Season one really was enough. It's worth a look just for the nostalgia factor of seeing fan favourite Data, and a plot involving him, but no Data, then what's the point of a second season?
shareYeah, they finally got to some actual "Star Trek" in the very last part of the season. Picard's a robot now. The actual Picard is dead. Time to wrap it up.
shareHow will they even call Season 2 "Star Trek: Picard" anymore? Besides, everyone was so merry and happy to accept this Replicant as a substitude of real Picard, who is now seemingly left out to rot under the sun on planet synth.
A robotic or organic clone of a person is not that person. This is one of the things bothering me, the other being the transporter clones.
Every night when you sleep there are periods between REM cycles where your higher brain functions are completely shut down. Call it temporary brain death. If the contents of your mind were copied in their entirety during one of those times and transferred to a clone or artificial duplicate, then your original body was terminated, you'd wake up in the morning and not know the difference.
Your primary care doctor calling you up a few days after your physical regarding the bloodwork, saying you need to come back in right now, might very well be your first indication anything had changed. Assuming your new ride wasn't loaded down with neat features. If your eyes suddenly had zoom, IR and UV modes selectable on a virtual heads-up display, that would be a small hint. Or underwater breathing capability. Or the fact that you accidentally bent a piece of steel.
What you think of as yourself is a collection of data stored in your neural processing core (a.k.a. your brain). Nothing more. There's no mysterious essence coursing through you that's lost if you move that data elsewhere. The pattern reactivates and simply continues its evolution with time in a new vessel. So all that talk about whether or not the new body is "really" you makes no sense. Of course it is. No meaningful distinction exists. The idea that it does is purely intuitive thinking.
Bullshit. We are now watching an android...its a copy of picard..
...end of story...
No, it's not bullshit. "You" are nothing more than an information pattern evolving in time. Move that information to another suitable body and it picks up right where it left off. Just like it did when you woke from unconsciousness this morning. It makes no sense to describe the result as a copy that only thinks it's you, what the hell does that even mean? If all your memories are intact it is you. The idea that there's some magic essence that didn't carry over is essentially religious reasoning.
As far as naturally occurring vs. artificial, what difference does that make? We're machines too. Meat droids if you will. It's the end result that matters, not chemical composition.
Im sorry to tell you, but we are more than a collection of data. Our "Selves" are deeply attached to our bodies. It gives constant feedbacks to your brain and is part of the Imagination of a consiousness. Put that into a synth and you might be able to move the body, but youre basically dead and empty.
Not that it couldnt work in SciFi though.
No, you replicate all those neural connections to get the same feedback. Everywhere your organic body has a natural neuron the synthetic body has an artificial one performing the same function. That's the whole point of an artificial body. It duplicates everything, part for part and process for process. It's all there. Nothing's missing. You need a body in order to be fully alive in the sense you're accustomed to. But it doesn't have to be the one you're in right now.
shareyeah, but the new body would still be different from your previous one and change your personality.
shareIt's likely the new brain would have to be configured to duplicate the architecture of yours; everyone's brain has a unique structure, distinct from all others. Even identical twins aren't precisely alike. A detailed scan of your brain would likely be an essential part of preparing the new body. And yes, getting that part wrong could very well cause changes to your personality after the transfer.
But as for the body itself - your brain doesn't interact with every cell and piece of tissue directly, it does so through the web of neural connections that extends throughout, from your spinal cord to the tactile nerves in your skin and everything in between. Outside of the brain itself that part is basically standardized. No real variation from one person's body to the next, aside from any nerve damage that may have occurred.
If your consciousness were being housed in a simulation, a la The Matrix, that same sensory web could be simulated, giving your avatar in the VR environment the same feel and functionality as your physical body out here in the real world. Just like it doesn't matter where geographically the backbone, servers, and client systems that make up the internet are located - only the nodes and connections (topology) of the network matters in terms of function. The number of neurons and their pattern of connections. That's the important part. Whether those neurons are made of cytoplasm or synthetic polymers, say, is irrelevant, as long as they work the same the behavior of the overall system will be identical.
So..... I think you are fully aware that the science in Star Trek is not that advanced as to replicate biological processes in an artificial body 100 percent identically to the ones in our biological bodies. If he was in fact a clone, it would make a bit more sense for the picard to still be there 100% - but this is a whole new deal.
shareThey seem to have implied that this breakthrough is exactly what's happened. Soji and Dahj so perfectly duplicated human physiology that they didn't realize they weren't. They had saliva and mucous, as Riker's daughter pointed out. When you cut them they bleed. They require food and water. They also have the strength and speed of an android like Data along with heightened sensory acuity and memory. These latest generation androids blur the line between biology and technology. Neither living organisms nor machines but something in between, with aspects of both.
shareDude it doesn't matter. If Picard didnt die and they imprinted his conscious into the golem there would be two picards. An original and a copy.
shareYou're still thinking in an intuitive way. What you'd have are two versions of the same person, two originals as it were, who would immediately begin to diverge becoming progressively more different with the passage of time and separate experiences. The stream of consciousness splits in two. Or three, or four, if you kept making duplicates.
Is this ethical? Should it be legal just because we have the capability? Perhaps not. Definitely not, in my own opinion. But that's a separate discussion. As I see it the laws drafted to regulate this kind of tech should specify a single version of anyone at any given time; if you die, we can transfer the contents of your mind to one new body, and one only, copying a still living person (i.e. spawning multiple copies) would be a criminal violation with a lengthy sentence.
No no no....look at Farscapes Twining episode....they were all equal and original or Voyagers episode where the crew was split in two. Picard is now just a copy. We will just have to agree to disagree.
shareTwo identical systems are identical. Calling one an original and one a copy is purely semantic - when you have precisely the same data (the mind) in a piece of hardware (the body) which functions exactly the same way down to the tiniest detail, it's a distinction without a difference.
New elementary particles are created in high speed collisions. You could call an impacting proton "the original" and one of the new protons created "a copy", but do the shell game with them, mix them up so you don't know which is which, and it no longer matters. They're the same.
What if you create a cloned human body perfectly identical to its progenitor, all the dental work, every old bone break or bit of scar tissue, it's all there. Down to the molecular level you can't tell them apart. If you're going to object and say that couldn't be done, I can think of a way: nanotech assemblers. Then you copy the full brain into the empty one and wake them both. If the two come walking out of that room together, which is the original and which is the copy? How would you distinguish them without having eyes on both continuously from the moment of the procedure and never losing track?
The silliness of trying to maintain a distinction here just illustrates something that comes up often in science: everyday ideas and ways of thinking don't always fit reality. Simple as that. The breach of individuality being copied represents may be disconcerting to a human being but hey, the universe can be that way if it wants. We're not the ones making the rules.
Look....doesn't matter of it's an identical copy of picard. Its just a copy. We are no longer watching the same human character we watched in TNG. We know it's a copy. So your analogy doesn't apply here.
shareYou're applying crude everyday concepts outside the realm where they're relevant and meaningful. That's what I'm trying to tell you. Perfectly identical "copies" can't in any verifiable way be distinguished from one another. Separate iterations or versions would be more accurate than the intuitive idea that one is "real" and one is "imitation".
shareFirst of all, sorry Galactus i missed the whole ordeal with the imbecile troll here. Now.
Troll, when all your neural connections are copied to a clone, you do not "migrate" to the clone. You are still you. Nothing you do will change that you are still you. Unless your brain is placed into a different vessel, you are trapped into your body until the end of your days.
This copy of Picard may be identical to the original Picard down to the molecule, but it doesn't change the fact that the real Picard died on the planet of robot belly dancers. If you were the real Picard, you would be dead as Dodo, regardless of how many other clones you have.
My whole point is, it's a fallacy to say you can make an exact duplicate but it's still a copy and the original you is dead. That's intuitive thinking that doesn't pan out when you ponder the question more rigorously.
"You" are a pattern of information. Not the blood and tissue. Not the body or even the brain. The information part. And that can be moved, in theory (once you develop the technology to record it). You would lose consciousness and then wake up again in your new ride. No one is dead. You are still the original you.
The average person's conception of self, even those who are not religious, still tends to be mired in magical thinking. And one's uniqueness is a big part of that. The idea of being duplicated offends in a primal way how we like to view ourselves. But the universe is under no obligation to operate by rules that make us comfortable. I happen to have a degree in physics so I do have some clue what I'm talking about here. Calling me a troll is childish and no substitute for a valid argument.
I have two degrees and i am very fond of physics and philosophy. If you really have a physics degree you will acknowledge that you, as the person, are the hardware (your brain) and the neural connections it makes (your experiences). An exact copy of these two will still be an exact copy. You, the original person, will die after the cloning procedure. Your clone will think he is you, nothing is different for your family and stuff, but you, your body which is the original schematic for the clone, will die. There is only one you. And that dies. Your journey ends at the cloning table. Your clone's journey continues.
There is nothing religious or magical about my argument. There is two identical people, and one of them dies. How you can reject this baffles me.
No. You are the information pattern, not the hardware - that's just a vehicle, if you will, and potentially interchangeable. It's a bit like imaging your hard drive and shutting down the computer, then loading that image up on a second terminal. If all your memories are recorded down to the very last moment of consciousness you will not die with your old body but awaken in the new one. It's meaningless to draw a distinction between the "real" you and a copy that's exact down to the smallest detail. There is no difference. That's why I reject the intuitive way of thinking. It's one of those ideas that seems to make sense as long as you don't examine it too closely.
Some people are uncomfortable with the idea that the essence of their being could be completely captured in a huge data file. But with the technology to record the information encoded in our brains it could be. That data needs a piece of hardware to run on, just like a hard drive image does nothing until it's loaded onto a machine and the machine is powered up. But one host body is as good as another. To clarify: I'm not talking about a situation where a copy of your mind is "activated" in another body while you're still alive and awake in yours. The assumption is that your brain has shut down for the last time and a final update is recorded containing the memories leading up to the moment of your death.
Here's a question to think about. Suppose we used some technology, say nanites, to convert the organic brain into an artificial one which could then be physically moved to a new body at need. This process would probably take a while. Say, a few weeks, maybe a month or two. A few cells at a time would be replaced with synthetic versions. You wouldn't notice anything unusual, as your brain would retain normal function throughout the treatment. At what point along the way are you no longer yourself? Or if you remain you, why is duplicating one neuron, one synapse, at a time, then breaking down the original cells for raw material, different from doing it all in a single shot? The death of a billion cuts is different somehow from the death of one?
Here's another question. One of the things your brain does during sleep is to assimilate new experiences and learned information. Old skills and old memories are often modified in the process. When you awaken in the morning you are a very close, yet altered copy of the person who went to sleep the night before. Is the old you dead? A machine copying of your brain's contents would be FAR more exact. Is it simply that one situation is common and familiar while the other (as yet) is not?
No, it's not a matter of familiarity. You are missing the essence of this. You compared this to an image back-up of a hard drive. That's exactly right. However, an image of a hard drive is not that original hard drive. Let's say you are hard drive A. An exact copy is made, hard drive B, and A is dumped to be recycled. You are still A, sitting in the recycle bin. B thinks it is A, has the exact same data up to the point of cloning, and there's no difference in experience of B, and everyone else inspecting and using it. But A still is and will always be A, and nothing will change that.
A neuron by neuron replacement is also the same thing. You are being replaced with something that is not you. Not entirely different from cutting your arm and replacing it with a prosthetic, or a genetically engineered identical arm. You may keep using it, it may be an exact replica, but you original arm is amputated and is inside a bag right now.
I think we will not reach an agreement on this. You claim to continue existence when you are precisely cloned. That is only true if you are the clone. If you are the template, you will always be the one left behind.
You won!
But then again,.losing was impossible...
Isn't the actual Picard still stuck in the Nexus?
shareThere are 2 other things to consider as well:
1.) The real Picard is technically dead. What we are looking at is an android copy with his memories and personality, and an organic body that was not enhanced in any way. In some ways, he might not even be an android. They mentioned the word "golem" for that artifically-grown body.
2.) I can't imagine what more they could do, considering they've done everything they set out to do, and gave Data proper closure that he'd always wanted.
Plus, I'm not sure I could stand to see more of this producer's style of story-telling. He takes everything "Star Trek" and turns it to dark, violent, woke, dystopian shit.
The Picard dying and then being ressurected in an articially grown body plot point was stupid. When he died, that should have been it, Data dies, Picard dies, end of season and series. Finito. Them ressurecting him, in an android body, but not android body... that has implications. It means anyone in this world, if they so desire can be immortal. Just because Picard chooses not to be immortal, doesn't mean others would feel the same. It opens a can of worms that shouldn't be open. Death means death. Some things are absolute in our world and should be in this fictional world. The fact that anyone can have back ups of their personality and memeories and essentially live forever... euh... it's stupid.
Not looking forward to Season 2. I am seriously done with Trek.
Sidenote, they so should have explored 7 of 9 being the Borg Queen for longer.
If PICARD's CONSCIOUSNESS is now inside of the SAME kind of BODY as DAHJ has, that definitely doesn't mean he's IMMORTAL.
Because DAHJ was also KILLED when one of the ROMULANS attacking her SPRAYED the GREEN STUFF on her after which she DISINTIGRATED into THIN AIR.
And since this is also the FIRST TIME that any HUMAN has been placed into an ARTIFICIAL SYNTHETIC BODY in TREK WORLD (unless you want to include AIRIAM from DISCOVERY who had her CONSCIOUSNESS placed into a ROBOT like BODY), we also don't know if the TRANSFER PROCESS is going to work on a permanent basis or not.
Because in another Sci Fi story called WESTWORLD, where they also place the CONSCIOUSNESS of humans into REPLICANT BODIES that look like them, there's also a problem where it works at first, but then stops working later on.
And with PICARD being a SYNTHETIC BEING now, that may also mean the ZHAT VASH will also try to KILL HIM the same way as they did DAHJ.
Because even if PEACE has been made, there's also always some FANATICS who refuse to accept PEACE agreements and still CLING to their original point of view.
So PICARD could also end up being HUNTED DOWN in S2 (the same way as RIVER also had a PRICE on her head in FIREFLY).
Plus there's also other ISSUES to consider such as can this SYNTHETIC COPY of PICARD OWN PROPERTY???
If not, then he would also have no rights to own the CHATEAU or the WINE that's made there, which also means he might end up being HOMELESS.
In other words, the rest of you also don't seem to have IMAGINATIONS enough to even CONSIDER all of the MANY kinds of VERY DIFFERENT and INTERESTING POSSIBILITIES that this TRANSFORMATION implies.
CaPiTaLiZaTiOn EmPhAsIs OvErLoAd
shareWhat's wrong with your caps lock? Does it toggle on/off at regular intervals? Do you have to pace your typing by it?
I'm pretty sure that a second season would be bringing back Data ... the Search For Data. This first season I would not have bothered watching if not for the pandemic and nothing else to watch, but it was so stupid, infantile even. I don't know how full grown adults can stand to be involved in such a stupid endeavor.
share