Reavers, what's their deal? by athertonwing

GENERAL DISCUSSIONS

Reavers, what's their deal?

POSTED BY: ATHERTONWING
UPDATED: Tuesday, March 30, 2004 20:24
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Monday, March 29, 2004 4:29 AM

of course that means we're back to: what could be so absolutely horrible and shocking to cause the effect we have seen in bushwhacked? but maybe thats the wrong question and the point of this episode was to show the effects so we can imagine anything that will work for us (which i consider a brilliant idea that will now become a little dangerous.. if he is going to show it i couldnt think of anything that would really work.. so maybe these details will be avoided or covered under "the movie is NOT the show")

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Monday, March 29, 2004 4:45 AM

FINN MAC CUMHAL

Quote:
Originally posted by Fireflythemovie:
I think you give the people of ancient cultures too much credit when it comes to their knowledge of genetics and inbreeding. Marrying first cousins was not only common, it was often more or less a requirement (and still is in many parts of the world.) Better mixing of the gene pool was a side effect of this kind of thing, but I have to think it wasn't the main purpose: mixing happened regardless, and even if it didn't, there are large parts of the world where the genetic benefits to breeding with someone who isn't traceably related to you are far from well known.

I didn’t say they had an understanding of genetics, but it is a fact that ancient scripts speak very clearly about denying close incestuous relationships. Ancient Hebrew texts, for instance, prohibit marrying between a man and a “close relative.” [See Leviticus 18] It goes on to list the relatives that are prohibited to marry. And this is not something that is limited to the Hebrews, but has been shown to be something that is universal among ancient people, from Native Americans to African to Europeans to Asians. Therefore it cannot be simply a cultural thing, but must reside in the effects of these kinds of marriages, and that stands to reason.

It is also true that cousins were not always included in these prohibited groups, and sometimes even encouraged, as you say. But the genetic inbreeding effect between cousins is not always readily obvious, especially in a polygamist society where cousins were likely to be more genetically distant then one would think of them today.

So for a small tribe, or perhaps even a large tribe, where the number of single women was limited, it was very likely and reasonable to conclude that they would kidnap women from other tribes in order to maintain the validity of their marriage laws, which in turn, whether they understood it or not, maintained the necessary breadth of the gene pool.

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Monday, March 29, 2004 5:38 AM

CYBERSNARK

Quote:
Originally posted by Jared:
only problem is that some things look more like good old mind reading and adding that ability to our sc might be going a little far.

Actually, telepathy might not be as far out there as you might think.

It's been proven that some animals have electromagnetic senses (migratory birds, for one, have built-in compasses). Others have thermographic senses (pit-vipers that can "smell" heat).

Organic brains produce electrical impulses between the synapses. We also produce and interact with electrical fields outside our own bodies (notable when you get a shock from staticy carpet and a metal doorknob). Possibly these are the "auras" that some psychics claim to read.

Think of the evolutionary advantage to a predator (or even a prey animal) who could learn to sense those electrical impulses in another creature's brain. If both the "reader" and the "target" are of the same species (i.e., River and the Serenity crew), they might even be able to interpret those impulses (by virtue of having the same physical layout in their brains --so that you could take the pattern of another's synapse-firing pattern and overlay it on another brain). Possibly this is part of what the Alliance did to River (and maybe Early).

Couple that with just being really really perceptive (watching people's breathing, how they act, their eyes, etc), and suddenly you have a crazy genius mind reader.

-----
We applied the cortical electrodes but were unable to get a neural reaction from either patient.

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Monday, March 29, 2004 6:04 AM

JARED

,-) thats why i said far shot rather than impossible, as i think subconsciously reading body language and eye movement are still a different level from sensing electric fields and being able to turn them back into thoughts and images. maybe some people really are able to do this in a very (very, very, very) limited way. and thinking about it the only scenes troubling me are:

-safe: knowing what happened to the child
-safe: immediately knowing what happened to the old patron
-shindig: immediately knowing a lot about badger

all of that could of course be explained by hearing rumors and putting pieces together, hearing other crew members talk about badger, maybe just having to hear his accent to know where he's from and having a lot of information she picked up during her life to figure the rest (might explain her interest in that thing on his jacket).

in fact, i pretty much like the idea of rivers abilities being the result of removing the wall between consc. and subconsc... a little wink to the myth that people only use 10-20% of their brain. maybe by turning it around make that "consciously using 20%", while the rest is automated functions (heart beat, breathing, lets say another 10% to pull more numbers out of thin air), leaving a lot of potential if the remaining 70% could be used in a controlled fashion rather than having it run wild and do nothing but giving us gut feelings or bad dreams.

and why we're at it: yes, why not allow that our subconsc. can also to some extend pick up electric fields and interpret them (its scifi after all and this explanation still seems better than just saying "mind reader"). not to mention how wonderfully it would explain her somewhat confused state and daydreams.

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Monday, March 29, 2004 6:44 AM

FINN MAC CUMHAL

Quote:
Originally posted by Cybersnark:
Actually, telepathy might not be as far out there as you might think.

It's been proven that some animals have electromagnetic senses (migratory birds, for one, have built-in compasses). Others have thermographic senses (pit-vipers that can "smell" heat).

Organic brains produce electrical impulses between the synapses. We also produce and interact with electrical fields outside our own bodies (notable when you get a shock from staticy carpet and a metal doorknob). Possibly these are the "auras" that some psychics claim to read.

Interesting concept. I have to admit that this is an explanation that I've not actually heard before.

Although the amount of electricity that you're talking about is very small. If someone were sensitive to say the magnetic field generated by brainwaves one might find it very uncomfortable living on a spaceship where, conceivably, electric devices produce magnetic fields thousands or millions of times stronger. Even the earth's magnetic field (~0.5 gauss) is much larger then brainwave activity.

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Monday, March 29, 2004 7:06 AM

JARED

an even better explanation for rivers behaviour. "vroom vroom tchka tchka clonk clonk" "oh boy, is she mind reading the engine again?" "nah, i think its jayne"

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Monday, March 29, 2004 4:31 PM

LTNOWIS

About the inbreeding: like all emotion-based ethics, we evolved them. The reason it just feels wrong is becuase for thousands of years of evolution inbreeding, killing your own kind, eating gross-looking things and the like were surefire ways of not having a healthy genetic future.

Say, that's a nice theory about reavers. A colony ship gets lost, they've got a couple generations of rations, they practice inbreeding, they run out of rations, their only option is to attack non-reavers. It would help if the colony ship was run by some weird, sick, self-mutilating cult, that taught that outsiders aren't people, and took it on faith that they'd actually get somewhere when they set out to roam the outskirts of the galaxy/solar system/star cluster. The only hole in the theory is that inbreeding usually causes things like hemophillia, not things like gibbering insanity. Maybe one person was exposed to radiation and mutated the "no morals! Kill Kill Kill!" gene.
Actually, now that I think about it, the stress and such on an already messed-up people would have caused most if not all of the insanity. To quote Hank Hill, "You're putting extra stress on a structure that wasn't up-to-code to begin with." If you need some more examples of civilized people turning ultra-sadistic, just look at the Balkan guerillas and Russians in WWII.

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Monday, March 29, 2004 8:25 PM

FIREFLYTHEMOVIE

Quote:
has been shown to be something that is universal among ancient people

Not true. Siblings were almost universally prohibited from marrying, with a few notable exceptions, the most notable being Egyptian royalty. This was probably unnecessary, given that siblings pretty much never want to marry each other, anyway. Certain cultures prohibited other relatives from marrying, even out to "traceable" relatives, but many of the rules about who someone could and could not marry had nothing to do with blood relation.

Quote:
Therefore it cannot be simply a cultural thing, but must reside in the effects of these kinds of marriages, and that stands to reason.

Are you trying to say that there are no cultural universals? First, this isn't universal, and 2nd, there are plenty of other reasons to set down rules about who's allowed to marry whom. Remember that in some cultures, you're required to marry a cousin. But it's not just any cousin--almost all require you to marry a cross cousin, rather than a parallel cousin. Marriage is about alliances between groups of people. You generally can't marry within your own group, because there's no new alliance. But you can't marry into just any group, either. A parallel cousin (your father's brother's kid or mother's sister's kid) is either going to live in your same group or in some group that may well have exactly 0 alliance with your group. But a cross cousin is from a group your group has dealt with at least once before, a generation earlier.

Quote:
But the genetic inbreeding effect between cousins is not always readily obvious, especially in a polygamist society where cousins were likely to be more genetically distant then one would think of them today.

From a genetic/evolutionary standpoint, it's obvious enough. And a cousin is either a cousin or a half cousin, both of which are pretty closely related to you. (Ok, we can get into double cousins, but they're more closely related, not less.) I'm not sure what you're arguing here. But prescriptive rules about mate choices that require you to marry a relative (which are very common throughout the world, to this day) really didn't have anything to do with the genetic effects of inbreeding.

Quote:
So for a small tribe, or perhaps even a large tribe, where the number of single women was limited, it was very likely and reasonable to conclude that they would kidnap women from other tribes in order to maintain the validity of their marriage laws, which in turn, whether they understood it or not, maintained the necessary breadth of the gene pool.

I absolutely agree with that. My point was that women, when seen as commodities, are always in short supply. In polygynous societies, it's tough to find any man who isn't at least contemplating getting another wife. He may think it's impractical, that he won't be able to support another wife, etc., but he probably thinks about it. And in all societies, it's hard to find men who aren't at least tempted to find a mistress or 3 on the side, or at least some one night stands. So men always have some incentive to go grab more women. The reason they don't do it more often in our society and most of the world today is that there's enough disincentive to outweigh the incentive.

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Tuesday, March 30, 2004 2:21 AM

ELFRENETICO

Great thread.

You guys cover most of the options, just thought I'd add that "barbarian" communities traditionally stayed on the outskirts of "civilized" society using horses (Huns) or ships (Vikings) to make raids and then quickly fade into the wilderness. They often used terror tactics including piling up bodies and skulls and leaving them as calling cards. This gave the relatively small units a reputation, striking fear and softening resistance.

In time it turned out these were pretty evolved cultures, but to the victims of course they were, barbarians, subhuman creatures. But they were just poor people making raids on rich people without pity or mercy. White settlers pictured American Indians this way. Maybe Joss started with this premise?

I like the idea of Blue Sun & the Blue Hands playing a part in the Reavers story though.

Shiny

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Tuesday, March 30, 2004 2:52 AM

JARED

Quote:
Originally posted by Elfrenetico:

In time it turned out these were pretty evolved cultures, but to the victims of course they were, barbarians, subhuman creatures.

so maybe book had a good reason to insist on them being human beings and again knowing far more than he should?

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Tuesday, March 30, 2004 3:55 AM

FINN MAC CUMHAL

Quote:
Originally posted by Fireflythemovie:
Quote:
has been shown to be something that is universal among ancient people

Not true. Siblings were almost universally prohibited from marrying, with a few notable exceptions, the most notable being Egyptian royalty. This was probably unnecessary, given that siblings pretty much never want to marry each other, anyway. Certain cultures prohibited other relatives from marrying, even out to "traceable" relatives, but many of the rules about who someone could and could not marry had nothing to do with blood relation.

Actually it's quite true, and it was demonstrated in 1949 by G.P. Murdock.

Quote:
Originally posted by Fireflythemovie:
Are you trying to say that there are no cultural universals? First, this isn't universal, and 2nd, there are plenty of other reasons to set down rules about who's allowed to marry whom.

You just asserted in the last paragraph that it wasn't true to begin with? Are you changing your story now?

And exactly how do you know that siblings never wanted to marry? This isn't really something you can know. But since throughout most of history marriages were arranged, it makes little difference anyway. It is true that cousins were sometimes married because the family wanted to maintain the homogeneity of the blood relationships in the family, but then why didn't cultures more frequently marry siblings if that's the case? If cousins maintain a close blood kin in the family, wouldn't marrying siblings maintain a closer blood kin, or at least as close? But almost universally, marriage laws prohibit the marrying of siblings. There is only one reasonable explanation for this and that is that they understood the dangers involved in incestuous relationships.

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Tuesday, March 30, 2004 4:54 AM

FIREFLYTHEMOVIE

Quote:
Actually it's quite true, and it was demonstrated in 1949 by G.P. Murdock.

Huh? What exactly is true? That close relatives are universally prohibited from marrying? I've given counter-examples to that premise, so it can't really be true.

Quote:
You just asserted in the last paragraph that it wasn't true to begin with? Are you changing your story now?

No. You said it (and I'm still not quite sure what "it" is) was universal, then said that because it was universal, it had to be more than just cultural. I said (a) it's not universal, and (b) even if it was, that doesn't mean that it's not cultural.

Quote:
And exactly how do you know that siblings never wanted to marry?

There have been many studies on sibling incest taboos. There have been cultures that have tried to get people who were raised together to marry. People raised together see each other as siblings, and don't find each other sexually attractive. The marriages never really work. Also, avoidance of sibling incest is common throughout the animal kingdom, or at least mammalia. I'd argue that an animal without language shouldn't have much trouble identifying at least a subset of their siblings (e.g., animals born in the same litter may recognize each other as siblings, but if a female sends out one litter on their own before having the next one, animals born a year apart to the same mother wouldn't recognize each other as siblings) but would have no way of identifying cousins. The sibling incest taboo is pretty well ingrained in our psyches. Parent-offspring incest is similar, although more common, even among humans.

Quote:
It is true that cousins were sometimes married because the family wanted to maintain the homogeneity of the blood relationships in the family

That was the reason given by European royalty, but I've never heard of it anywhere else. In most cultures, there's little or no mention of "blood"--it's all about alliances.

Quote:
But almost universally, marriage laws prohibit the marrying of siblings. There is only one reasonable explanation for this and that is that they understood the dangers involved in incestuous relationships.

Nope. I see 2 other explanations: (1) universal revulsion at the thought of siblings marrying, genetically programmed into our brains, with no actual understanding that siblings are far less likely to produce healthy children with each other, and (2) no benefit to a family's alliances.

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Tuesday, March 30, 2004 5:36 AM

ELFRENETICO

Quote:
Originally posted by Jared:
Quote:

so maybe book had a good reason to insist on them being human beings and again knowing far more than he should?

Or he just belives in the humanity of all peoples and frowns upon superstious talk, like preachers tend to do. Check out the "Book" thread for some cool ideas on his past.

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Tuesday, March 30, 2004 7:23 AM

JARED

Quote:
Originally posted by Elfrenetico:
Or he just belives in the humanity of all peoples and frowns upon superstious talk, like preachers tend to do. Check out the "Book" thread for some cool ideas on his past.

well, my favorite version would be: both ,-) knowledge can be such a nice little help for faith.

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Tuesday, March 30, 2004 7:50 AM

CORWYN

My first thought when I saw them was that they were suffering from 'laughing sickness', a problem similar to BME (mad cow disease). It is one of the problems of cannibalism.

I don't think cannibalism is as hard to explain as some people here. If you were hungry enough and you had dead comrades, could you really spend thirty days or so, dying and not eat them?

So, they start hungry, become crazy, and the rest follows. As much as people want there to be an external 'reason' why people do horrible things, for the most part it is not required.

I think people are also giving too much credence to Mal's pop psychology. A person who endured a reaver attack is likely to become a little crazy. The exact symptoms are not that important.

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Tuesday, March 30, 2004 8:08 AM

DRAGONFLYDIRECTOR

Quote:
Originally posted by corwyn:
My first thought when I saw them was that they were suffering from 'laughing sickness', a problem similar to BME (mad cow disease). It is one of the problems of cannibalism.
B]

Just a note of interest: Kuru, aka the laughing death or laughing sickness is spread only by eating the brain of one infected.

Strange, but true!

It has been limited to tribesmen in New Guinea and is very unusual to come across.

"Observe Analyze & Respond"
Motto of the A.P.E.s
Alliance Protean Engineers

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Tuesday, March 30, 2004 5:17 PM

FINN MAC CUMHAL

Quote:
Originally posted by Fireflythemovie:
Huh? What exactly is true? That close relatives are universally prohibited from marrying? I've given counter-examples to that premise, so it can't really be true.

You haven't given counter examples of anything.

Quote:
Originally posted by Fireflythemovie:
There have been many studies on sibling incest taboos. There have been cultures that have tried to get people who were raised together to marry. People raised together see each other as siblings, and don't find each other sexually attractive. The marriages never really work. Also, avoidance of sibling incest is common throughout the animal kingdom, or at least mammalia. I'd argue that an animal without language shouldn't have much trouble identifying at least a subset of their siblings (e.g., animals born in the same litter may recognize each other as siblings, but if a female sends out one litter on their own before having the next one, animals born a year apart to the same mother wouldn't recognize each other as siblings) but would have no way of identifying cousins. The sibling incest taboo is pretty well ingrained in our psyches. Parent-offspring incest is similar, although more common, even among humans.

I think you need to go back the re-read those studies.

Quote:
Originally posted by Fireflythemovie:
Nope. I see 2 other explanations: (1) universal revulsion at the thought of siblings marrying, genetically programmed into our brains, with no actual understanding that siblings are far less likely to produce healthy children with each other, and (2) no benefit to a family's alliances.

First, neither of these “explanations” demonstrate anything contrary to my point. The fact remains, and despite your claims you have yet to demonstrate any counterexamples whatsoever that marriage laws almost universally prohibit the marrying of siblings.

Second, there is no “genetically programmed” “universal revulsion” to sexual sibling relationships. You’ve misinterpreted the studies or something, but that’s not what the Westermark effect is. In fact, there is something called GSA, Genetic Sexual Attraction, which is a sexual attraction that occurs when sibling separated at a young age are reunited as adults.[1] It is a documented effect, which suggests that if any genetic programming exists at all it is not at all revulsion. On the other hand, the Westermark effect is not limited to Siblings, and says the children who grow up in close contact together are not likely to experience a sexual attraction as adults.

Third, to your second point of there being no benefit to family alliances, you’ve already been kind enough to demonstrate that is wrong, because siblings were married in ancient Egypt for purposes of family alliances and political gain.

Incest taboo is not something I invented yesterday. It is a widely accepted anthropological theory that has been around for a lot longer then I have. If you have anymore confusion on this issue, I suggest you consult Murdock’s book or Edward Westernmark’s writings. Both helped to pioneer the theory of incest taboo and they will explain to you that marriage laws do in fact prohibit certain exogamic or endogamic unions.

Finally, it’s fairly obvious to me that this discussion is probably not going to go anywhere, and I think it’s detracting form the current "Reaver" discussion, so this will be my last post on this subject.

[1] http://www.postadoptioncentre.org.uk/Publications/gsa.htm

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Tuesday, March 30, 2004 7:21 PM

FIREFLYTHEMOVIE

Quote:
Finally, it’s fairly obvious to me that this discussion is probably not going to go anywhere, and I think it’s detracting form the current "Reaver" discussion, so this will be my last post on this subject.

Agreed. All I have to say is that I think that at least one of us (not sure which), if not both of us, has been arguing our points rather poorly and/or reading the other one's poorly. You seem to think you're contradicting some things that I don't think I said. (e.g., I was never arguing that marriage laws universally prohibit marriage of siblings. I was arguing that the prevalence of such marriage laws didn't depend on any explicit understanding of the genetic downsides to inbreeding. And I certainly have given at least one counter-example to the idea that close relatives are always prohibited from marrying: Egyptian royalty.) Whatever. It's late, and I don't care anymore.

Back to your regularly scheduled Reavers.

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Tuesday, March 30, 2004 8:24 PM

SHINY

Quote:
Originally posted by Fireflythemovie:
Siblings were almost universally prohibited from marrying

"That's just not something brothers and sisters do...well, on some planets, but only pretty bad ones..."

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