Synth Shaun: Moral Issue?

[greentea101]

I just realized something, the OP has kind of gone full robobrain here. The OP's logic is (or was) "his life is not good enough to be worth living, therefore the moral thing to do is to kill him". The "Jezebel" robobrain from the Automatron DLC described a similar logic, along the lines of "their being alive is the main problem, therefore the optimal way to help them is to kill them".

Here's the dialogue from the game for reference:
"Assisting a human to the best of my abilities only affords a 25 percent survival rate. That means there's a 75 percent chance that despite my efforts, the human I'm assisting will die from something beyond my control. Therefore it's better to hasten the human's death and put them out of their likely chance of misery than to deplete my limited time."

Let's hope that real life AI (and the people who develop it) will do a better job than this. People freak out about AI, but personally I'm more concerned about the people who shape its development. That being said, what I'm reading about this is reasonably encouraging (http://research.ibm.com/cognitive-computing/ostp/document8.shtml). Ultimately, when it comes to AI or any other technology, it's up to humanity to not kill itself with it. Good luck to us all!

[Stronglav]

A guy who calls his parent "colladeral damage" doesn't deserve to live.

[TheGadget1945]

A guy who calls his parent "colladeral damage" doesn't deserve to live.

To be fair the Vault Dweller simply leaves their spouse in the pod instead of giving them a decent burial.

[Stronglav]

 

A guy who calls his parent "colladeral damage" doesn't deserve to live.

To be fair the Vault Dweller simply leaves their spouse in the pod instead of giving them a decent burial.

 

Blame it on Beths which are incapable of giving a player decent RPG game experience.

To get the player emotionally into the game.

Im just having fun running around and killing stuff because I dont care.

Railroad BoS MM's whatever.They all suck and dont get me any emotions at all.

I had much fun selling a ghoul kid.That was awesome.

Companions dont like?Screw 'em. LOL.

Too bad too many folks like Preston are immortal.

Just cleared Diamond city.For fun.And still too many people there dont die.Dissapointing.

Edited August 7, 2016 by Stronglav

[RS13]

Not much in the plot makes sense. If real people such as a certain named settler had been replaced by synths it would become obvious to their families over time that they weren't ageing.

 

 

There's something that's always bothered me about "they don't know they're robots!" story-lines whether it's in Fallout, Blade Runner or Battlestar: it's not clear how they are really different from humans. Are we sure they're not clones? Or maybe (clones turned into) cyborgs? I mean, they presumably get hungry, tired, drunk (how's that work?), horny (calm down James Garret), and so on. If they get cut they bleed, if they get a haircut, it grows back. If something gets into their eye, it waters. If they get scared or run a mile, their heart beats faster. Once you start thinking about all the biological parts that these synths/replicants/cylons have to have in order to pass for humans *to themselves*, they seem more man than machine. Sure maybe they have a chip in their brain that makes them docile when the right code is said, but there have been plenty of stories where someone's put a similar chip inside a human brain (the new manchurian candidate for instance).

 

All that to say, they whole "he'll be 11 forever thing," seems like a gaping plothole. If you can make synths need haircuts or give them immune systems that heals cuts and scrapes, can you really not make them age? Not buying it. And why bother making Shaun think he's really the PC's son when that illusion is going to last... two years? Tops?

 

But plothole or not, I don't see why it would be any different than allowing a terminally ill child to live out their life even if they won't live to be 11 or 15 or whatever. Sure the terminally ill don't get stuck at a certain age, but it would be weird if the fact that synth shaun would *keep living* meant the moral thing to do is to kill him. FWIW, I don't see any in-story why reason Shaun's intellect would stay stuck at 10--nothing odd about Skyrim's babette having an adult mind in a human body--but even if it did, there are people with severe mental handicaps who never develop past the level of a child and I don't think it's moral to kill them.

[robhartman9]

I left the child synth in the institute to get blown up. I saw it as nothing more than a robot designed to subvert my emotions in order to gain favor hoping that I would not seek to destroy the institute. It was all the more reason to end the insidious plots of the enemy. Ad Victorium brothers and sisters

[TheGadget1945]

I left the child synth in the institute to get blown up. I saw it as nothing more than a robot designed to subvert my emotions in order to gain favor hoping that I would not seek to destroy the institute. It was all the more reason to end the insidious plots of the enemy. Ad Victorium brothers and sisters

 

I did too, in my second playthrough where I was playing as a woman. I thought "my real son,who I gave birth to, has no affection at all for me and has engineered this replacement which is now calling me mother even though it has no real connection to me". If Sturges wished to teleport the kid out he could have done but I didn't want to be saddled with it. It was, in the words of the BOS, an "abomination".

[TheVampireDante]

 

can you really not make them age? Not buying it. And why bother making Shaun think he's really the PC's son when that illusion is going to last... two years? Tops?

 

 

Might be due to the mechanical components. If the engineering lab in the institute shows an accurate creation of a synth then the skeletal parts are still mechanical (like the old gen 1 and 2) with a "terminator-esque" living exterior fabricated over it. With perhaps various internal organs replicated as well during the process.

If that's the case then even if his dermis aged, he'd likely be locked in height. Perhaps the replicated/fabricated skin tissue doesn't have the capacity to simulate the aging process without breaking down completely.

 

Perhaps his mind could be transferred into an adult synth body at some point in the future, but that would require someone like Doctor Amari and perhaps the railroads help.

 

As for "Shaun-thetic" and his mental status, he's obviously intelligent and capable of learning. So I do see him having the ability to mature in the area, his personality will go along with that, and he may begin to act like an adult. It depends on whether there is any programming in place that would either prevent or inhibit the process. Shaun/Father did state that this particular Synth was an early test in that particular area of work (children) and mentions something about the synths reaction to stress/trauma when the player first speaks with them (I need to check the scene again for the exact dialogue). So the synth may be more prone to a child-like response to something sudden or shocking to them, reacting more like a frightened child than a wary/combative adult.

 

As for the leave/adopt question, I usually leave him or if overruled by someone else (railroad for example), they can keep him.

 

Might keep him around in my current playthrough, since this character has Vault 88 to call home.

[GnatGoSplat]

Might be due to the mechanical components. If the engineering lab in the institute shows an accurate creation of a synth then the skeletal parts are still mechanical (like the old gen 1 and 2) with a "terminator-esque" living exterior fabricated over it. With perhaps various internal organs replicated as well during the process.

If that's the case then even if his dermis aged, he'd likely be locked in height. Perhaps the replicated/fabricated skin tissue doesn't have the capacity to simulate the aging process without breaking down completely.

I don't believe gen 3 synths are terminator-esque, although I do think it would have been quite cool to have a gen 2.5 that were. Imagine shooting someone in the face, only to reveal a metal skull behind the skin or a glowing eyeball, or shooting their arm off and revealing metal parts, all the while they're still coming at you because they can ignore pain.

 

Anyway, I think gen 3 synths mostly biological, virtually indistinguishable in anatomy, except they're made in a lab. I don't remember who said it, but I do remember someone in the game says the biological differences between synth and human are so small, they can only be detected in an autopsy.

 

Also, I didn't catch where synths don't age at all. They could still age, but a synth child is unable to grow up. Growth and aging are two separate processes. An adult human ages, but no longer grows.

[Raycheetah]

 

Might be due to the mechanical components. If the engineering lab in the institute shows an accurate creation of a synth then the skeletal parts are still mechanical (like the old gen 1 and 2) with a "terminator-esque" living exterior fabricated over it. With perhaps various internal organs replicated as well during the process.

If that's the case then even if his dermis aged, he'd likely be locked in height. Perhaps the replicated/fabricated skin tissue doesn't have the capacity to simulate the aging process without breaking down completely.

I don't believe gen 3 synths are terminator-esque, although I do think it would have been quite cool to have a gen 2.5 that were. Imagine shooting someone in the face, only to reveal a metal skull behind the skin or a glowing eyeball, or shooting their arm off and revealing metal parts, all the while they're still coming at you because they can ignore pain.

 

Anyway, I think gen 3 synths mostly biological, virtually indistinguishable in anatomy, except they're made in a lab. I don't remember who said it, but I do remember someone in the game says the biological differences between synth and human are so small, they can only be detected in an autopsy.

 

Also, I didn't catch where synths don't age at all. They could still age, but a synth child is unable to grow up. Growth and aging are two separate processes. An adult human ages, but no longer grows.

 

Speaking to the issue of maturation in synths, I would agree with you, except for the fact that synths aren't grown like classical clones; they're constructed. It may be that the Institute hadn't yet mastered the biological science necessary to provide for a natural growth/maturation process on any but a cellular level (wound healing, hair growth, etc.). Otherwise, Institute Bio Sciences would be involved in their manufacture, not Robotics. Thus, Shaun is a prototype child synth, (ostensibly) created to test the mental and emotional aspects of the project. ='[.]'=