With freedom comes internal vigilance.

With true freedom come true and complete inequality.

I wish we could have true freedom,but seeing how we are not the same.We will most likely never atane a state of being high enough to truly enjoy the fruits of our labors.

I have to admit that despite all of my knowledge, my usual reaction to anything that's threatening me or my people is 'F*ck diplomacy, just shoot the bastards!' It isn't as if I'm some great teacher or anything, but if someone's out to hurt you and they don't get the picture the first time, it sort of makes sense to whoop their butts so they get it the second time.

Though, truth to tell, I've found a good dose of telepathy usually persuades the idiotic to leave me alone. If they're stronger and faster than me, then I'll use whatever weapon comes to mind - literally.

Don't make the mistake of assuming that because I'm a glorified bookworm and filing system that I'm helpless. Put anyone in a corner, and they'll fight to the death.

Holy Lord and Lady, I'm agreeing with a Terat. Hey, don't tell my bosses!

Codex

Delicious, we do have Freedom. It's called Free Will. It's what god gave us.

We have the freedom to make choices beyond what nature gives other creatures. Humans and Novas alike have the gift of free will, wich in my opinion is the greatest example of freedom in existance.

True freedom would be a hellish existance. You are right that we don't have true or total freedom. If we had such a thing, we'd be in total chaos because no one would have responsibilities or duties. True freedom is against nature, because everything has it's place in Nature's and God's plan. There are degrees of freedom, though. The freedom to choose who you wish to be is tempered by the responsibilities and duties of that station in life you choose to take on. By choosing to raise a family, you must take the responsibility of taking care of your children, and your partner in life. Hell, even having a car has responsibilities...

In other words, with freedom doesn't come eternal vigilance, with freedom comes great responsibility. And to those with nodes out there, you know what I'm about to say. Great power equals freedom, but also with great power comes responsibility.

You see, even comic book philosophy has bearing in the real world! ^.^

When humans lived on the open savanna and later in caves the strongest ruled. Are you saying that we are no better than that Jager?

It still happens some in human society. A sadistic man kills his wife. A woman kills her children. The stronger kills the weaker. You see it in less violent forms as well. Children instinctively gang up on the weak or the different ones in their midst.

But then that’s part of what society is all about. It tempers some of these evolutionary driven mechanisms in favor of creating something for the greater benefit of all. The man who kills his wife goes to jail if he doesn’t kill himself first. The woman is imprisoned. The children are taught to do differently though it takes years for them to really learn.

That’s one of the big reasons I don’t like the Manifesto. Living without society is crazy. If you want to create some sort of nova society then I’m not going to argue as much … but in all of history the new is built out of the old. Our human ancestors started with their ape-like society and it grew more complex. Painters learn from the old masters and invent new works that build upon them. Scientists create new theories but could not do so without the work of all the ones who came before.

Ultimately it is the Manifesto driving the behavior you talk about right now Jager. The strong subjugating or destroying those weaker than them. That’s not a way to create a new society … it’s how you regress to evolutionary driven beasts.

Well, Meridian, I lost Jack Chance and you have replaced him. All in all, a trade up.

If a nova abandon's his/her baseline heritage, he/she is back on that savannah.

The struggle then becomes what do novas abandon, and what do they keep, in evolving their society?
For instance, Civilized Discourse is a learned response. It is a foundation of modern society. No were is it "okay" for the brutal and savage to just take what they want. This does not mean that violence has no power. Quite the contrary, but it has power in context.
Thus, society sees a difference between a gun-totting ganger/militiaman/terrorist and someone walking down the street randomly shooting people. We may not like the violence, or agree with it, but we understand it.

You say , but I don't see you emigrating to West Africa, were life can be cheap and dangerous, or to Nigeria, were you would be oppressed for just being a nova.
Society is a living, breathing, adaptive thing. It is adapting to us, and some of us may not like the adaptations it takes.

Situation 1: Society finds it acceptable to make novas wear explosive collars, or ingest certain toxins to keep them controlled. Is that acceptable to you?

Situation 2: Society decides that novas should be placed in positions of power and responsibility. A node is the key to power and control. Is that any more acceptable?

Ashnod,
In theory, Tiawan could achieve a military victory against the PRC. Still, it is the PRC that rattles the saber and Tiawan who quakes. It is in the nature of intelligent beings to pick fights they can win.
A lungfish could attack a hippo. It could blind the brute, then nip at him at it's leisure. Lungfish don't attack hippos, though.

Your discussion of powers and their intent reminds me of another discussion I had, many years ago.
It concerned using micro-nuke explosives to mine asteroids. It is a really effective way to crack open space rocks and getting to the goodies inside. It also puts multiple nuclear warheads on space ships and sends them galavanting across the solar system. Let's just hope that some miner doesn't decide to do some "mining" in Switzerland.

About reputations;
Exactly! Rep is very important. It is a weapon as sharp as any other.

Actually, it's your discussion. I've just been defending myself from your opinions of my motivations.

That's unfairly laid blame. The Manifesto is not responsible for the urges you speak of; they were already in existence. It gave voice to what many were already feeling. The violence and feelings of hatred and mistrust would have appeared as they are today without the Manifesto. So would the sense of estrangement and bitterness felt among members of both species.

Another problem, Meridian, is that society has always been reluctant to allow any facet of itself to separate without its sanction. This is how civil war often starts, when part of a nation decides it will no longer recognize the authority of the government. Many motivations on the part of the first government exist to prevent this from happening, but it is exceedingly rare that the succesion of new nation from the old occurs without blood, if it indeed it happens at all.

Revolution is seldom without blood, despite the best intentions of those who lead them. Even the peacefully-led ones tend to have blood spilled, if nothing more than by society trying to keep pacifist-revolutionaries in check. This is in simply baseline-baseline historical standards. With the advent of Novakind, with all the tensions, resentment, questions, uncertainty, and feelings of superiority/inferiority that exist on both sides, it's very likely that the behavior you are blaming on the Manifesto is going to happen regardless, and it would have happened eventually even if Mal had never released it. I'm not saying it isn't possible to build a Nova nation bloodlessly, but I can't forsee it happening.

Okay, Ashnod, if you want to see it that way.

Sure.

You took my line "It's not about oomph." and stated that coming from someone like me, it was amusing. The discussion of power and the intent behind it spawned from that moment, in your reply to me. I felt no need to even address the issue until you pointed the way.

On the other hand, you could have simply said "Our discussion," which would have been more honest than either other option, and in fact I could have as well, but I felt the need to be a little catty this morning.

I swear I can see you smiling beyond that link, Ashnod. I hope it was me.

Yes, "Our discussion", but you know about my need to breed discussions and spark thought. Does this make me a mini-Mal? Gosh, I hope not.

I hope the readers have enjoyed our little discourse.

Jager,

And you had the temerity to call me a wet blanket.

Sure nature is red in tooth and claw but that same nature from which we all derive a part of ourself has also evolved strategies of co-operation. Nature 'realises' that too much agression is bad which is why the doves always outnumber the hawks. The hawks can drive agression out of all proportion to the doves, but at the end of the day it's always the doves, in the society as a whole, that reap the reward of the hawks agression while the hawks risk loosing everything.

Delicious, we do have Freedom. It's called Free Will. It's what god gave us.

I agree with the rest of the stuff - about duty and responsibility - hell that sort of things been ingrained into me every day for the last 8 years - it's just this initial line that bothered me.

Now I'm no philosophiser, though I do like to consider what may or may not be. Either way I can see two flaws in this statement.

Firstly, is there a God? If there aint then how'd he give us anything. I've seen a number of novas pulling the Diety trick to fill up on their own self worth. If people believe they are really Gods, where does that leave the original big man?

Secondly, if he does exist - who says he gave us free will? Ever since I was old enough to understand what omniscient and omnipotent meant I've had trouble with this one - even more so now with all the precogs laying out the future for us. If he's meant to be the ultimate precog (knowing all past, present and future) where does that leave free will, since he already knows what I'm going to do well before I do it.

If it's what you believe then I've no grudge against you or it, but that only makes it okay for you - not every other Joe and Tom.

Ah hell...I always tend to talk meself round in cicles when I get on this poxy subject. Guess I'll leave it to you brainiacs and go kill a few more braincells down the pub........If my nova physiology will let me for a change that is.

As someone who knows a Precog rather well, I can tell you that he knows what "might" happen, not what will. He prefers it that way, I think. To know what will happen and not be able to do anything about it would be a living hell for him.

As for if there is or isn't a Divine Being;
I imagine that is why they call it faith. If we knew about such an entity, what would be the point?

For one thing, there is a God. She isn't a Nova if you're asking.

Now as for why I believe?

Well, I have seen things beyone the understanding of even the Science I know. I have witnessed Miracles that are beyond the Node. Both in my Latent and Post-Eruption life I have seen things that I can only describe as Divine Intervention.

Why people think it's foolish to believe in a higher order and being is beyond me. After all, we are parts of God trying to understand herself.

As for Responsibility, yeah, some of that is idealism, but what is wrong with dreaming of, and striving to create a world better than what you found when you were born?

I have the power now to achieve things beyond what Humanity has achieved on 20,000 years, in a years time, yet I'm feared for it. I can create a better world yet I'm hemmed in by other's fear of the unknown.

While I have high hopes for the Human race, I am ashamed of their cowardice.

It is true that these urges were already in existence. But some things shouldn't be given a voice. The classic example is yelling "fire" in a crowded theater.

I'll say it again. Some things shouldn't be given a voice. Racial tentions in the American South did exist before the Klan. But giving them more form by creating the KKK wasn't a good thing. If you leave wounds closed long enough they will heal.

And that brings up another point, the Manifesto doesn't just bring these things to light. Mal's words are seductive & convincing. I think that lots of novas would have worked things out for themselves without joining the revolution without his words, regardless of the "truth" behind them.

Such as? Don't leave it as vague as that, please.

Ashnod, the experiences I have had where I experienced or have seen Divine Intervention are very numerous. To describe them would take more time than I have, and would probably take up alot of screen space.

Let me put it this way, if my Mother hadn't erupted when her car crashed, she would have died in that accident.
If I hadn't erupted when I did, I would have died impaled on construction rubbish.
I've seen people step back from the curb moments before a traffic accident would have crushed them.
I've seen life in places where it would be deemed impossible. Namely a flower blooming in the center of a landfill.
I have seen people come back from the brink of death.

It's not luck, or circumstance. There was a divine intervention.

In fact, it is my point of view now that I look on it, that there is no luck. We are in control half the time, the other half we're flying blind, with God guiding our way.

Sometimes we slip and fall, and we call it bad luck. It's just not us having faith in ourselves and God.

Now, don't think I carry a cross around with me, I don't, but I do see where God resides, and it isn't church.

So Mal saw the differences, the issues, and in the hopes of reconciling our differences he founded a terrorist group? Or (if you prefer) a group that aids, justifies, and supports terrorism?

And if the fire exists, but is a small one? Then the point is dead on valid. The cure is worse than the disease. In addition, it would have been nice to try peace before forming armies and killing people.

Voiced yes. But too many novas have taken his words as a call to violent action. It isn't like Mal is dead and his followers are running around without guidance. Mal is still around, and if he disapproves it hasn't been in public.

Hopefully someone who wasn't a combination of mega powerful, charisma, and intelligence. I can out debate any baseline. I can't convince someone that 1 is 2, but just because I'm smarter it isn't a fair match. If someone is able to sway crowds into a riot, then warns that there will be one, and then it happens, I'd call that a misuse of power.

Is the Manifesto talking about reality, or is it just creating it?

So, in other words, you think that because things happened in the exact way needed to get you into this place, divine intervention was responsible? How fascinating...what about all the people for whom had more faith than you, and were killed by a stray bullet in a drive-by shooting that missed its intended target? Those who died when a plane's hydraulics failed and sent it plummeting into the earth? Should I continue?

It is the prerogative of those still alive to state that these deaths were not God's responsibility, but that the "coincidences" that brought them good fortune "divine intervention."

You, with what you claim to have undergone recently, should acknowledge that in other possible realities, there was a world where Hino Hitomi that died before she ever gave birth to you; a world where you impaled on junk instead of erupting, etc...and where was the divine intervention? Does it apply ONLY when the outcome is positive? To someone who can see the other possibilities, divine intervention doesn't exist. It cannot exist, because there are infinite outcomes and infinite scenarios. How can it be providence in some instances, but not all? Or, are you going to state that it is God's will that some times things work out one way, but also God's will that things work out another so something else can happen?

That's just rationalizing the infinite, when, by it's nature, infinity encompassed all possibilities and it doesn't matter if there are guiding hands or not. It simply is.

Most, when asked, will say it's not their place to judge when or why God acts, but I find it incredibly intriguing that these same people state they can recognize God's hand in motion.

And it is some people's perogative to argue a subject to death. Some people disagree simply because they want to. Being a rebel is your nature, Ashnod.

As for I, I can understand your hypotheticals. Those hypotheticals only stregnthen my reasoning. If it wasn't for the influence of a greater power, we all may not be here even having this debate.

That we exist is not proof of a higher power.

It was never my intention to prove you wrong, Sakura-chan, but to illustrate why myself, and others, cannot accept God on "faith." You had stated earlier that you didn't understand why people don't believe.

But since neither of us can prove the other incorrect, it honestly doesn't matter. We both have our own perspectives.

As I said 'Endeavor', if thats what you believe then all the good to ya. But it aint everyones viewpoint so it kinda limits it's scope.

As for precogs Mr Preston...well I've heard of some that can predict exactly when a disasters gonna happen - no probabilities just that's it's gonna take place. You can't tell me that doesn't smack of predestination. (by the way I'm more for the probable futures way, I just plugged precogs cause they fit what I was trying to say)

Duty and responsibility are the keystones to a working society, as I see it anyway. It strikes me that Mal seems to be advocating turning our backs on who we were before our 'glorious evolution'. That don't sit too well with me.

Oh I'm all for finding out just what I be and I'll freely admit some people seem too keen to oppress and abuse novas rather than live along side them, but that's pretty much just due to ignorance and fear - nothing time wont solve (hopefully). What I am against is abandoning those who haven't been 'blessed' with eruption.

My friends and family are essential part of who I am, since they had a hand in making me this way. I find it pretty inconscionable that there are those who think they are better off without the pasts that got them to where they are today.

Atta boy, Kage. Keep the faith.

Hell, Mal ripped me off! I was a "law unto myself" long before N-day.

Church of Sphere, anyone?

Even though my viewpoint has changed quite radically since the start of this conversation, I'm still not too keen on old terrible angel's manifesto.

It's probably the pompous tone, and being told what I should be doing or believing in, man, that always gets right up my nose, even if I agree with the logic of a particular argument.

Ashnod,your blinded by pride, and to a small point ignorance. If there is a Gad, like anything in the bible, everything is in it's plan. Good and bad things hapen.It is a part of life. Who knows if the bad things that happened in the past,were so that in the future there would be even greater evils?

A child dies at birth.But if that child live, he would have gone to somewhere,caught a virus.That virus could adapt it's self to it's new host and kill countless. Is that a evil by God? Maybe a child dies at birth,leading to improvements to medical care, saving countless lives?

As far as I know you do not see the future.I do, and I would not trust you with this ability. But if you had it, it would change your views of everything.

Signy Malory,

I care little if you trust me with my perceptions. As I told Sakura-chan, one who can see the possibilities and understands that those possibilities are just as valid paths in the forking garden as the one we are on may hold the idea of divine intervention in a different light than one who cannot.

That you hold a differing opinion from me is inconsequential. It is, after all, only your opinion, and you are just as entitled to it as I am mine.

The question of why bad things happen to good people if there is a just and loving creator god is one that most Christian faiths grapple with … but if Mal is your god, like he is for some Terats, or you are an atheist then I guess you don’t have this little problem. Some Hindu faiths use the concept of reincarnation to escape this puzzle. Bad things happen to good people because of evil deeds in their past lives … But then again I’m not the most religious person in the world, or even this particular forum I’ll bet, so I’m not really qualified to speak as much on this one.

…

Kage I really liked your point about our pasts making us what we are today.

…

Ashnod I’m an outsider so when you say that Mal didn’t found and doesn’t lead the Terag