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Now You Feel Like Number None [Bleach Arrancar Quest]

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Anyway, I notice that the debate is - as it stands - filled with the Refuse and Nothing factions tearing into one another, ignoring the sizeable block who aren't really engaging and are simply voting for healing without much actual justification beyond "let's get rid of the debuff from being hurt".

So to people voting for the Healing, I direct this question - what do you think you're actually getting from this? What price do you think you're paying?

Because all these options have significant downsides. The argument between Refuse and Nothing is an argument between whether it's better to risk the ire and loss of Cirucci's one Espada ally vs the moral compromise of assisting in something and trying to mitigate it.

But all the assistant votes have their own downsides too, on top of the moral compromise of helping him. Getting him to lay off Cirucci also risks the alliance between them. "Nothing" means you're spending most of your "benefit points" on "trying to help mitigate things" and so it'll have much less of a reward than the others.

But what costs do you think the Healing will have? Because it will have a cost, and a significant one. Just like the others.

This is how @Omicron's votes go. There is no such thing as a vote which offers "N things, (N-1) of which have downsides and one which has no real downside". And that's what the "Oh, it'll be healing" unquestioned vote is.

Healing is not just a vote to remove a debuff. It's a vote to let Szayel into your insides, and in the long term it'll have a cost similar to "he's not Cirucci's ally anymore", from how the options are presented. No. If you want healing, have patience and accept the debuff and don't accept the very first thing offered to you by Szayel of all people. If you want healing, wait and try to justify vote options that will lead to Nemo being able to get her hands on the medical equipment that she can take to Esmeralda. Or other things. I don't believe the Winter War will start immediately after the gala, so it's probably not wise to act as if this is the last time possible to get healing when it is in fact the first time it's been offered and it's been literally only, like, 2 weeks tops since Nemo was injured in the first place.

Sensible people don't let Szayel anywhere near their inner organs. If you must sup with the devil, bring a long spoon. And don't give him a scalpel and wear more than a hospital gown to the dinner party.
 
EarthScorpion said:
Anyway, I notice that the debate is - as it stands - filled with the Refuse and Nothing factions tearing into one another, ignoring the sizeable block who aren't really engaging and are simply voting for healing without much actual justification beyond "let's get rid of the debuff from being hurt".

So to people voting for the Healing, I direct this question - what do you think you're actually getting from this? What price do you think you're paying?

Because all these options have significant downsides. The argument between Refuse and Nothing is an argument between whether it's better to risk the ire and loss of Cirucci's one Espada ally vs the moral compromise of assisting in something and trying to mitigate it.

But all the assistant votes have their own downsides too, on top of the moral compromise of helping him. Getting him to lay off Cirucci also risks the alliance between them. "Nothing" means you're spending most of your "benefit points" on "trying to help mitigate things" and so it'll have much less of a reward than the others.

But what costs do you think the Healing will have? Because it will have a cost, and a significant one. Just like the others.

This is how @Omicron's votes go. There is no such thing as a vote which offers "N things, (N-1) of which have downsides and one which has no real downside". And that's what the "Oh, it'll be healing" unquestioned vote is.

Healing is not just a vote to remove a debuff. It's a vote to let Szayel into your insides, and in the long term it'll have a cost similar to "he's not Cirucci's ally anymore", from how the options are presented. No. If you want healing, have patience and accept the debuff and don't accept the very first thing offered to you by Szayel of all people. If you want healing, wait and try to justify vote options that will lead to Nemo being able to get her hands on the medical equipment that she can take to Esmeralda. Or other things. I don't believe the Winter War will start immediately after the gala, so it's probably not wise to act as if this is the last time possible to get healing when it is in fact the first time it's been offered and it's been literally only, like, 2 weeks tops since Nemo was injured in the first place.

Sensible people don't let Szayel anywhere near their inner organs. If you must sup with the devil, bring a long spoon. And don't give him a scalpel and wear more than a hospital gown to the dinner party.
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Or to put it another way: don't vote for healing unless you're okay with Nemo's spleen whispering to her as she sleeps and telling her to bring Szayel more test subjects.
 
[X] Work with Szayel. In exchange you will ask for…
-[X] Nothing. By feigning pure scientific interest in his work and an eagerness to help him, you will please him greatly and make him less likely to scrutinize your work, putting you in a better position to make the Sacrophagus less inhumane, and perhaps giving you the opportunity to pilfer Szayel's notes on other subjects for your own use.
 
EarthScorpion said:
Anyway, I notice that the debate is - as it stands - filled with the Refuse and Nothing factions tearing into one another, ignoring the sizeable block who aren't really engaging and are simply voting for healing without much actual justification beyond "let's get rid of the debuff from being hurt".

So to people voting for the Healing, I direct this question - what do you think you're actually getting from this? What price do you think you're paying?

Because all these options have significant downsides. The argument between Refuse and Nothing is an argument between whether it's better to risk the ire and loss of Cirucci's one Espada ally vs the moral compromise of assisting in something and trying to mitigate it.

But all the assistant votes have their own downsides too, on top of the moral compromise of helping him. Getting him to lay off Cirucci also risks the alliance between them. "Nothing" means you're spending most of your "benefit points" on "trying to help mitigate things" and so it'll have much less of a reward than the others.

But what costs do you think the Healing will have? Because it will have a cost, and a significant one. Just like the others.

This is how @Omicron's votes go. There is no such thing as a vote which offers "N things, (N-1) of which have downsides and one which has no real downside". And that's what the "Oh, it'll be healing" unquestioned vote is.

Healing is not just a vote to remove a debuff. It's a vote to let Szayel into your insides, and in the long term it'll have a cost similar to "he's not Cirucci's ally anymore", from how the options are presented. No. If you want healing, have patience and accept the debuff and don't accept the very first thing offered to you by Szayel of all people. If you want healing, wait and try to justify vote options that will lead to Nemo being able to get her hands on the medical equipment that she can take to Esmeralda. Or other things. I don't believe the Winter War will start immediately after the gala, so it's probably not wise to act as if this is the last time possible to get healing when it is in fact the first time it's been offered and it's been literally only, like, 2 weeks tops since Nemo was injured in the first place.

Sensible people don't let Szayel anywhere near their inner organs. If you must sup with the devil, bring a long spoon. And don't give him a scalpel and wear more than a hospital gown to the dinner party.
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we can stay awake the entire time to tell him just what he can and cannot do, also, we have Esmeralda and the glove to get rid of any surprises.
 
*frowns* I was always caught between Refuse and Nothing, and if nothing else, pragmatism demands I swap my vote over.
[X] Work with Szayel. In exchange you will ask for…
-[X] Nothing. By feigning pure scientific interest in his work and an eagerness to help him, you will please him greatly and make him less likely to scrutinize your work, putting you in a better position to make the Sacrophagus less inhumane, and perhaps giving you the opportunity to pilfer Szayel's notes on other subjects for your own use.
 
dredloki said:
we can stay awake the entire time to tell him just what he can and cannot do, also, we have Esmeralda and the glove to get rid of any surprises.
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I doubt Nemo's medical skill is good enough to catch whatever extras Szayel decides to add unless they're pretty obvious- as an example, if he decides to sew our damaged organs closed with a parasitic tapeworm that tracks our movements and is grown to look exactly like surgical thread, how are we meant to know the difference? Similarly, the glove isn't perfect- we don't have total control over what we see with it- and Esmeralda's somewhat crippled in the investigative area of medicine due to lacking the ability to sense reiatsu and lacking proper equipment.
 
[X] Work with Szayel. In exchange you will ask for…
-[X] Nothing. By feigning pure scientific interest in his work and an eagerness to help him, you will please him greatly and make him less likely to scrutinize your work, putting you in a better position to make the Sacrophagus less inhumane, and perhaps giving you the opportunity to pilfer Szayel's notes on other subjects for your own use.
 
dredloki said:
we can stay awake the entire time to tell him just what he can and cannot do, also, we have Esmeralda and the glove to get rid of any surprises.
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Yeah but you don't have Champion Medicine or whatever his rank in Mad Hollow Science is so it's not like you can perfectly understand everything he does :V

I promised this wouldn't be "spycams and a kill-switch," not that it would be without drawbacks. Or benefits. Or benefits which are also drawbacks.
 
Omicron said:
Yeah but you don't have Champion Medicine or whatever his rank in Mad Hollow Science is so it's not like you can perfectly understand everything he does :V

I promised this wouldn't be "spycams and a kill-switch," not that it would be without drawbacks. Or benefits. Or benefits which are also drawbacks.
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Well that's just convinces me that the healing option is even better.

"Listen to your heart Nemo"
"Aizen is all and you shall love him with every pulse"
 
EarthScorpion said:
Anyway, I notice that the debate is - as it stands - filled with the Refuse and Nothing factions tearing into one another, ignoring the sizeable block who aren't really engaging and are simply voting for healing without much actual justification beyond "let's get rid of the debuff from being hurt".

So to people voting for the Healing, I direct this question - what do you think you're actually getting from this? What price do you think you're paying?

Because all these options have significant downsides. The argument between Refuse and Nothing is an argument between whether it's better to risk the ire and loss of Cirucci's one Espada ally vs the moral compromise of assisting in something and trying to mitigate it.

But all the assistant votes have their own downsides too, on top of the moral compromise of helping him. Getting him to lay off Cirucci also risks the alliance between them. "Nothing" means you're spending most of your "benefit points" on "trying to help mitigate things" and so it'll have much less of a reward than the others.

But what costs do you think the Healing will have? Because it will have a cost, and a significant one. Just like the others.

This is how @Omicron's votes go. There is no such thing as a vote which offers "N things, (N-1) of which have downsides and one which has no real downside". And that's what the "Oh, it'll be healing" unquestioned vote is.

Healing is not just a vote to remove a debuff. It's a vote to let Szayel into your insides, and in the long term it'll have a cost similar to "he's not Cirucci's ally anymore", from how the options are presented. No. If you want healing, have patience and accept the debuff and don't accept the very first thing offered to you by Szayel of all people. If you want healing, wait and try to justify vote options that will lead to Nemo being able to get her hands on the medical equipment that she can take to Esmeralda. Or other things. I don't believe the Winter War will start immediately after the gala, so it's probably not wise to act as if this is the last time possible to get healing when it is in fact the first time it's been offered and it's been literally only, like, 2 weeks tops since Nemo was injured in the first place.

Sensible people don't let Szayel anywhere near their inner organs. If you must sup with the devil, bring a long spoon. And don't give him a scalpel and wear more than a hospital gown to the dinner party.
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Please see...
Omicron said:
If you let Szayel heal you, it is very likely that he might think that as long as he's wrist-deep in your lungs he might as well do some "improvements."

That doesn't mean picking this choice automatically means you get implanted with spy cameras and a kill-switch. There are ways to avoid the worst. For one, Szayel seems to genuinely feel like Cirucci and him are on the way to being fast friends, so that rules out "Nemo wakes up a horrible mutant freak."

Beyond that, Nemo has tools of her own. She's actually tough enough that she doesn't have to go under for surgery, as seen when Esmeralda operated on her, so she could just watch. She's creepy that way. The Memory Glove, post-operation, might let her get a glimpse of what exactly Szayel did to her. She has a high enough Medicine skill that she can double-check what Szayel is doing to her, and afterwards might pay a visit to Esmeralda for a check-up and perhaps some modifications to Szayel's modifications if they turn out to have been untoward.

That doesn't mean it's a safe choice by any means. It could cause Nemo some real issues. It could improve her in some way. It could improve her in a way that causes real issues. But it's not exposing yourself, totally defenseless, to someone who might do anything with your body.
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So yes, there is risk, but it's not completely unmitigateable.
 
dredloki said:
we can stay awake the entire time to tell him just what he can and cannot do, also, we have Esmeralda and the glove to get rid of any surprises.
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Whether you are awake or not, there's a limited amount of things you can do to stop the good doctor from making spirited "upgrades" in the heat of the moment, especially when he's acting out of enthusiastic goodwill.

Both in the sense that physically stopping him would be extremely difficult if he decides to put his foot down and puts us under for the rest of the operation, because we'll ultimately thank him for surgically removing our capacity for fear anyways, and in the sense that we'd have to be very careful not to offend him, because in his mind all the messed up things he might do to us are pure benefits he's offering out of the goodness in his heart.
 
Pipeman said:
Whether you are awake or not, there's a limited amount of things you can do to stop the good doctor from making spirited "upgrades" in the heat of the moment, especially when he's acting out of enthusiastic goodwill.

Both in the sense that physically stopping him would be extremely difficult if he decides to put his foot down and puts us under for the rest of the operation, because we'll ultimately thank him for surgically removing our capacity for fear anyways, and in the sense that we'd have to be very careful not to offend him, because in his mind all the messed up things he might do to us are pure benefits he's offering out of the goodness in his heart.
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Obviously our small intestine will be greatly improved if it can leap up out of our throat and strangle people!
 
Pipeman said:
Both in the sense that physically stopping him would be extremely difficult if he decides to put his foot down and puts us under for the rest of the operation, because we'll ultimately thank him for surgically removing our capacity for fear anyways, and in the sense that we'd have to be very careful not to offend him, because in his mind all the messed up things he might do to us are pure benefits he's offering out of the goodness in his heart.
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Please stop fear-mongering.

He's not going to do anything to piss off Cirruci. Omi has even said this.
 
[X] Work with Szayel. In exchange you will ask for…
-[X] Healing your crippling injuries. With the Quinta as your mistress, there is no risk of him offending her by turning you into a freaky mutant, but letting Szayel play around with your insides might still have consequences, even - especially - if he believes he's helping you doing so. Then again, these consequences could be positive…
 
AmineHsu said:
Please stop fear-mongering.

He's not going to do anything to piss off Cirruci. Omi has even said this.
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The problem is, his views on what would be beneficial for us or not (and as a result, what would piss off Cirucci) are a little skewed. Sure, he's not going to mutate us into a horrific half-moth half-bird monster, but there's a ton of stuff he could do that falls way below that line and that would still be detrimental. Implanting our heart with Yammy cells to increase the amount of spiritual energy we can store at the cost of reduced emotional control, for example.
 
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Personally I don't think getting healed by him, even if he is on the level, in exchange for our help is worth it. Mostly because I don't feel that it is in character for Nemo to make such a bargain, as the girl is far too self sacrificing for that.
 
NSMS said:
---[+] Stab yourself in the heart.
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---- [+] Cutely.

[X] Work with Szayel. In exchange you will ask for…
-[X] Nothing. By feigning pure scientific interest in his work and an eagerness to help him, you will please him greatly and make him less likely to scrutinize your work, putting you in a better position to make the Sacrophagus less inhumane, and perhaps giving you the opportunity to pilfer Szayel's notes on other subjects for your own use.
 
One thing I want to refute is the idea that Szayel is the only ally Cirucci potentially has among the Espada. As much as Nemo may dislike him, Barragan has just as much claim to that title, and is possibly more useful and certainly more trustworthy than the Octava.

Hell, I'd even say Grimmjow is more reliable, in a shounen rivalry sort of way, than Szayelaporro will ever be.

There certainly is a case to be made that annoying an Espada is a bad idea, but I think the claim that Cirucci would be completely isolated as a result is overstating it.
 
EarthScorpion said:
So to people voting for the Healing, I direct this question - what do you think you're actually getting from this? What price do you think you're paying?
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So to try and answer this question instead of just going "Well, surely the price can't be that bad!":

I don't know what the price of any "improvements" will be. There are simply too many unknowns for me to say it with certainty. There will be some, of cause, but I doubt it'll be too much. Likely some small adjustments that none-the-less makes Nemo feel less like herself whenever they become apparent. Maybe if we're unfortunate something that Cirucci can pick up on as well, though thankfully our mask of propiety will help shield this a bit, hiding Nemo's discomfort.

However, that's not where I think the 'real' price in going for healing is. I think that comes more from letting Szayel get a good and hard look at Nemo herself. Yes, he has already scanned her, but there's a difference between getting a scan of Nemo in neutral mode and literally sticking a camera inside her guts (and let's not assume that there isn't a camera inside his glasses). Szayel being Szayel, this means he'll have the perfect countermeasure prepared in case he ever goes up against Nemo, at the very least at the levels where he can presumably counter her healing factor. Given how he is one of the more amoral Espada (and that's not something to say lightly), there's a decent-or-better chance that his path will one day cross Cirucci's in a non-friendly way. And if that happens, well, being able to shut down Nemo is an immense benefit, especially if he manages to sucker-punch Cirucci and take Nemo hostage.

And of course there's also the opportunity cost of not getting the Szayel affection points that Nothing gives and the control we cede over what exactly the mad scientist will learn.

That said, I also think getting to look into Nemo will boost Szayel's knowledgebase more than just giving him guidance. Nemo is probably the second or third strongest Arrancar with High Speed Regeneration around (depending on how you count Mr. 9), a trait that is usually a sign of relative weakness in Arrancar. Seeing how it works might allow him to add it more effectively to his clones, and possibly even use the Maraña technique we give him him together with a Nemo catalyst to build a regen-factor into the Sarcophagus. Which would probably allow him to cut some safety-measures to keep Yammy alive or something similar.
My point with this is that healing might also be the option that boosts Las Noches' powerbase the most (even if only by a slight amount), and given how the winter war canonically ended we need whatever power we can get. Even if said power might eventually turn against us.


(And yes, I realise the irony of me starting this post by saying other people underestimate the cost of the physical alterations before immediately saying I don't think the improvements are the real cost. I didn't say I was any better than the rest of the Heal voters)
 
Omicron said:
But if you want to argue which of Consequentialism or Deontology or Virtue Ethics or Whatever Else is Objectively Morally Superior And Correct, I invite you to make a thread in the Humanities forum, where you can devour each other in an endless circle of pointless hunger thinking you'll solve debates that have existed for basically all of history.
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But this is a Hollow quest??
 
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