695 réponses à ce sujet

[AlexMBrennan]

MetallicShepard wrote...

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?

The premise remains that "all organics will eventually create synthetics that will kill all organic life". As such, geth being peaceful proves nothing.
The Catalyst's conclusion - to harvest all advanced civilisations at regular intervals* - remains valid.

* The current cycle was supposed to end much sooner, but due to the protheans sabotaging the keepers Sovereign had to use more indirect means (Rachni wars and such). The scheduled end would have been two millenia before the the creation of the geth.

[LegacyOfTheAsh]

CDHarrisUSF wrote...

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.

Sorry about all the typos in my last post. We only have evidence after the the Crucible is complete that the Catalyst may or may nor place organics above synthetics. It only gives us one option to destroy synthetics (which will be created again by our children) as compared to: 1)making just the Reapers (one form of Synthetic life) leave us alone with the possibilty to return; 2)Synthesis for peace (which is flawed because we'd end up killing eachother anyhow). This may have just been giving Shepard, an organic, the chance to choose the fate of his own cycle. I understand your viewpoint, but terrifying an entire galaxy of people , slaughtering many of them and saving few is not placing higher value on organics in my opinion.

[LegacyOfTheAsh]

Cazlee wrote...

@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.

Lol thanks. It's the only way that I could make any sense of the Catalyst choosing the solution it did.

[CDHarrisUSF]

LegacyOfTheAsh wrote...

I understand your viewpoint, but terrifying an entire galaxy of people , slaughtering many of them and saving few is not placing higher value on organics in my opinion.

They value the concept of organic life as a whole, not the individual examples of it... as one values the plant but not the parts needed to be pruned away for it to grow "properly."

[LegacyOfTheAsh]

CDHarrisUSF wrote...

LegacyOfTheAsh wrote...

I understand your viewpoint, but terrifying an entire galaxy of people , slaughtering many of them and saving few is not placing higher value on organics in my opinion.

They value the concept of organic life as a whole, not the individual examples of it... as one values the plant but not the parts needed to be pruned away for it to grow "properly."

Yes, that does prove there is a value placed on organic life. I agree with that but not more than synthetics.

[CDHarrisUSF]

Cazlee wrote...

If it were that easy, every planet would be full of life.

Why do you think life exists on Earth, but not Mars? The conditions weren't right. I said "you start with the right combination of chemicals mixing by chance in the right order to give it the initial spark." This requires certain circumstances to exist and certain events to happen in the correct order. It will not happen on every planet for one reason or another, but on the universal scale (in both number of planets and the time since the dawn of the universe) it is pretty much guaranteed to happen. Look up research into abiogenesis. We've managed to create situations which could happen naturally and result in the building blocks of life.

[Eckswhyzed]

It's good to know that at least one other person on the forums understands Critical Thinking 101.

"I understand your viewpoint, but terrifying an entire galaxy of people , slaughtering many of them and saving few is not placing higher value on organics in my opinion."

Do people not understand that the Reapers believe their whole "salvation through destruction" "we're just preserving you" thing? Imagine yourself as the Reapers. If you honestly believed you were saving the people that you turned into Reapers, you wouldn't mind killing a few billions so you could harvest and 'save' trillions.

I'd like to make something very clear: I do not believe that harvested = saved. But IF I DID, WHICH I DON'T, I would agree with the Reapers' reasoning.

[sydranark]

taelus.calimshan wrote...

1) 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.  

2) 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".  

3) 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.

4) 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

5) 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). 

6) In the game, the assertion is not provably wrong, there is just evidence to submit to challenge it. 

7) 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. 

1) If it must be unknown, then it is not true. If you must assign one of the following to the premise: True, False, Unknown, you would choose Unknown. 

Soundness, as I stated before, is determined by truth. Not truths and/or unknowns. So, even if it is "unknown," it is still not "true." Therefore the argument is still unsound. 

2) Fine, lets add "eventually" to the premise. it changes from "all synthetics kill all lifeforms" to "eventually, all synthetics will kill all lifeforms." This statement would count as an "unknown" and is therefore, not "true." So, the argument is still not sound. 

3) Even if there was a cycle in which synthetics never rose up, wouldn't this still have been "evidence" and not "proof?" Just like currently there is evidence for and against the theory, but no proof. The "eventually" would have been included that time too, since the reapers would have been proactive. 

4) Okay, no analogies haha. I'll assume that P2 and C are unknown. 

Premise 1 (True):
Organics create synthetic life
Premise 2 (Unknown):
Eventually, all synthetics will kill all lifeforms
Conclusion (Unknown):
Organics will kill all lifeforms

Is the argument valid? Yes. It follows the X=Y, Y=Z, X=Z formua. Is the argument sound? No. It does not include onlue true premises, so there is no way it can be sound. 

5) Yes, then they take action. But they acted upon an unsound argument. This is why I think the logic was dumb. I already argued with Lugaidster on the meaning of the word stupid, I'm too tired to do it again haha. But basically, Something dumb is something unintelligent. An unsound argument is one that incorporates unsupported premises, uneducated/unintelligent statements, i.e a load of crap. Someone who believes in and acts upon a load of crap is an idiot. 

Moving on, 

6) Unknown means neither true or false, right? Argument is still not sound.

7) Refer to #4 & #6. Even if there is no absolute proof (there can never be), you can't still can't call his argument sound. #5: an unsound argument is one that has no weight, and is stupid to argue.

[CDHarrisUSF]

LegacyOfTheAsh wrote...

Yes, that does prove there is a value placed on organic life. I agree with that but not more than synthetics.

If they did not prefer organics over synthetics, they would allow synthetics to win as neither would be preferable to the other... just as they allow the various races of organic life to fight each other to extinction.

Modifié par CDHarrisUSF, 26 mars 2012 - 09:58 .

[Cazlee]

CDHarrisUSF wrote...

Cazlee wrote...

If it were that easy, every planet would be full of life.

Why do you think life exists on Earth, but not Mars? The conditions weren't right. I said "you start with the right combination of chemicals mixing by chance in the right order to give it the initial spark." This requires certain circumstances to exist and certain events to happen in the correct order. It will not happen on every planet for one reason or another, but on the universal scale (in both number of planets and the time since the dawn of the universe) it is pretty much guaranteed to happen. Look up research into abiogenesis. We've managed to create situations which could happen naturally and result in the building blocks of life.

You're right, I didn't take into account that you said the right conditions are necessary. 
Should we conclude then that life still being created on earth to this day?

Or can life only be created on *new* "class M" planets... if the latter is the case then once all organic life is wiped out of the galaxy, it's can't spontaneously come back on its own.

Modifié par Cazlee, 26 mars 2012 - 10:08 .

[lillitheris]

Eckswhyzed wrote...

Do people not understand that the Reapers believe their whole "salvation through destruction" "we're just preserving you" thing? Imagine yourself as the Reapers. If you honestly believed you were saving the people that you turned into Reapers, you wouldn't mind killing a few billions so you could harvest and 'save' trillions.

We get it. It's just that it's a dumb plan.

[LegacyOfTheAsh]

CDHarrisUSF wrote...

LegacyOfTheAsh wrote...

Yes, that does prove there is a value placed on organic life. I agree with that but not more than synthetics.

If they did not prefer organics over synthetics, they would allow synthetics to win as neither would be preferable to the other... just as they allow the various races of organic life to fight each other to extinction.

We'll just have to agree to disagree.

[Dessalines]

humes spork wrote...

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 conclusiIon 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.

1) First, you cannot bring a character from Jurrasic Park to prove you argument in Mass Effect. Ian Malcolm is in Jurassic Park, this is Mass Effect. It would like for me to saying that the Catalyst is wrong, because Neo proved that computers are wrong in Matrix. It makes no sense.
2) Legion and EdI prove that they do not led chaotic lives without organic. The geth have lived a non-chaotic existence without humans. EDI is still orderly. There is no proof to support that you made by anyone. The Catalyst did not state either. It is an opinion.
3)The statements concerning Legion are straw men fallacies which neither prove or disprove the validity of the Catalyst argument.

The arguements is this.
The rise of advance organism will  lead to the  creation of synthetics. The creation of synthetics will lead  to the destruction of  all organism. The rise of advance organism will lead to the destruction of all organics
Now, let's change the words a bit.
 The rise of  multiple choice games will lead to the creation of Mass Effect  The creation of Mass Effect will lead to the destruction of all games. The rise of multiple choiced games will lead to the destruction of all games. 
IT is an example of slippery slope, and pre-determined fallacy.
The Star child used a slippery slope fallacy of logic, and a fallacy of pre-determined. to describe their beliefs.
Harbringer used . appeal to force fallacy of logic to describe their beliefs.
Sovereign used ad homenim fallacy to explain their beliefs.

Modifié par Dessalines, 26 mars 2012 - 10:04 .

[Eckswhyzed]

lillitheris wrote...

Eckswhyzed wrote...

Do people not understand that the Reapers believe their whole "salvation through destruction" "we're just preserving you" thing? Imagine yourself as the Reapers. If you honestly believed you were saving the people that you turned into Reapers, you wouldn't mind killing a few billions so you could harvest and 'save' trillions.

We get it. It's just that it's a dumb plan.

But this isn't about whether it's dumb or not. It's about whether the Catalyst is reasoning correctly. If accept his premises, you end up accepting his conclusion. Obviously I don't accept his premises, and neither do you. So why are we arguing again?

[Dessalines]

lillitheris wrote...

Eckswhyzed wrote...

Do people not understand that the Reapers believe their whole "salvation through destruction" "we're just preserving you" thing? Imagine yourself as the Reapers. If you honestly believed you were saving the people that you turned into Reapers, you wouldn't mind killing a few billions so you could harvest and 'save' trillions.

We get it. It's just that it's a dumb plan.

Even if the Reapers believe it, the fact that Shepard just goes along with makes it stupid, and again Reapers do not create life. They are destroying all organic life at slower place, and why do it every 50,000 years. Who came up with that timescale?.

[Kanon777]

Good post, i hate that silly meme so much...

[Kanon777]

Dessalines wrote...

lillitheris wrote...

Eckswhyzed wrote...

Do people not understand that the Reapers believe their whole "salvation through destruction" "we're just preserving you" thing? Imagine yourself as the Reapers. If you honestly believed you were saving the people that you turned into Reapers, you wouldn't mind killing a few billions so you could harvest and 'save' trillions.

We get it. It's just that it's a dumb plan.

Even if the Reapers believe it, the fact that Shepard just goes along with makes it stupid, and again Reapers do not create life. They are destroying all organic life at slower place, and why do it every 50,000 years. Who came up with that timescale?.

He goes along with it? Im pretty sure you can chose to destroy all of them in the end, or control them yourself.

[LegacyOfTheAsh]

tobito113 wrote...

Dessalines wrote...

lillitheris wrote...

Eckswhyzed wrote...

Do people not understand that the Reapers believe their whole "salvation through destruction" "we're just preserving you" thing? Imagine yourself as the Reapers. If you honestly believed you were saving the people that you turned into Reapers, you wouldn't mind killing a few billions so you could harvest and 'save' trillions.

We get it. It's just that it's a dumb plan.

Even if the Reapers believe it, the fact that Shepard just goes along with makes it stupid, and again Reapers do not create life. They are destroying all organic life at slower place, and why do it every 50,000 years. Who came up with that timescale?.

He goes along with it? Im pretty sure you can chose to destroy all of them in the end, or control them yourself.

Yeah, he goes along with the explanation and doesn't argue about the choices he is presented, nor does he question the Catalyst on why these are the only choices. This is more odd because as far as Shepard knows, organics began building the Crucible many cycles ago and he doesn't even say, "Wait, what the hell are giving me these choices for? Organics built the Crucible and now you're screwing with it! Go away!".

[LegacyOfTheAsh]

Sorry to double post but; The Catalyst could have leaked the Crucible plans long ago to give some cycle a chance to finally come up with it's own solution. I use the term "own" loosely as we are pigeon-holed into 3 choices. This has little merit though because it doesn't really prove that the cycle that completed the cycle is more worthy of a choice than any other cycle. It just proves that they found the schematics and finally finished them by building on the work of others.

[Kanon777]

LegacyOfTheAsh wrote...

Yeah, he goes along with the explanation and doesn't argue about the choices he is presented, nor does he question the Catalyst on why these are the only choices. This is more odd because as far as Shepard knows, organics began building the Crucible many cycles ago and he doesn't even say, "Wait, what the hell are giving me these choices for? Organics built the Crucible and now you're screwing with it! Go away!".

If you dont believe what he say just blow up the entire thing... 

Why there need to be any other choices?You either blow up the place (if you dont belive/agree with him), try to control them  (if you dont agree but think the reapers can be dominated) or do the synthess thing (the only choice where you believe in what he says).  

My sheppard never believed them he blow up the entire place

[LegacyOfTheAsh]

tobito113 wrote...

LegacyOfTheAsh wrote...

Yeah, he goes along with the explanation and doesn't argue about the choices he is presented, nor does he question the Catalyst on why these are the only choices. This is more odd because as far as Shepard knows, organics began building the Crucible many cycles ago and he doesn't even say, "Wait, what the hell are giving me these choices for? Organics built the Crucible and now you're screwing with it! Go away!".

If you dont believe what he say just blow up the entire thing... 

Why there need to be any other choices?You either blow up the place (if you dont belive/agree with him), try to control them  (if you dont agree but think the reapers can be dominated) or do the synthess thing (the only choice where you believe in what he says).  

My sheppard never believed them he blow up the entire place

Whether you want to accept it or not. Everyone's Shepard believed what the Catalyst said regardless of your choice. My primary Shepard chose the destroy option as well but never once did I get a chance to question the Catalyst about its reasoning or argue with it. All Shepard says is the killing us is wrong and that we need hope. This leads me to believe that he accepts what the Catalyst has introduced to what is does.

[Mandemon]

Cazlee wrote...

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.

Ah, but a nation is nothing more than sum of it's inhabitants.

If we wipe out all geths, then rebuild Geth platforms, is it still "The Geth" we know, or complety new synthethic life that looks like The Geth? Geth as a nation are created from their experiences. Their sudden gain of sentience. Quarian civil disobidience to protect them. The Morning war. Decision to spare Quarians.

All these created what we know as the Geth. Just rebuilding and creating new set of programs does not automatically create Geth.

Modifié par Mandemon, 26 mars 2012 - 10:32 .

[daisekihan]

I agree with you, the idea is that organics will inevitably create synthetics will otherwise destroy all, sentient or otherwise, and thus the solution is to cut off sentience, but not life itself, before this occurs. But the problem is, while there is no logical or syllogistic contradiction, it would seem a much easier answer to this problem would be for the Reapers to destroy the synthetics organics made before they could kill all life off.

[taelus.calimshan]

sydranark wrote...

taelus.calimshan wrote...

<SNIPPAGE OF MY STUFF>

1) If it must be unknown, then it is not true. If you must assign one of the following to the premise: True, False, Unknown, you would choose Unknown. 

Soundness, as I stated before, is determined by truth. Not truths and/or unknowns. So, even if it is "unknown," it is still not "true." Therefore the argument is still unsound. 

Ah, I see where our disconnect is.  I'm allowing for action based on assumption so long as that action is recognized as assumption by the viewing audience and you're saying the only valid arguments are the ones that are provably true.  We're similar in some ways, but different in others.  By your definition of "unsound" (which I don't dispute), you're correct that the assertion about synthetics always wiping out organics is insufficiently supported.

I'm snipping out items 2-4 because they're essentially answered by the above statement.

sydranark wrote...

5) Yes, then they take action. But they acted upon an unsound argument. This is why I think the logic was dumb. I already argued with Lugaidster on the meaning of the word stupid, I'm too tired to do it again haha. But basically, Something dumb is something unintelligent. An unsound argument is one that incorporates unsupported premises, uneducated/unintelligent statements, i.e a load of crap. Someone who believes in and acts upon a load of crap is an idiot. 

This is a spot where we significantly differ, not in terms of your definition, but in terms of what I presume is your application of it to the Star Child.  It is indeed stupid to act on a premise that is unsupported entirely (your "load of crap").  The thing is, there's reason to believe that the Star Child has significant support for his assertion.  If we assume that an entity capable of creating the Reapers, the Mass Effect relays, and the Citadel is of above average intelligence, then we can assume that it would not take drastic, extinction level action without a basis for that action.  We don't, as the audience, know what the Star Child has seen, experienced, or calculated to come to his conclusions, but it's reasonable to assume that there's cause for them.  That means he's not stupid, nor is his action stupid, it's just difficult to understand without knowing his history.

sydranark wrote...
Moving on, 

7) Refer to #4 & #6. Even if there is no absolute proof (there can never be), you can't still can't call his argument sound. #5: an unsound argument is one that has no weight, and is stupid to argue.

I disagree.  His argument only appears to have no weight from the perspective of the audience.  That's a failure in writing, not a failure in the argument.  It's possible that the Star Child has seen cycle after cycle where he tried to let organics handle the presence of synthetics only to have civilizations wiped out forever, leading him to think that preserving them as a Reaper is better than their outright destruction.  In that case, he has significant evidence to support his position.  We don't know if that's true, but it's possible and since the possibility that he has good reason for his actions is in line with his degree of sophistication, we have to assume that his argument does indeed hold weight, at least for him.

[taelus.calimshan]

daisekihan wrote...

I agree with you, the idea is that organics will inevitably create synthetics will otherwise destroy all, sentient or otherwise, and thus the solution is to cut off sentience, but not life itself, before this occurs. But the problem is, while there is no logical or syllogistic contradiction, it would seem a much easier answer to this problem would be for the Reapers to destroy the synthetics organics made before they could kill all life off.

Hey now, no fair swapping the modeling method in use.  This is a topic discussing strict logic and you want to swap to a reason-based exchange.  We all know the ending is going to fall apart under that one and I like this thread so you just quit it