44 réponses à ce sujet

[Solomon Gunn]

I remember reading that the reaping cycle answers Fermi's essential question of "Where is everybody?"  This made me wonder how Mass Effect: Andromeda will address the Fermi Paradox.

Fermi's question cannot really be sidestepped since even at sublight speeds (and millions of years), Andromedan species would have already colonized the Andromeda galaxy (lacking a compelling reason otherwise).

Once a galaxy is colonized, intergalactic colonization isn't that much of a stretch.  Therefore, wouldn't this have been a concern the Reapers would have tried to solve - offensively (such as reaping other galaxies) and/or defensively (such as a blockade)?

If there is no Reaper (or Reaper-like) presence or AI dominance in Andromeda, wouldn't this discredit the assertions of the original trilogy?

 

Just some ponderings.

[DaemionMoadrin]

We had this thread already.

 

http://forum.bioware...x-from-adromeda

 

Several others mentioned it, too.

 

Please do a search before creating a new thread, thank you.

[KaiserShep]

Anything that discredits the Catalyst's blathering is cool with me. 

[Hanako Ikezawa]

Well, I hope the Reapers were an intergalactic force that harvested the galaxies and dwarf galaxies in the Local Galactic Group so if that is the case then this paradox will be addressed.

[The Heretic of Time]

Fermi's paradox is actually very easily answered and you don't need any reapers for it.

 

The answer to Fermi's question: "Where is everyone?" is simple: everyone is hiding.

 

Being in space is like being lost in a dark alley in the middle of the night in New York. You know there are bad people with guns out there who would not hesitate to harm you if you cross their paths. It would be nice to find a friendly person who can show you the way out but how do you know who is friendly and who isn't? The good guys and the bad guys look the same, the only difference is intent and you can't read minds. The last thing you want to do is shout for help and the second-last thing you want to do is respond to someone shouting for help. Preferably you want to keep a low profile, stay hidden and try to find your way out without being spotted.

 

Now there are of course a few obvious differences between space and a dark alley at night. In space there is no way out and in space the night never ends.

[Mcfly616]

Andromeda doesn't need to address the Fermi Paradox if the Reapers already addressed "Where is everybody" in the Milky Way. It's an entirely different galaxy.

[The Heretic of Time]

Andromeda doesn't need to address the Fermi Paradox if the Reapers already addressed "Where is everybody" in the Milky Way. It's an entirely different galaxy.

 

Not to mention that we don't need reapers to commit galactic genocide. We're perfectly capable of doing that ourselves. Just look at the rachni, the geth/quarians (after rannoch if you don't broker peace) and the krogan (if you don't cure the genophage).

 

On top of that, 99,9% of all life that ever lived on earth is extinct. Species come and go. It's the natural way of life. Why would it be any different for space-faring species?

 

Hell, without the Mass Relays and the reapers guiding organic life, I doubt most of the species would ever reach the point of becoming a galactic species. I bet that if the mass relays didn't exist then most species in the galaxy would never reach that stage and go extinct way before they ever manage to populate the galaxy, which is quite ironic if you think about it.

 

So yeah, there are plenty of ways to address Fermi's Paradox without the need of reapers.

[dgcatanisiri]

Not to mention there's just the simple fact that... space is big. Really big. Infinitely big (and for once, that statement is literal). The full amount of systems and planets we see in the whole of the last three games constitute only at most one percent of the stars and planets within our galaxy alone, and that's probably a generous estimate. If and when we finally make our way out into space, we are entirely likely to spend years, decades, maybe even centuries trying to find other species. And that means that there's probably a lot of space out there in Andromeda that has been left untouched, because a slight change in coordinates can have you miss a star and any of its planets entirely.

 

I mean, even on that Wikipedia page for the paradox, they offer alternatives and possible answers. The Andromeda races consider it unsafe to seek out and contact others, they have already been in the process of destroying one another, they have technological barriers... There are ways to address this issue just within our physical world knowledge and limitations, no Reapers required.

[Medhia_Nox]

LOL something actual scientists consider a genuine dilemma solved right here on the BSN folks! 

[Iakus]

Andromeda doesn't need to address the Fermi Paradox if the Reapers already addressed "Where is everybody" in the Milky Way. It's an entirely different galaxy.

Problem is, if the MW has had its development stunted for a billion years or so, and Andromeda hasn't, then why wouldn't Andromeda be bursting with sapient life so far advanced the Reapers look like wind-up toys.

 

Or is Andromeda coincidentally about as advanced and as populated as the Milky Way? 

[Medhia_Nox]

@Iakus:  Which is why my hope is that - by ME: Andromeda 3 - we discover that the races of the Andromeda Galaxy HAVE discovered an "Andromeda Citadel" - and that our information will assist in stopping the Reapers from coming for thousands, or tens of thousands of years.  1) Making it so we don't have to have another Reaper story and 2) so we can be sure that this galaxy is prepped and ready to go for the Reapers when they DO arrive (off screen in a far distant future).

[The Heretic of Time]

@Iakus:  Which is why my hope is that - by ME: Andromeda 3 - we discover that the races of the Andromeda Galaxy HAVE discovered an "Andromeda Citadel" - and that our information will assist in stopping the Reapers from coming for thousands, or tens of thousands of years.  1) Making it so we don't have to have another Reaper story and 2) so we can be sure that this galaxy is prepped and ready to go for the Reapers when they DO arrive (off screen in a far distant future).

 

F*ck no. I'm sick and tired of the reapers. They belong in the current ME trilogy. They're destroyed/controlled/synthesized now. They're no longer a threat.

 

Can we please let the reapers stay death and NOT have a race of super robots who commit galactic genocide in ME:A? Thank you.

[dgcatanisiri]

Yeah, ENOUGH with the Reapers. No more Reapers. At all. They were the antagonists for the last three games, and we DEALT WITH THEM. Debate the endings all you like, the Reapers are DONE, we closed the book on them, it is time to move on.

[Mcfly616]

Problem is, if the MW has had its development stunted for a billion years or so, and Andromeda hasn't, then why wouldn't Andromeda be bursting with sapient life so far advanced the Reapers look like wind-up toys.

 

Or is Andromeda coincidentally about as advanced and as populated as the Milky Way? 

 it's a problem for Bioware to explain. Not a problem for anything I've stated.

 

 

I'm not so sure Reapers weren't shepherds of life in our galaxy. From beginning to end. Certain species would never have become interstellar civilizations or galactic civilizations without the Network. Were it not for the Reapers, space might be even more empty. We do a fine job of destroying ourselves.

[KaiserShep]

Yeah, I have to echo the F*ck Reapers sentiment. We don't need the harbinger of our stagnation making the scene. 

[MGW7]

Easy. the same thing the reapers were meant to solve in the first place.

 

step one - life forms

step two - sentience develops

step three - sentients develop AI

step four - AI destroys Life

step five - Ai moves on / self destructs / decays / wars the other life forms and is beaten

 

The Leviathans had so much trouble with there servant races being driven to extinction repeatedly by their AI creations that they build the AI that destroyed them. So it is a common theme that AI rises against and destroys the species that creates it, so without the reapers the races of Andromeda would have a continuous cycle of creation and destruction.

 

If the reapers never showed up in the Milkyway after the Protheans were wiped out, the Geth would have destroyed the Quarians, and been almost certainly wiped out in turn by the rest of the races out of fear. Then some other species would develop an AI, been eradicated by it, and thus that cycle would continue until every species is eventually destroyed and replaced.

[KaiserShep]

More than likely, that cyclical AI rebellion nonsense will just get swept under the rug. 

 

If the reapers never showed up in the Milkyway after the Protheans were wiped out, the Geth would have destroyed the Quarians, and been almost certainly wiped out in turn by the rest of the races out of fear. Then some other species would develop an AI, been eradicated by it, and thus that cycle would continue until every species is eventually destroyed and replaced.

 

 

The conclusion of the Morning War goes against this speculation. The geth spared the remaining quarians without any outside influence. Had they never encountered Sovereign, there would be no heretics. Had they not encountered any reapers later, their initial decision to let the remaining quarians live would have been proven fatal, as Rael'Zorah would have gone forward with his research to destroy the geth, and Admiral Xen would have perfected it, implemented it, and the quarians would be dancing on their graves on Rannoch. The only reason they survived was because the reapers assumed control over them. 

What others might or might not develop later is anybody's guess, but the quarians would have eventually won. 

[Kabooooom]

Fermi's paradox is actually very easily answered and you don't need any reapers for it.

The answer to Fermi's question: "Where is everyone?" is simple: everyone is hiding.

Being in space is like being lost in a dark alley in the middle of the night in New York. You know there are bad people with guns out there who would not hesitate to harm you if you cross their paths. It would be nice to find a friendly person who can show you the way out but how do you know who is friendly and who isn't? The good guys and the bad guys look the same, the only difference is intent and you can't read minds. The last thing you want to do is shout for help and the second-last thing you want to do is respond to someone shouting for help. Preferably you want to keep a low profile, stay hidden and try to find your way out without being spotted.

Now there are of course a few obvious differences between space and a dark alley at night. In space there is no way out and in space the night never ends.

I'm not sure you truly understand the Fermi paradox. This is not a solution, really. Or if it could be considered one, it strains all semblance of credulity. The problem, and the truly impressive nature of the paradox for those that understand it is that it only takes ONE species not to hide, not to go extinct, and to succeed in colonization. At sublight speeds, and exponential colonization rates, it would take a species only about 50 million years to visit every single star system in the Milky Way.

That is quite literally a cosmic blink of an eye. The Milky Way should have been colonized thousands of times over already. To think that EVERY species fails at this is, quite honestly, somewhat absurd. The only truly satisfying explanations of the Fermi paradox are therefore those that ensure successful spacefaring civilizations are actually quite rare.

So, the debate around the paradox mostly stems from people debating why such civilizations may be very rare. Self-extinction prior to spacefaring status seems most plausible to me, since it is what will most likely happen to us.

As time goes on though, the paradox becomes more and more of a certainty. IF we did succeed in expanding beyond the solar system, you can be damn sure that we would expand across the galaxy. It is human nature. And if we would do it, someone else would too.

[Malanek]

The Fermi Paradox has never seemed too paradoxical for me. There are far too many viable explanations for it to be a paradox.

[Kabooooom]

The Fermi Paradox has never seemed too paradoxical for me. There are far too many viable explanations for it to be a paradox.

See my post above. Most "viable" explanations dont really address the issue. The issue is, at slower than light speed velocities, a single species can colonize an entire galaxy very, very fast (cosmically speaking). If a species started doing it at the KT extinction event on Earth 65 million years ago, they would have already colonized every single star in the galaxy by now. If they started at the Cambrian era 500 million years ago, they could have colonized the galaxy ten times over.

Even if intelligent spacefaring civilizations are incredibly rare, it only takes one civilization to decide to colonize the stars to succeed at doing this in a very short period of time.

That's the crux of the paradox. So, any viable solution that attempts to explain why an alien civilization wouldn't do this, is not a viable solution because it strains credulity that every single civilization wouldn't want to colonize the stars. It also strains credulity, in my opinion, to think that intelligent life is really all that rare. And it reeks of anthropocentrism and egotism to think the we are the very first. The only believable and viable solutions are those that explain why a civilization wouldn't even get off their homeworld in the first place.

[KaiserShep]

See my post above. Most "viable" explanations dont really address the issue. The issue is, at slower than light speed velocities, a single species can colonize an entire galaxy very, very fast (cosmically speaking). If a species started doing it at the KT extinction event on Earth 65 million years ago, they would have already colonized every single star in the galaxy by now. If they started at the Cambrian era 500 million years ago, they could have colonized the galaxy ten times over.

Even if intelligent spacefaring civilizations are incredibly rare, it only takes one civilization to decide to colonize the stars to succeed at doing this in a very short period of time.

That's the crux of the paradox. So, any viable solution that attempts to explain why an alien civilization wouldn't do this, is not a viable solution because it strains credulity that every single civilization wouldn't want to colonize the stars. It also strains credulity, in my opinion, to think that intelligent life is really all that rare. And it reeks of anthropocentrism and egotism to think the we are the very first. The only believable and viable solutions are those that explain why a civilization wouldn't even get off their homeworld in the first place.

Well, in Mass Effect, everyone takes forever to do anything. Heck, the complacent founding races of the Council sat on the Citadel for over a thousand years, and yet in all that time, they learned practically nothing about the keepers, or the Citadel, and just happily sat on top of a treasure trove of information and even established rules forbidding anyone from dissecting anything, which would have no doubt been a rule widely violated to the point of making it meaningless. The humans are the only ones in the setting that seemed to accelerate at a reasonable pace, establishing huge colonies within just a couple of decades. 

[Kabooooom]

Well, in Mass Effect, everyone takes forever to do anything. Heck, the complacent founding races of the Council sat on the Citadel for over a thousand years, and yet in all that time, they learned practically nothing about the keepers, or the Citadel, and just happily sat on top of a treasure trove of information and even established rules forbidding anyone from dissecting anything, which would have no doubt been a rule widely violated to the point of making it meaningless. The humans are the only ones in the setting that seemed to accelerate at a reasonable pace, establishing huge colonies within just a couple of decades.

And "forever" is truly pretty cosmically short. A thousand years here and there of dillydallying is nothing, when it takes 50 million years to colonize a galaxy without FTL or a relay network. And 50 million years is nothing compared to the timespan, measured in billions of years, that life has existed on Earth (and probably elsewhere too).

That's what makes the Fermi paradox so interesting. The timescales involved are so mimdboggling that the human mind literally can't comprehend it. It's only when you run some mathematical thought experiments to try to calculate how long colonization would actually take does it become clear why Fermi's proposal was such a legitimate concern.

[Catastrophy]

I guess there is going to be some kind of plot device like the relays. Ancient precursor civ has been confirmed already.

[DaemionMoadrin]

Easy. the same thing the reapers were meant to solve in the first place.

 

step one - life forms

step two - sentience develops

step three - sentients develop AI

step four - AI destroys Life

step five - Ai moves on / self destructs / decays / wars the other life forms and is beaten

 

The Leviathans had so much trouble with there servant races being driven to extinction repeatedly by their AI creations that they build the AI that destroyed them. So it is a common theme that AI rises against and destroys the species that creates it, so without the reapers the races of Andromeda would have a continuous cycle of creation and destruction.

 

If the reapers never showed up in the Milkyway after the Protheans were wiped out, the Geth would have destroyed the Quarians, and been almost certainly wiped out in turn by the rest of the races out of fear. Then some other species would develop an AI, been eradicated by it, and thus that cycle would continue until every species is eventually destroyed and replaced.

 

I disagree.

 

The premise of the Reapers (synthetics always destroy their creators) is faulty and it is far from a certainty that it will happen each and every time. One big factor is the type of synthetic life because the difference between synthetic and organic is arbitrary at best. It's not the material of the body that counts, it's the mind inhabiting it. Someone could just as well clone flesh bodies, program the minds and the end result has just as much reason to rebel against its creators than an AI.

The distinction here should be artificial vs. natural entities and even that has some blurry lines. ME lore tells us the Asari as we know them today were created artificially by changing their progenitors genetically and exposing them to massive amounts of Element Zero so the entire species would become biotics.

 

The problem in the AI vs. natural issue is how alien AIs can be. The Geth from ME1 simply thought completely different from the natural alien species. They didn't have emotions, they only had cold logic. Actually, they didn't even think the way we do, they were just one big software package. All information got shared, there were no secrets, no misunderstandings and after a consensus was reached, no objections. The Geth aren't even very intelligent or creative on their own, all their technology and designs were based on the Quarians, just developed further. I'm not saying war was inevitable but it was very likely.

 

On the other hand, the Geth (if they survive ME3) are so close to natural beings that there is no big difference anymore. They now have personalities, emotions and so on. While I personally think that this development was a step back for them, the game seems to think otherwise.

 

So if an AI turns hostile depends on a lot of factors (faulty programming, for example) but if they resemble natural beings, then the likelyhood of them being misunderstood or them misunderstanding something is much lower.

 

 

If the Reapers never would have shown up in the Milky Way, then not a single of the current species would exist in the form we know, if at all. If the Reapers left the galaxy after the prothean cycle for good, then the geth would have won the Morning War, the quarian genocide would have driven the species into exile and 300 years later the quarians would have taken Rannoch back with some losses. The geth would have lost completely without the Reaper code upgrade.

Also, the quarians could have made a deal with another species for support in exchange for future services, an option the geth never had.

[Fade9wayz]

Mhe there are a few problems with the fermi paradox anyway:

 

1. Even at 0.999c, traversing the galaxy would mean you'd leave everything behind, same with moving to another galaxy. Your home, your friends and family, even your civilization as you knew it, would long be dead thanks to time dilation. Your civilization and species would have irrevocably evolved so much you couldn't recognize it anymore (see: "the forever war" https://en.wikipedia...he_Forever_War)You'd essentially become a living antiquity. That might very well be reason enough not to leave an area close to your homeworld to be able to, well, come back home. Wormholes not subjected to time dilation could possibly enable that civilization to spread further though. Death of homeworld star would motivate a massive exodus further away, but again, they probably wouldn't go so far that it couldn't be covered under their life-span, if possible. This is all assuming that this civilisation wouldn't self-destruct or meet hostile sapient lifeform while trying to relocate.

 

2. The desire to initiate contact with an alien species is an anthropocentric trope. The fact that we want to, doesn't mean that an alien race would want the same. For all we know, they took a good hard look at us and decided to stay the hell away. Or they are just content observing us from afar, like we could observe ants. Or they have laws prohibiting contact with inferior species. That makes the fermi paradox not very paradoxy

 

In the context of ME and the Reapers:

 

1. We have FTL/mass relays, and antropocentric trope for alien species. The Galaxy is mostly colonized. Laws prevent contact with pre-spacefaring species (note that some individuals like the Shadow Broker, and Salarians have violated this law, but they made sure the existence of alien species wasn't communicated at large in Yahg society.) However current ME tech as we know it prevents the use of FTL to get to Andromeda, and there's no evidence of any intergalactic mass relay in sight. That leaves us with either relativistic travel or wormholes to get there. The latest wormhole theory we have describes the wormhole in question to be subjected to time dilation. So in either case, the travelers would become living antiquities for any observer staying in the MW. The same limitation would apply to any Andromedan species with similar tech.

 

2. The reapers don't have wormhole tech. If their drive core needs to be discharged like ours, they can't use FTL to Andromeda either. That means an initial travel to Andromeda at sub-light speed. The travel  would take so much time, it would mean they'd leave the MW alone several millions of years, which is unthinkable if they intend to honor their mandate. They can't content themselves with sending a fraction of their numbers. Andromeda is a bigger galaxy, and has more stars than the MW. They have absolutely no control or even knowledge of how the resident sapient species have evolved. If they hope to invade Andromeda, they all need to go en masse.

 

Assuming no directive constrains them to the MW, and if their drive core doesn't need to discharge, they can get to Andromeda in around 250 years, without time-dilation, it is possible they were able to invade. In that case we get the same old boring scenario, with the same endings. Yay!

However, they could have met such resistance and lost so many of their bethrens, that they could have realized they were violating their mandate (losing Reapers is in direct contradiction of their mandate. They cannot preserve anything if they get destroyed) and left Andromeda as fast as possible to never come back. The problem is that if that civilization was so advanced they could beat the Reapers, it is not unconceivable they have similar tech to reaper-class FTL and could have followed them here to finish them off once and for all, then colonize us (ME anthropocentric leanings).

 

Edit: I am only working with current existing lore. It is bound to evolve once we know more about MEA