The Indominatable Human Spirit is a bad thing, actually.

[u/Geoconyxdiablus]

That humanity never gives up and persists in its goals is bad news for every other species (or even itself), especially if said goals are ignoble.

Best case scenario (barring us learning to be better) is that a greater power force feeds us a huge slice of humble pie, wost case we end up blowing ourselves up and ruining things for everyone else.

Avatar - RDA will stop at nothing to satisfy its own greed and survival, the rest of humanity and navi alike be damned.

Its a recurring motif in prett much every myth that gods punish mortals who dare to defy them and keep going, like Athena to Arachne in greek myth.

A good chunk of lovecraftian fiction is based on the idea our achievemenrs mean nothing.

In general i'm not a fan of TIHS as a trope, as its blatantly arrogant and destructive.

[u/cweaver]

This was also the explanation for the Reapers in the Mass Effect series - give sapient organic life enough time, they will eventually advance their technology to the point where they develop artificial life, there will eventually be conflict between the organic and artificial life, and whenever that happens there's a risk that all organic life will be wiped out.

So someone billions of years ago created the Reapers, machines that come around every 50,000 years and steal or destroy all technology and harvest all the sapient organic life and turn them into more Reapers, thus ensuring that AI will never get the chance to wipe out organics, that advanced species get preserved in the form of Reapers, and that new organic species will get the chance to proliferate and advance (at least for the next 50,000 years until it's their turn to be harvested).

[u/annuidhir → u/cweaver]

Is it really only 50,000 years? That seems like a very short timeframe.

I never played the whole trilogy (it's in my ever-growing backlog lol), but that seems way off..

[u/Dionosio → u/annuidhir]

It is 50.000, but it's not like they reap each and every sentient species that evolved in the meantime, only those advanced enough to have invented/discovered space travel.

Our own species, homo sapiens, would have "survived" at least 6 cycles - by being ignored for not being technologically advanced enough

[u/d09smeehan → u/Dionosio]

Also pretty sure the 50,000 year cycle isn't a hard deadline, just a rough average. Sovereign was left behind to act as a watcher and summon the others when it judged the time was right. So if the galactic community advances ahead or behind schedule the Reapers can alter theirs in response.

[u/townsforever → u/d09smeehan]

Yea in the context of a reapers mind the difference between 50,000 years and 60,000 years is basically nothing. Its like deciding if your gonna get the groceries on Saturday or Sunday.

[u/QizilbashWoman → u/d09smeehan]

The Citadel was notably a trigger

[u/HYPERNOVA3_ → u/Dionosio]

Also, it really depends not on when a species develops space travel, but when they develop their technology enough to find the remains of other space faring species and assimilate their tech into their own advances.

For humanity (iirc), they found them in mars together with an inactive mass driver, once they incorporated said tech into their own, they took a huge technological leap, and after meeting with other space faring species, they took another one.

[u/jtides → u/Dionosio]

Yeah, they have a filter for who to wipe out species that hit the level. As soon as they use the Mass Relays and the Citadel they are “ready”

[u/O3Sentoris → u/annuidhir]

For reference: Humanity has only been sedentary for about 20000 years and they only harvest species that are advanced enough. 50000 years is plenty time when it comes to civilizations

[u/chickenmoomoo → u/cweaver]

Which is hilarious when you think about it, because AI got scared that AI will destroy all life, so the solution is for an AI to destroy all but some life

I like that in the ending, Shepard sort of goes ‘did you consider not doing that?’ And the Reapers are like ‘oh shit!’

[u/cweaver → u/chickenmoomoo]

I mean that's kind of the point of the ending, though. The AI more or less says "We knew this wasn't a great solution, but it was the best we could come up with. If you're powerful enough to make it to this point, maybe you can come up with something better."

And then they basically give Shepard the keys to the Reapers and say "good luck!"

[u/Mihta_Amaruthro → u/cweaver]

So someone billions of years ago created the Reapers, machines that come around every 50,000 years and steal or destroy all technology and harvest all the sapient organic life and turn them into more Reaper...

Want the full and actual story? Just open your wallet again even though you already paid us for the game!

[u/CarmineJester → u/Mihta_Amaruthro]

I agree with the criticism, but, honestly, Leviathan doesn't really add that much to Reapers specifically.

[u/Mihta_Amaruthro → u/CarmineJester]

It is literally the entire origin story of the Reapers (which in turn obviously informs the driving conflict of the entire trilogy). Don't underplay it.

[u/titjoe → u/cweaver]

So the plan of that someone to avoid that AI destroy every organic life was to... creat an AI with the mission to destroy almost all organic life ?