467 réponses à ce sujet

[GalacticWolf5]

But its ok for you to say that to me? Seriously?

Yeah, because I wasnt using it in the way you did.

[GalacticWolf5]

I'm not telling you that you should chose Synthesis. Absolutly not. I don't even chose it, I never do and probably never will. I'm explaining to you why the Catalyst does what it does and why it doesnt stop when the Geth/Quarians get peace(a temporary one).

[GalacticWolf5]

Also, I'm not saying that having conflict is bad. I'm just explaining the Catalyst, it's purpose and how it works.

EDIT: If I believed that conflict was that bad, I would chose Synthesis. But I don't. Conflict is part of who we are.

[themikefest]

I'm not telling you that you should chose Synthesis. Absolutly not. I don't even chose it, I never do and probably never will. I'm explaining to you why the Catalyst does what it does and why it doesnt stop when the Geth/Quarians get peace(a temporary one).

I know what the thing wants and does. I don't accept any of its garbage especially when the thing says Synthesis is the final evolution of life. I would ask it how it knows that.  

[GalacticWolf5]

I know what the thing wants and does. I don't accept any of its garbage especially when the thing says Synthesis is the final evolution of life. I would ask it how it knows that.

Synthesis is the final evolution because we are all at our apex. The line between Organics and Synthetics dissappears. We may transcend mortality, etc. EDI's monologue pretty much explains why.

Whether you like it not, facts are facts. I believe we've adressed all that needed to be. We're done here.

[dreamgazer]

Final evolution of life as we comprehend it, at least.  There's a universe of possibilities after the Synthesis folks have dismantled biological limitations.

 

Could =/= Should, of course.

[Coyotebay]

One instance of temporary alliance does not disprove the Catalysts assertion.

 

The Catalyst never says that organics and synthetics can't work together.

 

It states that there will never be permanent peace between either of them. 

 

All you're doing is saying 'hey look, we're holding hands right now!' 

 

Do you really think it's going to work long-term? I'd rather go ahead and solve the issue via synthesis.

 

You can say that about anyone.  You can say that about the people of Earth.  There is never any lasting peace here, there is always a war going on somewhere, and the threat of war going on somewhere else.  So the Reaper approach would be to bomb the planet back into the stone age and let humans advance again, but always wipe us out every time we reach the industrial revolution.  I know, the Reaper argument is that synthetics will always win and will destroy all the organics, but that is a flimsy argument proven wrong by the writers' own story with the Geth being defeatable, and ignores the myriad of complex relationships between organics and synthetics that would result in a tangle of alliances and rivalries that would cross the boundaries between synthetics and organics.  Life would continue much as it does today, just with synthetics thrown into the mix.

[fraggle]

By "woken up" I just meant becoming sentient, self-aware.  If it hadn't been sentient all along then it wouldn't have memories the way we understand them, with thoughts and feelings attached.  It would just be old data archives.  I still think it has always been self-aware, being an AI that advanced.  Maybe it has been limited by the directive hard-coded into it, but I think it has always been capable of making choices.  Deciding that organics had somehow crossed a threshold by successfully building the crucible seems an opinion that a self-aware mind would come up with, not merely an advanced computer following intructions.

 

I see It's a tough question.

I must admit I don't know too much about AIs, but I thought one point of an AI is to adapt to problems and solve them on their own terms. Does that mean it's always sentient by doing so? Did it develop emotions? It even describes itself to Shepard as a "construct", an intelligence to solve a problem. So doesn't it acknowledge that it is little else? Specifically, it states that it was created to be the catalyst of peace between Organics and Synthetics. So its ultimate desire of Synthesis is not driven by its own emotions or feelings in regards to this solution, but it simply follows what it was created to do.

I stumbled upon a very interesting article on wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia....telligent_agent), and a lot of what is written in there sounds like the Catalyst, for example:

-Accommodate new problem solving rules incrementally

-Are able to analyze itself in terms of behavior, error and success

-Learn and improve through interaction with the environment (embodiment)

-Learn quickly from large amounts of data 

-Have memory-based exemplar storage and retrieval capacities

(It might not really be relevant but I found it very interesting it draws several similarities to the Catalyst )

 

Anyway, the original point was that it could detect that its solution won't work anymore after the Crucible docked/after Shepard arrived, again fulfilling its purpose in adapting to a problem and finding a new solution. Maybe I see it wrong, because like I said, I don't know enough about AIs, or maybe the Catalyst can be interpreted as sentient or nonsentient by each player, depending on the players' perception.

 

The other conflict was between the Quarians and the Geth, which wasn't really so much about synthetics and organics as it was about one people subjugating another.  That conflict would have occurred if the Geth happened to be simply another organic race.

 

I don't really agree with that, especially the last sentence. Before the geth/quarian war started, quarians ordered the geth to shut down. They ignored that command and the quarians acted on that act of rebellion. I'd say the conflict arose exacly because the geth were synthetics. A machine that disobeyed orders to shut down.

[Torgette]

The Organic vs. Synthetic theme was definitely there in ME1 to some extent, but ME2 made the Quarian/Geth conflict less of a fundamental issue between organics/synthetics and more of a future allegory for slavery and rebellion. ME3 hammered that even more when you saw that Quarians stood up for the Geth at the beginning of the conflict. Had that conflict not been solveable by ME3 the Catalyst may have had a stronger argument to the audience but it was solveable and defeat at the hands of the Geth never felt inevitable.

 

The other issue I have with the Organic vs. Synthetic theme is that it's not pervasive enough. A core theme should be something that's tied to every moment, every choice and every consequence. To me the "illusion of free will" is something I see all the time in the Mass Effect games whether it's a huge main quest plot point or any of the random loyalty missions in ME2. Organic vs. Synthetic is something that only really gets brought up with the Geth/Quarian conflict, and even then the Geth actively tell you they are not like the "old machines" nor do they want to be like the "old machines". This draws a line in the sand for the audience, and puts the Reapers squarely in "mysterious ancient organic/synthetic hybrid godlike creatures" and never is that connected with "we should be like that" or "transhumanism is inevitable" - it's always "we're going to die!". If anything the Geth wanting to build their own future is well... more "illusion of free will".

Modifié par Torgette, 13 mai 2015 - 01:18 .

[God]

You can say that about anyone.  You can say that about the people of Earth.  There is never any lasting peace here, there is always a war going on somewhere, and the threat of war going on somewhere else.  So the Reaper approach would be to bomb the planet back into the stone age and let humans advance again, but always wipe us out every time we reach the industrial revolution.  I know, the Reaper argument is that synthetics will always win and will destroy all the organics, but that is a flimsy argument proven wrong by the writers' own story with the Geth being defeatable, and ignores the myriad of complex relationships between organics and synthetics that would result in a tangle of alliances and rivalries that would cross the boundaries between synthetics and organics.  Life would continue much as it does today, just with synthetics thrown into the mix.

 

Until said synthetics finally reached a point where their nature of exponential growth puts them completely above other organics, in which case any kind of relationship that falls into violence would end with the organics entirely annihilated.

 

This is nothing like life as it is today, or the policy or nuance of our life and power.

 

I dispute that such complex relationships exist.

[dorktainian]

They had no interest in wiping things out. They were controllers and dominators, not destroyers. "Tribute does not flow from a dead race".

 

Their mentality is similar to Aria in ME2, with Patriarch. "She doesn't destroy what she can use."

They kill and preserve their kill within a reaper, the image of themselves, each reaper a tribute to a dead race.  

[God]

I know what the thing wants and does. I don't accept any of its garbage especially when the thing says Synthesis is the final evolution of life. I would ask it how it knows that.  

 

That's an irrelevant question.

[God]

I expect that from someone who calls himself "God".

 

The only selfishness I see is precisely in that -- playing god. Although sometimes I wish an actual god would come down and bitchslap the pretenders.

 

Chaos is an equal opportunity enterprise. It lets everything take it's own course. That's hardly selfish.

 

Not really. There really are those who know better and are more capable and more able to grow and progress. Chaos gives them a pretext to take advantage of that, but it inevitably leads them on the path to order. To playing God. Because somebody has to if you want to actually have a real future. To make the chaos useful for something. Not what you're espousing. Somebody has to be selfless enough to be God. To ensure that things beyond their own are taken care of. To ensure that not only is there a future for themselves, but for their own. To ensure that we aren't some growth that decays with carnage at every step. To ordain, understand, comprehend, and absorb knowledge.

 

True chaos is where no one wins, no one can win, and no one can grow. Entropy. There's no order, just randomization. No change. No progress. Just things happening, which all equal one big nothing that happens. That's madness.

[Vazgen]

The conflict between Reapers and organics wasn't a conflict at all, it was a genocide, based on the falsity that there would always be conflict between synthetics and organics, ergo, we are going to destroy you before that happens.  The other conflict was between the Quarians and the Geth, which wasn't really so much about synthetics and organics as it was about one people subjugating another.  That conflict would have occurred if the Geth happened to be simply another organic race.  In this case they happened to be synthetic.  The Quarian/Geth conflict was one of the major themes in the series, but the theme was not organic vs. syntheritc, it was about oppression vs. free will and self-determination.  It was a theme explored multiple times with the Rachni, and the Krogan, both organic races being subjugated or persecuted by other organic races.  The synthetic vs. organic argument also falls apart when you look at the fact that two of the three options for concluding the Quarian/Geth conflict include successfully destroying the Geth, and making peace with the Geth.  Both of these outcomes fly in the face of the Reaper argument that synthetics and organics will always come into a do-or-die conflict, which will always be won by synthetics.  Also, the Geth joining forces with organics to fight other synthetics (Reapers) kills the Reaper argument.  It's also an incredibly simplistic argument, as you could come up with a million scenarios where synthetic life prevails, synthetic life is destroyed, and oragnic and synthetic life co-exist.  I will always subscribe to the last one, because there are just an infinite number of complex variables with organic life evolving with advances in technology as well as synthetic life, not to mention the integration of organic and synthetic cultures/societies, the intermingling of which would make a simple "Us versus Them" situation highly unlikely.

Genocide is still a conflict. And whether you like it or not, "organics must always destroy or control synthetic life forms" in ME universe. The conflict is inevitable. You know where this quote is from? ME1

[God]

Well, I'm a Christian.. believe it or not. Not a very good one, but still.

 

If you really want to get serious about this, I hope you get a rude awakening. And hope that my God is the only one that matters.

 

Now I'm going to get away from you. You're creepy. As are all aspects of these games that touch on this.

 

Alright. So you are. I'm an atheist, believe it or not, but that doesn't mean that I don't believe achieving God-hood may someday be real.

 

I am very serious about this ideology. I hope you come to see that your worldview isn't one that's necessarily validated, especially by Gods that aren't nearly as effective as ones who are more willing to act as one. Not be one per se, but definitely capable of living their life as one.

 

That's fine. The mistake is yours to assume that everyone here operates on your level or adheres to your belief system. If those aspects of the game that challenge that are creepy, if I'm creepy, that sucks for you. You can either deal with it or leave. I'm not going anywhere. 

[dorktainian]

They don't want a tribute TO a dead race. lol

 

They want tribute FROM.. They want minions and slaves.

and that way they get both.  Husks, and a Reaper.  That's a result.  Reapers for the Win.

 

OK assume that somehow the people assimilated into a reaper live on in some kind of artificial reality matrix.  Each reaper, a nation.... so to speak.  The (artificial) population of the reaper will remember stories regarding where they came from...  The sacrifice someone made on their behalf.  "Tell me another story about the Shepard"...  etc..

 

Squiddy is scared of the reapers.. That doesnt mean they arn't doing exactly what the squiddies want.

 

They constructed starjar to do exactly what it's being doing since day one, but failed to enter themselves into the equation.

 

Leviathan: "There was no mistake, it still serves its purpose."

 

If races expand, grow, but ultimately destroy themselves, then why would something preserving races before they get the chance to obliterate themselves be out of the question?

 

Leviathan: "None have possessed the strength in past cycles. Your own species could be destroyed with a single thought."

[Coyotebay]

Genocide is still a conflict. And whether you like it or not, "organics must always destroy or control synthetic life forms" in ME universe. The conflict is inevitable. You know where this quote is from? ME1

 

Yes, it's a "quote".  That's the problem with your logic.  Four problems, actually.  The first is that these words come from the things that are using it as an excuse to wipe out all advanced organic life forms.  Kind of biased, wouldn't you say?  Second is that, again, it is a synthetic life form seeking to control and destroy organic life forms (which is exactly what harvesting is).  Third, conflict is inevitable among every species that compete for land, resources, and general survival, not just synthetics and organics.  And fourth, the story itself proves this argument wrong multiple times.  This overarching theme of ME is NOT synthetics vs. organics, it is oppression vs. free will and self-determination, a theme repeated again and again with the Reapers, the Geth, the Kroan, and the Rachni.  And I'll say again, organics wanting to always control or destroy synthetic life or the inevitably of conflict between the two resulting in annihilation is a very simplistic and unproven argument for the sake of the story.  To say the Reapers truly believed this, of course. To say this is a valid argument...ummmm....no.

[Catastrophy]

IT forever - Intoxication Theory saved the franchise for me!

[Vazgen]

 

Yes, it's a "quote".  That's the problem with your logic.  Four problems, actually.  The first is that these words come from the things that are using it as an excuse to wipe out all advanced organic life forms.  Kind of biased, wouldn't you say?  Second is that, again, it is a synthetic life form seeking to control and destroy organic life forms (which is exactly what harvesting is).  Third, conflict is inevitable among every species that compete for land, resources, and general survival, not just synthetics and organics.  And fourth, the story itself proves this argument wrong multiple times.  This overarching theme of ME is NOT synthetics vs. organics, it is oppression vs. free will and self-determination, a theme repeated again and again with the Reapers, the Geth, the Kroan, and the Rachni.  And I'll say again, organics wanting to always control or destroy synthetic life or the inevitably of conflict between the two resulting in annihilation is a very simplistic and unproven argument for the sake of the story.  To say the Reapers truly believed this, of course. To say this is a valid argument...ummmm....no.

First, we are talking about synthetic here, bias should not apply to beings working on cold logic. Not to mention that its intentions are not the destruction of organics. Second, contrary to popular belief, harvesting does not equal to killing in ME universe where experience, knowledge and skill can be stored in DNA. Third, other conflicts are irrelevant. Yes they are bound to occur, but they fall outside of Reaper programming. The intelligence was created to solve the problem of organics getting wiped out by synthetics. The only problem that Leviathans cared about. Organic vs organic they can easily stop, synthetic vs synthetic they don't care about. Fourth, the story does not prove it wrong. The fact that you need the Reapers destroying advanced civilizations to achieve a temporary peace between the geth and the quarians and that you need Reaper technology for EDI to cooperate with organics (while still opposing her creators - Cerberus) and Collector attack to unshackle her only reinforces the idea.

 

And organics vs synthetics is one of the key elements of ME trilogy. Not seeing it won't make it go away. If you're interested, here is a quote from the lead writer on ME1 and ME2 - Drew Karpyshyn

We knew we wanted to focus on some key themes and bring in certain key elements: organics vs synthetics; the Reapers; the Mass Relays.

[Torgette]

That's your opinion.

 

We can argue over which theme is the one the storytellers wanted to be the most important, but which is more prevalent is kind of objective.