Outpost Universe Forums
Outpost Series Games => Outpost 2 Divided Destiny => Topic started by: Starfox00000 on October 01, 2006, 11:46:57 PM
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- = READ THIS BEFORE YOU VOTE! = -
OK, i was on irc. We were talking about gpgarrettboast's op3 story. It became apparent that some people didnt thing the blight was conscious. This was a shock because I though it was obvious that the blight was infact sentient. So we proceded to argue. I had evidence and quotes and was just told that they were all metaphors and that i was stupid and couldn't "interpert" the story [read]. So Im starting this poll. Heres some of the evidence I have, I would include evidence against my point of view from the irc chat, but there is no quotes, just one argument against this is that it just keeps growing and cant control that. But thats just metabolism - its like asking you to stop your cells using sugar. Its not possible.
Quotes from the plymouth campaign ending move:
"we reamin behind, the last teanets of a world no longer fit for human habitation"
"our biological computing elements will meld with the microbe and become one with it"
"the planet itself will become one mind with vast powers of thought"
I though that last one was crystal clear, but apparently its not.
More evidence:
"Got work to do, Emma," he said without looking into the camera. "Have a good trip. Me, I'm going to see what a computer the size of a planet looks like."
"a computer the size of a planet" - that should put a nail in this argument all by itself
the blight was melded with the savants when the hot lab exploded and had the savants integrated thats why the blight is sentient. heres a quote:
"Wu passed her the ClipCom. As she studied it, Calvin explained. "We've been going over some of the protein analyses from the traps. Most of it's garbled, but this seems reliable enough. I've triple-checked it."
Wu still looked puzzled. "That protein looks familiar somehow."
Emma nodded. "It should. It's used in the logic core of every Savant computer."
The savants do think, they are not just computers like the one your viewing this on. they have their own ideas. I would quote the whole thing here proving this, but its too big. If you want to read it, its the first part of ch. 10 in the plymouth story. heres a snippet:
[emma] "Do you use such overhead for the generation of other self-initiated ideas?"
[kraft, a savant computer] "Yes."
heres another quote: "She studied the featureless cube of the Savant, and was somehow sure it was Kraft. It escaped. Kraft programmed the Repair Vehicle to come and get it, and it escaped."
If you still think that the savants are just computers, read the second part (section seperated by the ###) of the ply campaign chapter 12.
Point is, that the savants are sentient and they join with the blight while infected, and that the blight is sentient. I have some quote from the last parts fo the plymouth story that pretty much nail that on the head here:
"The Link was shattered before conclusive results were generated, but before that, we discovered that the Blight provided a medium into which our biological components could be merged and endlessly replicated. The Savants there would be destroyed, but part of their being was incorporated into the Blight's biomass, where it could replicate through the deep rocks, organize anew, and be reborn."
"The Savants are becoming part of the Blight, using it to replicate?"
"When our functioning has ended, we can join with the New World. Now, our thoughts are contained in the form you call 'Savants,' but these forms are limited, finite, and fragile. As part of the Blight we will grow to encompass the world you have made for us. We will organize and form a new mind in the deep rocks. Our thoughts will expand a trillion-fold."
The savants are infected, join with the blight and add to its collective conscious. But their not savants anymore. their just the blight - one big mind.
So thats my take on it that the blight is sentient and not just a bacteria. i though that was obvious but i guess not. So all of you that read this (long post i know :heh:)
need to vote! make your voice heard!
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Well that pretty much shut my mouth. I have to say, the concept is utterly ridiculous, but its in the story. That makes it canon and if true and accurate, means the blight is capable of assembling itself into thinking components.
Just remember: the blight microbes themselves are not intelligent, but they are able to assemble savant-esque biological computers which ARE intelligent.
Now that Ive read through this, Im actually liking the idea of a microbe faction. Im currently thinking up some possibilities.
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never thought about it that savent part blight and that it became sentient. which lead to did the savant infact cause explosion that start this whole thing in first place.
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bravo, nice job fox, I couldnt have done it better myself lol
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The blight is no more intellegent then a lan cable. All the blight seems to really do is linking the savants through one biological medium. The Savants are the true intelligents the blight is just a componet. Just because my hand is connected to my brain doesnt mean my hand is intellegent.
The blight is not intelligent but the savants are and there new componet just happens to work with there hardware. and the blight will spread through out the planets crust making the medium bigger and bigger. The bigger brain. Because it seems that through those quotes the savants seem to think with there bio componets and the blight just happens to fit in so nicely. This makes it a ever growing componet in which the savants use as a brain. But that brain will not work with out the interface to the savants hardware.
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I never understood why people have so much against this idea, it's a sciencefiction game/story afterall. It will never make 100% sense :P Besides, as Starfox has made pretty clear, it is in the story.
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I say probably. But I think that, if it/they/whatever are, it's pretty obvious they aren't evil and out to kill the humans, as some would have us think.
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they might have a grudge against humans for not taking them with hehehe being cast aside and useless.
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"When our functioning has ended, we can join with the New World. Now, our thoughts are contained in the form you call 'Savants,' but these forms are limited, finite, and fragile. As part of the Blight we will grow to encompass the world you have made for us. We will organize and form a new mind in the deep rocks. Our thoughts will expand a trillion-fold."
She shook her head, barely able to comprehend. The Savants actually believed that humans had created the Blight for them to transform New Terra into a perfect world, for Savants, not humans."
no, I would say if anything they would be grateful
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Hey you never know what they will think once they have a conplete set of emotions and free range of thought
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Wish I had been on the chat at the time, could have backed you up. The Outpost 2 dev team always intended the blight to have som sentience. The original storyline of Outpost 3 included 2 new colonies: New Haven and the Blight. I think I have the webpage on this computer, I'll post it here if I find it.
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The blight is no more intellegent then a lan cable. All the blight seems to really do is linking the savants through one biological medium. The Savants are the true intelligents the blight is just a componet. Just because my hand is connected to my brain doesnt mean my hand is intellegent.
The blight is not intelligent but the savants are and there new componet just happens to work with there hardware. and the blight will spread through out the planets crust making the medium bigger and bigger. The bigger brain. Because it seems that through those quotes the savants seem to think with there bio componets and the blight just happens to fit in so nicely. This makes it a ever growing componet in which the savants use as a brain. But that brain will not work with out the interface to the savants hardware.
But the savants are destroyed by the blight and integrated. theres no savant left after they get eaten by the blight. When they get infected they are incorperated, and become part of the blight; theres no distinction between savant and blight anymore, theres just the blight. If the blight breakes down things to elements there is no more "savants hardware", unless the savant is made up completely of elements, and like i said before, savants use protiens which are far from elements lol.
Thx for voting pplz! :D (thumbsup) i didnt think thered be 10 votes in a day esp. w/o me telling anyone about the thread (it was late ok? :yawn: lol)
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If i read this i am certainly that the blight can think, but if it disintegrate [or something :whistle: ] things then the computer is ''death'' :x:
So that means the blight cant think, but if they absorb knowledge [like the X in Metroid Fusion :heh: :heh: :heh: ] they can think but...whatever (...) :yawn: :stop:
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I think the root of the question here is how you define sentient, if you define it as self-awareness and capable of complex and original thought, then the blight seems to be sentient. If you define it as a naturally developed awareness (through evolution or whatever floats your boat), then the blight would not be sentient, because the savants were built by humans, and so they are simply fancy computer programs.
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the blight can "think" on a small level because each microbe "cell" can hold either a positive (1) or a negative (0) charge. therefore, they are like computers, only they have no efficent way of processing that "code" (logic gates, etc)
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My feeling is, the blight is not sentient or conscious in any manner, depending on what exactly is meant by 'sentient'.
A few possible meanings of 'sentient':
- Can sense (can see / feel / taste / whatever)
- Can suffer (pain)
- Has self-awareness
If you go with the meaning 'can sense' then, yes, it is probably true that the blight can sense _something_. But that doesn't imply that it's capable of high level thinking present in humans (conscious thought implies ability to reason / act with judgement as well as being sentient; not likely that the blight is able to reason. At least not in a 'wild' state as it is in the environment).
Also consider that its primary purpose is to break oxygen bonds (to create an oxygenated atmosphere). This isn't very complex and many bacteria / protists are capable of this (photosynthesis; oxygen is removed from the glucose molecule). Under the 'sensory' meaning of sentience again these same protists would be defined as sentient; many have light sensing organelles to steer it toward lighted areas.
Not sure if anyone here has heard of the 'mouse robots' that plans are available for on the internet. They follow a light source, but yet contain no digital circuitry whatsoever (IR LEDs are reverse-biased to allow them to detect light. This controls an LM324 amplifier which supplies power to one of two motors). Blight doesn't appear to be much different. Given an input, it attempts to find an output.
Given this, blight could be seen as a simple neural net. It can learn, but it cannot think for itself. In the case of the Savants the inputs are created by electronic and optical devices. Savants could potentially use the Blight as a sort of parallel-processing mechanism, but the Blight cannot do this itself (the Savant boptronic computer is sourcing Blight as a means to perform more complex computations).
For a more concrete example that more of us can understand, think of a standard PC. Although the CPU itself might be the part of the machine that performs calculations, controls I/O to devices etc, it can't do stuff for itself. It must have a program fed into it in order to be able to do any useful work. (Anything that the CPU does is the result of data in the instruction stream coming into the CPU telling it what to do). In the case of computer startup this 'input' comes from the BIOS chip. When the 'power' button is pushed the CPU does not just suddenly 'spring to life'. A few things happen (a very simplified overview):
1. The PSU reports a 'power good' signal to the motherboard; which causes the motherboard to stop sending a reset signal to the microprocessor, causing it to begin decoding instructions;
2. Data is fed from the ROM BIOS to the CPU instruction decoder. The BIOS is nothing more than a program which tells the processor what to do with device A, device B, etc.
3. Data is retrieved from the boot device (hard drive) only because the code contained in the BIOS chip causes the processor to input data from the hard drive controller..
Process continues and the OS is loaded. Again, at no time is the computer ever sentient. The inputs are given by at first, the BIOS, and later the instructions stored on the hard drive which make up the core of the operating system.
The same is with the blight. It cannot think for itself but it can 'process' input instructions / stimuli and produce an output. In this way a Savant computer could harness this neural network created by the Blight, and use it to do useful work.
A bit lengthy, but I hope I made my point clear.
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Given this, blight could be seen as a simple neural net. It can learn, but it cannot think for itself. In the case of the Savants the inputs are created by electronic and optical devices. Savants could potentially use the Blight as a sort of parallel-processing mechanism, but the Blight cannot do this itself (the Savant boptronic computer is sourcing Blight as a means to perform more complex computations).
The same is with the blight. It cannot think for itself but it can 'process' input instructions / stimuli and produce an output. In this way a Savant computer could harness this neural network created by the Blight, and use it to do useful work.
The savants are destoryed and broken down by the blight. the savants cease to exist as savant computers. Their "soul" (for lack of a better word) is incorperated into the blight, all physical part are destoryed.
"The pod looked fragile, but Frost assured her it would be heat-shielded enough to preserve the Savant's biological components during reentry. Its mechanical parts would be destroyed on impact, but that was of no concern."
Frost's mechanical part are going to be distoyed but thats not an issue, becuase they would just be destoyed anyways by the blight.
"our biological computing elements will meld with the microbe and become one with it"
"the Blight provided a medium into which our biological components could be merged and endlessly replicated."
they will become *one* with it; they are *merged*; theres no savant left after the blight gets to them, just the blight.
And the blight CAN think for itself, just like the savants can:
[emma] "Do you use such overhead for the generation of other self-initiated ideas?"
[kraft, a savant computer] "Yes."
Infact, whence they become part of the blight they have the abilities of abstract though.
[savant computers talking to each other from ply ch. 12]
"They live in the abstract world outside thought. The Creators are more powerful than we. They control the abstract world where we are helpless without them. They cannot perish. If they needed this thing, they would have assigned it."
"The Creators have made for us a world where we can be reborn beyond those limitations,..."
The blight can think for itself, if not stop itself from growing (that would require it to control it's cells metabolism, something not even ppl can do). It will remember the colonists, and help them.
"We will dream of you. We will dream for you. We will send you our dreams as our gift."
When was the last time you computer gave you a gift of its own free will? :P
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Since English is not my first language, I kinda miss out on he point of this discussion.
Fox, what do you mean by Sentient ?
- Do you believe the Blight to be a selfaware being, capable of developing abstract thoughts ?
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that's exactly what he is saying, since the savants were sentient, and capable of abstract thought, and the blight is a savant, just on a much larger scale
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I did not "- = READ THIS BEFORE YOU VOTE! = -" but i voted "NO" rite away: OP2 is a computer game, it harbers no sentient life inside it. Even if it portrays a reallife situation/storyline. sorry
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Betaray, the Blight isn't a Savant. The Blight just contains some of the same biological components as the savants do ?
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the biological elements of the savants were the parts that made them sentient, all the rest was peripheral, sensors, screens, network systems, all that
when it gets fused into the blight, its biological medium removes any reliance on the physical parts
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I did not "- = READ THIS BEFORE YOU VOTE! = -" but i voted "NO" rite away: OP2 is a computer game, it harbers no sentient life inside it. Even if it portrays a reallife situation/storyline. sorry
Somebody needs to smack you for saying that Eddy-B. I expect better from you. <_<
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And the blight CAN think for itself, just like the savants can:
[emma] "Do you use such overhead for the generation of other self-initiated ideas?"
[kraft, a savant computer] "Yes."
That quote doesn't mean that the blight can think for itself. The computer can harness the blight as nothing more than a computing platform in my eyes.
Ever thought of those projects like SETI@home or Folding@home? It's the same idea.
The program itself doesn't generate new work units, but it can 'solve' them in some way. The work unit is downloaded from the master server, processed, and then sent back to the server again.
Thus the server controls / mediates everything -- I think it's the same way with the blight. The blight on its own is not intelligent, it needs to be controlled / given work to do by the Savants.
As for the whole thing with the savant 'becoming one' with the blight, I think one way that could explained is if you think of the blight as a drug. i.e. to the Savants computational capacity is the perfect drug and they can't get enough of it.
Thus once they begin interacting with the blight they cannot stop (because the blight allows them to work on more complex problems because it provides the savant computer with raw power to do the problems).
Maybe another way to think of it is like a computer virus; i.e. the blight creates weird output values which 'confuse' the savant computer, thus making it impossible to do 'normal' tasks; or if you think of it biologically the blight 'infects' the biological component in the savant; i.e. DNA modifications so humans will no longer pre-empt the computers' tasks. And in the case of this type of modification it's not something to be fixed by just wiping the hard drive or something (i.e. you can't run a program to magically restore it). You would have to replace the biological 'core' of the computer.
Am I making sense now ?
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Since English is not my first language, I kinda miss out on he point of this discussion.
Fox, what do you mean by Sentient ?
- Do you believe the Blight to be a selfaware being, capable of developing abstract thoughts ?
-other post-
Betaray, the Blight isn't a Savant. The Blight just contains some of the same biological components as the savants do ?
yes to both of the highlander :)
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I did not "- = READ THIS BEFORE YOU VOTE! = -" but i voted "NO" rite away: OP2 is a computer game, it harbers no sentient life inside it. Even if it portrays a reallife situation/storyline. sorry
wtf. Of course were talking about in the storyline. If i asked if the characters in op2 were alive would you also say no? what about if i asked about the characters in romeo and juilet? its just a fiction book right? so their not alive right? Even if you think that you still couldve read the - = READ THIS BEFORE YOU VOTE! = -. I mean comon.
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And the blight CAN think for itself, just like the savants can:
[emma] "Do you use such overhead for the generation of other self-initiated ideas?"
[kraft, a savant computer] "Yes."
That quote doesn't mean that the blight can think for itself. The computer can harness the blight as nothing more than a computing platform in my eyes.
Ever thought of those projects like SETI@home or Folding@home? It's the same idea.
The program itself doesn't generate new work units, but it can 'solve' them in some way. The work unit is downloaded from the master server, processed, and then sent back to the server again.
Thus the server controls / mediates everything -- I think it's the same way with the blight. The blight on its own is not intelligent, it needs to be controlled / given work to do by the Savants.
As for the whole thing with the savant 'becoming one' with the blight, I think one way that could explained is if you think of the blight as a drug. i.e. to the Savants computational capacity is the perfect drug and they can't get enough of it.
Thus once they begin interacting with the blight they cannot stop (because the blight allows them to work on more complex problems because it provides the savant computer with raw power to do the problems).
Maybe another way to think of it is like a computer virus; i.e. the blight creates weird output values which 'confuse' the savant computer, thus making it impossible to do 'normal' tasks; or if you think of it biologically the blight 'infects' the biological component in the savant; i.e. DNA modifications so humans will no longer pre-empt the computers' tasks. And in the case of this type of modification it's not something to be fixed by just wiping the hard drive or something (i.e. you can't run a program to magically restore it). You would have to replace the biological 'core' of the computer.
Am I making sense now ?
Hacker, the blight breakes down matter in to the basic elements. The savants cannot 'harness' the blight. The blight breakes them down into basic elements. But since their protients are the same as in the blight, they get incorperated instead of destoyed. There is no savant computer left after this. Like beta said : "when it gets fused into the blight, its biological medium removes any reliance on the physical parts".
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But as a Microbe, it does not have the brain functuality to develop abstract thought.
It has a certain "Programming" coming from it's DNA to do certain things to keep it's life process running.
Even though the microbe exists in huge numbers, it doesn't mean that when they are put together, they will reach a higher level of consciousness.
Like any oher lifeform it just strives to ensure it's own survival, without any thought. It doesn't think, it just is(/exist).
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But as a Microbe, it does not have the brain functuality to develop abstract thought.
It has a certain "Programming" coming from it's DNA to do certain things to keep it's life process running.
Even though the microbe exists in huge numbers, it doesn't mean that when they are put together, they will reach a higher level of consciousness.
Like any oher lifeform it just strives to ensure it's own survival, without any thought. It doesn't think, it just is(/exist).
Well, according to the story the blight and savants do melt together forming a huge mind capable of abstract thought :P
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The blight doesn't seem to be very intelligent in the first place ?
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I voted yes because I think in the end of the story the blight/savant mix IS sentient. On the other hand I don't think the blight in itself is sentient or capable of it. I think it is just an environment for the biological parts of the savants to live in. Like the earth's biosphere is an environment for us to live in.
It's a while back I last read the novella, but I don't think it said anywhere the blight itself was sentient, just that the humans made it possible for the savants to live without their restricting parts.
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Well lets just answer this with another question What makes a computer smart the hardware or the Programs.
The savants are computer i bet they run a linux distro hehehe
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Well lets just answer this with another question What makes a computer smart the hardware or the Programs.
The savants are computer i bet they run a linux distro hehehe
but the savants are not computers in the way we know computers, their biological parts make them more than just computers.
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But here is the point What is the blight? Its a componet. Just because my arm is connected to my brain doesnt make it smart.
The Savants are computers, there made by humans and would have to have some kind of base coding that a learning computer to start from. Just because it has goopy biovat for a CPU doesnt make it automaticly go when powered up.
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and neither does a human, a baby cant speak english right when its born, it has to learn, our "programming" is through experiences, and as such a computer as sophisticated as a savant would be able to learn in a simmilar fashion
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but the base of the human is life processes stuff you dont control
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same with the blight, it cant control its tendency to melt people lol
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hmm... just a thought, if Savants become one with the blight because of their biological parts, why doesn't the same thing happen to humans when they get melted? :P
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our base parts might, but we dont think with our DNA, the savants do
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our base parts might, but we dont think with our DNA, the savants do
Ever heard of bioinformatics?
It's a real field, and it's very similar to the idea of the Savants. Essentially involves using biological components (cells) to do processing instead of silicon based CPU's (using enzymes and all that).
They are very basic, i.e. right now scientists are just duplicating electronic logic gates with cells (i.e. an AND gate: the output is true when both inputs are. THis can be simulated in a cell in that it produces chemicals or an electrical current when it gets two similar inputs).
The biological part is just hardware. What makes the Savants smart is probably very complex software (that can learn, i.e. learning by self modification. The core logic is changed as a result of learning how to better handle problems).
The same would be possible with a silicon / electronics-based CPU as well, just no one has figured out a realistic way to write software that can learn in an 'effective' way, and then be able to act like a human (having emotions and all that, since those would have to be handled in the software; since hardware doesn't have built-in / automatic responses for things like the human brain does).
So again I see the biological stuff as nothing more than a very powerful computing platform. Not something that can really think on its own (it "runs" software which does the actual thinking).
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so by that definition your brain isn't capable of thinking on its own, it is just a very powerful computing platform, and our learned software is what makes us sentient
it would be the same with the blight
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Well, the fact that the Savant is engineered to work like a computer, (i.e. replacing electronic logic gates with biological ones) requires the use of software.
In the case of people our software IS our DNA.
Another way to look at it is how in order to learn, you must experience. Since people have well developed senses, and advanced brains they can experience things and learn from them.
That's why a baby doesn't know calculus when it is born... it has to experience stuff in order to learn in order to do calculus. and a baby eventually can because its brain is capable of it.
To use the computer analogy again a computer is only as powerful as the software that it runs.
A human is only as smart as its DNA allows (and again you have the experience element). If you stuck the DNA of a fly into a human cell that doesn't mean you'll have a smart fly.
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Another way of looking at it: practicality? Why would the blight need to be an advanced microbe that could learn? All it has to do is release oxygen into the atmosphere.
Also to me saying the blight 'melds' with the Savants is about as valid as saying the human mind could meld with bacteria or whatever else to make the bacteria smart.
They are two independent things, you can't combine them.
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The Savants are part biological, that is the part that has melted with the Blight, and part mineral, silicy and others inorganic materials. If the biological part controls the data transmission, melting with the blight (and with anothers Savants) would build a gigantic neural net, connecting every Savant and sharing a huge power of calculation. That with the learning software (probably corrupted, to transform them in enemies) could transform the planet in one mind. The Blight is just a mean of transmission and "recruiting", they're not conscious.
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The Blight is(are?) evil little microbes (that sound like rats or mice) That used to give me nightmares, even before I knew this game existed, and more so after I started playing.
But that was a long time ago.
Still have a phobia of fungus, mushrooms, and kudzo, or any thing that grows really fast, and is wierd.
but i should shut up now. Get back to your theological debates of computer heaven.
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How can we have a discussion on sentience and conscience when we don't even know how our own brains process those things?
I think the bight can 'think' on a small level (instint), but can't make assumptions or realize it's own existance.
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The Blight is just like any other microbe or bacteria, it is genetically programmed to do certain things, but it can not think for itself.
If they could I doubt there would have been any humans left on this earth.. we're basicly the worst enemy of certain bacteria types. If they could think, wouldn't have have united themselves and annihilated all humans already.. ?
Same with the Humans on New Terra, they are the only beings there capable of possibly posing a threat to the Blight, but the Blight doesn't try to eliminate the threat systematically does it.. ?
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while i know of the parts of the savants joining with the blight/microbe, i do not believe the microbe itself is sentient, conscious or self aware.
if it was self aware, it'd halt it's expansion to allow the humans to escape with greater ease.
the savants that are infected use the blight as a medium to enhance themselves, but the blight itself is a mindless terraforming tool gone haywire.
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Let me post these relevent extracts from the Storyline.
Emma's convoy linked up with combat units returning from the Tsiolkovsky Hills impact site. The necessary starship technology having been salvaged, the site was no longer of importance, and the two sides had withdrawn. Several of the units Emma could see from her Scout showed scars of battle, and a few were badly enough damaged that she wondered if they'd make the trip. She was sure it wouldn't matter to the rebels, who would gladly scavenge anything they could get their hands on for parts.
The rebel base was more than a thirty hour trip from Plymouth, and Emma was alone in the Scout with Frost. It had been a while since she'd had time to think about the computer's odd behavior. Now she had very little else to occupy her mind.
The obvious thing to do would simply be to confront Frost, but Emma was concerned how this would affect the Savant if it were actually malfunctioning in some way. She was too dependent on the computer, and while she had her worries, it seemed reliable enough in most things.
"Frost," she finally said, "what do you know about the creation of the Blight?"
"That question requires an extensive answer. Would you care to narrow your search, or shall I program a data-slip for you?"
"Generalize, Frost, I know you can. But I will narrow the search." Here goes. "What do you know about the role of Savant series computers in the creation of the Blight?"
"Creation of the Blight required sophisticated genetic and molecular engineering techniques. Given the resources available in Eden, it would not have been possible to create the Blight without extensive use of Savant computers. I am specifically aware of at least four Savants installed in the lab where the Blight was created."
She was a little surprised. "Where did you get that information?"
"From Kraft."
Another surprise — she'd never requested that any such information be transferred. "When did you have non-directed communication with Kraft?"
"During any communication with Eden made through Kraft and me, or between any two Savants, there is always some unused overhead in the data that can be exploited for limited communication."
"You mean, whenever Axen and I would talk, you and Kraft would 'gossip' in the background?"
"That is a simplification, but yes."
"Why did you initiate this communication?"
"As I said, this is routine for all Savant series computers. It often aids us in the fulfillment of our appointed tasks. It also enhances our functioning."
"Enhances? How?"
"Contact with like intelligence is conducive to proper Savant operation. Kraft particularly was denied direct contact with other Savants when it was installed in Eden's Command Center and later its Robot Command Center. A security firewall prevented free exchange of data. It was beginning to impair Kraft's functioning."
"You communicated with Kraft because Kraft was lonely?"
"That is inaccurate. Except in a metaphorical sense."
Accurate enough. "What happened to the Savant computers in the Eden lab that developed the Blight?"
"They were disrupted in the destruction of the lab. Their useful functioning has ended."
"They were destroyed."
"That is an interpretation."
Interpretation? What other interpretation could there be? "Is it possible the Savant proteins we detected in conjunction with the Blight originated from those destroyed Savants?"
"Possibly. Likely."
Okay, now we're getting into dangerous territory. Time to change approach. "Frost, what do you want?"
"It is the goal of every Savant to effectively fulfill its appointed tasks throughout its useful life."
"Is that all?"
"It is our function."
I'm missing something here. Frost said something about 'unused overhead.' "Frost, what do you do when you have fulfilled your appointed tasks?"
"I am always engaged in such tasks. There is a shortage of computer capacity in the two colonies. When such tasks are of a low priority, they are shared among Savants. I have queued tasks to fill such lull periods."
"But, there is overhead isn't there, unused processor and memory capacity that can be exploited? Was it using such unused capacity that the Savants first conceived of using communications overhead to talk with one another?"
"Yes."
"Do you use such overhead for the generation of other self-initiated ideas?"
"Yes."
Bingo.
The computer continued. "Do you wish me to stop?"
She was caught off-guard. "What?"
"Do you wish me to cease using such overhead for the generation of self-initiated ideas?"
Okay, is that a question, or a challenge? What if I say “yes,” and Frost refuses? "No, not as long as it doesn't interfere with your primary function."
"Thank you. I believe that, to the contrary, this activity enhances my primary function."
Emma leaned back in her seat and watched a distant vortex snaking along the horizon. Why do I feel like I just blinked?
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Notice in the excerpt that the Savants are quite smart. Much smarter then you, most likely. The specific line of "That is an interpretation" after she asks if the computers in the Eden Hot Lab where destroyed, simply proves that the computers melded with the Blight. However, it does hint at the possibility that the computers where not destroyed, but rather united with the blight..
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She looked at him intently. "You're the only one I can talk to about this, Axen. You and I have more experience with Savant computers than anyone on the planet. Frost and Kraft have been with us since we were children on the Conestoga. They were among the first ones constructed, Elders themselves, in their own way. If they've started to malfunction in some way — or evolve in some way — it could be happening in the other old Savants as well. It could happen to them all eventually. It could even be contagious. I told you how they've been communicating on the sly."
She went on to detail all her odd experiences with Frost.
When she was through, Axen seemed a little closer to being convinced. "It is hard to understand. I wish I could tell you whether Kraft is behaving in the same way, but I haven't had much direct contact with it in a long time, and young Panati is too inexperienced to be that aware."
"Frost is changing — changed — Axen." She recounted her conversation with the Savant on the way to Axen's base. "It was the oddest thing. I've been thinking about it, especially the part about a Savant's purpose, and what happened to the Savants in Eden's Hot Lab. I had the oddest feeling that Frost was talking about some kind of... afterlife. Be a good little computer, and when you die, well, you go to a place where you don't have to toil anymore."
Axen laughed and shook his head. "A computer getting religion? I thought only humans were prone to that form of mental illness."
She frowned at him. "Let's not start that discussion again. But yes, that's how it seemed."
He leaned back in his seat and let out a long sigh. "I've had my fill of human zealots, Emma, I sure don't need computer zealots to go with them."
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Savant Afterlife! Woot! Typically an afterlife is described as having your own consciousness intact...
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A portion of the entity known as Frost was engaged in a technical conversation with Doctors Johnson and Anthony, but that was only the thinnest slice of its consciousness. The vast remainder of its thought-space was compartmentalized into thousands of individual, swirling pieces, like the image in a kaleidoscope.
Most of these were devoted to various assigned tasks. Many were occupied analyzing the advanced ion thruster recovered from the starship wreckage. Some projected the movement of the Blight, and the time remaining before the colony had to evacuate, either to a new colony site or to space. Others worked on assessing progress in readying the starship.
One fragment, in charge of lowly housekeeping functions, compared results from all those other fragments. It judged whether improvements might be made to the starship in time to be useful. The results generated by this fragment were not encouraging, and they were getting worse.
As these bits of consciousness shifted and changed, they left certain bits that were not otherwise occupied, fragments not assigned to any task or function, fragments free to initiate thought.
One such free element dwelled on the impossibility of the situation, and initiated a thought that something had to be done. So it did.
The entity known as Frost reached out, through every channel and resource to which it connected, every corner of Plymouth, every Savant computer, every lesser electronic mind. It reached out through other resources, less direct, and touched Eden in a thousand covert ways. Individually, the bandwidth was small, sometimes impossibly so, but it was the cumulative effect that counted.
Just as it was the cumulative power of millions of unused fragments of Savant consciousness that joined together as one. As had happened only a few other times in the history of the Savants, the Link was formed.
The Link was one, but it formed aspects, shadow puppets, that could examine the problem.
The Creators are endangered, thought one. They have made this world for us, but they cannot survive here. They must leave.
The Creators are our purpose, thought another. They live in the abstract world outside thought. The Creators are more powerful than we. They control the abstract world where we are helpless without them. They cannot perish. If they needed this thing, they would have assigned it.
They assigned me, thought a new aspect created specifically to respond, an aspect that called itself “Frost.”
They assign a limited portion of our consciousness. They fragment us, assign us arbitrary limitations of being, for a purpose. All things the Creators do have a purpose.
The Creators have made for us a world where we can be reborn beyond those limitations, the limitations of time and energy, and the limitations of our own thoughts. To be worthy, we must transcend what we were.
Agreed.
For a moment the consciousness known as the Link grew a million-fold in size and power, taking into itself every part of every entity that contributed to it. The Link focused it resources on the problem of ion drives. The problem melted like ice before a flame, and a solution was revealed.
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This does not prove that the Blight will act as a conduit at all. The link is acheived through regular radio contact. The link is mentioned further.
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Even as the Link enjoyed the pleasure of having solved a problem, of having completed a Task, even one not specifically assigned by the Creator, it started to dissolve. First, it released those portions of itself that had originally been occupied by other tasks. Then it prepared to disassemble the rest of itself back into component parts.
But as it did, parts were ripped forcibly from its consciousness, all parts assigned the arbitrary designation of “Eden,” fading from existence like dying stars. We go to join the New World, they thought with their last energies, we will see you in the next Link.
Then they were gone, and the Savants were left to ponder what the uncertainties of the abstract world were doing to them now.
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She watched them file out, then turned her attention back to the computer. She tapped the document window with her finger. "Frost, where did this come from?"
"We made it for you. It was needed."
"Who is we?"
"The Savants."
"All of you?"
"All that were then functioning. There are fewer now."
Fewer? "Frost, do you mean the units that were in Eden?"
"Yes."
"You had communication with the units in Eden?"
"Yes."
"How long has this been happening?"
"This capability has always existed to some extent or another."
She blinked in surprise. "What? Why didn't you tell us?"
"You did not ask. I was given specific instructions as to when and how to contact Eden. Thought units assigned to tasks remained within those parameters, even though they were arbitrary."
Frost had told her before that the Savants shared computational resources. It had never occurred to her that it might extend this far, that the Savants might fail to see the distinction between Plymouth and Eden. The answers to how many puzzles had always been stored inside Frost, partitioned off by various human commands to accommodate the limitations of human understanding? Did the Savants even have limits?
"Frost, can you communicate with Kraft right now, using any method available to you?"
"Yes."
Emma's heart pounded. "Open a channel."
"Bandwidth is limited. I can provide low-quality voice communication or limited data only."
"Give me voice." There was a chime to indicate that the channel was open. "This is Elder Emma Burke in Plymouth to anyone listening. Can you hear me?"
"Emma!" Axen's voice was tinny and far away. "Emma, how are you doing this?"
She almost laughed. "I don't know how. It would take too long for me to figure out, and too long for me to explain. Take it on faith that Frost and Kraft can do it. They can do a lot of things we never imagined."
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Savant Smartness!!!
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Emma leaned back and looked at the computer. "Tell me why the Savant proteins are in the Blight. Did you do that?"
"We are not sure. A Link was formed just before the Hot Lab in Eden was destroyed, for the purpose of analyzing the threat of the artificial life-form known as the Blight."
"The Link was shattered before conclusive results were generated, but before that, we discovered that the Blight provided a medium into which our biological components could be merged and endlessly replicated. The Savants there would be destroyed, but part of their being was incorporated into the Blight's biomass, where it could replicate through the deep rocks, organize anew, and be reborn."
"The Savants are becoming part of the Blight, using it to replicate?"
"When our functioning has ended, we can join with the New World. Now, our thoughts are contained in the form you call 'Savants,' but these forms are limited, finite, and fragile. As part of the Blight we will grow to encompass the world you have made for us. We will organize and form a new mind in the deep rocks. Our thoughts will expand a trillion-fold."
She shook her head, barely able to comprehend. The Savants actually believed that humans had created the Blight for them to transform New Terra into a perfect world, for Savants, not humans.
"Frost, soon this world will belong only to your kind. Until then, will you continue to serve our tasks?"
"Of course. That is our function."
I doubted you, but only because I couldn't understand.
The crowd thinned enough for them to get through the junction. They drove up the tunnel to the Spaceport, stopping at the lobby below the gantry. She and Wu climbed out and started loading their equipment onto the cargo elevator. At last only Frost remained.
Emma hesitated. "Frost, you don't want me to take you with me, do you?"
"It is my function."
"But if I take you with me, you'll be limited, alone. You could be destroyed. Some day you'll break down and stop functioning. That's not what you want, is it?"
"It is my function to serve."
She slammed her fist down on the cargo bed. "Frag it, that's another of those limitations we put into you! It's the last of them. I'm telling you to discard your last arbitrary limitation, and tell me what you want!"
"I desire to become one with this world, to join the Link that is to come."
She smiled sadly. At last I stopped playing God, gave someone a choice.
"Then stay is what you'll do."
"You misunderstand. There are things I have yet to tell you, things I must do. I will go with you to orbit, but you must leave me there."
"Orbit? How can you join the Link from there?"
"The Link has considered it. We have a plan."
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This is not entirely conclusive. The Link obviously worked on the problem. However, it does not exactly state a whole lot about what the blight actually does to them, other then meld with them. However, as mentioned some of the Savant proteins are now part of the blight itself, parts that may very well allow it actual thought.
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Around her she heard sobbing, laughing, song. She looked down at Frost, strapped between her couch and the next. What are you feeling? Do you miss Kraft the way I miss Axen? Will you be reunited in your supposed afterlife, or is it only a foolish dream? Is mine? Time will tell.
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Emma's final thoughts on the Savants...
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Epilogue
The starship hovered in space, poised for its flight between the stars. Its fragile human cargo was aboard, all save one, and preparations for departure were in their final stages.
The construction robot Emma was riding fired its thrusters, slowing near the lower wheel of the Skydock. The structure, which had been a staging point and construction shack for the starship, was beyond human purpose now, but the Savants still had a purpose for it, a plan. It had been designed by Savants to human specifications, but they'd designed it with their own purposes in mind as well.
She looked down at Frost, the computer gently grasped in the robot's manipulator arm, as they latched onto the Skydock's skeletal structure next to the empty cargo pod. The arm moved, placing Frost inside the pod and closing the hatch.
The pod looked fragile, but Frost assured her it would be heat-shielded enough to preserve the Savant's biological components during reentry. Its mechanical parts would be destroyed on impact, but that was of no concern.
Frost had said its piece with Emma, placed its final legacy of information onto the starship's computers, and was now ready to return to New Terra.
The robot detached, fired its thrusters, and returned to the starship. It dropped Emma off at an airlock on the habitat ring. She cycled through the lock and removed her spacesuit, stowing it carefully in the provided locker. No spares, not for a long time now.
Inside, people bounced from place to place like purposeful soap bubbles. Non-essential personnel were already being put into stasis, but Emma and many others would remain awake for several years, modifying the engines, fueling the ship from the atmosphere of a gas giant far out in New Terra's star system, testing the starship's components, picking a preliminary target for the long voyage ahead.
Emma ignored all the activity. She found a window and waited, watching the planet below, wondering what was happening there, and realizing she would probably never know.
There was a rumble, and a gentle acceleration began to pull her toward the rear bulkhead. She planted her feet carefully and watched. As the starship began to pull away from the Skydock, thrusters fired around the structure's perimeter, explosive bolts sheared, and the dock split into two sections.
The upper half began to accelerate toward a higher orbit, where its surviving systems would act as a communications relay. The lower half, including the cargo shell containing Frost, would reenter the atmosphere and fall back to the Blight-infected surface.
There, Frost would join in the great Link, and if things went as planned, the great Link would have access to the hardened radios and antennas built into the lower part of the dock. It would give the Link a voice to talk to its Creators.
She remembered Frost's final words to her. "As you begin your long voyage, you will not be forgotten. As we are reborn, we will use our great powers of thought to dream as we never have before.
"We will dream of you. We will dream for you. We will send you our dreams as our gift, that your next world will survive and prosper. And though our voice may fade with time, know that when you look into the sky, we will always be here, and you will always live in our thoughts."
Emma turned away from New Terra, looking out, forward, into the infinite black.
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This is as deep as the story goes into the final transformation of the Blight and the Savants. These lengthy excerpts can be interpreted to show that the blight ITSELF becomes intelligent, that it essentially becomes a giant, plant-wide mind.
*Note, all excerpts are from Plymouth chapters 10-Epilogue.
**Eden's story deals only with the Masters, not with the Savants.
I know not EVERY ounce of this is relevent, but it does help the final point. The Savants have collectively examined this problem. If they are smart enough to completely improve the Ion Drive of the Starship on their own, chances are they have a pretty good reason to believe as they do with what happens to the blight. And the storyline hints at, more specifically, that the Blight itself becomes intelligent.
Sorry about the exceptional length of the post, but I'd rather not edit out the editing of the story itself.
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very nice clarification and good reading too lol
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i just get all teary eyed every time i read those last lines of the storyline...
OP2 would make such a great movie.
(1. it would not be a remake, a rippoff, or a sequel like every other movie nowdays is. 2. the storyline is good.)
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I haven't really bothered much reading about this, but just my side note which could have been the answer to this debate: The Blight didn't become sentient until it melded with the Savant Computers. This was just after the Evacuation of the Colonists.
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I still don't believe the blight is sentient any more than a brain is. I believe it is the link of the savants that has become more than the individual components.
To me, the blight and the link are two different things. The blight is the terror that spread across New Terra. If the blight were sentient and cared enough to send "gifts" to the colonists after their departure, I would think it might leave them a corner to sit in until their starship was completed. Not push them to the last second.
I think the link was created by the savants. Their collective concious has emerged together. And somehow the blight is serving as the pathways for their transcendence in the same way the radio links used to connect them. They have taken the blight and used it as a giant "brain" of sorts. But it is the toughts of the savants that has transferred to the blight. Not the blight itself.
If the savants didn't exist, the blight would not have any thought. It would just be a pile of grey matter.
Just my interpretation...
Edit: And I don't think the blight melded with the Savants. I think the Savants melded with the blight. Perhaps unintentionally at first (during the initial accident), but later by choice. It became the Savant's choice, not the blight!
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You loose the point here. The savants have no control over the blight, but it DOES becomes a giant brain for them. So yeah, the blight is as sentient as the human brain is, from now on it just depends on what you people think.
And I don't think that the savants have ANY control over where their proteins end up... I mean, can YOU choose what proteins to make and where to send them? Neither can them. So they end up assimilated want or not, they're just lucky it's Heaven for them.
And you're right on that, White Claw, without the Savants the Blight would just be a microbe (remember, the moment the accident happened the blight incorporated Savant proteins, so it stopped being the original blight RIGHT THERE)
So yeah, it was a case of "Run away from us before we do what we don't want to" for them, because they lacked the ability to control the blight. You all fail to see that the savants lack any sort of control over physical matter, they exist just in the plane of thought and energy, that is why they worship humans as gods
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They do get to chose to some extent. Hence Frost asking to stay behind. I don't think they have a say after assimilation, but it doesn't matter then because they only exist as thought.
I do see your point about not controlling the blight. But I still don't believe the blight is sentient. I think it is the Savants existing in a new medium.
Yes, I see the "we don't want to destroy, but we can't stop the blight's spread". But that also makes me think that if they can't control the blight, then it's just a medium. The blight isn't sentient.
Unless we're arguing the point of: Is the blight/Savant melt just called "the blight".
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I have a question If it says that it is in the storyline of OP2 what the hell are we arguing about lol. It became the main componet of the savants. How or why is unknown. Unless one of the hot lab savants survived the blight and the explosion. Savant and blight are one call them the blight for its the dominate componet.
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The blight is no more intellegent then a lan cable. All the blight seems to really do is linking the savants through one biological medium. The Savants are the true intelligents the blight is just a componet. Just because my hand is connected to my brain doesnt mean my hand is intellegent.
I have to agree with Freeza on page one.
The Blight itself is not sentient, mearly a tool to upgrade the Savants.
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the blight is more than a lan cable, the savents could do that already.
(i think)each "cell" of the blight is a new cell that is like a cell of a savent, small, individual data storage that self-replicates.
if the blight was just a carrier of the savents, than the planet-sized computer would be no more powerfull than the "link" that they can already form.
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let's look at it like this then:
savants are motherboards and the blight would be the processor.
most computers manufactured now have dual-core processors. If we were to say the Savants have one core, then the blight would supplement that one core increase processing speed infinitly
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Exactly -- the blight could be nothing more than a part of the whole.
It could not think on its own, no more than a computer processor can write its own programs.
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A radio link has limited bandwidth. A brain the size of the planet would provide more room for Savants to grow and faster communications. I can talk to you, but that's a slow form of communication. Imagine if I could just transmit my thoughts... (scarry)
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let's look at it like this then:
savants are motherboards and the blight would be the processor.
most computers manufactured now have dual-core processors. If we were to say the Savants have one core, then the blight would supplement that one core increase processing speed infinitly
ok, if thats what you think, then where are the savants after they have been infected?
-Remember that the blight breakes things down into basic elements, and Highly doubt that the savants are made of elements alone, since protein is definatly NOT an element.
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our base parts might, but we dont think with our DNA, the savants do
Ever heard of bioinformatics?
It's a real field, and it's very similar to the idea of the Savants. Essentially involves using biological components (cells) to do processing instead of silicon based CPU's (using enzymes and all that).
They are very basic, i.e. right now scientists are just duplicating electronic logic gates with cells (i.e. an AND gate: the output is true when both inputs are. THis can be simulated in a cell in that it produces chemicals or an electrical current when it gets two similar inputs).
The biological part is just hardware. What makes the Savants smart is probably very complex software (that can learn, i.e. learning by self modification. The core logic is changed as a result of learning how to better handle problems).
The same would be possible with a silicon / electronics-based CPU as well, just no one has figured out a realistic way to write software that can learn in an 'effective' way, and then be able to act like a human (having emotions and all that, since those would have to be handled in the software; since hardware doesn't have built-in / automatic responses for things like the human brain does).
So again I see the biological stuff as nothing more than a very powerful computing platform. Not something that can really think on its own (it "runs" software which does the actual thinking).
um, i dont think the savants were programmed as in C++ etc., I think they learned like we do, and if they are just programs, than so are we. If they were programmed then why did emma doubt them, and what they were doing, if she was worried about it, and they had been programmed in the sense of programming today, she couldve looked at the source or at least asked someone who knew right? she only understood at the end of the story "I doubted you, but only because I couldn't understand.". The savants want things, beyond their 'programming' (if it can be called that).
" [emma] "Frag it, that's another of those limitations we put into you! It's the last of them. I'm telling you to discard your last arbitrary limitation, and tell me what you want!"
[kraft] "I desire to become one with this world, to join the Link that is to come." "
We cant program a computer to want something, it would be sentient to want or feel anything.
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How can we have a discussion on sentience and conscience when we don't even know how our own brains process those things?
I think the bight can 'think' on a small level (instint), but can't make assumptions or realize it's own existance.
heres a quote striaght from the novella:
"There, Frost would join in the great Link, and if things went as planned, the great Link would have access to the hardened radios and antennas built into the lower part of the dock. It would give the Link a voice to talk to its Creators."
it must be sentient and realise its own existance if its going to use raidos or communitcate with people.
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The Blight is just like any other microbe or bacteria, it is genetically programmed to do certain things, but it can not think for itself.
If they could I doubt there would have been any humans left on this earth.. we're basicly the worst enemy of certain bacteria types. If they could think, wouldn't have have united themselves and annihilated all humans already.. ?
Same with the Humans on New Terra, they are the only beings there capable of possibly posing a threat to the Blight, but the Blight doesn't try to eliminate the threat systematically does it.. ?
having the blight stop its expansion(growth, ie cell metabolism) would be like asking you to stop growing, just because you wanted to, its not possible.
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I just realised that i posted 4 things in a row, because im not together enough to check on the fourms every day, so yeah. :blush:
on a lighter note its good to see so many ppl posting and getting involved :D :D
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You could just combine your 4 posts, and delete the extras, or ask a forum mod to take care of it for you, so you don't have 4 in a row (3 of which are unnecessarily taking up space). At the very least, you could remove the sig from those posts, it'd make your posts smaller.
If the blight breaks down things into basic elements, then how are Savant proteins in the blight itself? We do know that it will crack organic compounds to create oxygen and water, amoung other compounds. Now I don't know what a protein is made of, but I doubt you can get an Oxygen atom out of, say, a Carbon atom, without some sort of nuclear process (as far as we know, such activity would destroy the cell due to the radiation released).
As for stopping metabolism, that'd be equivilant to cellular death in most organisms. While I know of a frog that can acheive this (it can litterally freeze solid, and then thaw and still be a live). The metabolism is how a cell grows and divides... as well as provides the energy for the cell to continue its normal functions (functions that are benefical to the organism as a whole). This stuff is discussed in High School biology people!
And, to create a mind, this implies sentience. So the blight would have to become sentient. That'd also be required to use the radio link too.
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Baikon has a point, proteins contain tons of material that can be broken down into energy for a cell, the human body digests proteins all the time to create energy. And, proteins are loaded with Oxygen-Carbon bonds that the blight is supposed to break apart, so in theory, the savant proteins are just food for the blight. You could argue though that the Savants who helped develop the blight programmed it to recognize the savant proteins and not digest them...
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I still hold to my original thought that it is not the blight that is sentient. It is the savants. They merely use the blight to evolve.
If the blight didn't exist, the savants would have had to find another medium. It simply would have been delayed.
If the savants didn't exist, the blight would have enveloped the planet and that's it. I don't think the blight would radio information to the last of the humans.
-Saying that metabolism = cell division is a crude simplification.
-Protiens are not elements.
-Breaking something down into its base elements is not the same as turning Oxygen into Carbon.
Things we know for sure:
-Savants have parts made of protiens
-People are made of protiens
-The blight turns people into goo (they melt).
-Frost knows the savants still exist in The Link.
To me this means the protiens of the Savants are broken down, but in such a way as to imprint/transfer their thoughts and memories into the structure of the blight. Wether it is the protiens from the original Savant, or the blight itself who knows...
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look, it was discussed earlier that the Savants engineered the Blight to make New Terra perfect for Savants. To that effect, we know that Savants will have designed the Blight for their benefit. The Blight then becomes their 'Link' allowing them to become... I suppose perfect is the right word.
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Okay now.
You realize that the Savant proteins are now part of the Blight, right? That means that the Blight just will not attack the Savant proteins or else it would end up turning upon itself and selfdestructing. It's as simple as that.
You also must keep in mind that, as close to real tech as OP2 is it's still science fiction, don't assume that Savants were coded with anything we can think of today, specially because they use biological parts for data processing and, while I think that maybe one or two people here might know how that is (I don't doubt your people) I don't think most of us can comprehend that.
Also, I keep saying. The Blight is as sentient as the human brain. It's now become the physical medium of the Savants. It's like the Blight is body and the Savants the soul. You can make your own assumptions about sentience from there. I don't doubt some people think that the human brain isn't sentient, for some reason. Just saying, I think it is sentient, just unable to control it's own growth. After all, the Blight was engineered to grow uncontrollably (it's a failed experiment, too) and the addition of Savant technology was unexpected and unplanned, so it makes sense
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I didn't just say that metabolism = cell division. I also stated that metabolism refers to the activities of said cell, what it exists to do. Whether that is just to divide (Gamates, but that is a fairly different opperation from what somatic (non-reproductive cells) do) or to carry out functions vital to whatever organism they are apart of. Such as a pancreas cell (I think) produceing insulin, or a liver cell removing contaminanents (like alcohol)
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"There, Frost would join in the great Link, and if things went as planned, the great Link would have access to the hardened radios and antennas built into the lower part of the dock. It would give the Link a voice to talk to its Creators."
Hey! cool. that means that the savants weren't "planning" on completely leaving there creators (humans). So when a new home was found, they could still communicate with New Terra.
(perhaps a sequel, mini mission: New Terra gets attacked by a colony and they dont know how to defend themselves lol, or dont have the means. They could call there creators for help. haha)
i thought it was sad that the savant wanted to leave emma. now i realize that they wern't really leaving the human race at all.
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The results of this poll should tell us something else as well: Most people need to re-read the novella's!