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[wright1978]

Starbrat's first choice solution is to turn all life into a substance with the consistency of pea soup and shove it in a big totilla. It's second choice solution synthesis is to turn all life into the equivalent of mindless drones, scurrying about without any higher thought processes or creative thought. Yeah i'm not down with either options.

[YNation913]

The Angry One wrote...

YNation913 wrote...

But the Geth aren't really getting anything out of helping the quarians. EDI even said in her Shadow Broker files that she had to restrict herself to help organics.

The Geth gain acceptance and co-existance, what they've wanted all along.
Remember the consensus mission? The Geth try to hide it, but they want to work with organics, and specifically they want to be with their creators.

The first thing the Prime does after peace is ask the Quarians to settle on Rannoch "with us". Why would it specifally add "with us"?
Why not "Look have this part of the planet and stay out of our way."

There's also the cut Geth Prime dialogue where it sounds quite pleased to be fighting alongside the Quarians.

They wanted to unite against a common enemy. After that, co-existence would be pretty one-sided. The geth would pretty much be super heroes that their creators would depend on for help; restricting themselves to organic limitations purely out of the chivalrous desire to help and protect them. But like Superman, the geth wouldn't get much out of protecting "Metropolis", except perhaps the opportunity to have personal relationships. And what if, like Tali said, the geth decide to stop helping because of personal bias against guys like Gerrel? What would their relationship with organics be then? Isolation.

[Ieldra]

lordofdogtown19 wrote...
Because that's exactly what Saren wanted in ME1. Listen to him yourself: 
 (skip to 1:54)

"Organic machine intertwined, a union of flesh and steel. The strengths of both, the weakness of niether. I am a vision of the future, Shepard. The evolution of organic life." 

This is irrelevant as an argument. An idea is not bad just because it has been promoted by a villain. The idea sounds rather attractive to me once you disconnect it from the Reapers.

[The Angry One]

Ieldra2 wrote...

lordofdogtown19 wrote...
Because that's exactly what Saren wanted in ME1. Listen to him yourself: 
 (skip to 1:54)

"Organic machine intertwined, a union of flesh and steel. The strengths of both, the weakness of niether. I am a vision of the future, Shepard. The evolution of organic life." 

This is irrelevant as an argument. An idea is not bad just because it has been promoted by a villain. The idea sounds rather attractive to me once you disconnect it from the Reapers.

Well, it can't be disconnected from the Reapers, because the Reapers endorse and encourage it.
Also, Saren's vision is relevant, because his vision matches synthesis almost word for word, and Saren believes in the imposition of his ideal over all organic life. Just like synthesis.

Synthesis removes all choice and self-determination. If you do not accept the Reapers' vision for the future, too bad. You're part of it anyway, sucker.

Modifié par The Angry One, 09 mai 2012 - 01:53 .

[The Angry One]

YNation913 wrote...

They wanted to unite against a common enemy. After that, co-existence would be pretty one-sided.

Wrong. The Geth have desired unity with the Quarians regardless of the Reapers.

The geth would pretty much be super heroes that their creators would depend on for help; restricting themselves to organic limitations purely out of the chivalrous desire to help and protect them. But like Superman, the geth wouldn't get much out of protecting "Metropolis", except perhaps the opportunity to have personal relationships. And what if, like Tali said, the geth decide to stop helping because of personal bias against guys like Gerrel? What would their relationship with organics be then? Isolation.

The Geth gain the unity they desire, and new perspectives by uploading into Quarian suits.
They are not limiting themselves, they are doing what they want to do, and both gain from this.

This argument is absurd anyway. How does synthesis make it any better? What possible advantage do the Geth gain by being part organic? They use hardware platforms and remotely hop to and from servers. Making their platforms part organic is not only useless, but possibly dangerous. To say nothing if their servers are affected too.

Modifié par The Angry One, 09 mai 2012 - 01:55 .

[Ieldra]

cogsandcurls wrote...
Because, aside from the non-consensual aspect and the fact that it makes no sense on a practical level, there IS no "next step" or "pinnacle" in evolution. Evolution doesn't have a direction, evolution is random changes, some of which survive if they happen to be beneficial to the survival of the species in the environment in which they live. Synthesising primeval slime does not make it the pinnacle of evolution, it makes it some primeval slime with some circuitry in it, which, given the somewhat static nature of sythetics, might actually HINDER the slime's evolution into something more advanced rather than help it at all.

The premise is that if it was possible to avoid the extinction scenario, organic and synthetic life would gravitate towards a symbiosis more or less naturally. With enough knowledge, you can actually make predictions like that, because the random element - the creation of synthetic life - has already happened. Thus, Synthesis is seen as a shortcut to that state. 

Also, evolution is not interpreted as purely natural evolution, because as soon as life is intelligent enough to understand evolution, it can actively try to change its direction. You may call that "artificial evolution", and you would be able to predict its direction based on the physical and psychological profiles of intelligent life.

What evolution - natural or artificial - doesn't have is a final stage. I take issue with that phrasing, but I can choose to take it metaphorically.

Modifié par Ieldra2, 09 mai 2012 - 01:59 .

[MattFini]

It's a pretentious cop-out that has no place at the end of this story.

"Oh, wouldn't it be beautiful if we all got along?"

It's anticlimactic and silly.

[NoSpin]

Ieldra2 wrote...

lordofdogtown19 wrote...
Because that's exactly what Saren wanted in ME1. Listen to him yourself: 
 (skip to 1:54)

"Organic machine intertwined, a union of flesh and steel. The strengths of both, the weakness of niether. I am a vision of the future, Shepard. The evolution of organic life." 

This is irrelevant as an argument. An idea is not bad just because it has been promoted by a villain. The idea sounds rather attractive to me once you disconnect it from the Reapers.

What? It is an idea being endorsed by someone who has been indoctrinated by the freaking Reapers. Thus the Reapers want it. Thus Shepard should NOT want it. The Reapers are the bad guys of the series, and a couple lines by a ghost child should not be able to convince otherwise. 

[YNation913]

The Angry One wrote...

YNation913 wrote...

They wanted to unite against a common enemy. After that, co-existence would be pretty one-sided.

Wrong. The Geth have desired unity with the Quarians regardless of the Reapers.

The geth would pretty much be super heroes that their creators would depend on for help; restricting themselves to organic limitations purely out of the chivalrous desire to help and protect them. But like Superman, the geth wouldn't get much out of protecting "Metropolis", except perhaps the opportunity to have personal relationships. And what if, like Tali said, the geth decide to stop helping because of personal bias against guys like Gerrel? What would their relationship with organics be then? Isolation.

The Geth gain the unity they desire, and new perspectives by uploading into Quarian suits.
They are not limiting themselves, they are doing what they want to do, and both gain from this.

This argument is absurd anyway. How does synthesis make it any better? What possible advantage do the Geth gain by being part organic? They use hardware platforms and remotely hop to and from servers. Making their platforms part organic is not only useless, but possibly dangerous. To say nothing if their servers are affected too.

If you believe that the geth gain no advantage in being part organic, why would you think that gaining perspective on organic behavior helps in any way other than to support the geth's efforts in helping their creators? They end up either being restricted to a support role, or choosing to isolate themselves for organic society all together.

[frylock23]

EvilMind wrote...

d-boy15 wrote...
although, you think just because it's good people will accept and like it?

I actually do. Call me the moral freak, but if some "Casper the friendly ghost" came over to me and offered magically heal all diseases or solve problem of hunger, i'd say force that mother f***er on everyone and spare noone.

It is true that its completely unexplained how Synthesis works and I see why everyone would hate it for that. But i'm not bothered by moral side of the question, dunno maybe i'm f***ed up:O

You know, there are plenty of people in history who though they'd found the key to Utopia and decided they would force it on their people in the name of Utopia. We call them Pol Pot, Mao Tse Tung, Lenin, Stalin, Hitler ... basically people like that. You need to consider that everything they did was done in the name of the Greater Good, too.

The Greater Good and Utpoia are really wonderful concepts until you're the one getting sacrificed in their name without your consent. Has that ever happened to you? Until it has, you can't conceive of how evil the two ideas really are.

[Navasha]

Let's see... what precedent for synthesis do we have in the ME universe. Saren, husks, cannibals, banshees...

Wow... being able to huskify everyone in the galaxy in one fell swoop. Sounds like the reapers win this cycle without even much of a fight.

Synthesis: The Human cycle goes down in history books as the shortest and easiest cycle to defeat in their entire history.

[Garlador]

My biggest problem with Synthesis (well, ONE of my big problems... they are numerous) is that Synthesis doesn't FIX ANYTHING!!!!

If the Starchild's argument is that synthetics will always rebel against their creators, how does combining them prevent org-synths from not creating a new race of synthetics? Even synthetics could create new synthetics that would rebel against prior synthetics?

The argument that it is our carbon-based DNA that causes conflict is so insanely stupid, I won't even justify it with an explanation. It is the MIND and HEART of a person that either creates peace or propagates war. Free-will is what causes conflict... not the creation of synthetics.

So, either Synthesis 1) robs all organic life of their free will (which is horrible) or 2) it just makes people's eyes turn green and the choice has changed absolutely nothing about people's nature so the cycle will just keep continuing.

Either choice is stupid. That's why Synthesis is stupid... that and it's thematically revolting, makes no sense, is physically impossible, and nobody in the galaxy wanted it or asked for it.

[frylock23]

MattFini wrote...

It's a pretentious cop-out that has no place at the end of this story.

"Oh, wouldn't it be beautiful if we all got along?"

It's anticlimactic and silly.

It's not so much that. It would indeed be beautiful if we could all get along, but the idea that forcing everyone to be the same at some fundamental level is going to achieve that is only going to work if it takes away all freewill. Our differences do not come so much just from our DNA as they do from our nurture.

We're all individuals and even genetically identical individuals are different as evidenced from their different experiences -> their nuture.

Difference is the root of conflict.

So the only way that Star Brat's synthesis works is if it also removes freewill by forcing everyone to be the same in more than just the fundamental but also in the behavioral.

[antares_sublight]

I've written some of my favorite problems/questions about synthesis in a couple of threads. In summary, it's a ridiculous idea when you think about the ramifications (which BioWare didn't)

Above all, it's a tremendously naive choice to make after an all-to-brief, content-free overly-agreeable chat with a being you know as the most evil force in the galaxy who is impliing that choice is its favorite. You have *no idea* what it will do, and you're risking that on EVERY SINGLE ORGANIC LIFE FORM IN THE GALAXY.

1. Peak of evolution, or freeze of evolution. How does making something a synthetic-hybrid mean that organism has reached the "peak of evolution". Does that mean it stops evolving? So what it's actually done is stop the evolution of all species where it was when you chose. Aside from being contradictory, this is just... waht?

2. Flora & fauna. Plant life is now synthetic-hybrid as well. Entire ecosystems and organisms have been rendered useless in the new galactic framework. Is pollination necessary now, how will plant reproduction work? What does it even mean for plant life to be synthetic? What about cooking & eating plants now? How do electric eels work now? Is wood flammable still? Is cotton soft? What will fossil fuels of synthetic organisms be like? How are single-celled organisms synthetic now? On and on and on...

3. The kill-switch. You just found out that there exists technology to destroy all synthetic or partly-synthetic life in the galaxy. By choosing synthesis, you are implanting that kill-switch in ALL ORGANIC LIFE IN THE GALAXY. On top of that, the beings that possess the technological knowledge are left alive. How long will it be before someone reconstructs the Destroy option and uses it as a threat? Would an EMP now destroy all life in the affected area?

4. Nonsensical. It's just too difficult to explain the way it was done. DNA requires specific chemicals to work, how is organic DNA changed to be partly synthetic without totally altering everything about EVERY LIFE FORM IN THE GALAXY?

5. The reapers are still alive.

6. There is no indication it does anything good for anyone. Because you have *no idea* what it will do, yet you rashly impose fundamental genetic changes on ALL ORGANIC  LIFE IN THE GALAXY without a clue of what that means, or even a question about it.

[kookie28]

Ieldra2 wrote...

cogsandcurls wrote...
Because, aside from the non-consensual aspect and the fact that it makes no sense on a practical level, there IS no "next step" or "pinnacle" in evolution. Evolution doesn't have a direction, evolution is random changes, some of which survive if they happen to be beneficial to the survival of the species in the environment in which they live. Synthesising primeval slime does not make it the pinnacle of evolution, it makes it some primeval slime with some circuitry in it, which, given the somewhat static nature of sythetics, might actually HINDER the slime's evolution into something more advanced rather than help it at all.

The premise is that if it was possible to avoid the extinction scenario, organic and synthetic life would gravitate towards a symbiosis more or less naturally. With enough knowledge, you can actually make predictions like that, because the random element - the creation of synthetic life - has already happened. Thus, Synthesis is seen as a shortcut to that state. 

Also, evolution is not interpreted as purely natural evolution, because as soon as life is intelligent enough to understand evolution, it can actively try to change its direction. You may call that "artificial evolution", and you would be able to predict its direction based on the physical and psychological profiles of intelligent life.

What evolution - natural or artificial - doesn't have is a final stage. I take issue with that phrasing, but I can choose to take it metaphorically.

That was my problem with it.  And I wanted to live.

I'm hoping I can just chalk that phrasing up to Bioware over-simplifying a complicated subject. 

[aj2070]

Simply put, it is a crime against the galaxy. It is destroying 2 forms of life; organic and synthetic, to create a 3rd form of life in a forced change. Not to mention the physiological issues of suddenly forcing lifeforms that do not have the physical need to eat, sleep, or breathe to suddenly need to do all with no real knowledge of how. Or, do the synthetics cease to exist and become part of the organics? This in my opinion is why the term "space magic" has become so common in talking about the "endings".

[lordofdogtown19]

Ieldra2 wrote...

lordofdogtown19 wrote...
Because that's exactly what Saren wanted in ME1. Listen to him yourself: 
 (skip to 1:54)

"Organic machine intertwined, a union of flesh and steel. The strengths of both, the weakness of niether. I am a vision of the future, Shepard. The evolution of organic life." 

This is irrelevant as an argument. An idea is not bad just because it has been promoted by a villain. The idea sounds rather attractive to me once you disconnect it from the Reapers.

Saren isn't just guilty by association, he is being contolled by the Reapers so, ipso facto, what Saren wants is what the Reapers want.

And even if you don't beilieve that, synthesis is obviously what the Catalyst wants and the Catalyst is Reaper. He admits it himself.

Modifié par lordofdogtown19, 09 mai 2012 - 02:27 .

[frylock23]

aj2070 wrote...

Simply put, it is a crime against the galaxy. It is destroying 2 forms of life; organic and synthetic, to create a 3rd form of life in a forced change. Not to mention the physiological issues of suddenly forcing lifeforms that do not have the physical need to eat, sleep, or breathe to suddenly need to do all with no real knowledge of how. Or, do the synthetics cease to exist and become part of the organics? This in my opinion is why the term "space magic" has become so common in talking about the "endings".

This.

And it's done in such a way that all extant organisms who have previously existed as either one kind of life or the other will be suddenly and traumatically changed into the third, new kind of life. It isn't like this new form of life is natural and begins its existence being what it is and will be. Presumably, every single one of these new beings will remember what they were and what they lost giving them the capacity to mourn what was left behind and resent what they've become, even reject it. This makes it even more potentially traumatic.

[EvilMind]

tvman099 wrote...

EvilMind wrote...

The short versions like "Its genetical rape" "Its forced" are not welcomed,.

Translation: "Please do not bring good reasons for why it's completely immoral and unacceptable in here, I want to believe in my silly fantasy that forcibly restructuring the DNA of every living thing in the galaxy is a good thing".

It may have sounded wrong, but what I meant is: I wanted more detailed answers, feel free to base your opinion on those points, but give more detailed answer.

[Cyruge]

tilusN7 wrote...

Physically impossible. Morally questionable, and thematically horrible.

This, this and so much this.

[antares_sublight]

EvilMind wrote...
It may have sounded wrong, but what I meant is: I wanted more detailed answers, feel free to base your opinion on those points, but give more detailed answer.

I did, on this page. And lots of others have all over the place.

[MattFini]

frylock23 wrote...

MattFini wrote...

It's a pretentious cop-out that has no place at the end of this story.

"Oh, wouldn't it be beautiful if we all got along?"

It's anticlimactic and silly.

It's not so much that. It would indeed be beautiful if we could all get along, but the idea that forcing everyone to be the same at some fundamental level is going to achieve that is only going to work if it takes away all freewill. Our differences do not come so much just from our DNA as they do from our nurture.

We're all individuals and even genetically identical individuals are different as evidenced from their different experiences -> their nuture.

Difference is the root of conflict.

So the only way that Star Brat's synthesis works is if it also removes freewill by forcing everyone to be the same in more than just the fundamental but also in the behavioral.

I agree with you.  But fundamentally, I feel like it has no basis in what ME has been up to that point.  

I find it pretentious becuase, taken at face value (ie - not part of IT) it pretends that it's the "ultimate" solution.  But why would this be?  Couldn't the Krogan still go to war with the Turians, etc?  That was as much a part of ME's lore as organics vs. synthetics, but Synthesis somehow suggests that everything will work out right. 

[EvilMind]

Why Reapers didn't build crusible themselves and used Synthesis on galaxy? What, they can build hundreds mass relays, but not a structure that took organics few months(?)?

Well, I got my answer. Synthesis is not explained, at all. Its not a part of ME where everything has its explanation (ME fields, biotics, relays), thats space magic. For me thats a good reason to hate synthesis. Thanks everyone

[antares_sublight]

EvilMind wrote...

Why Reapers didn't build crusible themselves and used Synthesis on galaxy? What, they can build hundreds mass relays, but not a structure that took organics few months(?)?

Well, I got my answer. Synthesis is not explained, at all. Its not a part of ME where everything has its explanation (ME fields, biotics, relays), thats space magic. For me thats a good reason to hate synthesis. Thanks everyone

That's a good reason, but there are even better reasons.

[wright1978]

Garlador wrote...

My biggest problem with Synthesis (well, ONE of my big problems... they are numerous) is that Synthesis doesn't FIX ANYTHING!!!!

If the Starchild's argument is that synthetics will always rebel against their creators, how does combining them prevent org-synths from not creating a new race of synthetics? Even synthetics could create new synthetics that would rebel against prior synthetics?

The argument that it is our carbon-based DNA that causes conflict is so insanely stupid, I won't even justify it with an explanation. It is the MIND and HEART of a person that either creates peace or propagates war. Free-will is what causes conflict... not the creation of synthetics.

So, either Synthesis 1) robs all organic life of their free will (which is horrible) or 2) it just makes people's eyes turn green and the choice has changed absolutely nothing about people's nature so the cycle will just keep continuing.

Either choice is stupid. That's why Synthesis is stupid... that and it's thematically revolting, makes no sense, is physically impossible, and nobody in the galaxy wanted it or asked for it.

Yep this