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Guys as to cawl's "hairy see", let's face it. The imperium's game is survival, and when it come to human survival the rule book goes out the airlock. No dealings with Xenos? If enough of humanity depended on it you'd have inquisitors giving eldar hummers.
Space marines have fought alongside necrons in the face of a big enough threat to humanity. Commander Dante of the blood freaking' angels had a face to face with the necron silent king for vital human interests.
On Armageddon humans pass up attacking orks to fight daemons and vice versa.
Cawl's work is essential to save humanity. If he wanted to go to Terra and piss on the wall of the imperial palace they'd let him.
This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2019/10/14 16:23:19
Is Einstein so important that all other physicists of his time were rendered obsolete? Not at all.
no he only completely revolutionized a theory of study that required any other scientists to adapt to his discovery or be effectively "obselete"
I'm sorry but this is a horrible analogy. Einstein discovered general relativity on his own because none of the other physicists at the time were studying it. Everyone else was studying quantum mechanics, which was the real revolutionary theory of the time. You can get along with your quantum mechanics perfectly fine without any general relativity whatsoever, but good luck doing modern physics without quantum mechanics.
In fact general relativity to this day is incompatible with the framework of quantum mechanics and in that regard has been a bit of a scientific dead-end. We may never have a verifiable quantum theory of gravity because the energies involved are so large that they aren't testable by any craft that we here possess, Gimli son of Gloin.
The better analogy would be Isaac Newton, who did completely revolutionize science. I mean he basically invented physics as we know it, but not before inventing calculus because you need that first. If you asked Albert Einstein who the greatest scientist who ever lived was he would have said "Isaac Newton". If you asked Isaac Newton who the greatest scientist who ever lived was he would have said "me". And they both would have been right.
As to cawl's revolutionary technology, I bet every bit of tech heresy, every bit of forbidden research, every bit of suppressed innovation, and every bit of xenos tech, ends up funnelled to crawl thru the inquisition and the lords dragon. He is authorized by the HIGHEST possible source to access any and all forbidden tech lore and do whatever he damn well wants with it. He also probably gets funnelled a lot of "heretical" techpriests condemned for the crimes of innovation and originality.
He also has an unlimited black budget and carte Blanche access to whatever he thinks may be useful. And he has dealt with necrons like Trazyn, who gave him the secret of activating the necron pylons of cadia. Who knows what tech bits he salvaged from archeotech sites, or gleaned from edlar relics, necron tomb worlds or Tau devices? Would the silent king give him some scrap of advanced technology in hopes of it helping defeat the tyranids?
This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2019/10/14 16:33:44
Abadabadoobaddon wrote: The better analogy would be Isaac Newton, who did completely revolutionize science. I mean he basically invented physics as we know it, but not before inventing calculus because you need that first. If you asked Albert Einstein who the greatest scientist who ever lived was he would have said "Isaac Newton". If you asked Isaac Newton who the greatest scientist who ever lived was he would have said "me". And they both would have been right.
I'm not really sure that Newton would have called himself a "scientist" as that wasn't really a term used. A good deal of what he did was more philosophy than what we would even call science, even though he did, indeed, do experiments. But that is more a quibbling about terms.
What really set Newton apart, as far as I understand it, is that he had the "audacity" to disregard the prevalent notion of "mechanical philosophy." So, where people before Newton, I am pretty sure, entertained the idea of "action at a distance" and the like, they never took it seriously, since that was outside the accepted mechanistic paradigm. That is, if you couldn't mechanically model it, it couldn't be true. Newton realized that math itself could model the world, so he did, and out come gravity as an action at a distance and really changed the whole paradigm. From a mechanistic modeling paradigm to a predictive mathematical one.
From what I understand, part of what Einstein did was also really more of philosophy than science. He took Maxwell's equations seriously and this lead him to ponder some of the "hidden" assumptions in Newton's theories. That is, of what a frame of reference is/should be. It's quite debatable if what he was doing was science at all, but it was almost certainly math, whatever you want to decide that is.
So, in a way, they both actually share something in common, that is, thinking outside what was the normative paradigm, and realizing that there were assumptions there that were obscuring some aspect of reality from our understanding.
Now, I don't have even the slightest idea what Cawl was supposed to have done. GW might not either, they just throw things in there as they go, to whatever purpose the narrative has at hand. So, could Cawl have done something new, challenged some assumption that was holding things back? I don't see why not, if they want to have his narrative purpose be that of a Newtonian or Einsteinian sort of "genius."
Part of that could be to consider what Xenos know/how they do things. Again, if that is GW wants.
Of course, take all of that with a gain of salt as needed, since I am not a philosopher, a physicist, a historian, or a smart person generally. Just sharing what my understanding is of it.
"Wir sehen hiermit wieder die Sprache als das Dasein des Geistes." - The Phenomenology of Spirit
One thing about the "never seen the emperor keep any of the old warlords stuff" is that we don't know that to be true, as we know so little about the unification wars. for all we know the emperor stole an aweful lot from the old warlords.
Opinions are not facts please don't confuse the two
BrianDavion wrote: One thing about the "never seen the emperor keep any of the old warlords stuff" is that we don't know that to be true, as we know so little about the unification wars. for all we know the emperor stole an aweful lot from the old warlords.
Wasn’t Malcador rumored to be one of the old warlords?
If the truth can destroy it, then it deserves to be destroyed.
pm713 wrote:Humans weren't made by Old Ones and Eldar weren't designed to obsess. I'm not sure why you'd think they were.
Sgt_Smudge wrote:Being an expert in something isn't divine blessing. Eldrad is just a talented and skilled Farseer, he's not blessed by a divine power.
BrianDavion wrote:err no, I'm no expertt on eldar but as I understand it the paths are more a safeguard agaisnt the decadance of the old ways that destroyed the Aeldari empire of old.
Eldar were created by the old ones and obsess over things, therefore they were created to obsess over things. They had always obsessed, obsessing over decadence is what brought the fall. Paths were only made to contain the obsessions and prevent another fall. Through their obsessions, they unlock the power the old ones gave them.
BrianDavion wrote:no they weren't. other geneticly engineered warriors where forgotten ebcause they lost and thus the knowledge was ancient history. however we know for a fact that Luna was home to genetic engineers where where as good if not better.
I am sure the early Imperium would have kept their useful discoveries around. Also, as I understand Luna was mostly used for its gene factories and relics, not scientists.
Sgt_Smudge wrote: There's very few to can match the influence of a Primarch, but there's humans who have. Cawl, Macharius, Creed, Yarrick - they're all humans who have done more than some Primarchs, let alone Space Marines.
Creed and Yarrick were each tied to one world, hardly galactic influence. Marcharious has his problems (his conquests didn't last, he might have been a saint, and he worked with 5 marine chapters; but I haven't read William King's books) and Cawl, if what you say is true, was guided by the Emperor.
Sgt_Smudge wrote:Besides, I thought you claimed that this wasn't about power, it was about influence or potential for greatness - by your metric, the T'au should have no characters because they're not blessed by a divine power.
It's not about who would win in fight. And the tau don't even have a galactic influence to measure as a race.
Sgt_Smudge wrote:Great, the Emperor's a good weaponsmith. How does that make him a good biologist?
Are you claiming that a gun manufacturer nowadays could perform brain surgery?
Apparently: "The Emperor showed nothing but passionless interest. ‘Such rewriting of physiology certainly hinders the Twelfth’s higher brain function. The device is cunningly wrought, for something so crude.’ ‘Can you remove it?’ ‘Of course,’ the Emperor answered" (MoM)
Sgt_Smudge wrote: And what's your source that faith alone isn't enough to change the galaxy? Like, have you actually got any proof for that?
I think I really do have a problem with the idea that "the only people that matter are those who are "special" by divine providence", because that's explicitly not true. It's a nice headcanon, I guess, but beyond that, it's just not accurate in 40k canon. The whole idea of "if you're not blessed by a higher power, then you can't change the galaxy" is disproven on more places than I can count (Tyranids aren't blessed by a god, the Tau aren't blessed by gods, none of the Necron characters are favoured by the C'Tan*, and how about humans who have influenced things far beyond their means, like Yarrick, Creed, Macharius, or Kryptman). Like, their influence has changed the galaxy more than any random Space Marine has simply by being inducted into a Chapter.
And no, Cawl literally spoke to the Emperor, and was told that Cawl would do something that people would say "betrayed the Emperor", and was explicitly told by him that he should do it anyways. Is that not literally being guided by the Emperor? Not to mention one of Cawl's personalities directly working with the Emperor himself.
*if you want to argue that "the C'Tan empowered the Necrons, by that same virtue, a C'Tan empowers the Mechanicus, and it was either the C'Tan or Old Ones who apparently seeded human life, so by that virtue, all humans are "special".
Weren't humans also "created by the Old Ones (or C'Tan)"?
Just to clarify - you are genuinely suggesting that Newton had no personal brilliance or ability and was solely able to do what he did by divine power?
Because that's a real world argument right there which I'm very interested to hear you justify.
BrianDavion wrote:he was a direct STUDENT of the emperor's he learned his craft at the Emperor's feet. BTW the idea that you literally need divine intervention to change the galaxy is rediculas.
IRL, individual achievements are made with the help of others, building off their work or harnessing their work for something greater than the sum of its parts. In 40k, collective thoughts/action/belief manifests as gods/god-like beings, usually via the warp. Those who get themselves to be harnessed by these powers (the same way one man is chosen to lead many people), are able to achieve great achievements. What separates the two is that actions that could be done to achieve something great on one world are not sufficient to achieve something galactic in scale. This is what gives 40k it's scale. Creed is a great man who did great things using traditional means, but he was no god; he did not have a galactic impact, all his accomplishments were in regards to Cadia alone. Now the warp being the warp, every human has some psychic influence and is watched over by some god to some extent, but there is a difference between a normal plague marine and a daemon prince of nurgle, or a necron warrior and a necron lord (who was allowed to keep his personality by the Ctan). Egro, marines (grandsons of the emperor) are more capable of having a galactic impact than a normal techpriest. I'm not saying it's impossible for any one techpriest to be more important than any one marine, but you wouldn't expect the most important marine to be less important than the most important techpriest (the same way you wouldn't expect the weight lifting world record to be held by a little girl). But that's the case that Cawl used to put us in, but you seem to be adamant the Cawl had divine guidance, so his position makes sense relative to Calgar or Dante.
Sgt_Smudge wrote: Why did they need divine power to do that?
Because the Emperor had: Thunder Warriors Custodes Bolters Power Armour A superior intelligence (note that many of the warlords are described as mad, which could be truth, or just historical bias) Psychic powers Better military strategy Simple luck
That's my point - much like the US had better funding and access to better scientists (you said it yourself!), the Emperor was able to create better super soldiers, because his military was superior (a military consisting of Thunder Warriors and Custodes) and had better scientists than the other warlords.
The Astartes weren't the instrument by which the Emperor conquered Terra. The Thunder Warriors and Custodes were. And regarding your "losing side's contributions didn't disappear" - yeah, that's because they actually had something worthwhile keeping. The pre-Astartes superhumans were not worth keeping any more than the Emperor's own pre-Astartes (Thunder Warriors) were. It's simple pragmatism. Keep what works, discard the rest - the Emperor didn't need the Astartes to conquer Terra, but he did need them to conquer the stars. But okay, if the Emperor was so brilliant, and it totally wasn't about him having better access to resources - why didn't he create the Space Marines first, instead of the Thunder Warriors?
I am intentionally conflating the thunder warriors project with the astartes project. I can only assume that both were large projects carried out with help from human scientists. I assume they were organized in a similar manner. (I think it is quite possible that the Primarch and Custodes project were carried out mostly by the emperor himself, but probably not.) Is there some reason why the Emperor would be personally involved in one and not the other? So if you accept that, then what I am wondering is why the Emperor's scientists were able to create the thunder warriors when they only had access to the Emperor's comparatively small, original lab and no state to fund them? All they had was the Emperor with his intelligence, both psychic and physical, but you are saying he did not help them. Are you saying that the Emperor's stockpile of resources was all they needed to out-compete the scientists of might empires?
And as far as the Astartes vs. Thunder warriors go, I think we both agree that conquering terra is a much different than conquering the galaxy, which is why the Emperor made them in the order he did. Picking the best tool for the job.
Sgt_Smudge wrote:Why? They were inferior scientists who didn't create anything as powerful as the Astartes. I don't see what's so hard to get about that.
In real life do we hear about the scientists thousands of years ago who accomplished nothing? No, because they accomplished nothing!
Or, hear me out - the Emperor's scientists were just more talented! Why is that so hard to consider? What's so impossible about simple human skill, talent and luck? In the real world, are you seriously suggesting that the only way you can succeed over someone else is by divine aid?
Why is that roundabout? Who said he even needed to use his divine power to find the best scientists! It's done in the real world without needing psychic powers! Hell, the Emperor may well have been recruiting scientists from conquered warlords, or simply sending emissaries to every compliant settlement offering security and glory for the scientifically gifted!
I genuinely don't understand how you completely reject the idea that his scientists were simply *better*.
During the Age of Strife, Terra was divided into warring states, each vying to create the best genetically engineered super-soldier to fight through the radiation soaked wastes. Every empire was searching for the best scientists to lead their labs, they wouldn't have become big empires if they didn't, if they weren't rational like that. Throughout those 5,000 years, one empire got the best scientists and another got the second best of that century. Maybe that shifted the balance of power, but it never lead to one empire ruling over Terra. Then when the Emperor came, he got the best scientists of that century (we can assume), I am wondering why his scientists broke that mold. Do you think they were such an order of magnitude better than all the best scientists of the past 5,000 years? If they were normal, once every hundred years, scientists then for every Archimedes in the Emperor's employ there would have been a Pythagoras under someone else, for every Newton a Leibniz, and for every Einstein a Shrodinger, for every Nasa you have the Soviet Space Agencies (they had 3 separate ones or something).
Sgt_Smudge wrote:You keep assuming that the Emperor HAD that knowledge in the first place. He was able to create the Thunder Warriors and Custodes, yes, but if he could only create them, why didn't he just create the Astartes first? Because he needed scientists who were more capable in biology than he was!
Do you think a 40,000 year old god(-like being) would have much to learn from a mortal human? All he asked Arkhan Land in MoM was to confirm the origin of the butcher's nails. I can't see him needing mortal humans for much more than that, doing tasks the Emperor could have done himself, saving him time.
Sgt_Smudge wrote:
It was not the emperor's style to simply purge the scientific contributions of his enemies (not yet, at least). It is reasonable to assume their unique discoveries didn't exist, never happened. I don't think the insanity explanation is fair, it's like calling North Korea or Stalin "insane." Those regimes were very rational; evil, but rational.
I think we have very different idea of what rationality is.
I think you haven't read Kim Jong Il's autobiography.
BrianDavion wrote: One thing about the "never seen the emperor keep any of the old warlords stuff" is that we don't know that to be true, as we know so little about the unification wars. for all we know the emperor stole an aweful lot from the old warlords.
Wasn’t Malcador rumored to be one of the old warlords?
Big if true.
This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2019/10/15 05:42:46
pm713 wrote:Humans weren't made by Old Ones and Eldar weren't designed to obsess. I'm not sure why you'd think they were.
Sgt_Smudge wrote:Being an expert in something isn't divine blessing. Eldrad is just a talented and skilled Farseer, he's not blessed by a divine power.
BrianDavion wrote:err no, I'm no expertt on eldar but as I understand it the paths are more a safeguard agaisnt the decadance of the old ways that destroyed the Aeldari empire of old.
Eldar were created by the old ones and obsess over things, therefore they were created to obsess over things. They had always obsessed, obsessing over decadence is what brought the fall. Paths were only made to contain the obsessions and prevent another fall. Through their obsessions, they unlock the power the old ones gave them.
That's really not the case. The Eldar were just decadent, they were hedonistic, excessive - not because of some cosmic design, but because they were just flawed. If they were "designed" to do that, what about the Exodites who turned away from that lifestyle before the Fall?
The Path system wasn't a preordained commandment, it was the solution to the problems of the post-Fall Eldar. It's a safeguard against their past sins, not how they were "designed".
BrianDavion wrote:no they weren't. other geneticly engineered warriors where forgotten ebcause they lost and thus the knowledge was ancient history. however we know for a fact that Luna was home to genetic engineers where where as good if not better.
I am sure the early Imperium would have kept their useful discoveries around. Also, as I understand Luna was mostly used for its gene factories and relics, not scientists.
And who ran those factories if not scientists?
Sgt_Smudge wrote: There's very few to can match the influence of a Primarch, but there's humans who have. Cawl, Macharius, Creed, Yarrick - they're all humans who have done more than some Primarchs, let alone Space Marines.
Creed and Yarrick were each tied to one world, hardly galactic influence. Marcharious has his problems (his conquests didn't last, he might have been a saint, and he worked with 5 marine chapters; but I haven't read William King's books) and Cawl, if what you say is true, was guided by the Emperor.
Sorry, what? Creed is infamous across the Imperium for his defence of the Cadian Gate, which extends far beyond even just Cadia. Yarrick is probably even more widely known and respected, the man's a living legend across the Imperium - we have mentions of "Great Yarrick" as far out as the Sabbat Worlds Crusade!
Macharius being a "saint" only occurred after his death, and being canonized as a saint doesn't necessarily mean you're actually divine - Saint Basilius was a saint, and he wasn't blessed by the Emperor, and we have RL "saints" who were anything but. Macharius commanding multiple Space Marine Chapters is also more of a testament to how massively "special" Macharius was - plus, I should also mention that both Yarrick AND Creed had several Chapters worth of Astartes under their command (Yarrick in the third war of Armaggedon, where he was the commander of all Imperial forces on world, and Creed during the 13th Black Crusade, where he was the operational commander of the defence of the Gate.)
Yes, Cawl was "guided" by the Emperor, but what I'm arguing is that's not why he's special. He's special because of his deeds, not because of "divine intervention", much like how Yarrick, Creed, Eldrad, or Vect are special.
Sgt_Smudge wrote:Besides, I thought you claimed that this wasn't about power, it was about influence or potential for greatness - by your metric, the T'au should have no characters because they're not blessed by a divine power.
It's not about who would win in fight.
Yeah, that's what I literally just said??
And the tau don't even have a galactic influence to measure as a race.
Well, sorry to inform you, but that's simply not true in current canon. The T'au have intergalactic reach now (Startide Nexus), are militarily powerful enough to resist a full blown Crusade, and have enough influence to rival a larger sector. Incidentally, don't the Tau also have more numbers than the Custodes and Space Marines combined? I mean, if we're assuming the Tau are so few as to "not measure as a race" (which is a ridiculous statement, of course they're a race!), then surely the Space Marines and Custodes shouldn't matter either, because they're so few in number?
Sgt_Smudge wrote:Great, the Emperor's a good weaponsmith. How does that make him a good biologist?
Are you claiming that a gun manufacturer nowadays could perform brain surgery?
Apparently: "The Emperor showed nothing but passionless interest. ‘Such rewriting of physiology certainly hinders the Twelfth’s higher brain function. The device is cunningly wrought, for something so crude.’ ‘Can you remove it?’ ‘Of course,’ the Emperor answered" (MoM)
Awesome, and how does that translate to biochemistry? Brain surgery (literally what they're describing in the scene) is not the same as biochemistry - but by all means, if you'd like your brain operated on by a biochemist instead of a brain surgeon, that's not on me.
I suppose I shouldn't have bothered using the term "brain surgery" as a metaphor.
Sgt_Smudge wrote: And what's your source that faith alone isn't enough to change the galaxy? Like, have you actually got any proof for that?
I think I really do have a problem with the idea that "the only people that matter are those who are "special" by divine providence", because that's explicitly not true. It's a nice headcanon, I guess, but beyond that, it's just not accurate in 40k canon. The whole idea of "if you're not blessed by a higher power, then you can't change the galaxy" is disproven on more places than I can count (Tyranids aren't blessed by a god, the Tau aren't blessed by gods, none of the Necron characters are favoured by the C'Tan*, and how about humans who have influenced things far beyond their means, like Yarrick, Creed, Macharius, or Kryptman). Like, their influence has changed the galaxy more than any random Space Marine has simply by being inducted into a Chapter.
And no, Cawl literally spoke to the Emperor, and was told that Cawl would do something that people would say "betrayed the Emperor", and was explicitly told by him that he should do it anyways. Is that not literally being guided by the Emperor? Not to mention one of Cawl's personalities directly working with the Emperor himself.
*if you want to argue that "the C'Tan empowered the Necrons, by that same virtue, a C'Tan empowers the Mechanicus, and it was either the C'Tan or Old Ones who apparently seeded human life, so by that virtue, all humans are "special".
Weren't humans also "created by the Old Ones (or C'Tan)"?
Just to clarify - you are genuinely suggesting that Newton had no personal brilliance or ability and was solely able to do what he did by divine power?
Because that's a real world argument right there which I'm very interested to hear you justify.
BrianDavion wrote:he was a direct STUDENT of the emperor's he learned his craft at the Emperor's feet. BTW the idea that you literally need divine intervention to change the galaxy is rediculas.
IRL, individual achievements are made with the help of others, building off their work or harnessing their work for something greater than the sum of its parts.
Yes, but no amount of collective work will just spontaneous create progress - personal genius and achievement is the key part, IRL, if I somehow create FTL travel through luck, talent and skill, that's MY discovery. Yes, I was supported by the work of generations before me, but no-one else made this particular discovery - therefore, it is MY achievement. If personal luck and skill were not the most important factor, then why did no-one else discover it first?
In 40k, collective thoughts/action/belief manifests as gods/god-like beings, usually via the warp. Those who get themselves to be harnessed by these powers (the same way one man is chosen to lead many people), are able to achieve great achievements.
Which is simply not true when you factor in the amount of people who have made great achievements without divine blessing - Creed, Yarrick, Macharius, Vect, Eldrad, etc etc. Now, we know these people were not divine by their own choices or by birth or design. Which leads us to two potential hypotheses:
Hypothesis 1: You don't need to be divine or blessed to accomplish great things.
Hypothesis 2: Those people were all divinely powered, but not by virtue of birth or explicit blessing by a divine power. And if a "normal human" like Creed can be divinely powered, so too could anyone, of any background.
Basically, the very achievements of human characters making galactic waves in the 40k universe disproves the entire theory of "you need to be blessed by a divine power to do anything", unless you wilfully ignore the achievements of those characters - which just proves that the argument doesn't hold water.
What separates the two is that actions that could be done to achieve something great on one world are not sufficient to achieve something galactic in scale. This is what gives 40k it's scale. Creed is a great man who did great things using traditional means, but he was no god; he did not have a galactic impact, all his accomplishments were in regards to Cadia alone.
Not true. He is known across the Imperium, directly commanded Chapters of Astartes, legions of Guardsmen, and his actions defied the very Chaos Gods themselves. Arguing his actions didn't have a galactic impact is short-sighted in the extreme.
You don't need to be a god to do galaxy-altering things. Calgar isn't a god. Yarrick isn't a god. Thraka isn't a god. Farsight isn't a god. Abaddon isn't a god. Eldrad isn't a god. They are special by DEED, not by divine blessing or their own divinity.
Now the warp being the warp, every human has some psychic influence and is watched over by some god to some extent, but there is a difference between a normal plague marine and a daemon prince of nurgle, or a necron warrior and a necron lord (who was allowed to keep his personality by the Ctan). Egro, marines (grandsons of the emperor) are more capable of having a galactic impact than a normal techpriest. I'm not saying it's impossible for any one techpriest to be more important than any one marine, but you wouldn't expect the most important marine to be less important than the most important techpriest (the same way you wouldn't expect the weight lifting world record to be held by a little girl).
But that doesn't mean the little girl is incapable of achieving greatness, or can't attempt to lift it.
I don't disagree that Space Marines will have an easier time doing great things than Guardsmen, or that a Necron Lord is more capable than a Warrior. The problem is that you claimed "the only people who can have galactic importance are people who are blessed by gods", which is simply not true, because of the actions of people like Eldrad, Creed, Yarrick, Macharius, Vandire, Farsight, etc ARE of galactic importance. The hypothesis simply doesn't hold up. Yes, "normal" people will find it harder to achieve greatness, but they still can. The whole "the galaxy is a large place and you will not be missed" applies for EVERYONE, superhuman or not, because it's a big old galaxy.
But that's the case that Cawl used to put us in, but you seem to be adamant the Cawl had divine guidance, so his position makes sense relative to Calgar or Dante.
I'm not adamant about it, I'm just saying by your own admission, he is "special". However, your position that only "special" people can do anything important is incredibly flawed regardless.
Sgt_Smudge wrote:
Why did they need divine power to do that?
Because the Emperor had:
Thunder Warriors
Custodes
Bolters
Power Armour
A superior intelligence (note that many of the warlords are described as mad, which could be truth, or just historical bias)
Psychic powers
Better military strategy
Simple luck
That's my point - much like the US had better funding and access to better scientists (you said it yourself!), the Emperor was able to create better super soldiers, because his military was superior (a military consisting of Thunder Warriors and Custodes) and had better scientists than the other warlords.
The Astartes weren't the instrument by which the Emperor conquered Terra. The Thunder Warriors and Custodes were. And regarding your "losing side's contributions didn't disappear" - yeah, that's because they actually had something worthwhile keeping. The pre-Astartes superhumans were not worth keeping any more than the Emperor's own pre-Astartes (Thunder Warriors) were. It's simple pragmatism. Keep what works, discard the rest - the Emperor didn't need the Astartes to conquer Terra, but he did need them to conquer the stars. But okay, if the Emperor was so brilliant, and it totally wasn't about him having better access to resources - why didn't he create the Space Marines first, instead of the Thunder Warriors?
I am intentionally conflating the thunder warriors project with the astartes project. I can only assume that both were large projects carried out with help from human scientists. I assume they were organized in a similar manner. (I think it is quite possible that the Primarch and Custodes project were carried out mostly by the emperor himself, but probably not.) Is there some reason why the Emperor would be personally involved in one and not the other?
Perhaps because the Emperor was leading the Custodes and Thunder Warriors in battle? So delegated scientific progress to Astarte and her team?
Again - why are you assuming that the Thunder Warriors were created in the same way as the Astartes? What's your source on that?
So if you accept that, then what I am wondering is why the Emperor's scientists were able to create the thunder warriors when they only had access to the Emperor's comparatively small, original lab and no state to fund them? All they had was the Emperor with his intelligence, both psychic and physical, but you are saying he did not help them. Are you saying that the Emperor's stockpile of resources was all they needed to out-compete the scientists of might empires?
Yes, that's exactly what I'm saying. The Emperor's initial creations, the Thunder Warriors and Custodes, were created with his own personal expertise and resources (he clearly dedicated more resources into his Custodes), and then when he'd used them to conquer more territory and gain more influence, he assigned some of the best biochemists and genewrights of the age to create an army of supersoldiers which didn't require the same resource intensity of the Custodes, but were better than Thunder Warriors.
And as far as the Astartes vs. Thunder warriors go, I think we both agree that conquering terra is a much different than conquering the galaxy, which is why the Emperor made them in the order he did. Picking the best tool for the job.
Or, just maybe, the Thunder Warriors were simply only a stopgap measure. Again, if you read The Great Work, you'd see that the achievements made by Astarte's team were made *by them*, under orders of the Emperor to create superior soldiers. If the Emperor could just create superior soldiers anyways, why didn't he just do that with the Thunder Warriors to start with?
Sgt_Smudge wrote:Why? They were inferior scientists who didn't create anything as powerful as the Astartes. I don't see what's so hard to get about that.
In real life do we hear about the scientists thousands of years ago who accomplished nothing? No, because they accomplished nothing!
Or, hear me out - the Emperor's scientists were just more talented! Why is that so hard to consider? What's so impossible about simple human skill, talent and luck?
In the real world, are you seriously suggesting that the only way you can succeed over someone else is by divine aid?
Why is that roundabout? Who said he even needed to use his divine power to find the best scientists! It's done in the real world without needing psychic powers! Hell, the Emperor may well have been recruiting scientists from conquered warlords, or simply sending emissaries to every compliant settlement offering security and glory for the scientifically gifted!
I genuinely don't understand how you completely reject the idea that his scientists were simply *better*.
During the Age of Strife, Terra was divided into warring states, each vying to create the best genetically engineered super-soldier to fight through the radiation soaked wastes. Every empire was searching for the best scientists to lead their labs, they wouldn't have become big empires if they didn't, if they weren't rational like that. Throughout those 5,000 years, one empire got the best scientists and another got the second best of that century. Maybe that shifted the balance of power, but it never lead to one empire ruling over Terra. Then when the Emperor came, he got the best scientists of that century (we can assume), I am wondering why his scientists broke that mold. Do you think they were such an order of magnitude better than all the best scientists of the past 5,000 years? If they were normal, once every hundred years, scientists then for every Archimedes in the Emperor's employ there would have been a Pythagoras under someone else, for every Newton a Leibniz, and for every Einstein a Shrodinger, for every Nasa you have the Soviet Space Agencies (they had 3 separate ones or something).
Yes, I do think they were orders of magnitude better - through a combination of personal ingenuity, skill, luck, talent, and superior funding/resources.
You keep saying "for every X, there was also a Y" - but you're missing the fundamental fact that Y did not do what X did because that's not why Y was famous. Leibniz didn't accomplish what Newton did. Schrodinger didn't accomplish what Einstein did. The discoveries of Astarte's team was superior to the research and discoveries of the other contemporary scientists, in the same way Darwin's work was, or Einstein's was, or Newton's was. The very fact we've not heard about the achievements of the other scientists implies that they were simply not as revolutionary or unique.
Sgt_Smudge wrote:You keep assuming that the Emperor HAD that knowledge in the first place. He was able to create the Thunder Warriors and Custodes, yes, but if he could only create them, why didn't he just create the Astartes first? Because he needed scientists who were more capable in biology than he was!
Do you think a 40,000 year old god(-like being) would have much to learn from a mortal human? All he asked Arkhan Land in MoM was to confirm the origin of the butcher's nails. I can't see him needing mortal humans for much more than that, doing tasks the Emperor could have done himself, saving him time.
So why bother with Malcador? Why even bother keeping Land around, if the Emperor's so omniscient?
Look, just read The Great Work. It's pretty much explicit that the Astartes project is a product of human ingenuity and intellect, not because of the Emperor micromanaging everything.
And no, I do believe the Emperor would have much to learn from a human genius. He's not omniscient. He's definitely foresighted, and definitely powerful, but he's not omni-anything. Hell, he explicitly says in one interaction with Kai Zulane that he can't be omniscient and omnipotent.
Sgt_Smudge wrote:
It was not the emperor's style to simply purge the scientific contributions of his enemies (not yet, at least). It is reasonable to assume their unique discoveries didn't exist, never happened. I don't think the insanity explanation is fair, it's like calling North Korea or Stalin "insane." Those regimes were very rational; evil, but rational.
I think we have very different idea of what rationality is.
I think you haven't read Kim Jong Il's autobiography.
If you believe that I need to read someone's autobiography to see if their actions are far beyond the scope of rationality instead of judging their actions, I don't think it's worth discussing this any more with you.
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Well actually eldar were made by the old ones to fight the necrons/ctan. After the war in heaven the eldar society was post-scarcity without external threats. This was very boring for them, and to combat this boredom they sank into more and more questionable behavior. This is what eventually led to the fall; boredom, not obsession. After that the craftworlders created the path system, where an eldar focuses on a specific path. The ones who become obsessed with a path are the ones we know as exarchs and farseers (and other, unnamed ones for other paths). This is not something the eldar aspire to, they describe these individuals as lost on/to their path.
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The poor man really has a stake in the country. The rich man hasn't; he can go away to New Guinea in a yacht. The poor have sometimes objected to being governed badly; the rich have always objected to being governed at all
We love our superheroes because they refuse to give up on us. We can analyze them out of existence, kill them, ban them, mock them, and still they return, patiently reminding us of who we are and what we wish we could be.
"the play's the thing wherein I'll catch the conscience of the king,
Da Boss wrote: I dislike ALL of those characters. I prefered the setting before all these named characters were pushing the setting in any direction, back when all the primarchs were dead, gone or in comas.
In your personal head canon, this is can all a dream technpriest's head.
-"Wait a minute.....who is that Frazz is talking to in the gallery? Hmmm something is going on here.....Oh.... it seems there is some dispute over video taping of some sort......Frazz is really upset now..........wait a minute......whats he go there.......is it? Can it be?....Frazz has just unleashed his hidden weiner dog from his mini bag, while quoting shakespeares "Let slip the dogs the war!!" GG
-"Don't mind Frazzled. He's just Dakka's crazy old dude locked in the attic. He's harmless. Mostly."
-TBone the Magnificent 1999-2014, Long Live the King!
Just wait until they Primarize the Guard in 2020. The amount of salt will overflow this forum and blot out the sun when the Cadian Prime Militarium have CAWL Pattern multi-limb power armor, CAWL Pattern Bellasarius Cawlmanruss IMPULSOR MK VI tanks, and CAWL Pattern Las-Bolters MK VI.
Togusa wrote: Just wait until they Primarize the Guard in 2020. The amount of salt will overflow this forum and blot out the sun when the Cadian Prime Militarium have CAWL Pattern multi-limb power armor, CAWL Pattern Bellasarius Cawlmanruss IMPULSOR MK VI tanks, and CAWL Pattern Las-Bolters MK VI.
won't happen in that same way but I'd not be suprised to see guard get some degree of this in a new uniform and maybe some new updated tanks. "The Lemen Russ is now refinroced with the Gulliman Hover MBT which is quickly becoming a guard favorite."
new uiniforms would mean new guard sculpts which honestly would be welcomed.
shortymcnostrill wrote:Well actually eldar were made by the old ones to fight the necrons/ctan. After the war in heaven the eldar society was post-scarcity without external threats. This was very boring for them, and to combat this boredom they sank into more and more questionable behavior. This is what eventually led to the fall; boredom, not obsession. After that the craftworlders created the path system, where an eldar focuses on a specific path. The ones who become obsessed with a path are the ones we know as exarchs and farseers (and other, unnamed ones for other paths). This is not something the eldar aspire to, they describe these individuals as lost on/to their path.
Mucking about does not create a chaos god (except for the chaos god of mucking about). The Eldar would have had to be obsessive over whatever they chose to focus on, really believe in being profligates, in order to spawn a chaos god.
As a result (@Sgt_Smudge) it is reasonable to assume that most all warlords of old earth would have been working towards something like the method used to finally conquer earth. As a result, it is unrealistic to assume that one group of scientists is somehow exponentially better than another group of scientists. It is an assumption you are making that I don't agree with, just as you don't agree with my assumption that the thunder warrior project was similar to the Astartes project, and we disagree on whether or not the Emperor is near-omniscient, and what "special" and "influence" means, and who is or is not divinely empowered in 40k (for example, I can and will read The Great Work and concluded that whenever Sedayne boosts about what he accomplished by himself that it was just the Emperor implanting the solution in his head). There is no way to reconcile these different assumptions; they are just that, assumptions. But you are objectively wrong that collective work does not spontaneously create progress.
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Eipi10 wrote: it is unrealistic to assume that one group of scientists is somehow exponentially better than another group of scientists.
Why? Why is a place like MIT considered better than most other institutions? Why do countries like Germany or Japan produce more skilled scientists than the Democratic Republic of the Congo? It's not unrealistic at all for knowledge, equipment and funds not to be equally spread out, especially in a world like future earth, where there seems to be no global information exchange system and everything is ruled by vying warlords.
Eipi10 wrote: Mucking about does not create a chaos god (except for the chaos god of mucking about). The Eldar would have had to be obsessive over whatever they chose to focus on, really believe in being profligates, in order to spawn a chaos god.
Except the Eldar Codexes stating that was a direct result of depravity, a new Chaos God was spawned, formed by the Eldar's lusts and desires.
Like, that's been canon for decades. The Eldar created Slaanesh because of their excessive depravity, which caused Slaanesh to come into being, and killed most of the Eldar as a result. But, in case I am wrong - please, what are your sources for the Eldar not creating Slaanesh via their indulgences?
It is reasonable to assume that most all warlords of old earth would have been working towards something like the method used to finally conquer earth.
Yes, it is. Whether they had the same level of science, skill, resources, or simple luck is not known, and I don't think it's unreasonable to presume that some groups were less fortunate in their endeavours than others. Just because they were all trying to achieve the same thing (armies of superhuman soldiers) doesn't mean the quality of their achievements were all the same.
As a result, it is unrealistic to assume that one group of scientists is somehow exponentially better than another group of scientists.
No, it absolutely isn't unrealistic.
I'm going to make an assumption, but I assume you've done some kind of experiment or activity at school wherein teams of students try to build the tallest freestanding tower or strongest bridge out of paper straws and tape? Same access to resources and time to complete the activity? Obviously, one group will be superior over the others - and you think it would be "unrealistic" if one group happened to be vastly better than all the others? Could be that they understand principle of weight distribution and construction better than their peers. Could just be luck. Could just be some natural instinct. Could just be any other reason, but the point is that they had the same resources, and the same time, and the same goal, and you think that it's "unrealistic" for that to happen? Nonsense.
Unless you're telling me that school chemistry students are just as capable as well trained MIT-tier scientists, I think that it's completely possible, realistic, and logical for one group of scientists to simply be *better*.
Sgt_Smudge wrote: Same access to resources and time to complete the activity? Obviously, one group will be superior over the others - and you think it would be "unrealistic" if one group happened to be vastly better than all the others? Could be that they understand principle of weight distribution and construction better than their peers. Could just be luck. Could just be some natural instinct. Could just be any other reason, but the point is that they had the same resources, and the same time, and the same goal, and you think that it's "unrealistic" for that to happen? Nonsense.
Unless you're telling me that school chemistry students are just as capable as well trained MIT-tier scientists, I think that it's completely possible, realistic, and logical for one group of scientists to simply be *better*.
Right, I mean, just issues of actual material, be that funding, or just greater number of people working on the problem, or resources to work with can have a big effect. Think of how many people, how much material/money it took to get to the LHC. Or, since we are talking more about biology, how much more significant findings could be with larger scale experiments, where there are thousands of subjects rather than 10, or 100. Since we are talking about the future, consider the effect that "big data" could have, where orders of magnitude could yield even greater orders of magnitude more data. Then you need the ability to somehow sort/sift/analyze and do something with that data. Access to computer power, proprietary AI and other technologies could also be massive differences between research groups.
Not only that, but there is also the ethical angle as well. Now, in 40k we don't really consider morals or ethics, but realistically, leaps could be made with just (what we would consider) flatly unethical or illegal methodology. The team willing to cast that aside, or enabled to by some power-backing, would have a pretty large advantage or a team that stayed within those bounds.
Consider, would some society that is a totalitarian state, with a large population, which is willing to heavily fund scientific study, by any means, including widespread experimentation on it's entire population, if necessary and the authoritarian hierarchy in place to mine that data generated likely yield some things that a less authoritarian, disinclined to subject the population to such experimentation state would not? It seems fully plausible that it would. Or even just the general air of taking the scientific endeavor seriously could make a large difference.
Not to mention the sort of contingent (individualistic) circumstances that come into play sometimes. In the sort of way that Einstein did not come up with the notion of Relativity because he was the best funded researcher, he was working a patent office job and not even tied to any discrete scientific study at the time. He simply was the one apt to take Maxwell's equations seriously and actually question just what Newtonian "frames of reference" really were and what the implications would be for different ones. That's not really something you can "buy" or "fund" in an exact way. Sure, more researchers are apt to statistically yield someone like that, but it's not really deterministic, not in any way we can think of it right now.
"Wir sehen hiermit wieder die Sprache als das Dasein des Geistes." - The Phenomenology of Spirit
Obsession is not an emotion, I never said it was; only when it is applied can it create/do something (like create a chaos god or make you really good at something). All emotion requires some form of investment, be it mild or extreme.
Students =/= scientists. Nevertheless, the top tower was never hundreds of time taller than another tower; the only exceptions being those towers that never got off the ground. They never stood a chance, so I don't count them, Much the same way I don't count unholy hybrids of warzone and pit mine like the Congo. A more fruitful comparison would be to ask how much better MIT is compared to BIT (Berlin Institute of Technology). To bring this metaphor back to the argument, intrinsic human constraints mean that there will not be differences between top achievers (which is a prerequisite for being a scientist) large enough to answer for what the Emperor's scientists accomplished compared to the other scientists. Mortal humans simply do not have the time to stratify themselves like that.
As far as funding during the Unification Wars goes, the Emperor was on the back foot in that when he created the thunder warriors. His territory was much poorer than other technobarbarian states, compare the GDP of Nepal (his Himalazia) to France (Franc) or Brasil (Hy Brasil) or the US (Merica) throughout time. Assuming the Emperor used his god-like powers to secure resources for his scientists and not to directly help them is a big stretch, I am sure a near infinitely powerful psyker could do something for most any project. Furthermore, I am sure the technobarbarians had no limits on morals, I don't know of many who do in 40k. And we have already discussed Einstein as being overrated, quantum mechanics was the main focus of most physics at the time, not relativity; and even Newton's version of calculus was inferior to Leibniz's.
As far as funding during the Unification Wars goes, the Emperor was on the back foot in that when he created the thunder warriors. His territory was much poorer than other technobarbarian states, compare the GDP of Nepal (his Himalazia) to France (Franc) or Brasil (Hy Brasil) or the US (Merica) throughout time.
This has to be absolutely the DUMBEST comment I've ever read on DakkaDakka dude, and I've read some whoppers.
...... ok LET'S compare some economies through time.
the biggest and best economy in the world right now is proably the United States of America yeah?
WELL WHAT WAS THE GDP OF NORTH AMERICA 1000 YEARS AGO?!
Furthermore, the Space Marine project was started near the end of the wars of unity. I don't have a exact timeline, not sure one exists, but I bet the emperor controled a LOT of territory by then. including, no doubt, china, which is a pretty hefty economy today (and being the fastest growing economy right now could well by the year 30,000 be the worlds economic engine)
Also rememeber the space Marines where made with data from the primarch project, which was unique.
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Opinions are not facts please don't confuse the two
Eipi10 wrote: A more fruitful comparison would be to ask how much better MIT is compared to BIT (Berlin Institute of Technology). To bring this metaphor back to the argument, intrinsic human constraints mean that there will not be differences between top achievers (which is a prerequisite for being a scientist) large enough to answer for what the Emperor's scientists accomplished compared to the other scientists. Mortal humans simply do not have the time to stratify themselves like that.
Well, that might well be true for the real-life contemporary MIT and BIT, because there is no greatly significant difference in the technological, or methodological practice at hand today. Not to mention, there is a very communal approach to most science nowadays So, contemporarily, it is improbable that there would be large differences in the outputs of those groups. However, we are discussing a hypothetical future where real differences in methods or practices are more probable. My post was not to suppose that all those hypothetical conditions do apply, only that hypothetical conditions could apply which would plausibly give rise to a very real difference in scientific output. In other words, there are numerous things that, plausibly to me, could potentially transcend "intrinsic human limitations" on a case by case basis and leave one group ahead or behind another.
Eipi10 wrote: As far as funding during the Unification Wars goes, the Emperor was on the back foot in that when he created the thunder warriors. His territory was much poorer than other technobarbarian states, compare the GDP of Nepal (his Himalazia) to France (Franc) or Brasil (Hy Brasil) or the US (Merica) throughout time. Assuming the Emperor used his god-like powers to secure resources for his scientists and not to directly help them is a big stretch, I am sure a near infinitely powerful psyker could do something for most any project.
Well, there we go, there is a "plausible" reason, in-itself, why the Emperor's scientists could have had been much more productive. The Emperor himself, in whatever capacity. Even if he only only said one word, gave one idea to one person, that alone could have been enough to effect a paradigm change that produced results beyond what any other team could do.
Eipi10 wrote: Furthermore, I am sure the technobarbarians had no limits on morals, I don't know of many who do in 40k. And we have already discussed Einstein as being overrated, quantum mechanics was the main focus of most physics at the time, not relativity; and even Newton's version of calculus was inferior to Leibniz's.
I only used the moral case as a hypothetical example for something that plausibly could explain a differing of scientific output by different groups, not a fact of what would be the matter at hand in this case. Again, your point was that "it is unrealistic to assume that one group of scientists is somehow exponentially better than another group of scientists." I suppose there are several, at least, although the one of the Emperor simply helping them is the simplest, in terms of needing less further explanations.
I only brought up Einstein as another example of how a "simple" perceptual change, can lead to a very different outcome. Just another way that different groups, or even different scientists themselves. can plausibly have different results.
"Wir sehen hiermit wieder die Sprache als das Dasein des Geistes." - The Phenomenology of Spirit
@BrianDavion
So did the Emperor have some kind of El Dorado up in the mountains? The best description we have seen was in Two Metaphysical Blades, all that showed was some laborers and machines in a cave. Even the Custodians during that time needed to scrounge for resources, Constain Valdor didn't get auramite armor until halfway through the wars. The Emperor was not rich in those days. And do you really believe that Nepal, an increadily mountainous country with few natural resources, will ever become the major industrial powerhouse? Even the swiss economy is mostly built on services and luxury goods.
@H
All of those conditions that would apply during the unification wars would be limiting factors that would only magnify intrinsic human limitations. The only exception being the Emperor, and I don't think you and I disagree with the extent of his involvement. Some (Smudge and Davion) seem to think that the Emperor was really not directly involved in the Astartes and Thunder Warrior projects.
Eipi10 wrote: @H All of those conditions that would apply during the unification wars would be limiting factors that would only magnify intrinsic human limitations. The only exception being the Emperor, and I don't think you and I disagree with the extent of his involvement. Some (Smudge and Davion) seem to think that the Emperor was really not directly involved in the Astartes and Thunder Warrior projects.
Well, it's completely unclear as far as I can tell. He might have been, might not have been. It could be a combination of small practical advantages and the leadership of the Emperor. Or his direct involvement, of course. Like I said, even a small paradigmatic, perspectual, or procedural influence could have had a massive effect. While everyone is trying to get nails in a board with hammers, he shows up and gives them the idea of a screw driver. Of course that is a nonsense example, but it's emblematic of the sort of conceptual shift that could have happened.
I'm just saying, it wouldn't have to be that the Emperor was literally "in the trenches" with the actual research, per se. He simply could have supervised and give broad conceptual advice, like, "try something like this, not that." Not that I am well versed on the lore itself, but another thing that seems plausible in-itself could be the fact that they had access to the Emperor's DNA. Not that they had to necessarily recreate it, or use it directly, but that is something that hypothetically could have given them a research vector that any one else was unlikely to have know of/could have known of, for example.
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"Wir sehen hiermit wieder die Sprache als das Dasein des Geistes." - The Phenomenology of Spirit
Eipi10 wrote:Obsession is not an emotion, I never said it was; only when it is applied can it create/do something (like create a chaos god or make you really good at something). All emotion requires some form of investment, be it mild or extreme.
Answer my question, please. If you have another source for how the Eldar created Slaanesh (if it wasn't through sheer indulgence), what was it? With quotes, if you please.
Because, unfortunately, nearly all lore pretty much states that, as I said, Slaanesh was born out of the Eldar's hedonism and excessive practices - not them being "engineered to obsess".
Students =/= scientists.
What's the difference? Education, yes, but that's a resource. The Emperor may have had better educated scientists.
Nevertheless, the top tower was never hundreds of time taller than another tower; the only exceptions being those towers that never got off the ground. They never stood a chance, so I don't count them, Much the same way I don't count unholy hybrids of warzone and pit mine like the Congo. A more fruitful comparison would be to ask how much better MIT is compared to BIT (Berlin Institute of Technology). To bring this metaphor back to the argument, intrinsic human constraints mean that there will not be differences between top achievers (which is a prerequisite for being a scientist) large enough to answer for what the Emperor's scientists accomplished compared to the other scientists. Mortal humans simply do not have the time to stratify themselves like that.
Simply incorrect. Compare MIT to the science departments of less fortunate nations. Why shouldn't they count - they are still science departments.
The problem is that you assume that every nation the Emperor waged war against were roughly on the same level playing field and had the same intellect, resources, and skill: what's your proof of this? Much like in real life, there is NOTHING to assume that the empires were roughly equal in their science departments, and so throwing out the Congolese science projects because they're not on the same level as MIT is functionally admitting that two nations CAN have massively drastic differences in their scientific achievements, no matter what the weight of other people's discoveries are.
I mean, you're genuinely telling me that if the two of us were locked in a room with the same resources, neither of us would be able to reach a scientific breakthrough before the other?
As far as funding during the Unification Wars goes, the Emperor was on the back foot in that when he created the thunder warriors.
Source?
His territory was much poorer than other technobarbarian states, compare the GDP of Nepal (his Himalazia) to France (Franc) or Brasil (Hy Brasil) or the US (Merica) throughout time.
I won't repeat Brian's comment, but it is accurate. Why on earth are we using the GDP of modern nations to determine their wealth in the post-apocalypse?
Instead, I'll just ask for your source on the Unification War GDP of those nations, seeing as you're so confident about that statement.
Assuming the Emperor used his god-like powers to secure resources for his scientists and not to directly help them is a big stretch, I am sure a near infinitely powerful psyker could do something for most any project. Furthermore, I am sure the technobarbarians had no limits on morals, I don't know of many who do in 40k.
Having no morals doesn't mean you'll have more scientific achievements. It just means you'll take a bit less time on testing, and burn through more test subjects.
And no, I'm not implying the Emperor magics up resources, I'm saying he conquers and manages his resources better than other warlords. He might strategically conquer nations who have more skilled scientists early on, then conquer nations who are rich in the resources he might need, and uses those skilled workers and resource rich areas effectively, like a skilled leader, which he undoubtedly was.
And we have already discussed Einstein as being overrated, quantum mechanics was the main focus of most physics at the time, not relativity; and even Newton's version of calculus was inferior to Leibniz's.
And yet they're the ones who are the most documented, and their discoveries hailed widely as the most important of their time.
Huh. Sounds like the Emperor. Now imagine if Einstein became a dictator who brutally suppressed his rivals. Sounds even more like the Big E.
Eipi10 wrote:@BrianDavion
So did the Emperor have some kind of El Dorado up in the mountains? The best description we have seen was in Two Metaphysical Blades, all that showed was some laborers and machines in a cave. Even the Custodians during that time needed to scrounge for resources, Constain Valdor didn't get auramite armor until halfway through the wars. The Emperor was not rich in those days. And do you really believe that Nepal, an increadily mountainous country with few natural resources, will ever become the major industrial powerhouse? Even the swiss economy is mostly built on services and luxury goods.
As I said - it's not about what he started with, it's about what he conquered and how he used the resources he got after he conquered them. We know he started with the Thunder Warriors and Custodes, so clearly had enough resources to make them. From there, he conquers his neighbours, establishes better scientists to do what he cannot, and supplies them with the resources his army liberates. By the end, he can replace his initial flawed Thunder Warriors, with the slightly less flawed Space Marines created by his scientist team - which he can then dispose of after the Great Crusade, provided his pesky children don't ruin his plans...
It's a slippery slope - once you keep conquering and gaining more power, you can conquer other factions far easier.
Also, regarding auramite, the fact he even had some HALFWAY through the war is incredible, because auramite is better tier armour than what some Primarchs had. The fact that at some point, Valdor had any auramite at all is incredible.
@H
The emperor doesn't talk to people so much as he psychically implants thoughts in their mind, so who knows the form of his actual involvement. All I am sure of that it happened and that idea that something like the space marines, thunder warriors, primaris marines, etc. could have been made without his involvement is silly when both are so connected to each other and are integral to 40k.
Automatically Appended Next Post: Indulgence did create Slaanesh. The Eldar's obsessive nature created their indulgence. Emotions are influenced by personality traits.
I won't bother rewriting my previous posts. I have already said why I discount some factions an only look at the front runners (it's in the quote you cited) and the account of the Emperor preunification wars we have (two metaphyical blades), and most importantly why the fact that one is better than the other doesn't matter for my argument, but the unaided magnitude is what I object to (would you do something 100 times faster than me?).
But I will refute your Leibniz claim, all modern Calculus notation is based on his work and not Newton's; dy/dx and the integrals symbol are from him, not Newton.
I'm surprised the Emperor didn't stockpile some auramite during the DAoT, high tech stuff was plentiful them. It's your theory based on the Emperor stockpiling resources for his scientists to use?
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Eipi10 wrote: @H
The emperor doesn't talk to people so much as he psychically implants thoughts in their mind, so who knows the form of his actual involvement. All I am sure of that it happened and that idea that something like the space marines, thunder warriors, primaris marines, etc. could have been made without his involvement is silly when both are so connected to each other and are integral to 40k.
Automatically Appended Next Post: Indulgence did create Slaanesh. The Eldar's obsessive nature created their indulgence. Emotions are influenced by personality traits.
I won't bother rewriting my previous posts. I have already said why I discount some factions an only look at the front runners (it's in the quote you cited) and the account of the Emperor preunification wars we have (two metaphyical blades), and most importantly why the fact that one is better than the other doesn't matter for my argument, but the unaided magnitude is what I object to (would you do something 100 times faster than me?).
But I will refute your Leibniz claim, all modern Calculus notation is based on his work and not Newton's; dy/dx and the integrals symbol are from him, not Newton.
I'm surprised the Emperor didn't stockpile some auramite during the DAoT, high tech stuff was plentiful them. It's your theory based on the Emperor stockpiling resources for his scientists to use?
Emperor could have stockpiled scientists from DAoT.
If the truth can destroy it, then it deserves to be destroyed.
Eipi10 wrote: @H
The emperor doesn't talk to people so much as he psychically implants thoughts in their mind, so who knows the form of his actual involvement. All I am sure of that it happened and that idea that something like the space marines, thunder warriors, primaris marines, etc. could have been made without his involvement is silly when both are so connected to each other and are integral to 40k.
Automatically Appended Next Post: Indulgence did create Slaanesh. The Eldar's obsessive nature created their indulgence. Emotions are influenced by personality traits.
I won't bother rewriting my previous posts. I have already said why I discount some factions an only look at the front runners (it's in the quote you cited) and the account of the Emperor preunification wars we have (two metaphyical blades), and most importantly why the fact that one is better than the other doesn't matter for my argument, but the unaided magnitude is what I object to (would you do something 100 times faster than me?).
But I will refute your Leibniz claim, all modern Calculus notation is based on his work and not Newton's; dy/dx and the integrals symbol are from him, not Newton.
I'm surprised the Emperor didn't stockpile some auramite during the DAoT, high tech stuff was plentiful them. It's your theory based on the Emperor stockpiling resources for his scientists to use?
Emperor could have stockpiled scientists from DAoT.
Or trained his own with knowledge bases left over from the DAoT. We known Cawl in this case actually was TRAINED by the Emperor. it's almost certain this was how the emperor got his scientists, he likely gave them an education and an enviroment that few others had access too.
Opinions are not facts please don't confuse the two
BrianDavion wrote: Or trained his own with knowledge bases left over from the DAoT. We known Cawl in this case actually was TRAINED by the Emperor. it's almost certain this was how the emperor got his scientists, he likely gave them an education and an enviroment that few others had access too.
This. Ezekiel Sedayne was a 'smart' wasteland dweller on Earth, met the Emperor and 300 years later he's "Director Ezekiel Sedayne, technologist and scientist of the Emperor’s inner research cadres, biotechnical division".
- new tanks
- hovertech
(To be fair I always just assumed these last two were his doing. A quick Google search confirmed this however, because of course he did it)
Just a bunch of old STCs cobbled together in a new way.
No, clearly not. It's not yet another rhino/land raider/dreadnought/land speeder chassis with a new weapon on top of it. Hover STS other than land speeder were supposed to be lost.
Sgt_Smudge wrote: Or are we supposed to say that Sisters of Battle aren't blessed by the Emperor? If they're not, how else are they supernaturally protected?
Not supernaturally protected. Just placebo effect/willpower. Will continue fighting even when mortally wounded.
"Our fantasy settings are grim and dark, but that is not a reflection of who we are or how we feel the real world should be. [...] We will continue to diversify the cast of characters we portray [...] so everyone can find representation and heroes they can relate to. [...] If [you don't feel the same way], you will not be missed"
https://twitter.com/WarComTeam/status/1268665798467432449/photo/1
