Shou Kaukonen
Risen Sun Exploration and Venture
30
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Posted - 2012.09.22 20:36:00 -
[1] - Quote
Good point Annika, how much it matters probably depends a great deal on individual beliefs (though the 'official' Amarrian line has capsuleers as soulless abominations who get to exist anyway, due to how valuable they are). I generally assume that the Intaki are the only people in New Eden culturally prepared to be 'ok' with the idea of repeated cloning, since they have a similar practice in their soceity already. Although, I'd love to see a chronicle one day that addresses whether Intaki think that capsuleer cloning is in any way comparable to rebirth.
Anyway, I kinda wonder if clone death can truly be seen as 'violent' for the purposes of mental trauma. Sure, your instruments are telling you that you've been targeted, and you're about to go up in a fireball, but what actually HAPPENS is that, moments before your actual death, you're 'killed' by the brainscan that reads your memories - a process implied to be so fast as to be painless. The next thing you perceive is waking up in a clone lab, with no sense-memory of the actual attack that ended your previous clone.
Considering this, along with the fact that capsuleers have access to mental uploading and neural plasticity techniques, I'd imagine things going like this: a capsuleer's visceral knowledge of their repeated deaths is limited to drastically less than what they would experience outside of the pod. Therefore, how deranged they get as a result of their life is to an extent controlled by how they adjust to the 'existential dread' aspect of things depicted above. Capsuleers do have access to techniques that reduce the rigor of the cloning process, and they have the luxury of not actually having to experience their 'death', so I believe it's possible for a pod pilot to significantly reduce chances of mental illness - as long as they have a worldview that allows them to believe that their death isn't that big of a deal, like Intaki or Amarr spirituality, or the Caldari patriot's 'for the State!' sensibilities.
However, one thing that doesn't take into account is the fact that capsuleers still have to contort their mind to endure the fact that they are responsible for an ever-expanding list of deaths numbering in the tens-of-thousands or greater. That, I think, would be the biggest issue - the need to either disconnect from those deaths or succumb to bloodthirst or self-hatred is probably what drives most capsuleers to such magnificent heights of sociopathy. The most benign way I can picture this manifesting is similar to Thane from Mass Effect 2 (for those who have played it) - an assassin who views himself as a weapon, with the same level of moral responsibility for his kills as the rifle he wields.
I guess the big question that arises from looking at things this way is this: if only viewing your deaths by instrument could help protect against some of the psychological trauma, does only having to view your kills the same way provide any similar effect? Or do neither of them provide any effect, and both lead to dissociation and sociopathy?
Hm...now I need to think about this more. =/ |