Originally posted by venom2506:
yes, that's what's wrotten, but don't assume it's true. remember, it's a possiblilty thought off by the GTVA scientists, and not a proof.
Yeah. And I (as some others I'm sure) am not very fond of the "hive mind" theory for the Shivans, as it would then group them in with the Borg, and we really hope that Volition would have been able to come up with a better alien speices then just another Borg-remake.
1) I think you can associate the disorganization after the Lucifer died to a couple of things, one of which is the "holy &%#$" mentality:
The Shivans are overconfident. They defeated the vast Ancients empire. Surely they figured mowing over these Terrans and Vasudans would be a piece of cake (it was for pounding the Vasudan homeworld). So, when we actually managed to destroy the Lucifer, all of the remaining Shivans (in our space) were stunned screaming such things as "holy *$@#", "wtf!", etc. They were stunned, they did lose their command (and you can probably find many instances in our non-hive mind, human military history where armies became disorganized when they were in enemy land and they lost their command and the remaining forces argued with each other over what to do next).
So I don't think that you exactly need a "hive mind" theory to explain the disorganization after the Lucifer died.
2) You could consider them telepathic, or mentally linked via technology. Where as thinking this would make them "hive mind" as the Borg, it could also not. In "The Light of Other Days" (by Arthur C. Clarke & Stephen Baxter) and the "Forever..." series by Joe Haldeman ("Forever War", "Forever Peace", and "Forever Free"), the authors deal with the idea of people linking their minds together through technology. In both "The Light of Other Days" and "Forever Peace" people retain their individuality, but the mental link can provide them with like an Internet built into their minds. They can talk and discuss ideas with other people in fractions of a second. They can share memories and feelings of other people, while still having their own and their own individuality. In "Forever War" and "Forever Free", the linking of minds got rid of individuality, but it created a single mind, a single "Man" instead of a hive mind consisting of a queen and drones. In this scenario each "Man" is a single consciousness which shares many individual bodies. Either of these two scenarios use mind-links without being the typical Borg "hive mind".
3) As stated, what's in the techroom is just what the GTVA thinks about the Shivans. Where as the GTVA sees something like a hive mind, the true nature of how Shivans communicate with each other could be way beyond our understanding. Maybe they communicate via subspace the same way we communicate via sound. It's been stated that the Shivans have a sensitivity to subspace. Maybe they hear ships passing through subspace the way we hear planes passing through the air (or cars on the street, etc). Or maybe they communicate via subspace not like we do via sound, but like dolphins and whales do as sonar. Maybe they communicate like this, but they need a devise to pull their communications out of subspace into our space (freespace). Maybe that is what the Shivan Comm Nodes are, transmitting communications from subspace into freespace so all the Shivan ships can coordinate. And maybe the Lucifer carried such equipment aboard it, so that when it was destroyed, all the Shivans in GTA & PVA space lost communication with the rest of their species and became lost and disorganized. I know that they techroom says that "Shivan communication seems to occur in the electromagnetic spectrum" but that may just be them using the em spectrum like we use it: radio, TV, cellphones, etc.
But, as you can see from my rambling thinking
, there are lots of ideas you can get about the Shivans based on what we know and do not know.
Joe.
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