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The selfish gene and MGS1
Posted: Tue Feb 01, 2005 12:41 pm
by Crowley
I was watching the briefing in Metal Gear Solid and I started thinking about the following:
Campbell: The interesting thing is that nearly every member of the unit conspired in this attack.
Snake: How could an entire unit be subverted to rebellion?
Naomi: They're calling it a revolution.
Campbell: Since they all went through the same gene therapy, they probably felt closer than brothers. They see the unit as their only family.
In light of what I've recently learned of the 'Selfish Gene' theory this suddenly didn't seem as strange as it had before. According to the theory the prime interest of living beings isn't just to ensure the continuation of their own genes but their entire genetic lineage. It has been observed that among some pack animals a male may keep competing suitors at bay while it's brother impregnates the female.
Posted: Tue Feb 01, 2005 12:50 pm
by Artemio
Indeed, a lot of things in MGS1 and MGS2 are more logical after reading that book... and the derived works (opther books that follow some of it's line of though).
Great lines you got there, hadn't relate them
Posted: Tue Feb 01, 2005 1:26 pm
by thagen
I thought it was because of Mantis' mind control..
Liquid: Since Mantis died, the genome soldiers' brainwashing has started to wear off. I'm worried about the men's morale.
Posted: Tue Feb 01, 2005 2:01 pm
by Artemio
Indeed, that is right and is said in the game.... anyway, I think that the previous idea has some sense too and cannot be comlpetely ignored. It has resonance with the theme.
Posted: Tue Feb 01, 2005 5:28 pm
by Crowley
Shame on me... I just watched that scene a couple of days ago. I'd prefer to see it as a combination of factors. Mantis keeping a couple of hundred soldiers 'persuaded' at the same time seems a bit too thick. I'd see military training as a third factor. What's the first thing you're taught there? How to follow orders without questioning.
Posted: Tue Feb 01, 2005 7:19 pm
by thagen
Don't tell me you... DOUBT HIS POWER!?
I never really thought about this so much, but you might be unto something. I just figured it was all Mantis' doing, being the most powerful practitioner of psychokinesis and telepathy in the world, and all.
Posted: Wed Feb 02, 2005 10:35 am
by Finalfantasy7
'Selfish Gene' theory is bunch of bull to be honest. It has been proven to be false by many Psychologists who studied human behavior for years. We don't have traits built into our genes that make us survive as species. That was the whole point of MGS, genes don't count.
The only closest thing to it is Evolutionary Psychology, which is basically a simplfied concept of how memes work.
Posted: Tue Jun 14, 2005 9:58 am
by Zhofe
From what I understood of the Shadow Moses situation, Foxhound was there to keep an eye on things and the army of Genome soldiers were under thier command. Since Liquid was the leader of Foxhound, they would follow his orders, but some of the things they were required to do to follow those orders were unsavory, so Mantis used his powers to desensitize them to thier own actions.
With Mantis dead the soldiers realize what they are doing and you find a morale drop similar to that in SS units in Nazi Germany before the implementation of the death camps.
Basically it is that there is an inner conscience in the guards telling them "This is wrong!" and Mantis was the duct tape that shut the conscience up.
Posted: Sun Oct 16, 2005 5:51 pm
by GRACCHVS REX
because of their gene therapy, the soldiers felt closer than brothers, as the quote above states, so they all joined the revolution, but to combat any drops in morale and to highten effectiveness, mantis created a loose psycic(spelling?) blanket around them, raising morale and willingness to execute unsavory orders, &c.
see also "Heir to he empire". its a star wars novel, but it explains this idea, substituting the "force" for psycokenesis...