproved.

[quote]sydranark wrote...
[quote]taelus.calimshan wrote... 

Allow me to alter your TSA example to come more in line.  Your example makes the assumption that in previous cycles there have been instances where their postulate is disproven (i.e.: there are times where there is no terrorist and there never would be on that flight). 
 [/quote]  

I'm not saying that at all. I'm only saying that they cannot apply that type of logic to this life cycle. Besides, whether or not there were actually instances where their postulate is disproven, they went ahead and killed advanced civilizations anyway, right? It doesn't matter what happened, they did what they wanted. 
[/quote]

It matters.  If there was ever a cycle that could actually somehow prove that synthetics would never rise up and kill them all, then the assertion that "all synthetics will eventually kill all organics" becomes provably false and the entire set of cycles ends.

[quote]sydranark wrote...
[quote]taelus.calimshan wrote...  

Instead, inject this observation.  TSA notes that as fashion trends, luggage starts as blue, but black luggage will eventually exist.  They have also observed that once black luggage exists, it is always the case (from their perspective, not the absolute) that said luggage will ultimately be used to house bombs to kill said people because maybe that was their observation or maybe they do have some kind of unknown proof.  So, the TSA has decided that once black luggage comes up, they'll take out all plane passengers everywhere (because at some point all those organics start thinking that black is the new blue) and reset the natural luggage color to blue.  Then they'll wait until black luggage comes up again and repeat. 
[/quote]   

to reiterate, you just said this:

<Analogy Snip>
[/quote]

I'm thinking we should just avoid analogies all together a this point.  Finding an accurate one seems difficult at best.  So, no analogy involved, if the Reapers fully believe that this series of events will occur every time:
- Organics will create synthetics
- Synthetics will rebel against organics
- Synthetics will ultimately destroy all organic life

Then once they see organics creating synthetics, they perceive the cycle to have begun and they get ready to intervene (presumably, I'm making some assumptions about their sense of timing).  So, they wipe out all advanced organics and all synthetics (the latter is assumable based on the lack of synthetic life in the current cycle prior to the Geth).  I'm not saying their reasons or good, but if they believe that the above cycle is always true, then their actions can be seen as reasonable by them and not logically flawed.

[quote]sydranark wrote...
[quote]taelus.calimshan wrote...   

Their logic isn't provable (so far as we know), but it isn't disprovable because they have some evidence that it is correct.  Their premise is neither true, nor false based on the information we, as Shepard, have available.  We don't know the absolute truth either.  It's possible that they're correct and that all synthetics ultimately decide that organics, who are emotional and will do things like angrily destroy groups of synthetics out of fear/hatred/etc., are no longer safe to have in existence.  [/quote] 

It is disprovable. If something can't be proven with 100% efficacy, then it is not true. "A coin always lands on heads" is only right some of the time. I may "have some evidence that is correct" but the fact that there is evidence against it makes the statement false. 
[/quote]

Again, you've provided proof, not evidence.  You're saying their statement is false because you have counter-evidence, but the only evidence that can disprove that assertion is if "tails" were to show up on a coin flip.  Then you have proof of a contra-positive scenario and the assertion is false.  In the game, the assertion is not provably wrong, there is just evidence to submit to challenge it.  That's similar to someone saying that the weight distribution and such of the coin should be mathematically conducive to a 1 in 2 chance for heads, roughly.  That's evidence, but it doens't disprove the initial case.

[quote]sydranark wrote...
Their premise is "all synthetics will kill all lifeforms." Since zero-chances are not possible, the chance that "all synthetics will not kill all lifeforms" is also prevalent. This in addition to the evidence present at the time of the reaper attack is enough to debunk their theory. Even if "have some evidence that is correct," it is simply impossible for there not to be another side of the coin. They do not have 100% consistency in their argument. therefore, it is false. 
[/quote]

Still evidence of a false value, but not proof.  Their assertion isn't proveable nor is it disprovable.  Their assertion is that "all synthetics will eventually kill all organics".  The only way to disprove the statement is to prove the contrapositive, that "some synthetics will not kill organics, ever".  In order for that to be proven, a perfect pattern of life with no chaos would have to exist that can be described mathematically and would never result in an outcome of synthetics killing all organics.  No organic society can be modeled perfectly like that because of chaos so the assertion cannot be proven or disproven.  It can only be assumed.

[quote]sydranark wrote...
[quote]taelus.calimshan wrote...    

So yeah, the postulate about synthetics always rising up against organics to wipe it all out isn't disproven, it's challenged, and that's different in logic theory.  Admittedly, once you go away from binary true/false statements, you're supposed to swap into the realm of probabilities, but that's a whole other discussion.

Also, sorry OP.  I know I've helped to derail your thread at this point.
[/quote]

It may "unknown" (not disproven) in our real world, but in the ME world, there's more than enough evidence to support the contrary. In the ME world, a probability (or chance or whatever) cannot be assigned to occurence of synthetics killing all lifeforms, let alone all synthetics killing all lifeforms. Hasty generalizations such as "all synthetics will kill all lifeforms" automatically make the premise false. 

[/quote]

Don't get me wrong, the statement made by the Star Child has significant evidence to contradict it and, in general, can be argued to be correct a vanishingly small part of the time.  But, in a purely logic and modeling based discussion, it can't be formally disproven.  Math has similar things.  I can use a Taylor expansion on an unsolvable equation and get down to any degree of accuracy anyone wants, but I can never get the absolute answer to the equation.  Same here, we can get as close as we'd like to being able to call the Star Child's concepts nonsense, but we never actually have complete proof and that means that from a purely logical perspective, the Star Child's assertion is not true or false, it simply is.

Which is probably why so many of us think the ending is hard to swallow really.  The fact that we can even have this discussion speaks volumes about it.

[LegacyOfTheAsh]

terdferguson123 wrote...


The disconnect between players and what the OP is saying, is that many people are not able to see the difference between an irrational solution and one that does not make sense. The Catalyst certainly does make sense, it's not that difficult to understand, he is preventing galactic extinction by destroying the root of the problem. The problem is, that people see this as genocide, which it is, and they immediately think that it's stupid or doesn't make sense. They are mixing morality into the equation which causes them to not see the difference between an irrational solution and one that doesn't make sense. However, there is a big difference. Good post OP, sorry you are getting so much hate from people who can't seem to tell the difference between irrational logic and non-logic.

Well its like I said before; It is irrational if the Catalyst has only witnessed a near, galactic extinction event once in our galaxy. That is no basis for the future because if the extinction did happen here (assuming the Catalyst hasn't been to other galaxies) then there wouldn't be any Mass Effect games. The Catalyst would have needed to witness separate galaxies going extinct in the same manner. Alternatively, it could have witnessed extinction here, (somehow)repopulated the galaxy several times and witness organics going extinct multiple times before it came up with "The Solution".

[CDHarrisUSF]

LegacyOfTheAsh wrote...

I don't really see it that way. If the Catalyst put a higher value on us than synthetics then it would simply wipe the synthetics out when they tried to wipe us out. It is "protecting" us from synthetics not putting us in a better position that the synthetics. This does beg the question of what ends up happening to the synthetics in other cycles after advanced organics are wiped out? We know what happend during the Prothean's cycle with the Zha'til but that's about it.

It does put more inherent value on organic life. The scenarios can play out in three (with some exceptions but not relevant to the discussion) ways: 1) Only organic life exists. 2) Both coexist, peacefully or otherwise. 3) Synthetics eliminate all organics, leaving only synthetic life. By their actions, we know they deem situation three to be unacceptable... enough so that they do not even want to risk situation two.

This reveals much about their views. We have already established that they do not care about whether one particular race of organic life survives, because they will commit genocide to "protect" the concept of organic life. We also know they are willing to eradicate all synthetic life in the process to do so. The only logic which would dictate such a course of action would require the assumption that organics are more worthy of existence than synthetics.

If they did not make this value judgment, a synthetic race would be treated as any other race. If they were treated as an equal form of life, the Reapers would not need to intervene because they do not protect individual races. Thus, they treat synthetics as second-class beings who can not be trusted to live.

Modifié par CDHarrisUSF, 26 mars 2012 - 09:16 .

[Cazlee]

@LegacyOfTheAsh - the reapers bringing organic life to this galaxy after we extincted ourselves... that's really cool.
There are so many possibilities that explain the "first problem" that necessitated the "solution."
Yet people still believe that the cycle of destruction started with the reapers.

[MetallicShepard]

MegaSovereign wrote...

MetallicShepard wrote...

Possibly the most illogical, contradictory and idiotic part of the whole thing is this: if the purpose of the Reapers is to wipe out all advanced organic life every 50,000 years to prevent them from creating synthetics that will destroy all organic life, then why in the holy hell did they alter the Geth to become hostile towards organics? Wouldn't this be contradictory towards their purpose? They essentially catalyzed the very thing their trying to prevent. How could the writers not notice the lunacy they were creating?

Well they control the Geth. They didn't give them free will. If Reapers got their way. The Quarians would be wiped out/harvested with the help of the Geth. Then when they're of no use, the Reapers shut them down.

Yes, that's all true. But if what the Starchild says is true, their purpose is to prevent synthetics from wiping organics out by wiping them out. However, the only reason the Geth became hostile to all organics was BECAUSE of the Reapers. They caused the problem they are supposedly purposed to fix. Sure, they fought a war with the Quarians--an organic race--but it was purely out of self-defense because the Quarians are idiotic.  But once the Geth drove them out of their system, they didn't pursue. They stayed behind in the Veil, minded their own business, had no intentions of wiping out all organic life, until the Reapers came along and started the very damn thing they are purposed to fix. Where's the logic in that?

[Mandemon]

Cazlee wrote...

@GorrilaKing

Synthetic life can always be rebuilt. Organic life... ?
Well there is Shepard, but he's half-synthetic now.

I always love this thing. I assumes Synthethic life is nothing but hardware.

Hardware can be rebuilt, just like organics (cloning, for example) but will it result in same person? If I destroy this Geth platform so that it's programs are destroyed and then rebuilt it, is it the same Geth as before?

Just like if you clone a person, there is no guarantee you can get the same person with same memories and same personality.

Grunt is a good example. He has imprints, imported memories. But to him, they mean nothing. Just something given to him. Trough game and his own experiences, he starts to understand them and make his own opinions.

Now, if I upload memories that Legion has to another Geth platform, does it mean this Geth becomes excatly same as Legion? Or does it just see bunch of memories, none which are it's own and mean nothing?

Hardware does not matter. What matters, is that can personality be moved.

[Cazlee]

@MetallicShepard  Quarians are an advanced civilization, it was the end of the cycle.

Modifié par Cazlee, 26 mars 2012 - 09:21 .

[Seival]

Catalist is a deus ex machina ported to ME3 ending from some other game, just to "please" the fans.

[MetallicShepard]

Cazlee wrote...

@MetallicShepard  Quarians are an advanced civilization, it was the end of the cycle.

And your point is?

[CDHarrisUSF]

Cazlee wrote...

@GorrilaKing

Synthetic life can always be rebuilt. Organic life... ?

The beauty of organic life is that it builds itself from scratch. You start with the right combination of chemicals mixing by chance in the right order to give it the initial spark, then it takes care of the rest from there through evolution. This is one of the big reasons why I think the Catalyst's logic is flawed. They kill all advanced intelligent races to "protect" the idea of organic life, but we do not need to be protected. If organic life is destroyed, it is not gone forever... not even for a "long" time (on the universe's time scale).  We bounce back. Life finds a way.

Modifié par CDHarrisUSF, 26 mars 2012 - 09:30 .

[Cazlee]

Mandemon wrote...

Cazlee wrote...

@GorrilaKing

Synthetic life can always be rebuilt. Organic life... ?
Well there is Shepard, but he's half-synthetic now.

I always love this thing. I assumes Synthethic life is nothing but hardware.

Hardware can be rebuilt, just like organics (cloning, for example) but will it result in same person? If I destroy this Geth platform so that it's programs are destroyed and then rebuilt it, is it the same Geth as before?

Just like if you clone a person, there is no guarantee you can get the same person with same memories and same personality.

Grunt is a good example. He has imprints, imported memories. But to him, they mean nothing. Just something given to him. Trough game and his own experiences, he starts to understand them and make his own opinions.

Now, if I upload memories that Legion has to another Geth platform, does it mean this Geth becomes excatly same as Legion? Or does it just see bunch of memories, none which are it's own and mean nothing?

Hardware does not matter. What matters, is that can personality be moved.

You have focused on individuals instead of nations... the geth can always be rebuilt. Their personality software can always be reprogrammed.  But no, we will probably never get another Legion.

[tjc2]

It is not circular logic, but it is something most philosophers consider a ridiculous paradigm.

[Cazlee]

MetallicShepard wrote...

Cazlee wrote...

@MetallicShepard  Quarians are an advanced civilization, it was the end of the cycle.

And your point is?

You were saying it didn't make sense for the reapers to use the geth against the quarians?

[Cazlee]

CDHarrisUSF wrote...

Cazlee wrote...

@GorrilaKing

Synthetic life can always be rebuilt. Organic life... ?

The beauty of organic life is that it builds itself from scratch. You start with the right combination of chemicals mixing by chance in the right order to give it the initial spark, then it takes care of the rest from there through evolution. This is one of the big reasons why I think the Catalyst's logic is flawed. They kill all advanced intelligent races to "protect" the idea of organic life, but we do not need to be protected. If organic life is destroyed, it is not gone forever... not even for a "long" time (on the universe's time scale).  We bounce back. Life finds a way.

If it were that easy, every planet would be full of life.
Edit: okay, if it only happens on class M planets does that mean life is still being created on earth?

Modifié par Cazlee, 26 mars 2012 - 09:53 .