184 réponses à ce sujet

[Dean_the_Young]

Obadiah wrote...

Dean_the_Young wrote...

Obadiah wrote...

If there is a moral code by which the Reaper cycles were a moral action, are you bound by that and restricted from making a judgement simply because it exists?

Certainly. That's how computer programs work: they can only work within their parameters. Since the Reapers are shackled AI, that's pretty much what they have to do.

Of course, making a judement from within the context of such a moral code would likely consider the action moral in the first place, so a judgement would simply reinforce it.

That wasn't the question. If the Reapers are bound by a moral code, then the existence of some other moral code (like mine) that judges their actions as wrong would not prevent them from judging their own actions as right.

With respect to this thread, what I'm saying is that it doesn't matter what Reaper's moral code is, their actions can still be judged by me, or you if you chose, and justice demanded.

And your moral code would only be supported by justice if you apply a moral absolutist approach that favors yours. Which goes back to asking why your moral code has superiority over theirs, when they have every claim (and history) of being a higher life form than you.

Unless we just go to 'justice is what the winner says it is,' which kind of ignores the principle of justice and pretty much concedes that the only reason the Reapers were wrong was because they lost this round.

[Obadiah]

Dean_the_Young wrote...
And your moral code would only be supported by justice if you apply a moral absolutist approach that favors yours.
...

Why?

[Dean_the_Young]

Obadiah wrote...

Dean_the_Young wrote...
And your moral code would only be supported by justice if you apply a moral absolutist approach that favors yours.
...

Why?

Because in claiming Justice demands or allows you to rule over and convict others according to your morality, not theirs, you are implicitly claiming you have an authority over them. This only derives in moral absolutism (the antithesis of absolute moral relativism), with you claiming moral superiority and delegitimizing their morality, or simply claiming might-makes-right of the ability to enforce your views.

Modifié par Dean_the_Young, 16 janvier 2014 - 01:23 .

[Jorji Costava]

@Dean_the_Young:

I'm generally confused by the whole "It's always inappropriate to apply your own standards to another culture/species" view, since I don't see what second-order moral view could underwrite it. If you're an error theorist, then of course it's inappropriate to apply one's own moral code to a different group, for the trivial reason that it's inappropriate to apply moral codes of any sort to anything, ever. Such a view would make it equally inappropriate to apply your own standards to yourself, let alone others. That could be the correct view to have, but it presumably isn't what anyone in this thread has in mind.

If you're a cultural relativist, then what actions are right or wrong for you (and rendering judgment is an action) depends upon the beliefs of the culture or social group you happen to be from. On such a view, whether or not it's wrong to judge others by your own standards depends entirely upon whether or not you're from a culture where it is widely believed to be wrong to do such a thing. Not so great.

If you're an absolutist, then it might make more sense, because encountering moral disagreement might give you reason to think that your view is not the objectively correct view. But unless I'm mistaken, this seems to be precisely the approach you reject. So again, I'm confused as to why it is that it would always be wrong to judge other cultures or species by one's own moral views.

And your moral code would only be supported by justice if you apply a moral absolutist approach that favors yours.

I don't know what is meant by "justice" in this context. What is justice such that it is a thing separate from a moral code, that can either support or fail to support that code?

[Invisible Man]

i think this thread was more about if you picked destroy purely for justice against the reapers would you feel it was right or wrong? in this case, I'd say it was wrong, even if it was the right choice.
you can do the right thing for the wrong reason.
not that I'm saying any ending is more correct then the others.

[shodiswe]

Nightwriter wrote...

shodiswe wrote...

Nightwriter wrote...

Greylycantrope wrote...

Yeah, I'd be more inclined to agree with the, "they're just puppets" line of arguement if they weren't show to have had distinct personalities to begin with. Apparently Harby has a bit of a crush on Shepard and won't shut up about her. Until the beam run anyway, seems to be over it at that point, fickle bastard.

You're right, that means the Catalyst could also have pulled out the "Sov and Harb's races were just douche races" argument. All 10 billion people in each of them. Douches.

I don't think any of the reapers had a choice whoever they were before they got reaperised. Helping rebuild after synthesis might be their atempt to reattone for what they had to do against their will.

Yes. They didn't make the rules. They just MWAHAHAHA!ed as they followed them.

You see what I mean. Mustache twirling. Needed to be addressed. Drones don't mustache twirl. Unless programmed. Must address Windows: Mustache Twirling Edition 2.0.

Also, whether they have any desire to atone, or are even capable of understanding the concept of atonement, is a huge blank.

What if the mustachetwirling was required by the catalyst who was the pupeter? It helps keep the enemy from looking for the real threat.
If you look at what Sovereign said it's a bunch of lies and excessive mustache twirling.
For example tgat ghry were never created, they hsd always existed.
Unless you are a religius nut worshipping them you will realise it's a lie and a buch of crap since the statement itself is impossible.
Deliberately or not.

[Dean_the_Young]

osbornep wrote...

@Dean_the_Young:

I'm generally confused by the whole "It's always inappropriate to apply your own standards to another culture/species" view, since I don't see what second-order moral view could underwrite it. If you're an error theorist, then of course it's inappropriate to apply one's own moral code to a different group, for the trivial reason that it's inappropriate to apply moral codes of any sort to anything, ever. Such a view would make it equally inappropriate to apply your own standards to yourself, let alone others. That could be the correct view to have, but it presumably isn't what anyone in this thread has in mind.

If you're a cultural relativist, then what actions are right or
wrong for you (and rendering judgment is an action) depends upon the
beliefs of the culture or social group you happen to be from. On such a
view, whether or not it's wrong to judge others by your own standards
depends entirely upon whether or not you're from a culture where it is
widely believed to be wrong to do such a thing. Not so great.

If
you're an absolutist, then it might make more sense, because
encountering moral disagreement might give you reason to think that your
view is not the objectively correct view. But unless I'm mistaken, this
seems to be precisely the approach you reject. So again, I'm confused
as to why it is that it would always be wrong to judge other cultures or
species by one's own moral views.

I don't hold the 'its always inappropriate view' myself, so I can't help you there. I'm definitely dipping in both pools of relativism and absolutism- I just acknowledge the fact and am comfortable with it. I am... not uncomfortable or angry, but snarky with people who sling around the concept of justice as a moral absolutist position.

The basic premise of moral relativism is that since Justice and Ethics are cultural constructs, and not inherent, it's immoral and even irrational to empose your views on others against their will. After all, what claim do you have to being right? Moral absolutists and teleological ethics don't have this issue, since they know why they're right: because god/natural law/inherent virtue said so.

Of course, most moral relativists focus on the significant commonalities between cultural ethics. They look at the similarities and forgive the differences, generally seeing them as not worth fighting for. When huge disreprencies exist, moral relativists can easily adopt moral absolutist positions (ie, being intolerant of intolerance).

As few people are absolute moral relativists, they don't fall into the issue you see.

And your moral code would only be supported by justice if you apply a moral absolutist approach that favors yours.

I don't know what is meant by "justice" in this context. What is justice such that it is a thing separate from a moral code, that can either support or fail to support that code?

Justice is an ethical concept that directly ties into the concept of morality, and shares the same absolutist/relativistic delimma with morality. There's no singular concept of justice for the same reason that there's no singular concept of morality, and the two tie together.

In this case, claiming that there is justice in punishing people for their actions while under external mind control violates one of my premise for what Justice is, which includes the point that punishment is only justified for a crime. As intent and the ability to seek an alternative are key factors in my evaluation of crimes, punishing someone for something they literally do not have a choice in is unjust.

Thus, saying Justice demands it, completely goes against my position.

Of course, my position isn't your position, or his, or anyone else's. I make compromises for society, not least because society makes compromises for me- if I am selected for a jury I am enabled to act on my views, and otherwise I'm free to speak and try to lead others to think as I do.



None of which was my originl point, mind you. I just get snarky when people adopt moral absolutism without an acceptable supporting argument. Acceptable to me, mind you.

[Jorji Costava]

@Dean_the_Young:

This could be getting nitpicky (not to mention dangerously off-topic), but I still have a couple questions:

The basic premise of moral relativism is that since Justice and Ethics are cultural constructs, and not inherent, it's immoral and even irrational to empose your views on others against their will.

I don't see how the conclusion follows from the premise. The fact (assuming it is such) that ethics is a cultural construct doesn't entail any first-order moral claims; for instance, it's completely compatible with supposing that ethics, as a cultural construct, is simply a kind of massive error or illusion. Some cultural constructs are systematically erroneous (for instance, you might think religion is a construct that is entirely without merit), and morality might turn out to be one of them (not my view, but a possible one consistent with your initial premise).

Relativism, as I understand it, is a thesis about the truth conditions for moral judgments: It holds that whether a moral judgment is true or false depends upon the traditions, beliefs, etc. of the speaker's culture in the same way that the truth of a statement like "It's 4:00" depends upon the speaker's time zone. I don't see that this thesis has any implications about the rightness or wrongness of imposing one's views upon others (not that I'm trying to justify such impositions, mind you).

Returning to the topic, I think your basic premise (that it's wrong to punish someone who acted under the influence of mind control) is pretty obvious, and I agree with it. I think resistance to it in the context of ME arises from a tendency to phrase objections to the story in in-universe terms; "It was a bad idea to make the Reapers into mind-controlled puppets or whatnot" has a way of mutating into "The Reapers deserve to be killed no matter what" by way of "I want to kill the Reapers as a way of expressing my rejection of this plot development."

[AlanC9]

Obadiah wrote...
With respect to this thread, what I'm saying is that it doesn't matter what Reaper's moral code is, their actions can still be judged by me, or you if you chose, and justice demanded.

Which means, of course, that the Reapers can also demand justice of you according to their standards. Who actually gets justice is a question of power, I guess. ( I always thought Thrasymachus had a point)

Modifié par AlanC9, 16 janvier 2014 - 02:19 .

[Obadiah]

AlanC9 wrote...

Obadiah wrote...
With respect to this thread, what I'm saying is that it doesn't matter what Reaper's moral code is, their actions can still be judged by me, or you if you chose, and justice demanded.

Which means, of course, that the Reapers can also demand justice of you according to their standards. Who actually gets justice is a question of power, I guess. ( I always thought Thrasymachus had a point)

Sure, and I didn't ask the Reapers. But now that you mention it I am kind of curious.

[Obadiah]

Dean_the_Young wrote...
...
Because in claiming Justice demands or allows you to rule over and convict others according to your morality, not theirs, you are implicitly claiming you have an authority over them.
...

That's a false assertion, and in my case a wrong assumption. The original post is a personal opinion (frankly, I think that's kind of obvious since the first time I used the word justice it was in quotes), and the questions are there because I'm genuinely interested in the opinions of others.

Modifié par Obadiah, 16 janvier 2014 - 02:28 .

[Dean_the_Young]

osbornep wrote...

@Dean_the_Young:

This could be getting nitpicky (not to mention dangerously off-topic), but I still have a couple questions:

The basic premise of moral relativism is that since Justice and Ethics are cultural constructs, and not inherent, it's immoral and even irrational to empose your views on others against their will.

I don't see how the conclusion follows from the premise. The fact (assuming it is such) that ethics is a cultural construct doesn't entail any first-order moral claims; for instance, it's completely compatible with supposing that ethics, as a cultural construct, is simply a kind of massive error or illusion. Some cultural constructs are systematically erroneous (for instance, you might think religion is a construct that is entirely without merit), and morality might turn out to be one of them (not my view, but a possible one consistent with your initial premise).

The conclusion follows from the premise because if Justice and Ethics are artificial constructs for everyone, then there is no higher authority to derive legitimacy from. Justice and Ethics are what they are because we made them that way. And that 'we' changes for every differing society.

Moral Relativists generally conclude that since every society makes its own ethics, and we have no claim to being 'right' since there is no 'right' ethics there's no ethical reason to 'correct' others according to our standards when they are adhereing to their own morality.

Relativism, as I understand it, is a thesis about the truth conditions for moral judgments: It holds that whether a moral judgment is true or false depends upon the traditions, beliefs, etc. of the speaker's culture in the same way that the truth of a statement like "It's 4:00" depends upon the speaker's time zone. I don't see that this thesis has any implications about the rightness or wrongness of imposing one's views upon others (not that I'm trying to justify such impositions, mind you).

The practical application of moral relativism between societies, at least in general, is that we let everyone identify with their time zone ('it's 4:00 where I am') rather than enforce one standard on everyone ('it's 0400Z everywhere', which is done for military operations).

Heck, time zones are just a general convention. Some countries create their own for their own convenience: see Venezuela and Afghanistan.

Returning to the topic, I think your basic premise (that it's wrong to punish someone who acted under the influence of mind control) is pretty obvious, and I agree with it. I think resistance to it in the context of ME arises from a tendency to phrase objections to the story in in-universe terms; "It was a bad idea to make the Reapers into mind-controlled puppets or whatnot" has a way of mutating into "The Reapers deserve to be killed no matter what" by way of "I want to kill the Reapers as a way of expressing my rejection of this plot development."

Since it's not clear how much awareness, leeway, or potential for resistance the Reapers have, I generally avoid making a judgement at all. What if we found, for example, that the Reapers were needlessly cruel because it was an option they had to be less effective, and eventually spur their own defeat?

We don't know enough to make a judgement, so I dislike arguments based around such a judgement for the endings. 'Justice', when we lack sufficient insight to measure it appropriately, is far less important to me than the effects.

[Dean_the_Young]

Obadiah wrote...

Dean_the_Young wrote...
...
Because in claiming Justice demands or allows you to rule over and convict others according to your morality, not theirs, you are implicitly claiming you have an authority over them.
...

That's a false assertion, and in my case a wrong assumption. The original post is a personal opinion (frankly, I think that's kind of obvious since the first time I used the word justice it was in quotes), and the questions are there because I'm genuinely interested in the opinions of others.

It might not have been your intent, but it was how you worded your argument.

But, if that's not the case, out of curiosity what is? That everyone can hold others accountable by their own ethics, with Justice serving the strongest? 

[AlanC9]

Obadiah wrote...

AlanC9 wrote...

Obadiah wrote...
With respect to this thread, what I'm saying is that it doesn't matter what Reaper's moral code is, their actions can still be judged by me, or you if you chose, and justice demanded.

Which means, of course, that the Reapers can also demand justice of you according to their standards. Who actually gets justice is a question of power, I guess. ( I always thought Thrasymachus had a point)

Sure, and I didn't ask the Reapers. But now that you mention it I am kind of curious.

Right. So what's the point here? Like I said upthread, maybe you don't get what you call justice.

[Obadiah]

AlanC9 wrote...
...
Right. So what's the point here? Like I said upthread, maybe you don't get what you call justice.

The point is I'm curious about what other people thought about the justice of the Synthesis ending.

[Obadiah]

Dean_the_Young wrote...
It might not have been your intent, but it was how you worded your argument.

Yeah, your understanding might also say more about you than it does my wording, justthrowingthatoutthere.

Dean_the_Young wrote...
But, if that's not the case, out of curiosity what is? That everyone can hold others accountable by their own ethics, with Justice serving the strongest?

This is a forum. As far as this thread is concerned, that you can make a moral judgement, and state what you think a just outcome is.

Modifié par Obadiah, 16 janvier 2014 - 04:44 .

[Dean_the_Young]

Obadiah wrote...

Dean_the_Young wrote...
It might not have been your intent, but it was how you worded your argument.

Yeah, your understanding might also say more about you than it does my wording, justthrowingthatoutthere.

Indeed. In the first case, that you weren't clear in your intent. In this case, that you've a poor attempt at a sling.

Dean_the_Young wrote...
But, if that's not the case, out of curiosity what is? That everyone can hold others accountable by their own ethics, with Justice serving the strongest?

This is a forum. As far as this thread is concerned, that you can make a moral judgement, and state what you think a just outcome is.

...and your answer is that your viewpoint is a forum?

Can't say that makes sense in context, but I'm sure it was on-topic in your head.

Modifié par Dean_the_Young, 16 janvier 2014 - 05:58 .

[CronoDragoon]

Obadiah wrote...

The point is I'm curious about what other people thought about the justice of the Synthesis ending.

We don't know to what degree the Reapers were compelled to do what they did. If we take the Catalyst's word for it (when fire burns...) then they had absolutely no choice whatsoever, to the extent that their very thoughts were dictated by the Catalyst from the moment they were constructed.

1. If that's true, then the Reapers are innocent of the cycles. They may not be innocent simpliciter if they are indeed an amalgamation of a race's minds (you'd hardly call, for example, Javik's race an innocent race) but they can't be blamed for the cycles.

2. If that's not true and you reject the metaphor the Catalyst gives you, then how could you possibly discover the truth? To what degree were they compelled? Were some more compelled more than others (this is personally what I believe. Sovereign has a disdain for organics that I don't think gels with the Catalyst. Plus, the Reapers see themselves so differently than the Catalyst sees them that I can't help but think there's autonomous thought going on to some degree)? To what degree can you even morally blame the Catalyst if he's in fact a shackled A.I.?

3. Or, if you choose Destroy "for justice", do you take the view that what you are doing is not exacting justice against the Reapers but for the victims? Some type of karmic returning stolen property?

Modifié par CronoDragoon, 16 janvier 2014 - 06:14 .

[CosmicGnosis]

There is no way that every single harvested species would just go ahead and harvest other species without question. It makes no sense. It is incredibly obvious that there is some kind of mind-control going on.

[His Name was HYR!!]

Multi-quote ahoyyyyyy...

Dean_the_Young wrote...

I'd argue that synthesis implies that you admit that the reapers' actions were necessary, and thus acceptable, much like killing an intruder in self defence: If the reapers hadn't loving,y murdered all those billions of people then they would have made synthetics that would have killed enem AND all life in the galaxy.
If you disagree with that, you shouldn't have picked synthesis to begin with.

And this I don't. You're linking a viewpoint and a conclusion that don't lead to eachother, let alone need to be held at all. You can hold that the Reapers goal was necessary without supporting their actions.  You can hold that other means should have been pursued as an alternative to their process (which, to be frank, was needlessly cruel on many levels). You can also support synthesis for reasons entirely oppossed to fear of the synthetic singularity.

You can certainly argue that someone holds a viewpoint when they choose synthesis, but if you were to do so towards me you'd be embarassingly wrong.

Co-frickin-signed.

Obadiah wrote...

Second, it looks like there is an argument that what the Reapers have done is not a crime (or beyond judgement), and does not require any kind of apology, punishment, or restitution. What about "truth and reconciliation"? Do you think some kind of Reaper confession of facts behind the cycles, and understanding by this cycle's population took place in Synthesis?

Why not? If Leviathan was part of the canon, then there's almost no question about it.

Even if it's not, if the Catalyst is around (which is unclear, in this ending) then another source of info on this topic exists. Say neither of those two exist, it's possible that the Reaper created from Leviathan (Harbinger) knows the tale. And let's say even that slipped through the cracks, I think it could still be deduced from a little detective work, piecing together what we knew before and what we know now. I mean, that Prothean whose likeness was replicated by Vendetta (Thessia VI) was able to deduce that very thing (the Reapers as slaves of the cycle, not its masters).

@HYR 2.0 and Ieldra2
I don't believe that the Reapers are merely puppets or completely controlled, and I think that perspective is a hard stretch given the conversations with Sovereign, Harbinger, and the Rannoch Destroyer.

What's "a hard stretch" in this? We've seen mind-controlled individuals in this setting fairly often (indoctrination).

Hell, the Catalyst refers to indoctrination (referring to TIM's) as "control" ("... we already controlled him").

You bring up Sovereign, Harbinger, and whoever else. They sounded very similar to indocrinated victims like Kenson or Benezia, who were not bad/evil individuals, but they became this under control.

And speaking of Rannoch... what about the geth themselves? They fell under Reaper control, making them all (except for Legion) hostile towards everyone else. Once that control was removed, they become recruitable allies.

However, even if the Reapers were acting on some initially given purpose by the Catalyst and Leviathan, they've been in existence for millions of years. In that time they have certainly had an opportunity to change and didn't. If the Reapers were merely acting as part of the Catalyst whole, or so completely mind controlled that they did not realize that they were mind controlled, this does not put their actions beyond judgement. The Catalyst, or the Catalyst/Reaper being's actions as a whole, could be judged and some restitution/justice sought. None appears to be in Synthesis.

See above.

Let me ask you this: if serving the cycle in any way requires punishment, should the Keepers all be slaughtered? After all, they did help the Reapers invade until the Prothean rewrote them. Come to think of it, they seem to not be the least bit concerned with things when Shepard returns to the Citadel at the end of ME3. So, what, should they be put to justice?

We can speculate on what level of control the Reapers were under, but the bottom line is that even in the EC epilogue, we never hear of the Reapers acknowledging any wrongdoing for their purpose or actions, which indicates some willingness, righteousness, and therefore "guilt" on their part.

So if the EC doesn't say it, it didn't happen?

... I'll let you think that one over for a bit.

Obadiah wrote...

Dean_the_Young wrote...

Obadiah wrote...

Ieldra2...
...
Apart from that, I find it inappropriate to apply human ideas of justice to entities so clearly non-human, so clearly not made as a social species. According to Legion in ME2, this is racist...

This is ridiculous. Being an alien does not make the Reapers unaccountable for their actions or beyond judgement. It just makes their motives alien. It is not racist to judge and alien species that is committing a crime against you, especially one that understands us enough to know that we would think that what it is doing is a gross violation of ourselves and a crime.

I think you missed the 'mind controlled slaves' part.

But sure, let's play the moral absolutism. Why is your morality the standard for it? Are you a murderer for killing ants, even though behavioral analysis can show that ants do not appreciate being killed?

If there is a moral code by which the Reaper cycles were a moral action, are you bound by that and restricted from making a judgement simply because it exists?

Here's the thing, my dear Obadiah. How to judge different groups of people is a very real issue. In anthropology, it is called ethnocentrism to judge all groups of people relative to your own (cultural) standard. This is problematic because it assumes your culture is morally sound in every way. And this is an attitude many Westerners have -- they judge all other cultures that are very different from their own as being "backwards" and "uncivilized." In reality, however, people in the West do have problems of their own. You ever watch the movie Borat? That movie follows a foreigner in the USA learning American culture, and as backwards as his character is, he manages to expose how backwards American people and culture can be along the way (frat boys, Christian evangelists, sexualized media, among other things...).

Again, this is an issue that we humans have amongst ourselves -- whose definition of "right" is... right?

Now, enter Mass Effect, and we're dealing with this issue between different realms of life (organic/synthetic).

[ImaginaryMatter]

Upon thinking about it further I don't think the Reapers can be held accountable.

In the case they are forcefully controlled (I personally doubt this as why would the Catalyst design the Reapers to be independent, only to have to mind control them?), I would think they would be exempt somehow -- assuming they could be brought before an impartial system.

In the case they are tools that the Catalyst just remote controls, it would be the Catalyst who would go on trial. I actually think this makes some sense as it would be the Catalyst controlling the Reapers in the Synthesis ending.

Personally, I believe the Reapers are a sort of gestalt intelligence. The Organic slush forms the 'hardware' that the Reaper program runs off of and much like the variance in Quantum-blue box AI technology that give rise to the slight differences in personalities between MEU AI, the harvested species... flavors the installed Reaper programs (the Leviathans were pretty haughty individuals which gave rise to Harbinger's grandeur attitude). The Reaper code itself probably takes on the form of a sophisticated VI program, closer to how Vigil and Vendetta act, rather than a true AI. In this case the Reapers aren't responsible either, since they were just made that way.

[Ieldra]

To clarify my position regarding moral absolutism and relativism:

(1) Human morality is culture-dependent, but it has common roots in human biology. We, as humans, are hard-wired to care about some stuff our fellow-humans do in a fundamental way. For instance, one culture may define "murder" differently than another, and make different kinds of excuses or justifications for some acts of killing, but I don't know any culture where "killing one of your own for no other reason than you feel like it" is considered permissible. Thus, there are boundaries of any expression of human moral intuitions within a specific culture, and these boundaries can be used to circumscribe common elements of human morality.

(2) Morality serves a purpose. It exists to facilitate co-operation and give cohesion to a community. This has evolved because the human species is a hypersocial species - defined as a species where every individual has a psychological makeup that makes it possible to co-operate with any other individual of their species for common benefit. This ability to co-operate widely is the main evolutionary advantage of the human species, the reason why we have a technological civilization.

This means that it is inappropriate to apply human morality to species which are hardwired differently, or those those who are not social species. If the queen of a hive-mind species like the Rachni tells us, for instance, that a certain percentage of children are always killed off within one year of being born, it is inappropriate to judge that act by our moral standards. And if the krogan send out their children into the wilds of Tuchanka for initiation rites, knowing that 90% or so will not survive, it is also inappropriate for us to judge that by our standards.

What the Reapers do, in the end, is an act of culling. It has a comprehensible purpose. That such an act would be considered an atrocity for a human has no relevance. We would do the same to species we feel threaten a balance important for us. That we fight to survive and neutralize this threat is natural, but both their actions and our reactions are beyond the scope of human morality. The will to survive is not good or bad. It is part of our nature, and any construction of a "right to live" only has meaning with regard to the actions of other humans. Or members of human-like species.

The Reaper War is not good against evil. It is a conflict of natures and philosophies, the inevitable clash of mindsets alien to each other. That's what makes it interesting. Unfortunately, the trilogy's abomination aesthetic suggests otherwise, but to reduce it to good vs. evil and apply concepts of justice is to downsize it to human terms and make it boring.   

[Vigilant111]

Ieldra2 wrote...

To clarify my position regarding moral absolutism and relativism:

(1) Human morality is culture-dependent, but it has common roots in human biology. We, as humans, are hard-wired to care about some stuff our fellow-humans do in a fundamental way. For instance, one culture may define "murder" differently than another, and make different kinds of excuses or justifications for some acts of killing, but I don't know any culture where "killing one of your own for no other reason than you feel like it" is considered permissible. Thus, there are boundaries of any expression of human moral intuitions within a specific culture, and these boundaries can be used to circumscribe common elements of human morality.

(2) Morality serves a purpose. It exists to facilitate co-operation and give cohesion to a community. This has evolved because the human species is a hypersocial species - defined as a species where every individual has a psychological makeup that makes it possible to co-operate with any other individual of their species for common benefit. This ability to co-operate widely is the main evolutionary advantage of the human species, the reason why we have a technological civilization.

This means that it is inappropriate to apply human morality to species which are hardwired differently, or those those who are not social species. If the queen of a hive-mind species like the Rachni tells us, for instance, that a certain percentage of children are always killed off within one year of being born, it is inappropriate to judge that act by our moral standards. And if the krogan send out their children into the wilds of Tuchanka for initiation rites, knowing that 90% or so will not survive, it is also inappropriate for us to judge that by our standards.

What the Reapers do, in the end, is an act of culling. It has a comprehensible purpose. That such an act would be considered an atrocity for a human has no relevance. We would do the same to species we feel threaten a balance important for us. That we fight to survive and neutralize this threat is natural, but both their actions and our reactions are beyond the scope of human morality. The will to survive is not good or bad. It is part of our nature, and any construction of a "right to live" only has meaning with regard to the actions of other humans. Or members of human-like species.

The Reaper War is not good against evil. It is a conflict of natures and philosophies, the inevitable clash of mindsets alien to each other. That's what makes it interesting. Unfortunately, the trilogy's abomination aesthetic suggests otherwise, but to reduce it to good vs. evil and apply concepts of justice is to downsize it to human terms and make it boring.   

Do you think reapers have social cohesion and co-operation? Don't you think survival of a species favor social cohesion and co-operation? If they do then why do they treat everyone else so differently? Wouldn't reapers achieve more by maintaining social cohesion and promote co-operation amongst species?

You said that morality is a social construct, and then you said that humans are hardwired to certain things, which does not really add up to me since I don't believe we are hardwired to anything except we have instincts and reflexes but they are not moral. A krogan can be raised by human parents and can inherit human values and so can a reaper or anything else.

It is not very clear whether "good vs evil" can be applied to the struggle against the reapers, there exists ambiguity in the story since it was an organic race which caused the rise of reapers indirectly, it reflects organics' incessant need for power and as a result synthetics, being organics' children also carry the bad seeds and this manifests in the form of reapers. Good and evil aside, it is obvious that the reapers adhere to a certain code of conduct, maybe not morality but nonetheless something, I mean we have never seen a reaper ship swallows up another like animals would. My question is why do reapers get the mandate to manage galactic affairs? If they do not turn each other into goo, why do they do that to lesser races? If u say that the reapers are "hardwired" that way and have no emotions and do not feel pain and have no freewill, then it seems they are really just tools, born to reap, and when the cycles cease, it is time for them to fade away

[Obadiah]

@Ieldra2
I don't think discussing morality or justice in the Reaper's actions reduces the complexity of the story, issues, or conflict. It is simply one more aspect of it.

Also, (and I'm not trying to troll here), your post seems like moral statement because it describes your version of the correct way to make a judgement.

Modifié par Obadiah, 16 janvier 2014 - 02:14 .