450 réponses à ce sujet

[kal_reegar]

Ieldra2 wrote...

@kal_reegar:
I don't agree with everything you said, but it's really nice to see someone trying to create a scenario that makes sense instead of incessantly complaining that it doesn't.

I have to try, I love ME too much!

btw, is there something specific you don't agree? I know there are other possible scenarios that make sense, but if you have noticed something inconsistent please tell me, I truly believe that we can get better only through discussion and confrontation 

[Dysjong]

I would compare the catalyst Logic with a god. If anyone has read the avatar crisies in forgotten realms, kelemvor is accused for being too human. After that he had to change things in order to fufill his portfolio. Because of that, it caused a rift between him and mystra.

The Logic is correct, because it's inhuman. That doesn't mean that i like the catalyst.

[Ieldra]

kal_reegar wrote...

Ieldra2 wrote...

@kal_reegar:
I don't agree with everything you said, but it's really nice to see someone trying to create a scenario that makes sense instead of incessantly complaining that it doesn't.

I have to try, I love ME too much!

btw, is there something specific you don't agree? I know there are other possible scenarios that make sense, but if you have noticed something inconsistent please tell me, I truly believe that we can get better only through discussion and confrontation 

Hmm...after having analyzed your scenario, I must admit that it makes a great deal of sense. Premises 1, 2 and 4 are unproblematic, I've always thought the same. Premise 3 states the end of the cycle is inevitable as soon as the Crucible has docked, right? At that point "my solutions won't work anymore" and "the variables have changed", meaning that if not this cycle, then the next cycle will win as proven by Refuse, and the Catalyst knows this. This sounds weird at first glance, but it would make the Catalyst's presentation of the solutions so much more understandable. If it's doomed anyway, it would have no problem presenting a choice where it's destroyed or replaced or dissolved as long as some inroads are made towards its objective. Your rationale for Destroy is convincing.

I'll have to think this over some more, but it seems you have found a way to close several plot holes with one additional premise which sounds convincing as well. Your scenario is very elegant.

Modifié par Ieldra2, 26 décembre 2012 - 05:20 .

[kal_reegar]

Ieldra2 wrote...
Hmm...after having analyzed your scenario, I must admit that it makes a great deal of sense. Premises 1, 2 and 4 are unproblematic, I've always thought the same. Premise 3 states the end of the cycle is inevitable as soon as the Crucible has docked, right? At that point "my solutions won't work anymore" and "the variables have changed", meaning that if not this cycle, then the next cycle will win as proven by Refuse, and the Catalyst knows this. This sounds weird at first glance, but it would make the Catalyst's presentation of the solutions so much more understandable. If it's doomed anyway, it would have no problem presenting a choice where it's destroyed or replaced or dissolved as long as some inroads are made towards its objective. Your rationale for Destroy is convincing.

I'll have to think this over some more, but it seems you have found a way to close several plot holes with one additional premise which sounds convincing as well. Your scenario is very elegant.

thanks!

[JShepppp]

kal_reegar, I read over your post on the previous page and think we are in agreement on many things, and I like how you brought in your © point - the next cycle MUST win - as something that really must be true for the Catalyst to act how it did. I like what you wrote.

My opinion was that once the Crucible is docked, it is a manifestation of the problems with the Reaper solution (it's imperfect; things leak through) and this presents to the Catalyst the certainty that, eventually, the Crucible will be built, as it already has (before the Catalyst probably thought it was impossible the Crucible would be completed). The Catalyst has a few options then - it can somehow make the Reaper solution better and change what it does, or it can look for new, fresh ideas, like in the Crucible. But the Reaper solution, after a billion or so years, is already the best the Catalyst can make it, and the Crucible offers several other convenient solutions. Naturally it turns to the Crucible and urges Shepard to do it.

The entire thing does seem to hinge on the idea that, once the Crucible has been proven possible and a real threat, that its mere existence as a tangible object - and not a dreamy idea - changes things completely because one day the Reapers will be defeated by it.

I guess at a VERY basic level, an analogous situation would be someone using fire as a weapon (again, basic allegory), hearing of water existing but never seeing it, then finally seeing that water actually exists. Even if their fire is not extinguished, their fire is no longer the invincible weapon it was, and from that point on, they are immediately looking for another weapon. Apologies if that seems a little confusing.

[CosmicGnosis]

I think I've stated this before, but if so, I'll say it again: This thread is fantastic. Every time I look at the OP, I'm impressed with the length of the post and the evidence used to back it up. Much better than "Catalyst sucks lol!"

And I'm curious about your canon choice, JShepppp. Exactly why is Control your choice?

[Fixers0]

Regardless of the Rest, the Catalyst insane dialogue can be easiliy proven logically fallacious by his usage of absolustic terms when referring to the Destruction of organics. 

[Ieldra]

Fixers0 wrote...
Regardless of the Rest, the Catalyst insane dialogue can be easiliy proven logically fallacious by his usage of absolustic terms when referring to the Destruction of organics. 

This is nonsense. Reasons:

(1) You're making the assumption that the future is intrinsically unknowable, i.e. that it's impossible for anyone and anything to know with certainty what will happen without an intervention. This is an unproven assumption. *You* may not be able to know, but possibly the Catalyst can.

(2) The Catalyst just doesn't scientific language here. Let's assume that there are always uncertainties in projections into the future. After all, in spite of (1) that's the more reasonable assumption. If you make such projections, you make use of statistical models (compare Asimov's classic Foundation series). The results are always probabilities. The Catalyst's "always" is just a shorthand for something like "with a probability of 99.999999%". In other words "A probability so high that it might as well be certain for all practical considerations".

Modifié par Ieldra2, 31 décembre 2012 - 09:42 .

[Fixers0]

Ieldra2 wrote...
(1) You're making the assumption that the future is intrinsically unknowable, i.e. that it's impossible for anyone and anything to know with certainty what will happen without an intervention. This is an unproven assumption. *You* may not be able to know, but possibly the Catalyst can.

When did the bolded part happen, Exactly?

And it does not in ay way give him the legitimacy to to use absolutistic reasoning based one your conjecture (that starbrat knows the future)

Ieldra2 wrote...
(2) The Catalyst just doesn't scientific language here. Let's assume that there are always uncertainties in projections into the future. After all, in spite of (1) that's the more reasonable assumption. If you make such projections, you make use of statistic models. The results are always probabilities. The Catalyst's "always" is just a shorthand for something like "with a probability of 99.999999%". In other words "A probability so high that it might as well be certain for all practical considerations".

Except without the repeated use of absolustic terms and other logical fallacies the Catalyst story falls apart like a windbreeze through a cardhouse.

[Ieldra]

Fixers0 wrote...

Ieldra2 wrote...
(1) You're making the assumption that the future is intrinsically unknowable, i.e. that it's impossible for anyone and anything to know with certainty what will happen without an intervention. This is an unproven assumption. *You* may not be able to know, but possibly the Catalyst can.

When did the bolded part happen, Exactly?

And it does not in ay way give him the legitimacy to to use absolutistic reasoning based one your conjecture (that starbrat knows the future)

If the Catalyst knows what will happen, then it's perfectly reasonable to use that knowledge as a premise for its actions. 

Also, I didn't claim the Catalyst actually *does* know, I only say it's possible, and that means its conclusions aren't intrinsically flawed - which was what you were claiming. We don't know if the Catalyst's conclusions are correct, but they aren't intrinsically flawed.

Ieldra2 wrote...
(2) The Catalyst just doesn't scientific language here. Let's assume that there are always uncertainties in projections into the future. After all, in spite of (1) that's the more reasonable assumption. If you make such projections, you make use of statistic models. The results are always probabilities. The Catalyst's "always" is just a shorthand for something like "with a probability of 99.999999%". In other words "A probability so high that it might as well be certain for all practical considerations".

Except without the repeated use of absolustic terms and other logical fallacies the Catalyst story falls apart like a windbreeze through a cardhouse.

There aren't any logical fallacies. That was my point. Read the OP. Also, mathematical certainty isn't needed because the timespan covered by the Catalyst's hypothesis is not infinite. 

[kal_reegar]

JShepppp wrote...

kal_reegar, I read over your post on the previous page and think we are in agreement on many things, and I like how you brought in your © point - the next cycle MUST win - as something that really must be true for the Catalyst to act how it did. I like what you wrote.

My opinion was that once the Crucible is docked, it is a manifestation of the problems with the Reaper solution (it's imperfect; things leak through) and this presents to the Catalyst the certainty that, eventually, the Crucible will be built, as it already has (before the Catalyst probably thought it was impossible the Crucible would be completed). The Catalyst has a few options then - it can somehow make the Reaper solution better and change what it does, or it can look for new, fresh ideas, like in the Crucible. But the Reaper solution, after a billion or so years, is already the best the Catalyst can make it, and the Crucible offers several other convenient solutions. Naturally it turns to the Crucible and urges Shepard to do it.

The entire thing does seem to hinge on the idea that, once the Crucible has been proven possible and a real threat, that its mere existence as a tangible object - and not a dreamy idea - changes things completely because one day the Reapers will be defeated by it.

I guess at a VERY basic level, an analogous situation would be someone using fire as a weapon (again, basic allegory), hearing of water existing but never seeing it, then finally seeing that water actually exists. Even if their fire is not extinguished, their fire is no longer the invincible weapon it was, and from that point on, they are immediately looking for another weapon. Apologies if that seems a little confusing.

I like your example (water vs fire), it's... illuminating.

Of course there is nothing I can argue from a mere logical point of view... if the crucible exist and can be used -> the reapers are no longer as effective as the catalyst thought they were -> a new solution is required

but... maybe is just me and my organic's fallacies  but giving up a solution which has proven unfailing for billions of years "just" because this time organics were able to dock the crucible, it's kind of puzzling. Too yielding.

I mean... the crucible's projects have been around for severel cycle. The protheans were able to build it. So they were close too. And yes, this cycle is close, very close to win... but not yet. The crucible is docked, but they haven't used it yet. They have a match point, but the catalyst/reapers can still save it.
If the crucible can be destroyed (as the prohean's crucible was) without negative consequences for the reapers, why in the hell "his solution won't work anymore?"

Because this cycle is exceptional, with an exceptional leader and exceptional advantages (see Me1), and yet they weren't able to use the crucible... it's hard to believe that the next cycle (or cycles) will have "match point" too.

And except for synthesis, which can be the classic "now or never opportunity", destroy and control are less desirable than harvest, if harvest can continue indefinitely.


So somehow I still think that there must be something else, something implicit... something that has altered the variables forever and in favour of the organics. A point of no return.

For example -> the crucible cannot be removed/destroyed/disactived without relevant negative consequences for the catalyst and/or the reapers. A rude power source exploding/overloading on it's own after a while is quite realistic imo.

Or maybe the fact that the crucible can be succesfully build and used (water vs fire) is the classic last straw. The last but decisive alteration of the variables. Necessary but non sufficient alone. Except the fact, it's not alone -> prothean's indomitable resistance, keeper's signal modified, sovereing defeated (blitz krieg impossible), collectors destroyed, Alpha relay destroyed, Liara's warnings sent all over the galaxy, lot of reapers dead, all the races (even mighty leviathans) united against the reapers.. the working crucible is what finally forced the catalyst to accept the forthcoming, inevitable failure of his solution.

[JShepppp]

CosmicGnosis wrote...

I think I've stated this before, but if so, I'll say it again: This thread is fantastic. Every time I look at the OP, I'm impressed with the length of the post and the evidence used to back it up. Much better than "Catalyst sucks lol!"

And I'm curious about your canon choice, JShepppp. Exactly why is Control your choice?

Thanks a lot for your support. As for choosing Control, I basically did it because it overall seemed like it was a more elegant solution. I had taken a lot of effort to get peace between the Quarians and the Geth, and I pushed Joker and EDI to get with each other, so killing synthetics was a huge no-no for me. Also, I had just found out that the Reapers were (in my opinion) basically slaves to the Catalyst, and I did not know their guiltiness in the whole cycle process, so I was not about to outright kill them. Destroy seemed like a vanilla solution riddled with casualties. Again, this is my opinion.

Synthesis was something I was unsure about. I was unsure about (a) if the Reapers would be nice once free (I mean, even aliens in the galaxy had issues BEFORE the Reapers, and as the Catalyst says, peace is very difficult), ( if such a thing was possible, and © if I could make such a long-lasting decision for everyone. Synthesis though is a close second; I'd definitely pick it if it wasn't for control. 

Control basically was a cautious choice. I could kill the Reapers if they were bad/truly guilty later, I could use the might of the Reapers to rebuild (very very important for me - it takes resources to rebuild, and the Reapers would be an incredible asset), I save the Geth and whatnot, and I likely don't have to worry about making as large of a decision for everyone as Synthesis. The downside is a possibly manical AI Shepard, but I took a gamble that it wouldn't happen. Synthesis could eventually happen naturally with the urging of the Reapers through gentle influence.

So overall, control was basically a cautious choice. I know you have been posting about different endings - what is your canon?

[JShepppp]

kal_reegar wrote...


Because this cycle is exceptional, with an exceptional leader and exceptional advantages (see Me1), and yet they weren't able to use the crucible... it's hard to believe that the next cycle (or cycles) will have "match point" too.

...

So somehow I still think that there must be something else, something implicit... something that has altered the variables forever and in favour of the organics. A point of no return.

For example -> the crucible cannot be removed/destroyed/disactived without relevant negative consequences for the catalyst and/or the reapers. A rude power source exploding/overloading on it's own after a while is quite realistic imo.

This is another good idea. Other than the philosophical/ideal that "once it's built, it can be built again and shows the Reapers aren't as good", it could just be that the Crucible had other unnoticeable downsides that severely weakened the Reaper solution if the Crucible wasn't used anyways. 

[Kabraxal]

Organics and Synthetics might go to war is the main justification...... but organics go to war with each other all the time, so much more so than with synthetics. So.... why are synthetics more of a problem? Right... they aren't. It's just illogical prejudiced bull that makes no real sense when any context is actually added. That is why the Catalyst's logic and Javik's logic are both mind numblingly horrible.

It's irrational prejudice masquerading as thoughtful logic. It really isn't logical, but they really really really want you to believe it is.

[Ieldra]

Kabraxal wrote...
Organics and Synthetics might go to war is the main justification...... but organics go to war with each other all the time, so much more so than with synthetics. So.... why are synthetics more of a problem? Right... they aren't. It's just illogical prejudiced bull that makes no real sense when any context is actually added. That is why the Catalyst's logic and Javik's logic are both mind numblingly horrible.

It's irrational prejudice masquerading as thoughtful logic. It really isn't logical, but they really really really want you to believe it is.

*sigh*

[prayer wheel mode]
Hostility alone is not the problem. It's synthetics out-evolving organics at an ever increasing pace, so that *when* war breaks out, organics will be crushed. That will eventually lead to the destruction of all organic spacefaring civilizations. It's actually a rather widespread hypothesis that if we find a non-human civilization out there, it's likely to be an AI civilization, because they'll last longer, advance faster and be less dependent on very specialized environmental conditions.  
[/prayer wheel mode]

Modifié par Ieldra2, 31 décembre 2012 - 10:25 .

[Kira Sierra Cyrus]

>people actually defending the butt-pull that is catalyst

[Kabraxal]

Ieldra2 wrote...

Kabraxal wrote...
Organics and Synthetics might go to war is the main justification...... but organics go to war with each other all the time, so much more so than with synthetics. So.... why are synthetics more of a problem? Right... they aren't. It's just illogical prejudiced bull that makes no real sense when any context is actually added. That is why the Catalyst's logic and Javik's logic are both mind numblingly horrible.

It's irrational prejudice masquerading as thoughtful logic. It really isn't logical, but they really really really want you to believe it is.

*sigh*

[prayer wheel mode]
Hostility alone is not the problem. It's synthetics out-evolving organics at an ever increasing pace, so that *when* war breaks out, organics will be crushed. That will eventually lead to the destruction of all organic spacefaring civilizations. It's actually a rather widespread hypothesis that if we find a non-human civilization out there, it's likely to be an AI civilization, because they'll last longer, advance faster and be less dependent on very specialized environmental conditions.  
[/prayer wheel mode]

And that's different than another organic race out evolving or technologically outpacing another organic race how?  O right... it isn't.  Just more inane paranoia driven by prejudice against a lifeform different than what we are used to.  There is nothing inherently different from AI and organics.  Conceptually, it is possible for an organic race to evolve in such a way to not only have the processing capabilities of our projected AI, but also have evoloved into bodies that regenerate and are resistant to age, damage, and death.  The same inherent "differences" percieved in an AI lifeform exist within finding a suitably evolved organic lifeform that took another path.

We are just so damn caught up in the human centric veiwpoints of how the universe operates, we assume rather idiotic things like this synthetic v organic bull that folds under any intellectually honest scrutiny.

[Ieldra]

^Synthetics and organics are based on mutually exclusive design principles. Synthetics are constructs, they can be changed without much effort. Organics are grown, if you want to change their design, you must redesign the whole from the ground up. That can reasonably result in different speeds of advancement. Since RL synthetics don't exist I can't say what the final outcome of that would be, but claiming any fundamental difference is "idiotic" is not "intellectually honest scrutiny" but ideological bullsh*t.

Modifié par Ieldra2, 31 décembre 2012 - 10:53 .

[Kabraxal]

Ieldra2 wrote...

Synthetics and organics are based on mutually exclusive design principles. Synthetics are constructs, they can be changed without much effort. Organics are grown, if you want to change their design, you must redesign the whole from the ground up. Since RL synthetics don't exist I can't say what the result of that would be, but claiming any fundamental difference is "idiotic" is not "intellectually honest scrutiny" but ideological bullsh*t.

And you studied every oranic entity in existence to know this as fact... how do you find the time to post here with all that extensive study and universe wide travel?  Please o great all knowing master, share your knolwedge with us simple minded peasants.  We beg of you to enlighten us to your superior ways.

O right... you didn't.  You are only guessing and positing one unproven hypotheses based on one grain of sand on one beach among an untold number of beaches we've never even been to.  Bravo, you just proved my point.  Thanks for making it so easy.

[Ieldra]

I don't need to study every organic entity. This (the organic part at least) is a basic fact of developmental biology, from the simplest multi-celled organisms to humans, the principle is the same. Your ignorance doesn't change that.

Modifié par Ieldra2, 31 décembre 2012 - 11:25 .

[In Exile]

Ieldra2 wrote...
(1) You're making the assumption that the future is intrinsically unknowable, i.e. that it's impossible for anyone and anything to know with certainty what will happen without an intervention. This is an unproven assumption. *You* may not be able to know, but possibly the Catalyst can.

You're right. This is why the infallible catalyst has never lost - because it could always predict what organics would do, it being able to see the future and all, thus nothing ever being able to deviate from its plan. Certainly there was never  any kind of wrinkle at all that would have been perfectly solved by it being able to see the future.

(2) The Catalyst just doesn't scientific language here. Let's assume that there are always uncertainties in projections into the future. After all, in spite of (1) that's the more reasonable assumption. If you make such projections, you make use of statistical models (compare Asimov's classic Foundation series). The results are always probabilities. The Catalyst's "always" is just a shorthand for something like "with a probability of 99.999999%". In other words "A probability so high that it might as well be certain for all practical considerations".

Mathematically speaking, even with an infinite number of instances, the probability of an event ---> 1 is not a true statement.  More importantly, there is no evidence of this (for the player). So there's no reason a player should beieve it, thematically speaking.

[In Exile]

Ieldra2 wrote...

I don't need to study every organic entity. This (the organic part at least) is a basic fact of developmental biology, from the simplest multi-celled organisms to humans, the principle is the same. Your ignorance doesn't change that.

You're competely wrong. About as wrong as Bioware was about immunology when designing the Quarians. Cognitive science is pretty much a testatement to the idea that, to get anything even close to what we would call artifical intelligence, there isn't very much difference at all between the kind of stuff you use to make people vs. machines.

This "right stuff" hypothesis is bunk.

Edit: 

More importantly, you're just wrong about genetics. If you want to change organics, you need to alter them at a genetic level. That's technologically impossible today, but in theory possible - it would just involve rewriting each cell's DNA.

We can even imagine a crude mechanism: viruses designed as mechanisms to snip the DNA where needed to make changes. On a massive enough scale, we can radically alter organ system function (cf. HIV, which does exactly that).

Modifié par In Exile, 31 décembre 2012 - 11:31 .

[Ieldra]

In Exile wrote...

Ieldra2 wrote...

I don't need to study every organic entity. This (the organic part at least) is a basic fact of developmental biology, from the simplest multi-celled organisms to humans, the principle is the same. Your ignorance doesn't change that.

You're competely wrong. About as wrong as Bioware was about immunology when designing the Quarians. Cognitive science is pretty much a testatement to the idea that, to get anything even close to what we would call artifical intelligence, there isn't very much difference at all between the kind of stuff you use to make people vs. machines.

This "right stuff" hypothesis is bunk.

I was talking about the bodies as a whole, not the minds. I contend that what we are will influence what we think about ourselves and others, even if the design details of our thinking process are similar.

More importantly, you're just wrong about genetics. If you want to change organics, you need to alter them at a genetic level. That's technologically impossible today, but in theory possible - it would just involve rewriting each cell's DNA.

That's what I said - you need a fundamental redesign, you can't just add parts. There are no "genes for fingers". Our morphology is a result of the growth process which is controlled by genes and the environment in which the organism is grown. I didn't claim change wasn't possible. I said it was more difficult.

[Ieldra]

In Exile wrote...
Mathematically speaking, even with an infinite number of instances, the probability of an event ---> 1 is not a true statement.  More importantly, there is no evidence of this (for the player). So there's no reason a player should beieve it, thematically speaking.

There is no evidence for the player, yes. Yet again, I didn't say we should believe it and any who doesn't is wrong. I only claimed that the logic is not intrinsically flawed. As presented it isn't convincing, but it can be made sense of, if you want.

[In Exile]

Ieldra2 wrote...
I was talking about the bodies as a whole, not the minds. I contend that what we are will influence what we think about ourselves and others, even if the design details of our thinking process are similar. 

Our physiology is a necessary part of what we think. These aren't separable - that's my point. What insight is to us, for example, is a direct consequence of the kinds of informational processing we have to engage in to catch balls (or run, or swing on vines).

AI that's disembodied definitionally can't be something that is like us, unless we create it to be exactly like us, and then we're essentially creating a sentient being to torture because it is quite literally like creating someone with locked-in syndrome.

That's what I said - you need a fundamental redesign, you can't just add parts.

You can't do that with AI , either. You can do that with a computer - but a computer (as we use it) is as much an AI as a tree is an organic (for the purposes of ME). This idea that you can treat AI as modular is just born out of ignorance of what AI is - becuase like I said, you can't have disembodied minds and still have those minds be recognizable to us in any meaningful sense.

There are no "genes for fingers". Our morphology is a result of the growth process which is controlled by genes and the environment in which the organism is grown. I didn't claim change wasn't possible. I said it was more difficult.

I can't give a good analogy here for why that's really exactly the same as a machine - but the best I can do is say that the same applies because there is no robot "part". You don't just get a machine by finding it out in nature. It has to be build, component by component. A gene is one of the most fundamental of those building blocks - it's like a part on a circuit board (it's also like a blueprint, but let's not touch on that for a moment).

But how the parts interact - the form and what we call the mind - is a big deal ™.

There is no evidence for the player, yes. Yet again, I didn't say we
should believe it and any who doesn't is wrong. I only claimed that the
logic is not intrinsically flawed. As presented it isn't convincing, but
it can be made sense of, if you want.

But it involves a tremendous amount of assumptions. Assumptions that are totally unjustified. It's like assuming that being turned into Reaper slurpee is actually really enjoyable - we can assume that too, it just invovles contrading a much of what we see on screen and inventing post-hoc explanations.