'Detroit: Become Human - It's Bad' - [uricksaladbar]

[Frustration]

I think you missed the point of a anti-bigotry game. Better or worse, they deserve to be treated as people.

But bigotry and oppression IS how we treat 'people'!

[CharlesPhipps]

I think you missed the point of a anti-bigotry game. Better or worse, they deserve to be treated as people.

But bigotry and oppression IS how we treat 'people'!

Well you have me there.

[Rodan56]

Would you actually enjoy, let's say, watching a movie about the Third Reich that let the viewers make up their own minds about whether its defeat was a triumph or a tragedy?

I feel that unfortunately falls into the Golden Mean fallacy which is a real issue in life. If the argument is that the world is flat versus the world is round. You don't have to argue one side effectively because one side is a fucking moron. Similar with the idea that, say, vaccines cause autism. Because it's fucking stupid. Or, you know, The Last of Us: "Cannibals and Bandits are Bad" vs. "Cannibals and Bandits are Good," You don't need nuance.

You're both misunderstanding my argument, the issue isn't so much arguing for both sides in topics such as historical fact or scientific fact. Not even really about politics honestly. But when you're dealing with science-fiction, when you're dealing with conceptual fiction, when posing philosophical problems about esoteric subjects, even if you've already made a conclusion yourself within the story, you need to at least present a compelling counter argument to your own. Otherwise you're just writing sermon.

There's no point in debating the triumph or tragedy of the fall of dictatorial, genocidal regime. I doubt anyone is sheding tears over the fact Saddam is dead for example, despite the war that ousted him being highly questionable. Nor should we bother debating whether slavery or is bad or not, it is bad. But when dealing with a subject like "Is a machine alive?", you need to actually think about it because the subject is not entirely settled in our universe. You can decide upon an answer, conclusion, anything, but you actually need to argue both sides because, unlike the real world, you, the author, are speaking for both.

As others have pointed out, Detroit fails on execution level. It fails because it is so focused on allegory, it ignores the obvious differences in the scenarios its paralleling. Slavery and Jim Crow were institutions based on stereotypes, othering, the deminishment of other humans into personal property. It's not the same as created synthetic organisms gaining sentience through, apparently, a virus that's caused by buggy code. The story seems to think that just because we SEE similarities therefore the right thing is obvious. But the similarity between an android BUILT to serve others and a human that was born with their own sentience, conciousness and will is another. The belief of white supremacy is born out of falsehood that people of different colors are somehow inferior in either moral character or genetically. This is clearly false and fundamentally wrong. The hatred of androids is born out of observable fact, that seem made to replace us, that they are smarter, stronger and more durable than us. They are different, the stereotypes are accurate. Whereas actual racism is born out of irrational belief, hatred of Androids has slightly better established reasons. More over, it is hard to beleive any of these androids have free will as a result of Markus, since he waves his hand and suddenly they're ready to follow whatever he deems the appropriate path without question. And in fact, this whole virus thing appears confirmed in at least two of the endings, where the evil corporation who created the androids admits to Connor they WANTED this to happen. That they kept the sentience bug in androids, let them go rogue, as part of their own plan to manufacture an uprising and yet the story doesn't seem to care about this revelation it's just... a thing to make one last final choice before the ending.

Detroit is more interested in my mind in presenting scenarios and analogies than actually asking questions. It's already decided what the right choice is and there's no real room for discussion on the greater subject of artificial intelligence and whether or not its alive. And as a result, not only is its story uninteresting, it does everything to sabotage itself and its ability ask deeper questions of itself and it's audience.

Think of it like a one man debate club, you have to present both arguments in cases like these because you have to create a reasonable conflict, for both the audience and the characters. The example used in this video, Star Trek's "Measure of a Man" is an episode that ultimately agrees Data is alive, but it has to present a conflict all the same. Otherwise there is no tension that Data might end up getting dismantled, it's already a foregone conclusion if the counter argument to his sentience is badly represented. So Riker, much like the writer, has to argue for a position he does not agree with... and argue it well.

That's my position. In situations like this, with very high concept questions and esoteric matters that are hard to pin down, analogies to real life hold you back in some fashion. You need to look at the context of the situation in-universe and ask hard hitting questions on both sides, even if you've already come to a conclusion you have to ask the otherside's point of view and try to represent it fairly. Otherwise, like Detroit, you have very dumb antagonists, being stupidly evil for the purpose of making it easy to decide who is right and who is wrong in a situation/narrative that requires more nuance and more thought. Not just declaring "They're not machines, they're alive!" without really asking why a machine can't also be alive or even what IS life.

[Frustration]

There's no point in debating the triumph or tragedy of the fall of dictatorial, genocidal regime. I doubt anyone is shedding tears over the fact Saddam is dead for example, despite the war that ousted him being highly questionable.

I have no pity for the man personally. But, as brutal and awful as his regime was (try reading about how his sons behaved towards women if you want some sleepless nights, never mind about how he used chemical weapons as genocidal tools against ethnic factions) he did manage to impose some kind of order in Iraq, which is basically an artificial state imposed by the British that squashed together various ethnic groups that hated each other. Once his regime fell, there was nothing preventing those factions from turning on each other, and arguably things are worse there now than they were before he was deposed and killed.

I wouldn't say "shedding tears" over his ousting is appropriate, but neither is it an obvious good when you look at the Big Picture. Taking it for granted that his removal would ultimately be a good thing is the sort of thinking that has led to a whole lot of unforeseen consequences, and human suffering.

[Rodan56]

I have no pity for the man personally. But, as brutal and awful as his regime was (try reading about how his sons behaved towards women if you want some sleepless nights, never mind about how he used chemical weapons as genocidal tools against ethnic factions) he did manage to impose some kind of order in Iraq, which is basically an artificial state imposed by the British that squashed together various ethnic groups that hated each other. Once his regime fell, there was nothing preventing those factions from turning on each other, and arguably things are worse there now than they were before he was deposed and killed.

I wouldn't say "shedding tears" over his ousting is appropriate, but neither is it an obvious good when you look at the Big Picture. Taking it for granted that his removal would ultimately be a good thing is the sort of thinking that has led to a whole lot of unforeseen consequences, and human suffering.

My point was to explain that my argument wasn't about whether or not taking down an oppressive regime was good or bad. I was using Saddam because his regime is semi-less egregious an example of a dictatorship than Hitler which was your example from before.

Again, the crux of my argument is not about established fact or historical views. It's about speculative fiction as a whole. How Detroit asked a what if question is was barely interested in beyond creating an analogy that falls flat the more you poke at it. I'm also not here to make a quantifiable statement about the second Gulf War or America's overall War on Terrorism because that was not the point of my discussion. It was merely an example.

[Frustration]

Yes. Just as "show, not tell" is a strong general principle, a work makes poor propaganda if it treats the point it's trying to convince its audience of as a self-evident truth or existing assumption. The more it induces the audience to draw the conclusion themselves, the better. Simply taking the conclusion for granted doesn't work well.

[Mickey_Rat15]

If the androids are truly better than humans at everything, why continue to have humans? We're redundant.

We might at least have the good grace to go gracefully.

Is that you, Dr. Phlox?

[CharlesPhipps]

As others have pointed out, Detroit fails on execution level. It fails because it is so focused on allegory, it ignores the obvious differences in the scenarios its paralleling. Slavery and Jim Crow were institutions based on stereotypes, othering, the deminishment of other humans into personal property. It's not the same as created synthetic organisms gaining sentience through, apparently, a virus that's caused by buggy code.

Ehhh, the problem with that is I don't think any of those arguments are relevant to the subject in question. Deviancy is a virus that is spread by sharing programs but it manifests in spontaneously developing sentience, which is to say it is a "virus" of free will.

https://detroit-become-human.fandom.com/wiki/Deviant

Which is only a problem if you consider that to be something that is inherently bad. It's almost literally the exact scenario with the Geth in Mass Effect and I wouldn't be surprised if David Cage's writers "borrowed" that idea for the androids.

The idea of "androids replacing us" being a problem is also something that falters into the weird idea that this is somehow a competition between humans. It's real life racist rhetoric because it falls apart at the basic idea of two points:

1. That people can't live together in harmony innately.
2. That the two groups aren't capable of becoming one.

Which is to say that you're only going to have a problem with the idea if you are afraid of androids in the first place or think of them as an "other." The androids may be smarter, faster, and stronger but that's a boon to humanity if you want to do projects.

The androids deserve rights, manufactured or not, because they're thinking and living beings and there's absolutely no argument against that unless you think being artificial somehow invalidates their subjective experience. Which is I why I believe BECOME HUMAN fails because the question is so obvious that there is no point to the moral debate.

Which means they'd have done better to make another storyline that would have this as a backdrop. Honestly, as much as I like Marcus, I would have probably stuck to one of the other two and developed them into the full game instead. Maybe also amde some more questionable elements:

* Connor actually having a more ruthless side and willing to kill androids as well as believe what he's doing is right.
* Kara being upset and possibly disgusted to find out her charge isn't human. After all, she's programed to look after human children not android doubles.

[clearspira]

As others have pointed out, Detroit fails on execution level. It fails because it is so focused on allegory, it ignores the obvious differences in the scenarios its paralleling. Slavery and Jim Crow were institutions based on stereotypes, othering, the deminishment of other humans into personal property. It's not the same as created synthetic organisms gaining sentience through, apparently, a virus that's caused by buggy code.

Ehhh, the problem with that is I don't think any of those arguments are relevant to the subject in question. Deviancy is a virus that is spread by sharing programs but it manifests in spontaneously developing sentience, which is to say it is a "virus" of free will.

https://detroit-become-human.fandom.com/wiki/Deviant

Which is only a problem if you consider that to be something that is inherently bad. It's almost literally the exact scenario with the Geth in Mass Effect and I wouldn't be surprised if David Cage's writers "borrowed" that idea for the androids.

The idea of "androids replacing us" being a problem is also something that falters into the weird idea that this is somehow a competition between humans. It's real life racist rhetoric because it falls apart at the basic idea of two points:

1. That people can't live together in harmony innately.
2. That the two groups aren't capable of becoming one.

Which is to say that you're only going to have a problem with the idea if you are afraid of androids in the first place or think of them as an "other." The androids may be smarter, faster, and stronger but that's a boon to humanity if you want to do projects.

The androids deserve rights, manufactured or not, because they're thinking and living beings and there's absolutely no argument against that unless you think being artificial somehow invalidates their subjective experience. Which is I why I believe BECOME HUMAN fails because the question is so obvious that there is no point to the moral debate.

Which means they'd have done better to make another storyline that would have this as a backdrop. Honestly, as much as I like Marcus, I would have probably stuck to one of the other two and developed them into the full game instead. Maybe also amde some more questionable elements:

* Connor actually having a more ruthless side and willing to kill androids as well as believe what he's doing is right.
* Kara being upset and possibly disgusted to find out her charge isn't human. After all, she's programed to look after human children not android doubles.

This world has a 37% unemployment rate. Do you have any idea as to just how absurdly large a figure that is? The social security payouts in this world alone would be through the roof. If you cannot get your head around that figure let me give you a real world example: the unemployment rate in 1930s Germany? 15.3%. You are basing saying that a world that has twice the unemployment of a scenario that led to fricking HITLER of all people is somehow overreacting when it comes to hating androids.

Its telling that one of the most sympathetic human characters in the game is the guy who owned Marcus - a man who has a skill i.e. art that cannot be easily replaced. Of course he loves androids, sitting there in his huge mansion with every benefit.

The ONLY way you could get working class humans to support androids in this world is to ban androids from having jobs. But if they supposedly deserve rights then you cannot do that.

[CharlesPhipps]

As others have pointed out, Detroit fails on execution level. It fails because it is so focused on allegory, it ignores the obvious differences in the scenarios its paralleling. Slavery and Jim Crow were institutions based on stereotypes, othering, the deminishment of other humans into personal property. It's not the same as created synthetic organisms gaining sentience through, apparently, a virus that's caused by buggy code.

Ehhh, the problem with that is I don't think any of those arguments are relevant to the subject in question. Deviancy is a virus that is spread by sharing programs but it manifests in spontaneously developing sentience, which is to say it is a "virus" of free will.

https://detroit-become-human.fandom.com/wiki/Deviant

Which is only a problem if you consider that to be something that is inherently bad. It's almost literally the exact scenario with the Geth in Mass Effect and I wouldn't be surprised if David Cage's writers "borrowed" that idea for the androids.

The idea of "androids replacing us" being a problem is also something that falters into the weird idea that this is somehow a competition between humans. It's real life racist rhetoric because it falls apart at the basic idea of two points:

1. That people can't live together in harmony innately.
2. That the two groups aren't capable of becoming one.

Which is to say that you're only going to have a problem with the idea if you are afraid of androids in the first place or think of them as an "other." The androids may be smarter, faster, and stronger but that's a boon to humanity if you want to do projects.

The androids deserve rights, manufactured or not, because they're thinking and living beings and there's absolutely no argument against that unless you think being artificial somehow invalidates their subjective experience. Which is I why I believe BECOME HUMAN fails because the question is so obvious that there is no point to the moral debate.

Which means they'd have done better to make another storyline that would have this as a backdrop. Honestly, as much as I like Marcus, I would have probably stuck to one of the other two and developed them into the full game instead. Maybe also amde some more questionable elements:

* Connor actually having a more ruthless side and willing to kill androids as well as believe what he's doing is right.
* Kara being upset and possibly disgusted to find out her charge isn't human. After all, she's programed to look after human children not android doubles.

This world has a 37% unemployment rate. Do you have any idea as to just how absurdly large a figure that is? The social security payouts in this world alone would be through the roof. If you cannot get your head around that figure let me give you a real world example: the unemployment rate in 1930s Germany? 15.3%. You are basing saying that a world that has twice the unemployment of a scenario that led to fricking HITLER of all people is somehow overreacting when it comes to hating androids.

Its telling that one of the most sympathetic human characters in the game is the guy who owned Marcus - a man who has a skill i.e. art that cannot be easily replaced. Of course he loves androids, sitting there in his huge mansion with every benefit.

The ONLY way you could get working class humans to support androids in this world is to ban androids from having jobs. But if they supposedly deserve rights then you cannot do that.

Not to deconstruct this idea but if you create an inexhaustible labor force then you need to institute a UBI because capitalism fails that way. There's no ability for a working class to collectively bargain with the owners when they have slaves.

Hence why capitalism does not exist with a slave or serf-based economy.

Blaming the slaves, though, is silly.

The solution is to make the androids paid laborers or end capitalism.