Babylon 5: Epiphanies

[Madner Kami]

There's this beautiful scene in this episode, which keeps throwing me off like few others. Bester and his frozen wife. He monologues to her and then, importantly, notes:

Sheridan and the others. They're probably laughing right now.

No, Bester. They wouldn't. They understand your loss and each and every last one of them would empathize with you and your loss, probably even try to comfort you. Ivanova might make a quib, but even she would ultimately comfort an emotionally distraught person like Bester. How can one be such an utter disaster at judging other people's characters and yet be such a powerful psyker, literally being able to read their mind and emotions and yet miss the most fundamental parts about other's personalities? I get that he goes in with pre-concieved notions and percieves them as "outsiders" to him and "his" people. And yet, he can read their mind. He'd catch if their first emotion to him and his quasi-dead love of his life would be: "LOL! SUCKS TO BE YOU!"

[Fianna]

It always bugged me that it took this long for Earth to forbid travel to/from B5. They'd already seceded from Earth and fired on Earth Force ships; you don't normally get to do that and maintain freedom of travel, even when dealing with a non-authoritarian government.

[hammerofglass]

He would have been laughing at them if it had happened to them and can't let himself believe everyone else wouldn't do the same without confronting that he might be a bad person.

[bguy]

It always bugged me that it took this long for Earth to forbid travel to/from B5. They'd already seceded from Earth and fired on Earth Force ships; you don't normally get to do that and maintain freedom of travel, even when dealing with a non-authoritarian government.

It's a little weird but not completely implausible. IRL China allows trade and tourism with Taiwan despite the Chinese government considering Taiwan to be a rebellious province.

[hypocratus]

Unfortunately telepaths on Babylon 5 seem to be the worst judge of people's behavior and response to things. Look at the ultimatum that the telepaths tried in season 5.

[Frustration]

Possibly telepaths don't need to develop effective theories of mind, since they so often just sense what they're thinking and feeling. It's a little bit like lacking proprioception - like drunks being asked to close their eyes and touch their noses with their extended arms without visual feedback.

Also, it's entirely possible that as a telepath, he's entirely aware of the reactions that people have but censor from their outward behavior. Everyone has a brain module dedicated to things like laughing at the misfortune of their enemies, decent people don't let it express itself - but it's still there.

[Makeitstop]

Possibly telepaths don't need to develop effective theories of mind, since they so often just sense what they're thinking and feeling. It's a little bit like lacking proprioception - like drunks being asked to close their eyes and touch their noses with their extended arms without visual feedback.

Also, it's entirely possible that as a telepath, he's entirely aware of the reactions that people have but censor from their outward behavior. Everyone has a brain module dedicated to things like laughing at the misfortune of their enemies, decent people don't let it express itself - but it's still there.

There's so many interesting implications to telepathy, and the psychological impact it would have on the telepath.

On the one hand, you'd think that being able to tap into the hopes, dreams fears, loves, and sorrows of others would teach you a little bit of sympathy. Being a mind reader should be the fast track to understanding others, seeing things from their point of view.

On the other hand, most of the time we aren't focusing on the big, inspirational things. In fact, our uncensored surface thoughts have got to make us all look pretty bad. Not only will there be cruel and offensive things we would never say, but even just our momentary desires, concerns, confusions and musings will make us look selfish, petty, and ignorant. Then there's all the things in which we are confident but wrong, making us look both stupid and arrogant. And on top of that, all of our self doubts become a damning confession. From this perspective, the idea of seeing telepaths as inherently better than the rest of us starts to make a disturbing amount of sense.

And yet, someone like Bester isn't just observing people during their routine. Just imagine what he has sensed when ambushing runaways and rebels. This is a man who can enter the mind of an idealist that is risking their life to protect telepaths, someone displaying the very best of humanity, and then just kill them. Worse, he can take them in, torture and interrogate them, sensing all the horror and pain, and hearing all the completely valid thoughts about how monstrous and wrong this is, and he just continues. I'm not saying there aren't people who would be able to do that with disturbing ease, or that it wouldn't push some to react with hostility and doubling down on their position until they stop caring. But I do think the majority of people wouldn't be able to keep doing this kind of stuff for very long before they have a change of heart or a breakdown.

Do you think he blocks his victim's thoughts out sometimes, just to not have to face it? And if so, do you think he realizes that he's doing that, as opposed to just being dismissive and brushing away the naïve and irrelevant white noise that takes up so much space in the skulls of mundanes? Is someone who hears other people lie to themselves in their inner thoughts going to be any less prone to the same behavior?

And that's just scratching the surface.

[Frustration]

On the one hand, you'd think that being able to tap into the hopes, dreams fears, loves, and sorrows of others would teach you a little bit of sympathy. Being a mind reader should be the fast track to understanding others, seeing things from their point of view.

There's a famous classic science fiction story - whose author and title escape me at the moment - about a telepath who can't establish meaningful relationships with any of the people around him because he perceives all the dirty laundry we carry around in our heads, and he longs to encounter another telepath, someone who could understand what it's like to him. Then, one day, he brushes up against the range of another telepath. Both are immediately consumed with shame and hatred because they're encountering someone who can 'read' their own dirty laundry and communicate that awareness back, and they begin mentally screaming how much they loathe the other's guts.

[Scififan]

He would have been laughing at them if it had happened to them and can't let himself believe everyone else wouldn't do the same without confronting that he might be a bad person.

Evil cannot comprehend Good. Assholes tend to think everyone is an asshole.

[McAvoy]

It always bugged me that it took this long for Earth to forbid travel to/from B5. They'd already seceded from Earth and fired on Earth Force ships; you don't normally get to do that and maintain freedom of travel, even when dealing with a non-authoritarian government.

Space is vast.

I have no idea how Hyperspace works in B5. Is everything just really small? Or do you have to go to different pockets for different areas? All we know is that non FTL ships can travel through it and travel lightyears in normal space.