Topic: How many Borg does it take to screw in a lightbulb?
jh
Ex-Member
posted
I get where you're going, it's just that I think that when you talk about investing the queen with more command or decision making functions, etc, you're trapped into implying that she is somehow 'more' individual. Not that you're saying that exactly just that I think that is the consequence that we're lead to, you can't not say it is the problem.
If you don't like the router bit, what about a spinal cord? Queens can override certain things rather than wait for them to go to the whole Collective but they are still without any centralized processing powers?
Dunno, just like the Borg and trying to preserve some of their mystique.
------------------ Proverbs for Paranoids, 3: If they can get you asking the wrong questions, they don't have to worry about answers.
I don't think "queens" exist in the Collective until they are needed. We only see them in special circumstances. They are not a permenant part of the decision making process. The only time they are required to take on such a role is when a small group of Borg are cut off from the Collective, and an organizing influence is required to keep their much smaller hivemind from fragmenting.
------------------ "Recombination, then Viacom; Safeway." -- Soul Coughing
posted
Queens are for use when the ship is in another quadrent, or, as we have seen, back in time?
Here's another one. How could 7of9 know about the Enterprise, and events in First Contact? That whole group of Borg were in the distant past, and were cut off from the collective, and didn't make contact? Or did I missunderstand, and she just knew about the second Borg attack on Earth, and NOT about the events in the past?
------------------ Outside of a dog, a book is a mans best friend. Inside of a dog, it's to dark to read. Groucho Marx
posted
$$$ Only very slight one's if you don't know "Dark Frontier" from Voyager's fifth season
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Ugh, I think it only makes things worse to say they are only created when they are needed. In that case why did we see the Queen in Dark Frontier? If they're that special you come up with a whole slew of new problems. And Seven seemed to recognize the existence of the Queen, or at least expected her.
I just think having them a permanent part of the hardware makes more sense. But that could be my vision of what a Collective Consciousness would entail. Which is probably another thread.
Off for the weekend now.
------------------ Proverbs for Paranoids, 3: If they can get you asking the wrong questions, they don't have to worry about answers.
posted
Because, as I said at the beginning, the "queen" also acts as speaker for the Borg when such a thing is required. I would imagine it is quite difficult for a hivemind to relate to an individual one. Hence, when an actual discussion beyond "Resistance is futile." is required, a mouthpiece is necessary. The Borg realized that they needed to address Seven as an individual. So we get a "queen" to talk to her.
Of course, I think that any drone can probably be invested with such duties if need be, ala Seven in "Scorpion". (Though it is possible that Seven was some sort of higher level router to begin with. Depends on what a tertiary adjunct is.)
------------------ "Recombination, then Viacom; Safeway." -- Soul Coughing
posted
Why would it be difficult of a collective consciousness to relate to an individual? At least to the minimal amount that was need in Dark Frontier or FC? I think that's my problem with it. You seem to think that those situations are so special that the means to deal with them must also be special, or at least different than typical Borg day to day life. Whereas I think that while the situations might be extraordinary the means or hardware used to deal with them is probably not so special. Just used differently. When the queen needs to speak she speaks, when you need a phaser you fire a phaser, etc. Just because you don't use it all the time doesn't mean it's something so special that it has to be created separately each time.
------------------ Proverbs for Paranoids, 3: If they can get you asking the wrong questions, they don't have to worry about answers.
posted
Look at it this way. How many conversations with single brain cells do you have on the average day? That's the sort of scale we're talking about here.
I don't think that the Collective as a whole can "dumb down" enough to have a meaningful conversation with the likes of us. We're too far below it. Hence the use of a proxy.
As for the "queen" being something created in the moment, I'm not exactly trying to say that. I think there are a number of them out there, sent out when needed. And I'm not denying that they have other uses. Merely that they're anything more than another tool of the Collective.
------------------ "And much of Madness, and more of Sin, and Horror the soul of the plot." -- The Conqueror Worm, by Edgar Allan Poe
posted
I don't think they're anything more than another tool either, I just don't think they have to be any more individual, or self-aware as it were, than the average drone. I look at it like this: with a flashlight, or laser, or whatever, the part that focuses the beam cannot be done without and because it's the thing that brings everything else into alignment you might think it's role is more significant, but really it's not. Just because the consciousness of the Collective is focused through the queen doesn't add anything. It just happens to come through her. You're not trying to make them anything more than another tool of the Collective but your argument essentially implies that they are somehow a 'special' or indespensable tool. I don't like that. It reduces the Collective part of the Collective.
I don't think it's any bigger deal for the Collective to talk to an individual than it is for a Vulcan to talk to a Human. It's all alien (or Greek) to me.
If the Collective were trying to talk to an individual drone then the brain cell thing would work fine. But as it is they're relating to something external, so whether that external consciousness is individual or collective doesn't really matter. The gap is pretty much the same. The gap when dealing with an individual may seem more insignificant (in terms of the individual's ability) for the Collective, the motives may seem petty, (in short they may not like dealing with individuals) etc, but the actual relation isn't going to be that different. If they were dealing with another Collective consciousness it wouldn't be any different. The implicit assumption behind any belief that it would be easier for them is that any other collective consciousness would be essentially Borg-like. But that may not be the case, it could be a dream consciousness (similar to aliens in one Voy. episode) and not a hive-mind that centers around pure mathematical perspectives (efficiency, probability, etc). If that other collective consciousness is like the Borg only in that it is collective then why would relating to them be any easier than relating to an individual?
I'm enjoying this discussion but should we start another thread?
------------------ Proverbs for Paranoids, 3: If they can get you asking the wrong questions, they don't have to worry about answers.
[This message has been edited by jh (edited September 21, 1999).]
The First One
A lovely little thinker, but a bugger when he's pissed
Member # 35
posted
Well, no, why would we want to? This thread was created to discuss this stuff.
All you have to do is stop arguing at cross-purposes! Don't get bogged down in semantics. For a start, Sol has a point that the Collective might find it hard to interact with individuals. But I don't think that's why they created the speakers, be they Locutus or the Queen(s). The creation of a speaker in that context might imply compromise, and the Borg have no intention of compromising.
The Borg believe they are right. And nothing is going to persuade them otherwise. one might even say that the whole question of whether they are right or not is, to them, irrelevant. Locutus was a tool to persuade humanity that assimilation was inevitable and unavoidable. That's all. If humanity chose to ignore this message, then the iron claw inside the velvet glove would come into play. Likewise the Queen's duties as a speaker.
The ultimate question becomes: is the Queen an individual? The answer's no. However, she seemed to have far more of the Collective invested in her. Remember, that's what I started this thread to talk about: what IS the collective when it's quite demonstrably not a group mind comprising all the individuals that have been assimilated by it? The drones in "Unity" lost the main connection to the Collective and reasserted their individuality as a result. No Queen there, obviously. The mini-Collective in ST:FC had assimilated Cardassians, Klingons and Bolians and humans - yet had a Queen to keep them in line.
So the Queen isn't THE Collective, although to the unit itself it might seem like that. The overall Collective doesn't usually put much of itself into the individual drone apart from controlling it; but it does put more of itself into the Queen.
------------------ "The next time the workplace seems especially hectic, remind yourself it could be worse: you could have two-dozen sharp-toothed creatures chewing on your nipples." - James Lileks
The First One
A lovely little thinker, but a bugger when he's pissed
Member # 35
posted
Well, now you get into motivations. Was she telling the truth? But more interestingly, was she telling the whole truth?
Now, you might say it might not occur to the Borg to lie. They might not consider it necessary - after all, what can anyone do with such information against the all-powerful Borg?
But consider: "I am the Collective." Considering that they're shut off from the true Colleective and without her it's just a bunch of miffed ex-drones, then technically she's telling the truth. "I bring order from chaos" - maybe not a Borg Mission Statement, but really describing her function within the Collective. Without the existence of centralised, higher processing units such as Queens, once again the Collective is reduced to a bunch of fractious drones just as in "Unity." There was chaos on that planet, I'm sure you'll agree.
The best lies are always those which contain a significant amount of the truth. While Picard and Data were free and had a chance of resistance, she wasn't going to give them anything that might help them; but once Data had apparently given in, it never once occurred to her he might not be genuine 0 after all, resistance IS futile. . .
------------------ "The next time the workplace seems especially hectic, remind yourself it could be worse: you could have two-dozen sharp-toothed creatures chewing on your nipples." - James Lileks
posted
First One: No, no, no, no. You're saying exactly what I'm trying to keep us from having to deal with.
"Without the existence of centralised, higher processing units such as Queens, once again the Collective is reduced to a bunch of fractious drones just as in "Unity." There was chaos on that planet, I'm sure you'll agree."
It's not the that the queen is a centralised higher processer, it's just that she maintains the connection to the Collective. It's the loss of the connection that resutls in the regaining of individuality because the flow of information is no longer two way. It begins and ends with the individual. You said as much yourself two posts up.
What is the Collective if not just a group mind? I don't think we can answer that using anything that points to a particular part of the collective and I think the basic language that people use when talking about the queen does that inherently. Basically I think we're trying to figure out the Collective by looking at the queen instead of trying to figure out the queen by looking at the Collective.
Look at it this way. If you take the idea of Collective consciousness just as it is, you then think of practically how it would work if it were truly collective and not some Soviet style collective. Meaning, don't go into it with the idea that there have to be centralized parts or some sort of Polit Bureau (in a brain-functioning kind of way). You say that the collective is not a group mind made up of the individuals, and I agree with that. But why then would use that basic format when trying to figure out the collective? By pointing to the queen or centralizing her role or any role of the pieces of the collective you're basically saying that something has to exist to bring the individual minds of each drone into line with the collective. But then you're right back to the group mind which you don't want. Instead start with the idea of a mass consciousness where each drone, instead of being a mind, is just a thought, or a nerve cell. Sure a more complicated nerve cell than our own, but performing the same basic functions. Receive, react. That's it. That way the queen is just a router, without any more cognisant functions outside of the ordinary drone (which is what everyone else seems to be saying, that she has all the same functions and then some, including more awareness. Only they want to say that that doesn't make her more individualized or more centralized, something that strikes me as a contradiction) just different ones.
When the Queen says "I am the Collective" she's not making any special statement about her role, in my mind, she's only using language to emphasize each piece of the Collective is a piece of the totality. In a strange way it's the same as the Nike commercial "I am Tiger Woods". It's an identification with the larger picture or a message of belonging rather than a statement about function or role.
I just think that if you can't give the queen functions above that of the ordinary drone without taking some away from her, too. Giving her drone abilities plus 'blank' means you are making her somehow 'more' something. I don't like the 'more' part. It makes the Collective less even and more like the Polit Bureau.
------------------ Proverbs for Paranoids, 3: If they can get you asking the wrong questions, they don't have to worry about answers.
The First One
A lovely little thinker, but a bugger when he's pissed
Member # 35
posted
And you miss my point. What function the Queen ultimately plays is irrelevant, really. The fact remains she's no ordinary drone. Whether just a router, a centralised processor (but not THE central processor, I've always tried to draw parallels with the power distribution nodes) or whatever, there is something different about her. You can't just deny that because it goes against everything the Borg are supposed to be about. The fact remains: she's not a drone.
But more damningly, you missed the point that got me started on all this in the first place: The Borg are NOT a collection of minds. That would imply that it is a sum of the parts, and there are going to be a hell of a lot of parts that aren't happy at being mere parts. How many Borg were there on the Enterprise? How many of those do you think were ex-Starfleet? Most. There's no way that this mini-collective wouldn't come to be dominated by them! And what happened in "Unity?" Given the chance, the drones chose to be individuals again. Never mind that they then decided to re-establish a partial collective to enable them to function better together. . .
------------------ "The next time the workplace seems especially hectic, remind yourself it could be worse: you could have two-dozen sharp-toothed creatures chewing on your nipples." - James Lileks
Observation: People assimilated on the Enterprise E became standard Borg drones.
If the Collective is ruled by the will of those assimilated, the Borg onboard the Enterprise would have been made up of a majority of Starfleet officers. This, however, did not occur. Instead, the Borg aboard the Enterprise acted as all Borg do, even though they only had access to a collective made up of the drones aboard the ship.
Conclusion: While all the knowledge of an assimilated person is incorporated into the Collective, the "will" of the person is not. Hence, the Collective exists as an entity seperate from the minds of the assimilated.
In other words, the Borg Collective is an intelligence that coopts the minds of those who it assimilates.
Now, how does that relate to the "queen"? It suggests that the Collective stored certain important files in her to be used when cutoff from the rest of the Collective. Is she special? Only in a situation where there is no contact with the rest of the Borg. Zap a "queen" sitting on Planet 3832/X83129? Nothing happens. She wasn't doing anything that can't be done in a different matter. Zap a "queen" who's with some Borg in, say, 8472's space, and the drones connected to her die.
In fact, now that I think about it, that makes a lot of sense. Seven WAS a "queen"! Think about it...the plan was for her to take Voyager into fluidic space and use that weapon against 8472, yes? Well, that would set up conditions identical to First Contact. A small group of Borg in a situation where they were cut off from the rest of the Collective. (Of course, there's a nagging voice at the back of my head suggesting that she might have been in contact with the rest of the the Borg even while in fluidic space, which would negate this. Anyone?)
------------------ "And much of Madness, and more of Sin, and Horror the soul of the plot." -- The Conqueror Worm, by Edgar Allan Poe
posted
Seven said her link was weakened, not severed.
If the Borg are truely decentralized, how do you explain the Unicomplex seen in Dark Horizon? It seemed to be a central reference point (spacial grid 1, unimatrix 1, etc.).
The big question seems to be "Who's mind is it?" We've established that it can't be a general consensus among drones. Is it possible that there is a general consensus among the queens, and that that forms the hive mind? That is assuming, of course, that the queens are truely individual, and not just specialized drones. Let's say that each queen's domain is a subjunction, and that each subjucntion is divided into grids of a certain number of drones each. The collection of the queens would be called the unimatrix, or rather unimatrix 01, as the Borg would never just call something "the" whatever. Thus, if you're a "temporary adjunct to unimatrix 01", you're queen for a day, or something like that. So in the case that the queen dies, and that a signal from another nearby queen can't keep the collective together, or at least designate a temporary adjunct, the collective falls apart. Keep in mind that there would have to be millions of queens.
Quick recap: the queens are the true collective, and each queen has absolute control of the drones in her (his?) subjunction, but the collective controls the queens. If the collective is not available for some reason, be it temporal displacement or a dampening field, the queen has complete control of the drones in the area. If the queen fails, and nothing is available to take her place, the subjunction dies. Any problems with this theory?
On a side note, with this kind of system, the plan that that race (can't remember the name, but I think their designation was species 6339; anyone have a list of the species numbers seen so far?) had to destroy the collective ship by ship, in such a manner that by the time they realized what was happening, it would be too late, would probably work. Destroy the collective queen by queen.
------------------ For every complex problem, there is a solution that is simple, neat, and wrong. - H. L. Mencken
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