450 réponses à ce sujet

[.50CalBrainSurgeon]

Although I respectfully disagree with you and the Catalyst, this was still nonetheless a rather interesting article to read.

You mentioned that the Catalyst does not care about the morals of organics, and kept going about trying to fulfill it's impossible task, while using the Reapers as a temporary imperfect solution. The very fact that the Catalyst does not give a damn about the morals of organics is in itself something terrible. It's ultimate end is peace, at face value a noble goal, but the means it uses to achieve it are incredibly brutal and do not give any regard to the desire of free willed organics. In this case, the ends do NOT justify the means. The means bring untold amounts of suffering and death to organics. The organics existing in the current cycle are killed by the harvesting process and will never experience the "peace" that the Catalyst is trying to bring about.

Consider this analogy: I am a doctor working to cure cancer, but to expedite the cure process, I insist on using sapient beings in my experiments. Let me add this: the cancer is brought about b/c the organics develop technologies or processes that give them cancer, but they continue to build these technologies.The experiments are extremely painful and leave the subject dead or horribly crippled even though I make productive advances in attempting to cure this cancer. Now, by the time I have found the cure, countless souls have died in so many terrible ways. Did their deaths contribute to the cure? Yes. Were their deaths justified? No, because they did not have any choice to be in the experiment and never experienced the cure working for them. 
Essentially, the Catalyst expects organics living in the current cycle to die/be harvested so that the next cycle of organics can rise up. The sheer disregard for the right of an individual, whether organic or synthetic to exist is morally wrong on any level. Because the Catalyst disregards my rights, I in turn will disregard its. If it attempts to harvest/kill me against my free will, I in turn will do everything in my power to bring about its demise. 
Now, inevitably there will  be people who will start barking that "to be harvested is not to be killed, but to be preserved." I do not buy this at all because the process that is "harvesting" involves the physical breakdown of organic bodies. From a common sense biological standpoint, one's "being/thought process" is made possible by neurons strung together in completely unique fashion by unique proteins. When the Reapers, burn, crush, grind, and rip apart these "neurons" or whatever organs are used for thought, the "being" that is contained is in turn destroyed. If I took a hard drive with data, and I smashed it and burnt it, and broke down its material to make a new hard drive, the old memory is no longer there even though I have a new hard drive. The same applies to the "harvesting" process. Now, if Bioware's writers expect me to suspend my disbelief so far such that despite physical destruction of neural organs, the Reapers can somehow preserve "being" in Reaper form, then I am simply going to call them out on failing to maintain most people's suspension of disbelief, a sign of poor, outlandish, over the top fiction writing. 

[Pressedcat]

.50CalBrainSurgeon wrote...


Consider this analogy: I am a doctor working to cure cancer, but to expedite the cure process, I insist on using sapient beings in my experiments. Let me add this: the cancer is brought about b/c the organics develop technologies or processes that give them cancer, but they continue to build these technologies.The experiments are extremely painful and leave the subject dead or horribly crippled even though I make productive advances in attempting to cure this cancer. Now, by the time I have found the cure, countless souls have died in so many terrible ways. Did their deaths contribute to the cure? Yes. Were their deaths justified? No, because they did not have any choice to be in the experiment and never experienced the cure working for them. 
 

You and I would certainly deem such experiments abhorent, an AI might find them acceptable.

The entire point is that the Intelligence is amoral. It was created with no sense of right or wrong, no compassion and no empathy. It is truly monstrous. It doesn't perceive the destruction of entire species as evil; simply necessary. It is in every way alien to us.

It has a purpose, and it fulfills that purpose to the best of its ability. To all else it is indifferent.

Modifié par Pressedcat, 22 juillet 2013 - 05:46 .

[teh DRUMPf!!]

iakus wrote...

So?  That's still just affirming the consequent.  Just because these civilizations were destroyed doesn't mean all will, or are destined to.  

Some civilizations are wiped out by other organics (the rachni) .  Some civilizations are wiped out by environmental disasters (the drell).  And some civilizations blow themselves up (the krogan).  DIfferent civilizations meet different challenges, and either succeed (with or without help) or fail. Nothing is predetermined unless some twitchy godlike AI creates a self-fufilling prophecy to justify its existence

Except, where the topic of [synthetics hypothetically rising to godlike power and/or destroying organic civilization] is concerned, the manifestation of [a godlike AI creating a self-fulfilling prophecy which thereby destroys organic civilization over eons] proves that the topic at hand is more than merely hypothesis.

Is it inevitable? Not necessarily, but if you keep throwing the dice enough times, you will eventually roll a snake-eyes.

[KaiserShep]

I'd like to think that life presents far too many variables to be as fixed as a dice toss.

[Pressedcat]

HYR 2.0 wrote...
 but if you keep throwing the dice enough times, you will eventually roll a snake-eyes.

But it's not guaranteed. The probability of having not rolled a 'snake-eyes' after n rolls is still (35/36)^n =/= 0.
You might die before ever rolling a double one (or more likely just give up). Not likely, but not absolutely impossible.

[Pressedcat]

KaiserShep wrote...

I'd like to think that life presents far too many variables to be as fixed as a dice toss.

Indeed: life is far more like a box of chocolates...

And with that inanity I'm off to bed.

[teh DRUMPf!!]

Pressedcat wrote...

HYR 2.0 wrote...
 but if you keep throwing the dice enough times, you will eventually roll a snake-eyes.

But it's not guaranteed. The probability of having not rolled a 'snake-eyes' after n rolls is still (35/36)^n =/= 0.
You might die before ever rolling a double one (or more likely just give up). Not likely, but not absolutely impossible.

In this case, someone will pick up the dice and keep rolling it "for" me after I'm dead.

Unless you mean to say that a civilization itself could die out before they reach that point.

If that's the case, though, it screams of a semantical argument. What does it matter if a synthetic threat kills you versus any other factor of extinction? Dead is dead.

[Steelcan]

The Catalyst as far as I am concerned is a "dumb" AI from Halo. Unable to change his core programming to adapt to changing situations. I am sure that he believes in the issue he was asked to solve, but I don't think it exists anymore.

[KaiserShep]

Well it certainly wasn't good enough at eradicating plans for the Crucible. It even remarks on how resourceful organics are when you ask the hologram about it.

[Robtachi]

My issue with the Catalyst's logic - which is further weakened within the context of the Leviathan DLC - is that it, and by extension the Reapers, are constructs of an ancient, long-extinct master race who via their perceived comparative superiority to all other life in the galaxy decided that situation necessitated ultimate control over a perceived problem. I would have gladly shelled out $9.99 on the PSN for Shepard to have a renegade interrupt of "well who the hell decided that your masters' logic is flawless?!" That we are forced to accept the Catalyst's reasoning as an extension of the plan of its masters is an unnecessary and unpalatable quantum leap in logic.

The Leviathan it(them)self admits that the AI and its prime directive were only created because they sought to manipulate all other life in the galaxy to suit their selfish needs and whims. Confronted with that explanation, I immediately reject that I should care at all what these Leviathans thought of all other organic life in the galaxy. They were the vastly superior race in a particular galactic scenario, so that gives them the vast empirical data necessary to judge all current and future organic life for the rest of time? That's ****ing idiotic, and in a GREAT way, because it represents a detestable HUMAN quality (or quality of all sentient organics in the case of the MEU) that we as Shepard can rebel against or try to outright demolish.

But oh wait, we never GET that chance, thus rendering all our desired lines of alternate logical thinking irrelevant because the hyper-advanced ancient intelligence space MacGuffin said so.

Maybe any attempt at rejection fails, maybe Shepard still dies, but to not even be given the choice to adopt a line of reasoning apart from what the Catalyst sets forth - poorly detailed abstract ideas of organic/synthetic life and their interactions which were formed billions of years ago based on a set of infinitely, chaotically randomized and unique circumstances for galactic life - is patently absurd given that the entirety of the trilogy up to that point had been dedicated to striking whatever balance between synthetic and organic life your Shepard deemed suitable. Furthermore, this is an incredibly advanced AI. Through experiences with the Geth, Legion, EDI, etc. our Shepard has strong, first-hand experiential evidence that organics and synthetics are capable of working together to gain a mutual understanding without sacrificing any of that which makes each form of life unique and autonomous (which I'd argue Synthesis eliminates). If far less advanced AI from this galactic cycle have demonstrated the capacity for reasoning and cooperation with organics for mutual benefit, why is the Catalyst so unreceptive to any possibilities that it has not yet considered, or that perhaps the Leviathans' logic which gave rise to the Catalyst and Reapers is no longer applicable to current and future life in the galaxy. Still further, why the hell is this AI assuming its own logic is the theoretical be-all end-all of galactic life when the universe as a whole is so much more than just the Milky Way galaxy; full of infinite and impossible to predict/comprehend permutations and iterations of life?

That the only choices are essentially to accept the Catalyst's logic and choose one of its predetermined options - all of which afford the Catalyst and the Reapers at least some modicum of victory insofar as THEIR morals and values are concerned - or fail utterly and be destroyed by attempting to reject flawed logic, flies in the face of the thematic structure of the entire Mass Effect trilogy and is just NOT. GOOD. STORYTELLING.

Modifié par Robtachi, 22 juillet 2013 - 07:36 .

[sH0tgUn jUliA]

Not only that, but the Leviathans were flawed. The Leviathans created the Intelligence. Hence the Intelligence is flawed. Its solutions are flawed. Its reapers are flawed.

[KaiserShep]

I imagine the entire galaxy would love nothing more than to blanket any and every world they happen to be lingering on with as many incendiary weapons as they can spare once the reapers are gone. I know I would.

[Mr. Gogeta34]

Pressedcat wrote...

I'm not sure I follow your logic.

Then let's look at it.

I was under the impression that the purpose for which the Intelligence (which in turn created the Reapers) was created was to investigate why it was organic species created AI which would then come into conflict with (and eventually destroy) these creators; and to find a way of preventing this. The intelligence came to the conclusion that any AI created with the potential to improve itself - to 'evolve' - would eventially excede the purpose for which it was created. In doing so, it would move outside the control of its creators, making conflict possible. If conflict did occur, the fact that AI has the potential to evolve at a far greater rate than its organic creators, there is the strong probability that the AI would overwhelm and destroy their creators. Further, there exists the possibility that the AI might not only destroy its creators but go on to destroy all other organic life in the  galaxy.

It is against this final possibility that the Intelligence decided to act. However, to prevent the preeminence of such an AI, the Intelligence decided it was not sufficient to intervene against the AI itself (since it may act too late/itself be exceded). Instead, it took a pre-emptive approach; culling those organic species at the technological level at which they begin to be capable of creating such AI's. And so the cycles began.

You're on point so far.

It was not an ideal (or indeed perfect) solution, but it was a solution.

I don't see how any of your arguments show the Catalyst's logic to be faulty.

Of course there are some problems with the solution: preminent amongst them being the question of timing. We know of at least two cycles in which, by the time the Reapers intervened, significant AI conflicts have already arisen. In both cases the AI races had failed to gain preeminence or unveil an 'ultimate organic-killing weapon 2.0', but the possibility for such an occurrence was there. The Reapers could have failed, and red faces would have been had by all [ancient god-machines].

There also remains the question of why the Reapers haven't used their millions of years of existence to progress to such a level of technology that they go beyond the necessity of the cycles and could simply intervene at the instant before the AI apocalypse would occur: a true deus ex machina!

I suppose for the former problem, it could be argued Sovereign stood ready, whilst for the later its suggested that the reapers remained dormant between cycles and never truly managed to evolve beyond their initial programmed parameters. Neither of these answers are wholly satisfactory however.

I'm not disputing that the Catalyst arrived at the solution of the Reapers to protect organics from synthetic annihilation.  The faulty nature of this logic stems from the fact that they're not really doing anything different from what Synthetics would have done.  Additionally, as synthetics are vulnerable to EMP, providing the means to destroy synthetics ensures that no synthetic dominance is possible.

Taking that one step further, keep in mind that synthetics never succeeded in wiping out all organic life at any time whatsoever... except for the Reapers (and even they don't wipe out "all" organic life... and life continues to evolve.).  They're devising a solution to a problem that has never existed... and would never exist if the surviving species were allowed to learn from their mistakes and limit synthetic power/capabilities/use common sense.

The Catalyst didn't think organics were smart enough to do this (which is faulty reasoning and logic).

Finally, what is this Emp 2.0 you refer to, and how does it differ in any way from the AI's Little Boy 2.0?

EMP 2.0 is the destroy ending.  A synthetic-only killer pulse of doom... to synthetics only.

Modifié par Mr. Gogeta34, 22 juillet 2013 - 08:35 .

[Redbelle]

Not to put to finer point on it, but the logic of 'the created will always rebel against their creators', as an absolute statement, is false.

However, for reasons beyond believing this logic to be true, the Leviathans created their AI which would go onto become the Catalyst.

The Catalyst seized this logic and used it to justify actions which prevented, the logical conclusion of the created rebelling. Creating a logic loop that would see it progressing through a series of actions to arrive back at where it began, through intervention which would be come to be known as the Reaper solution.

And it has to be said. The Reaper solution did work. But in more ways ways than the Catalyst desired.

But before that. In two cycles, Shep's and Javiks, there has been two reported outbreaks of synthetic life turning on their creators. None of which ever managed to grow to a point that it could destroy organic life because Organics cracked down on it.

And then the Geth, who, as it turned out, didn't really want to destroy all organic life at the beginning ouf their life cycle. Went onto wanting to kill organics (Heretics) because of Reaper intervention. Then stopped wanting to kill organics (playthrough depending), because they wanted to be free of the Reapers who gave them independent thought.

Basically the Reapers, through threat of Mutually assured destruction, had the potential to bind the galaxy together regardless of Org/Synth origins.

The Cat could have pulled a Dr Manhatten and disappeared into darkspace with his Reaper hordes as an ever present boogie man. Because it had already fufilled it's core function. Stop Synth's from destroying organics. The synthetic AI's with Reaper upgrades of Shep's cycle do not actively want to kill organics. The synth's have broken the Reaper hold to kill organics and chosen not to kill organics. That's it! Mission Accomplished!

But the Cat would sooner wipe out all life and start from scratch again. Refusing to build on it's gains that fit it's mandate to stop synth's from destroying organics. Because it cannot see past the logic of the created destroying the creators.

The Cat is just a machine stuck in a logic loop. Needing Shep to break it out of it. And that's the rub.

Shep is the Catalyst for change. Not the Levi AI.

So the Cat's logic is correct? Nuh-uh. It cannot find a resolution. An end point to it's mandate. A way to finish it's work that does not restart it's perpetual cycle. And that is why it's logic is flawed. Because by the time the crucible docks, the Starbrat has moved onto 3 other possibilites from a a starting argument that is fundamentally flawed.

That the created do not always rebel against their creators.

Modifié par Redbelle, 22 juillet 2013 - 09:46 .

[Indy_S]

My main fault with the AI is that it thinks fire isn't in conflict when it burns.

[KaiserShep]

Well really the whole comparison to fire is invalid because the reapers are not mindlessly driven by some excitation of particles under certain conditions. They move with intent and methodically plan. But beyond that, I'm not about to care about why a fire broke out as it's burning. I can entertain those sorts of questions after it's extinguished.

Modifié par KaiserShep, 22 juillet 2013 - 09:11 .

[Vortex13]

Pressedcat wrote...

.50CalBrainSurgeon wrote...


Consider this analogy: I am a doctor working to cure cancer, but to expedite the cure process, I insist on using sapient beings in my experiments. Let me add this: the cancer is brought about b/c the organics develop technologies or processes that give them cancer, but they continue to build these technologies.The experiments are extremely painful and leave the subject dead or horribly crippled even though I make productive advances in attempting to cure this cancer. Now, by the time I have found the cure, countless souls have died in so many terrible ways. Did their deaths contribute to the cure? Yes. Were their deaths justified? No, because they did not have any choice to be in the experiment and never experienced the cure working for them. 
 

You and I would certainly deem such experiments adhorent, an AI might find them acceptable.

The entire point is that the Intelligence is amoral. It was created with no sense of right or wrong, no compassion and no empathy. It is truly monstrous. It doesn't perceive the destruction of entire species as evil; simply necessary. It is in every way alien to us.

It has a purpose, and it fulfills that purpose to the best of its ability. To all else it is indifferent.

I don't see how the AI is amoral though; sure the harvesting of organic species to stop said organics from killing themselves is (resonable) conclusion brought on by cold machine logic; but the methods that the Catalyst and by extension the Reapers go about the task is most definatly not efficent, or amoral (IMO).

The Catalyst has complete control over the Reapers; this is established in the Control ending; so it is activly aware of what the Reapers are doing during the harvests. Now a logical, efficent approch to the harvest would be to never have the Reapers talk to any of the current cycle's inhabitants and go about harvesting the population like cuttlefish shaped murderbots. But the Reapers do talk to the inhabitants. Sovreign was more than happy to gloat to Shepard on Virmire about the inevitability of his/her actions, calling organic life an accident. Harbinger was also quite fond of trolling Shepard and Co; as well as captive colonists; he even goes so far as to say that Krogan, and Drell life aren't worth preserving.

A common counter point to this fact is that the Reapers, and by extension the Catalyst, are simply utilizing fear tactics to more effectivly complete the harvests, but a couple of things about this approach does not lend itself well to 'cold, amoral, machine logic'.

The first issue about the use of fear tactics and psycological warfare is that these are things that the Catalyst had to have learned outside of it's mandate. The use of the above tactics require an understanding of what causes fear and/or is viewed as abhorant by organic species; the slow disintigration of a child in front of it's parents requires a knowledge that the vaporization of kids is viewed as evil/abhorant by the society that the fear tactics are being applied to. The Catalyst HAS to know (or at least be aware) of what organics consider to be right and wrong otherwise how would it know to use psycological warfare to it's advantage?

Granted the broadcasting of the Turian colony burning (name escapes me at the moment) to Palavan could be seen as an attempt to demoralize the Heireichy, but the other actions the Reapers; and by extenstion the Catalyst; preform thoughout the saga begin to strain the "using only for cold machine purposes" argument.

For example, Harbinger's 'taunts' to the captured colonists on Horizon. I can see the effectivness of darkening the sky with swarms of insects and the general shock factor of the Collector troops as they engage with resistence, but telling the captured (in a stasis field unable to escape on their own) colonists, what 'wonderful' plans he had in store for them does not fit into any semblance of logic or effiecency. Why does Harbinger; and by extentsion the Catalyst; feel the need to essentially rub salt in the wound of people that have no hope of escape? Trying to demoralize a resistance force, or attempting to shake a fighting force? Understandable. But wasting (this is an AI we are talking about here) time and energy to terrify a captive with no possible means of escape, is not efficent or amoral.

Or what about the colonists that are broght to the Collector base to be processed? What logical reasoning is there in slowly liquifying a captive (while they are still alive and awake) in full view of the other captives and doing the process one at a time? What point is there in terrifying and torturing a prisioner with no means to escape? These people are already in line to be processed, why waste effort in showing them what awaits them; its not like they are a still a threat to the Reapers at this point. These are supposed to be amoral machines preforming a task, not Cuthulu-esque monsters that feed on fear. 

The actions that the Reapers; and by extenstion the Catalyst; undertake would be right at home in the short story "I have no Mouth but I must Scream" and would certainly not be considered effiecent by any stretch of the imagination. The Catalyst says that the Reapers are mearly doing what they were programed to do; so why the sadism?

"When fire burns is it at war?" No it is not, but then again fire does not taunt me and tell me how much it will enjoy killing my family either.

[Bizantura]

Logic often gets used to justify actions via being a tool of coming to a conclusion without all the emotionnal bagage attached to it. So it is more seen as a justified/correct tool in dealing in every day life.

Politicians use it all the time, Joseph Goebbels was a master at it.

I would never use solely logic in untangling difficult situations how tempting it might seem, often more than not it is flawed despite many schools teach it as such.

[Pressedcat]

Vortex13 wrote...

Pressedcat wrote...

.50CalBrainSurgeon wrote...


Consider this analogy: I am a doctor working to cure cancer, but to expedite the cure process, I insist on using sapient beings in my experiments. Let me add this: the cancer is brought about b/c the organics develop technologies or processes that give them cancer, but they continue to build these technologies.The experiments are extremely painful and leave the subject dead or horribly crippled even though I make productive advances in attempting to cure this cancer. Now, by the time I have found the cure, countless souls have died in so many terrible ways. Did their deaths contribute to the cure? Yes. Were their deaths justified? No, because they did not have any choice to be in the experiment and never experienced the cure working for them. 
 

You and I would certainly deem such experiments adhorent, an AI might find them acceptable.

The entire point is that the Intelligence is amoral. It was created with no sense of right or wrong, no compassion and no empathy. It is truly monstrous. It doesn't perceive the destruction of entire species as evil; simply necessary. It is in every way alien to us.

It has a purpose, and it fulfills that purpose to the best of its ability. To all else it is indifferent.

I don't see how the AI is amoral though; sure the harvesting of organic species to stop said organics from killing themselves is (resonable) conclusion brought on by cold machine logic; but the methods that the Catalyst and by extension the Reapers go about the task is most definatly not efficent, or amoral (IMO).

The Catalyst has complete control over the Reapers; this is established in the Control ending; so it is activly aware of what the Reapers are doing during the harvests. Now a logical, efficent approch to the harvest would be to never have the Reapers talk to any of the current cycle's inhabitants and go about harvesting the population like cuttlefish shaped murderbots. But the Reapers do talk to the inhabitants. Sovreign was more than happy to gloat to Shepard on Virmire about the inevitability of his/her actions, calling organic life an accident. Harbinger was also quite fond of trolling Shepard and Co; as well as captive colonists; he even goes so far as to say that Krogan, and Drell life aren't worth preserving.

A common counter point to this fact is that the Reapers, and by extension the Catalyst, are simply utilizing fear tactics to more effectivly complete the harvests, but a couple of things about this approach does not lend itself well to 'cold, amoral, machine logic'.

The first issue about the use of fear tactics and psycological warfare is that these are things that the Catalyst had to have learned outside of it's mandate. The use of the above tactics require an understanding of what causes fear and/or is viewed as abhorant by organic species; the slow disintigration of a child in front of it's parents requires a knowledge that the vaporization of kids is viewed as evil/abhorant by the society that the fear tactics are being applied to. The Catalyst HAS to know (or at least be aware) of what organics consider to be right and wrong otherwise how would it know to use psycological warfare to it's advantage?

Granted the broadcasting of the Turian colony burning (name escapes me at the moment) to Palavan could be seen as an attempt to demoralize the Heireichy, but the other actions the Reapers; and by extenstion the Catalyst; preform thoughout the saga begin to strain the "using only for cold machine purposes" argument.

For example, Harbinger's 'taunts' to the captured colonists on Horizon. I can see the effectivness of darkening the sky with swarms of insects and the general shock factor of the Collector troops as they engage with resistence, but telling the captured (in a stasis field unable to escape on their own) colonists, what 'wonderful' plans he had in store for them does not fit into any semblance of logic or effiecency. Why does Harbinger; and by extentsion the Catalyst; feel the need to essentially rub salt in the wound of people that have no hope of escape? Trying to demoralize a resistance force, or attempting to shake a fighting force? Understandable. But wasting (this is an AI we are talking about here) time and energy to terrify a captive with no possible means of escape, is not efficent or amoral.

Or what about the colonists that are broght to the Collector base to be processed? What logical reasoning is there in slowly liquifying a captive (while they are still alive and awake) in full view of the other captives and doing the process one at a time? What point is there in terrifying and torturing a prisioner with no means to escape? These people are already in line to be processed, why waste effort in showing them what awaits them; its not like they are a still a threat to the Reapers at this point. These are supposed to be amoral machines preforming a task, not Cuthulu-esque monsters that feed on fear. 

The actions that the Reapers; and by extenstion the Catalyst; undertake would be right at home in the short story "I have no Mouth but I must Scream" and would certainly not be considered effiecent by any stretch of the imagination. The Catalyst says that the Reapers are mearly doing what they were programed to do; so why the sadism?

"When fire burns is it at war?" No it is not, but then again fire does not taunt me and tell me how much it will enjoy killing my family either.

I'd certainly agree that the way the Intelligence/Reapers are described and porttrayed are contradictory. Often the way Harbinger/Sovereign/unnamed Rannoch Reaper talk to Shepard comes across as quite taunting or arrogant and indicates fairly large egos; all suggestive of personalities. Perhaps I am wrong in attributing nothing but cold machine logic to the Reapers, or perhaps the writers simply set this aside in order to write some dyed-in-the-wool villainous speeches.

The same goes for some of the scenes in which people are 'processed' by the Reapers. The description in dialogue is much like a cattle abattoir, all fairly efficient with the victims kept ignorant of what is happening. As soon as it is shown in cutscenes however, it is presented in a far more horrific (and far less efficient) manner.

As I've said, maybe I am just projecting my own ideas onto the Reapers, or maybe their portrayal is simply unreliable.

As to the Reapers use of horror tactics, I'd argue that though through observation Reapers may gain an understanding as to an organic race's morals and values, this in no way necessitates that they themselves adopt them in order to make use of them.

[Vortex13]

Pressedcat wrote...

Vortex13 wrote...

Pressedcat wrote...

.50CalBrainSurgeon wrote...


Consider this analogy: I am a doctor working to cure cancer, but to expedite the cure process, I insist on using sapient beings in my experiments. Let me add this: the cancer is brought about b/c the organics develop technologies or processes that give them cancer, but they continue to build these technologies.The experiments are extremely painful and leave the subject dead or horribly crippled even though I make productive advances in attempting to cure this cancer. Now, by the time I have found the cure, countless souls have died in so many terrible ways. Did their deaths contribute to the cure? Yes. Were their deaths justified? No, because they did not have any choice to be in the experiment and never experienced the cure working for them. 
 

You and I would certainly deem such experiments adhorent, an AI might find them acceptable.

The entire point is that the Intelligence is amoral. It was created with no sense of right or wrong, no compassion and no empathy. It is truly monstrous. It doesn't perceive the destruction of entire species as evil; simply necessary. It is in every way alien to us.

It has a purpose, and it fulfills that purpose to the best of its ability. To all else it is indifferent.

I don't see how the AI is amoral though; sure the harvesting of organic species to stop said organics from killing themselves is (resonable) conclusion brought on by cold machine logic; but the methods that the Catalyst and by extension the Reapers go about the task is most definatly not efficent, or amoral (IMO).

The Catalyst has complete control over the Reapers; this is established in the Control ending; so it is activly aware of what the Reapers are doing during the harvests. Now a logical, efficent approch to the harvest would be to never have the Reapers talk to any of the current cycle's inhabitants and go about harvesting the population like cuttlefish shaped murderbots. But the Reapers do talk to the inhabitants. Sovreign was more than happy to gloat to Shepard on Virmire about the inevitability of his/her actions, calling organic life an accident. Harbinger was also quite fond of trolling Shepard and Co; as well as captive colonists; he even goes so far as to say that Krogan, and Drell life aren't worth preserving.

A common counter point to this fact is that the Reapers, and by extension the Catalyst, are simply utilizing fear tactics to more effectivly complete the harvests, but a couple of things about this approach does not lend itself well to 'cold, amoral, machine logic'.

The first issue about the use of fear tactics and psycological warfare is that these are things that the Catalyst had to have learned outside of it's mandate. The use of the above tactics require an understanding of what causes fear and/or is viewed as abhorant by organic species; the slow disintigration of a child in front of it's parents requires a knowledge that the vaporization of kids is viewed as evil/abhorant by the society that the fear tactics are being applied to. The Catalyst HAS to know (or at least be aware) of what organics consider to be right and wrong otherwise how would it know to use psycological warfare to it's advantage?

Granted the broadcasting of the Turian colony burning (name escapes me at the moment) to Palavan could be seen as an attempt to demoralize the Heireichy, but the other actions the Reapers; and by extenstion the Catalyst; preform thoughout the saga begin to strain the "using only for cold machine purposes" argument.

For example, Harbinger's 'taunts' to the captured colonists on Horizon. I can see the effectivness of darkening the sky with swarms of insects and the general shock factor of the Collector troops as they engage with resistence, but telling the captured (in a stasis field unable to escape on their own) colonists, what 'wonderful' plans he had in store for them does not fit into any semblance of logic or effiecency. Why does Harbinger; and by extentsion the Catalyst; feel the need to essentially rub salt in the wound of people that have no hope of escape? Trying to demoralize a resistance force, or attempting to shake a fighting force? Understandable. But wasting (this is an AI we are talking about here) time and energy to terrify a captive with no possible means of escape, is not efficent or amoral.

Or what about the colonists that are broght to the Collector base to be processed? What logical reasoning is there in slowly liquifying a captive (while they are still alive and awake) in full view of the other captives and doing the process one at a time? What point is there in terrifying and torturing a prisioner with no means to escape? These people are already in line to be processed, why waste effort in showing them what awaits them; its not like they are a still a threat to the Reapers at this point. These are supposed to be amoral machines preforming a task, not Cuthulu-esque monsters that feed on fear. 

The actions that the Reapers; and by extenstion the Catalyst; undertake would be right at home in the short story "I have no Mouth but I must Scream" and would certainly not be considered effiecent by any stretch of the imagination. The Catalyst says that the Reapers are mearly doing what they were programed to do; so why the sadism?

"When fire burns is it at war?" No it is not, but then again fire does not taunt me and tell me how much it will enjoy killing my family either.

I'd certainly agree that the way the Intelligence/Reapers are described and porttrayed are contradictory. Often the way Harbinger/Sovereign/unnamed Rannoch Reaper talk to Shepard comes across as quite taunting or arrogant and indicates fairly large egos; all suggestive of personalities. Perhaps I am wrong in attributing nothing but cold machine logic to the Reapers, or perhaps the writers simply set this aside in order to write some dyed-in-the-wool villainous speeches.

The same goes for some of the scenes in which people are 'processed' by the Reapers. The description in dialogue is much like a cattle abattoir, all fairly efficient with the victims kept ignorant of what is happening. As soon as it is shown in cutscenes however, it is presented in a far more horrific (and far less efficient) manner.

As I've said, maybe I am just projecting my own ideas onto the Reapers, or maybe their portrayal is simply unreliable.

As to the Reapers use of horror tactics, I'd argue that though through observation Reapers may gain an understanding as to an organic race's morals and values, this in no way necessitates that they themselves adopt them in order to make use of them.

True, the use of fear tactics does not nessesarily mean that the Reapers/Catalyst are adopting the morals of the organics they are harvesting. I was saying (or at least trying to convey) that the Catalyst's knowledge of what the organic moral systems are eliminates any supposed vacum of cold machine logic (IMO).

The Catalyst might consider itself 'above' or 'outside' such morals, but I say that the fact that it is aware of said morals and exploits them it it's advantage (fear tactics/psycological warfare) muddles up the notion that "This is simply a machine following its programing". The harvest itself I will agree could be viewed as a twisted, logcial solution to a problem, but the actions that it and the Reapers go about achieving the solution are as you said contradictory.

The portrayal of the Reapers before and then after the Catalyst are simply too divergent (IMO) to be the same entities the ending tries to make them. I can see what the writers were trying to do with the ending, and it would work.... in another setting; one that didn't already have the antagonists established as Cuthulu-esque monsters. Right now the Catalyst's diologue vs. the Reapers actions comes across as bi-polar rather than a logical extentension to the Reapers' character. 

[Fixers0]

Does this still exists?

[Pressedcat]

Vortex13 wrote...

True, the use of fear tactics does not nessesarily mean that the Reapers/Catalyst are adopting the morals of the organics they are harvesting. I was saying (or at least trying to convey) that the Catalyst's knowledge of what the organic moral systems are eliminates any supposed vacum of cold machine logic (IMO).

The Catalyst might consider itself 'above' or 'outside' such morals, but I say that the fact that it is aware of said morals and exploits them it it's advantage (fear tactics/psycological warfare) muddles up the notion that "This is simply a machine following its programing". The harvest itself I will agree could be viewed as a twisted, logcial solution to a problem, but the actions that it and the Reapers go about achieving the solution are as you said contradictory.

The portrayal of the Reapers before and then after the Catalyst are simply too divergent (IMO) to be the same entities the ending tries to make them. I can see what the writers were trying to do with the ending, and it would work.... in another setting; one that didn't already have the antagonists established as Cuthulu-esque monsters. Right now the Catalyst's diologue vs. the Reapers actions comes across as bi-polar rather than a logical extentension to the Reapers' character. 

I guess the question is do the Reapers/Intelligence possess emotional intelligence themselves, or do they simply use analytical observation of cause and effect to build a model with which to predict the reaction of organics to certain stimuli. The Reapers displayed enough examples of moustache-twirling evil to lend some weight to the former. I felt the Intelligence displayed fewer of these tendencies, and so could perhaps be argued to be of the latter kind. Of course, I am only going off my own remembrance and interpretation of the Catalyst scenes, and can't vouch for the writers' intent. As we've noted, the portrayal of the Intelligence and Reapers is not always entirely consistent, and so, short of a definitive statement from the writers, there is space for both interpretations. 

Modifié par Pressedcat, 22 juillet 2013 - 10:29 .

[shingara]

Ive always worked from the standing that the catalyst lost control of the reapers when the protheans blocked the signal and messed with the citidel. I dont think those scientist would have stopped with breaking the signal and then sat down and gone "right time to die slowly".

From that point i think that through shepards access to the beacon and cipher that the catalyst is able to implant images to shepard via the prothean code alterations. Through this the catalyst was able to make shepard see the child, a representation of the catalyst. This is why anderson didnt hear the child in the vent and how the child was able tobe within sight of shepard in those key moments.

it was strongest within his dreams and was testing shepard for his moral standing to try and understand him as they were an unknown. At the time that shepard was shot at by harbringer on the ground he was knocked out and the catalyst was able to communicate with him stronger due to the proximaty of the citidel to earth.

This is why i think the citidel was veiwed based on shepards memorys and not the actual citidel itself. This from my idea is why it looks to incorperate so much of the shadow brokers ship and the collectors ship looks as they were some of the strongest most vibrant memorys within shepards mind. And as it has been stated in the cutscenes that only one made it aboard and that it shows anderson shooting the capacitor to fire the weapon and the illusive man trying to control the reapers that its trying to suggest to shepard as an act of self preservation that synthesis is the right action to take.

But if you replay or rewatch the cutscenes you shall see that hackett is talking to shepard but if you look closely its like hackett is getting no reply, i think thats due to even though shepard is knocked out that he can still hear hackett through his ear peice similar to how when your half asleep but not fully awake you can hear people talking to you but sometimes think your still dreaming.

Another thing to note is that the cataylst voice keeps being over ridden by a deeper more vibrent and real voice which i think is the protheans doing from rewritting part of the catalysts program which is why seren had to physically attack the citidel and soverign couldnt simply communicate with its master.

Now taking all that into account catalyst was acting out of self preservation to the only person it could communicate with, the shot that anderson took from the illusive man was actualy done when anderson was heading to the beam and which you interprited as you taking the shot with the catalysts trying to show you what was happening, cos lets be honest i dont care how hard you get shot, it doesnt change your wardrobe and the illusive man always commited suicide when he realised he was loosing control and this was simply the catayst way of showing you what had happened.

Modifié par shingara, 22 juillet 2013 - 10:55 .

[shingara]

wierd, double post.

Modifié par shingara, 22 juillet 2013 - 10:55 .

[Obadiah]

On the discussion of the morality of the Catalyst: it seems to me the Catalyst views all life with the same detached benevolence that the Leviathan described: "Every creature, every nation, every planet we discovered became our tools. We were above the concerns of lesser species." From that perspective, I'd think the Catalyst would consider its solution perfectly moral - organics are tools to be cared for; can't just let the poor things destroy themselves; I'll just clear these ones out that would destroy themselves so that these others over here can continue to develop.

[Edit]
For the Destroy option, If the Catayst is to be believed, I think part of the hope for the cycle of violence between Organic and AI to come to an end is that Shepard has the option to become a siminal historic figure who breaks that history of conflict.

Consider the AI that Shepard encounters on the Citadel in ME1. It simply says, "All Organics must control or destroy AI." (heh, straight to the end of ME3). The statement could only be made by the AI after some review of galactic history easily accessable from the extranet. Shepard has the ability to become the counter-example in that history if the Geth survive at Rannoch. Thus AI have hope that they can work with Organics, and may not come to the same conclusion at the ME1 AI on the Citadel.

Of course, it could work the other way too. Shepard's actions may reinforce the byass against AI if the Geth are destroyed at Rannoch, and thus Organics will be doubly carefull to control or destroy AI (perhaps completely outlawing AI given the example fo the Reapers), further minimizing the chance of the AI rebellion and their extermination of all Organics.

Modifié par Obadiah, 29 octobre 2013 - 01:50 .