The Temple and Merlin

Dilandu wrote:

n7axw wrote:If we are talking about recorded personalities, I don't see them as being very rational or happy when their will is thwarted. I rather doubt that their reaction is going to be very pleasant, esp. for the good guys.

Don

Well, i think SOME of them may agree with rational explanation, that experiment on Safehold was a proven faliure even before Merlin appeared.

Sure it's possible, but if you were in charge (and likely a hardliner on the subject, given how they persecuted the War of the Fallen and destroyed Alexandria), would you let someone who wasn't a hardliner be your backup plan? I sure wouldn't.

I think this is one of those circumstances where the Inner Circle has no choice but to assume the worst of reactions on the part of whatever virtual personality returns.

Sure, assuming the worst and possibly getting a nice surprise is much safer and more rational, than the opposite option. I would be giving serious thought to how to isolate the main computer from everything else before waking it up.

Bluestrike2 wrote:
Sure it's possible, but if you were in charge (and likely a hardliner on the subject, given how they persecuted the War of the Fallen and destroyed Alexandria), would you let someone who wasn't a hardliner be your backup plan? I sure wouldn't.

I think this is one of those circumstances where the Inner Circle has no choice but to assume the worst of reactions on the part of whatever virtual personality returns.

Well, the situation was different. Doctor Pei and Fallen messed around with the start of experiment - actually, doctor Pei tried to terminate experiment at all. I.e. they weren't going to "just wait a thousand of years and see how the society would evolve" - they tried to change the situation at the start.

The Archangels may be hardliners, but the fact that they decided to leave some sort of control in thousand years clearly indicated, that they antisipated at least some sort of troubles. Let's not forget: their eventual goal was survival of humanity, and they MUST at least assume that they may be wrong. Even Langhorne admitted. that his idea was based on the theoretical assumptions, not the actual tests.

So, the most logical way would be to left a team of stored personalities to wait and after a thousand years -
thoroughly evaluate the situation.

P.S. Actually, the real reason of all this mess of Alexandria was exactly that both Langhorne and Pei
stubbornly stood their ground and didn't want to consider some sort of compromise - like "let's wait one thousand years, and after this - decide, who was right". But those who survive the WaF may be more willing to compromise.

Dilandu wrote:

Bluestrike2 wrote:
Sure it's possible, but if you were in charge (and likely a hardliner on the subject, given how they persecuted the War of the Fallen and destroyed Alexandria), would you let someone who wasn't a hardliner be your backup plan? I sure wouldn't.

I think this is one of those circumstances where the Inner Circle has no choice but to assume the worst of reactions on the part of whatever virtual personality returns.

Well, the situation was different. Doctor Pei and Fallen messed around with the start of experiment - actually, doctor Pei tried to terminate experiment at all. I.e. they weren't going to "just wait a thousand of years and see how the society would evolve" - they tried to change the situation at the start.

The Archangels may be hardliners, but the fact that they decided to leave some sort of control in thousand years clearly indicated, that they antisipated at least some sort of troubles. Let's not forget: their eventual goal was survival of humanity, and they MUST at least assume that they may be wrong. Even Langhorne admitted. that his idea was based on the theoretical assumptions, not the actual tests.

So, the most logical way would be to left a team of stored personalities to wait and after a thousand years -
thoroughly evaluate the situation.

P.S. Actually, the real reason of all this mess of Alexandria was exactly that both Langhorne and Pei
stubbornly stood their ground and didn't want to consider some sort of compromise - like "let's wait one thousand years, and after this - decide, who was right". But those who survive the WaF may be more willing to compromise.

I suppose you could be right on this one, Dilandu. But if it was your arse was in the crack, would you really be willing to depend on it?

I wouldn't.

Don

Dilandu wrote:

Bluestrike2 wrote:
Sure it's possible, but if you were in charge (and likely a hardliner on the subject, given how they persecuted the War of the Fallen and destroyed Alexandria), would you let someone who wasn't a hardliner be your backup plan? I sure wouldn't.

I think this is one of those circumstances where the Inner Circle has no choice but to assume the worst of reactions on the part of whatever virtual personality returns.

Well, the situation was different. Doctor Pei and Fallen messed around with the start of experiment - actually, doctor Pei tried to terminate experiment at all. I.e. they weren't going to "just wait a thousand of years and see how the society would evolve" - they tried to change the situation at the start.

The Archangels may be hardliners, but the fact that they decided to leave some sort of control in thousand years clearly indicated, that they antisipated at least some sort of troubles. Let's not forget: their eventual goal was survival of humanity, and they MUST at least assume that they may be wrong. Even Langhorne admitted. that his idea was based on the theoretical assumptions, not the actual tests.

So, the most logical way would be to left a team of stored personalities to wait and after a thousand years -
thoroughly evaluate the situation.

P.S. Actually, the real reason of all this mess of Alexandria was exactly that both Langhorne and Pei
stubbornly stood their ground and didn't want to consider some sort of compromise - like "let's wait one thousand years, and after this - decide, who was right". But those who survive the WaF may be more willing to compromise.

The real problem is that there is no room in the worldview as established by Langhorne for anything that disagrees with his assessment of correct action.

Nothing short of removing all of the technology from Alexandria would have prevented the enclave from being obliterated.

In which case, there would be an additional kingdom and they'd STILL be in this mess.

In other words - nothing could have prevented the schism except for possibly Langhorne becoming less of a megalomaniac.

shaeun wrote:
The real problem is that there is no room in the worldview as established by Langhorne for anything that disagrees with his assessment of correct action.

Nothing short of removing all of the technology from Alexandria would have prevented the enclave from being obliterated.

In which case, there would be an additional kingdom and they'd STILL be in this mess.

In other words - nothing could have prevented the schism except for possibly Langhorne becoming less of a megalomaniac.

Never liked simplified answers. The real problem was. that there was only one planet, and thus no space for different conceptions. So, they were forced to chose one of two avaliable.

With a growing family I don't normally like paying the extra to expedite the book but this time I'm making an exception.

But Amazon haven't shipped it yet

So still counting

Dilandu wrote:

shaeun wrote:
The real problem is that there is no room in the worldview as established by Langhorne for anything that disagrees with his assessment of correct action.

Nothing short of removing all of the technology from Alexandria would have prevented the enclave from being obliterated.

In which case, there would be an additional kingdom and they'd STILL be in this mess.

In other words - nothing could have prevented the schism except for possibly Langhorne becoming less of a megalomaniac.

Never liked simplified answers. The real problem was. that there was only one planet, and thus no space for different conceptions. So, they were forced to chose one of two avaliable.

No, Dilandu, that was not the problem. Sometimes the simple answer is the real answer and we only confuse ourselves by attempting to layer it with complexity.

The real problem here was that Langhorne wanted to freeze what was left of humanity into a pretech cultural stasis. He wanted that at least in part because he believed that was the best way to avoid the Gbaba. Had there been two available planets he would have declined the opportunity to allow a technologically literate society to develop on either of them because he would have figured that the tech spoor from the one planet would attract the Gbaba. But even more he would have have feared that the techies would come back around on him to challenge his vision on the planet that's left.

Don

n7axw wrote:

Dilandu wrote:
Never liked simplified answers. The real problem was. that there was only one planet, and thus no space for different conceptions. So, they were forced to chose one of two avaliable.

No, Dilandu, that was not the problem. Sometimes the simple answer is the real answer and we only confuse ourselves by attempting to layer it with complexity.

The real problem here was that Langhorne wanted to freeze what was left of humanity into a pretech cultural stasis. He wanted that at least in part because he believed that was the best way to avoid the Gbaba. Had there been two available planets he would have declined the opportunity to allow a technologically literate society to develop on either of them because he would have figured that the tech spoor from the one planet would attract the Gbaba. But even more he would have have feared that the techies would come back around on him to challenge his vision on the planet that's left.

Don

And a methodology was chosen by consensus and everyone agreed. Then Langhorne decided that he knew better than everyone else and changed the plan. Imagine the guilt of being witness to THAT crime where not only were some memories were taken but entire cultures.

No matter what had happened with the Alexandria enclave, the schism would have occurred as it was Nimue's mission to create it.

It is not really the simple answer...

I think it would be entirely worthwhile to stage a city burner nuke within range of the temple, and threaten to use it. Then you'd have a good old fashioned Mexican standoff, which should cause enough delay for the canned personality to make it through a realistic assessment. Surely it would take time to queue up strike orders for the OBS, so at the first indication of communication between the temple and the OBS, burn it down. That'd leave the OBS intact, of course, but the only truly impenetrable barrier ever built is a manned one. Given time and effort, eventually a way to overcome the OBS will be available. The biggest reason not to try to immediately is fear of waking the temple sleeper, but if that threat is removed, more overt, energetic methods can be tried.

They're only insurmountable in tandem. Remove one, and the other can dealt with, in time. Since assaulting the OBS out of available resources would either fail or wake the sleeper, either try to develop the resources in the remaining time, try to bring the sleeper on board so that the OBS can be taken from the equation with a minimum of trouble, or burn the sleeper down in a method that minimizes loss of life and set about the laborious job of destroying the OBS by more conventional means.