Prometheus - Ridley Scott's 'Alien Prequel' (or not)...

[Halb]

Guardian writer sounds like a tt.

[anonymous-user]

Halb said:

Guardian writer sounds like a tt.

Nothing new there

[popeyewhite]

housen said:

Halb said:

Lance Catamaran said:

To be good or evil you have to have a sense of morality, which only humans do. Even then, it's often just a point of view. The Nazis didn't think they were evil, they thought they were doing good in ridding the world of undesirables.

How do you know only humans do?

ooof

Basic morals, like empathy, are instilled at an early age by our parents. Empathy is a purely human feeling as in order to feel true empathy you have to understand why a parent or sibling is upset. This is different from a young monkey's distress when it sees its mother screaming - it's upset but it doesn't know why. That is not empathy. Morals are similar in that you need to be able to understand WHY a certain thing is right or wrong. Hence only cognisant beings have morals.

[Halb]

Saying sample a is 'purely human' is a human centric view of nature, but common. We don't know yet, there are other animals that may be self-aware, we know that some of the other animals have cultures and transfer knowledge by memes, not genes.

[LimaDelta]

Halb said:

Saying sample a is 'purely human' is a human centric view of nature, but common. We don't know yet, there are other animals that may be self-aware, we know that some of the other animals have cultures and transfer knowledge by memes, not genes.

It is proven that humans are not the only creatures who are self aware. Put a coloured dot on a chimp's head and show them in a mirror and they will reach up to remove it. They know the chimp in the mirror is them, and not another chimp.

Even dogs, are thought to have a level of self awareness. They wouldn't pass the mirror test like a chimp because sight is not their primary sense, but can pick out a sample of their own piss. They know it is 'them'.

[Halb]

LimaDelta said:

It is proven that humans are not the only creatures who are self aware. Put a coloured dot on a chimp's head and show them in a mirror and they will reach up to remove it. They know the chimp in the mirror is them, and not another chimp.

Even dogs, are thought to have a level of self awareness. They wouldn't pass the mirror test like a chimp because sight is not their primary sense, but can pick out a sample of their own piss. They know it is 'them'.

Learning in this field has come along way in the past 50 years. The acceptance to move away from a human-centric/humans are special (religious in it's origin) has dissipated some. I've seen some anecdotal videos of dogs, which are interesting. I don't think it's a straight line, as in, you move along the line and you achieve more awareness or whatever, brains/minds are complex, it might be that some creatures are better at other things. I wouldn't be surprised if the close relationship between dogs and humans over the millennia has helped the dog evolve certain traits. Not to make them more 'human-like', but to have traits which they share with humans.

[popeyewhite]

Halb said:

Saying sample a is 'purely human' is a human centric view of nature, but common. We don't know yet, there are other animals that may be self-aware,

Self-awareness is quite different from true empathy and morals, which are both learnt. A creature does not have to be self-aware to show a what you might call empathy.

[p1stonhead]

I watched prometheus over the weekend in prep for Covenant in a few weeks.

God its just tedious isnt it!

The premise is incredible. I dont understand how they could have made a 'meet our alien creators' storyline so dull. It could have been incredible. Why are the (presumably chosen for this reason) best ten scientists on the whole planet, so stupid!?

Edited by p1stonhead on Monday 8th May 10:21

[popeyewhite]

LimaDelta said:

It is proven that humans are not the only creatures who are self aware. Put a coloured dot on a chimp's head and show them in a mirror and they will reach up to remove it. They know the chimp in the mirror is them, and not another chimp.

There is a world of difference between the kind of self-awareness you describe, and empathy. To be truly empathetic you need to be able to perceive the situation from the other person's perspective. I can't see how this would work with dogs -

"You're a bit grumpy"
"I've just had a root canal at the dentist"
"Oh poor you, are you in pain?"
"Well I'm a bit groggy from the pain relief"
"I've had root canal myself, you have my sympathy"

woof woof!

[tankplanker]

I re watched Alien for the same reason on the weekend, John Hurt's character was just as stupid once he fell under the safety beam in the Engineers' ship, you could say that the scientists in Promethus are just following Hurt's example.

With the Engineers it felt that Scott downsized them as he didn't want to rely on pure CGI that a too scale Engineer from Alien would have resulted in. Downsizing allowed him to use an actor.

[housen]

popeyewhite said:

LimaDelta said:

It is proven that humans are not the only creatures who are self aware. Put a coloured dot on a chimp's head and show them in a mirror and they will reach up to remove it. They know the chimp in the mirror is them, and not another chimp.

There is a world of difference between the kind of self-awareness you describe, and empathy. To be truly empathetic you need to be able to perceive the situation from the other person's perspective. I can't see how this would work with dogs -

"You're a bit grumpy"
"I've just had a root canal at the dentist"
"Oh poor you, are you in pain?"
"Well I'm a bit groggy from the pain relief"
"I've had root canal myself, you have my sympathy"

woof woof!

ok ok I think my original point was will we get a nicer alien like a dog for eg, that protects the humans from the nasty aliens and has the powers to kill the evil like aliens

[p1stonhead]

tankplanker said:

I re watched Alien for the same reason on the weekend, John Hurt's character was just as stupid once he fell under the safety beam in the Engineers' ship, you could say that the scientists in Promethus are just following Hurt's example.

No they are following the idiots on Prometheus who started it as Alien is a sequel

[tankplanker]

p1stonhead said:

No they are following the idiots on Prometheus who started it as Alien is a sequel

Gah, true, although I meant from the script writing point of view.

[alanwul]

I too have just been reading a review and it's not good news.

"The biggest disappointment of the summer?" Lets hope this isn't Prometheus 2 in that regard.

http://io9.gizmodo.com/alien-covenant-may-be-the-b...

[ukaskew]

Which films do I need to watch/re-watch to jump into Covenant fresh and ready?

I've seen Alien, Aliens and Alien 3 but none of those for many years now. I've never seen Prometheus so presumably I definitely need to see that.

Or am I best off watching Prometheus, Covenant, then the originals after my cinema trip?

[p1stonhead]

ukaskew said:

Which films do I need to watch/re-watch to jump into Covenant fresh and ready?

I've seen Alien, Aliens and Alien 3 but none of those for many years now. I've never seen Prometheus so presumably I definitely need to see that.

Or am I best off watching Prometheus, Covenant, then the originals after my cinema trip?

It's a direct sequel to Prometheus so defo need that.

[Guvernator]

p1stonhead said:

It's a direct sequel to Prometheus so defo need that.

And 2 hours of your life wasted that you'll never get back.

[tankplanker]

alanwul said:

I too have just been reading a review and it's not good news.

"The biggest disappointment of the summer?" Lets hope this isn't Prometheus 2 in that regard.

http://io9.gizmodo.com/alien-covenant-may-be-the-b...

What I liked from that review is that they said it made Alien and Prometheus worse with the lore changes. I have seen the rumours around the changes made in the new film and I have to agree that if they are true I am not that impressed with the choices made by Ridley.

[p1stonhead]

Guvernator said:

p1stonhead said:

It's a direct sequel to Prometheus so defo need that.

And 2 hours of your life wasted that you'll never get back.

Yeah but you gotta power through!

[Lance Catamaran]

80% on RT at the moment so most critics don't see it as a disappointment