Scientia Weaponizes The Future

[Jastolus]

I think the critical point might be some sort of admission that all these inventions aren't just hers.
Because let's be honest, any human capable of this much on their own has more of a superpower than a Tinker cape. There isn't much difference between being hopelessly inferior to a cape and being hopelessly inferior to a genius superior to all previous humans by multiple orders of magnitude.
For her knowledge and power to actually inspire normal humans, or at least humans who aren't supernaturally intelligent, they need to believe that there is in fact a hope for them to make a difference in a similar way. Which means they need to know that all this knowledge was created by a lot of people over a long time.

Of course that throws up the question of how the hell she would communicate that without causing a lot of new problems.
Claiming it's time travel would be correct in a way, but has problems of how people would view her and so on.
Saying she's from an alternate dimension with more advanced technology is also possible, and in a way correct, but it may lead to people seeing her as an outsider with too much power over 'their' world.

I don't really have a solution, only what I think is a decent enough explanation of the issue with the current approach.

 

[BurnBright]

Okay, made an edit that might, I hope, thread the needle. Let me know what you think.


I guess we were thinking along similar lines, that's essentially what I did, although I was a bit coy about the details. A significant number of people would be repulsed by claims that she augmented her brain and so on, so it's better to be vague about it for PR reasons.

Click to shrink...

I will say that still, claiming she isn't a parahuman seems wrong. Yes, humanity can do incredible things, but this kind of false hope seems both wrong, and sort of out of character for Scientia? It's also, again, sort of unbelievable to anyone with even a slight understanding of just how bonkers her stuff is, which, as seen on PHO, is many people.

 

[Setras]

Thanks for the chapter! Hope your ribs heal up quickly!

 

[Ravenwood240]

She's not a parahuman; something that can be proven.

And any human with the alterations she has could do what she is doing. Is she super human? Yes, but superhuman and parahuman tinker are two completely different types of people.

Especially since she can create more people like her.

Trying to pass herself off as a parahuman and getting caught out would everything She's done to dispute and claims of fraud.

 

[Satisfaction]

She's not a parahuman; something that can be proven.

And any human with the alterations she has could do what she is doing. Is she super human? Yes, but superhuman and parahuman tinker are two completely different types of people.

Especially since she can create more people like her.

Trying to pass herself off as a parahuman and getting caught out would everything She's done to dispute and claims of fraud.

Click to shrink...

No it wouldn't. She can just claim it's a remote body, which is a technology she has and can prove she has. Her real body? Why would she expose it to potential parahuman assassins? Plus, how would she even get caught out? Dragon managed to hide being an AI and not having a physical body for years, which is a much bigger secret that's much more easily exposed than 'well technically it's not the same sort of superpowers'. Even if some cape detector comes across her and can't detect her capehood, is the reaction gonna be 'oh no everything is a lie Scientia is actually a normie human supergenius' or 'weird tinker anti-thinker thing'?

 

[JustDusty]

I still don't understand why Scientia(Taylor?) decided to undo all her efforts in keeping a low profile and challenged the S9 openly, and then posted it online. I'm pretty sure she spent dozens of charges on spycraft related enhancements. Oh, and she murdered Victor just to keep him quiet. But none of that matters anymore apparently

 

[TaliesinSkye]

I still don't understand why Scientia(Taylor?) decided to undo all her efforts in keeping a low profile and challenged the S9 openly, and then posted it online. I'm pretty sure she spent dozens of charges on spycraft related enhancements. Oh, and she murdered Victor just to keep him quiet. But none of that matters anymore apparently

Click to shrink...

She built an artificial body with her old face, and she used that for the reveal along with the adopted Scientia name. Her civilian identity is arguably safer this way, since everyone will be looking for completely the wrong person.

 

[Aineko]

Scientia was never very good at keeping a low profile, what with the scientific publications! And doing so was always a tool rather than a goal.

 

[Ravenwood240]

No it wouldn't. She can just claim it's a remote body, which is a technology she has and can prove she has. Her real body? Why would she expose it to potential parahuman assassins? Plus, how would she even get caught out? Dragon managed to hide being an AI and not having a physical body for years, which is a much bigger secret that's much more easily exposed than 'well technically it's not the same sort of superpowers'. Even if some cape detector comes across her and can't detect her capehood, is the reaction gonna be 'oh no everything is a lie Scientia is actually a normie human supergenius' or 'weird tinker anti-thinker thing'?

Click to shrink...

Dragon hid being an AI by never being seen in a human appearance body, something that the protagonist is not doing.

Plus, at some point, she is going to have to prove that A. She isn't a parahuman and that nothing she does is tinkertech to the satisfaction of a court.

NEAPA 5, remember? Shes going to step on the toes of some of the big industries with her stuff. When she starts costing them money, they will fight back, and the first thing they're going to try is claiming that she is violating the law. Plus, if she's considered a parahuman, she's automatically under the PRT, and does anyone want fandom Tagg, among others having access to her weapons? She has to stay out of the hands of the PRT and the only way to do that is to not be in their jurisdiction in the first place.

No, being a parahuman is bad for her plans and vision of the future.

 

[Aineko]

NEAPA 5, remember? Shes going to step on the toes of some of the big industries with her stuff. When she starts costing them money, they will fight back, and the first thing they're going to try is claiming that she is violating the law. Plus, if she's considered a parahuman, she's automatically under the PRT, and does anyone want fandom Tagg, among others having access to her weapons? She has to stay out of the hands of the PRT and the only way to do that is to not be in their jurisdiction in the first place.

Click to shrink...

Wait, what? There's no rule that the PRT owns all parahumans.

 

[Satisfaction]

Dragon hid being an AI by never being seen in a human appearance body, something that the protagonist is not doing.

Plus, at some point, she is going to have to prove that A. She isn't a parahuman and that nothing she does is tinkertech to the satisfaction of a court.

NEAPA 5, remember? Shes going to step on the toes of some of the big industries with her stuff. When she starts costing them money, they will fight back, and the first thing they're going to try is claiming that she is violating the law. Plus, if she's considered a parahuman, she's automatically under the PRT, and does anyone want fandom Tagg, among others having access to her weapons? She has to stay out of the hands of the PRT and the only way to do that is to not be in their jurisdiction in the first place.

No, being a parahuman is bad for her plans and vision of the future.

Click to shrink...

No, she is a parahuman. She has superpowers, therefore she is a parahuman. That those superpowers don't come from the same source other people's superpowers do is completely irrelevant as far as the law is concerned, because the law does not make that distinction. They don't even know that distinction exists; nobody except Cauldron knows the source of powers. Powers are powers. So what if a parahuman detector doesn't 'ding' when it comes to Scientia? She obviously has powers, the detector is wrong. Maybe tinker anti-thinker bullshit, maybe stranger power, maybe power oddity #193, whatever. Nobody's going to look at a negative reading and go 'well, gee golly willikers, I guess you aren't a parahuman after all! All our parahuman laws don't apply to you miss Scientia, please feel free to do whatever you like'.

Additionally, we don't know much of anything about either NEPEA-5 or the legal status of tinkertech, so citing those things is kind of disingenuous. Even then, 'other people can build it' (and they can) is probably proof enough. She publishes papers. Yeah she's gonna get a lot of legal challenges from big (insert industry) but they'd do that regardless, claim she's a parahuman regardless and she's gonna be unable to prove her lack of parahumanity regardless because she does, in fact, have superpowers and brain-weirdness. That it's not the same kind doesn't matter. She's not getting out of things on some sort of bullshit technicality.

 

[Kryslin]

Perhaps Ravenwood should have worded that "...under the jurisdiction of the PRT..."

Parahuman crime is their remit, after all.

 

[Ravenwood240]

Wait, what? There's no rule that the PRT owns all parahumans.

Click to shrink...

Um, the enforcement of the law as regards parahumans is the direct responsibility of the PRT, therefore, every parahuman in America and Canada is, in fact, under their jurisdiction.

If business A accuses her of being a parahuman or making Tinkertech, the PRT is the agency that will have to make the ruling.

WoG, by WB. "The Protectorate is a parahuman organization working under the PRT that has agreed to accept government funding and legitimacy and agreed to follow a special set of laws laid out for parahumans, to accept bureaucratic oversight and cooperate with local authorities."

Note the phrase "special set of laws laid out for parahumans."

Medhall accuses her of being a tinker, because her new burn healing ray can't be reproduced by their scientists.

The PRT is the organization that will determine whether the accusations are true, because that is their job, dealing with parahumans.

 

[TaliesinSkye]

I could probably write a whole comedy about the PRT/US Government attempting to regulate Scientia and failing, if I were inclined.

Sue her to enforce the law? It would be somewhat frustrating to try to serve her at first, given that they have no name and no idea of her location, although that's a solvable problem. Then they'd have to prove that she is, in fact, a parahuman. Depending on how expansive the legal definition is, that might be quite impossible.

Even if they won such a lawsuit, what remedy can the court actually grant?

Levy a fine? How do you collect? She doesn't really have any visible assets to go after. And she could just pay arbitrarily high fines if she wants, so fines aren't really a deterrent.

Award damages? It would be difficult to point to any except perhaps for economic damages from what NEPEA might call unfair parahuman competition, but if Scientia hasn't actually sold any products, just explained how to do things...there isn't really an argument there. Speech alone isn't economic harm, even if you're a car manufacturer and somebody tells all your customers how to make their own cars that are faster and cheaper than yours and also fly. And again, money isn't really a deterrent even if it were enforceable.

Order her to stop publishing papers, or explaining things to people? That's prior restraint on speech and probably outside the court's power, and even if a court did it anyway, she could just publish them outside of U.S. jurisdiction. The internet is globally accessible.

If she produced actual products a court could order them not to be sold in the U.S., but she doesn't, and even if she did and such an order were made, the result is that the whole rest of the world would have access to Scientia's groundbreaking products except for the U.S. The court would effectively be shooting the whole country in the foot. "What's that, you want biological immortality? Sorry, I can't sell it to Americans, there's a stupid court order. Take it up with the judge."

I suppose if a court or the PRT were completely mad they could try to arrest her, but because of her firepower, information supremacy, and mobility it would be a rather difficult task if she wasn't inclined to play along, to say the least. The Gunboat Diplomacy alone has enough ordinance onboard to equal a strategic nuclear arsenal. She could decline to engage, or scare the government into making peace.

And that's aside from other ways she could deal with the problem before it ever got that far, like a hostile takeover of the public corporation that tried suing her, or bribery and blackmail, or character assassination, or Cauldron, even. Some of that is the sort of villainy that she likely wouldn't resort to, but it's theoretically within her capabilities.

In summary, she has enough power and utility both that she can ensure rational actors apply a double standard to her, regardless of what the law says. Sure, the law isn't supposed to have double standards in application, but it's implemented by humans. That's always the greatest weakness of legal systems.

 

[Aineko]

Um, the enforcement of the law as regards parahumans is the direct responsibility of the PRT, therefore, every parahuman in America and Canada is, in fact, under their jurisdiction.

If business A accuses her of being a parahuman or making Tinkertech, the PRT is the agency that will have to make the ruling.

WoG, by WB. "The Protectorate is a parahuman organization working under the PRT that has agreed to accept government funding and legitimacy and agreed to follow a special set of laws laid out for parahumans, to accept bureaucratic oversight and cooperate with local authorities."

Note the phrase "special set of laws laid out for parahumans."

Medhall accuses her of being a tinker, because her new burn healing ray can't be reproduced by their scientists.

The PRT is the organization that will determine whether the accusations are true, because that is their job, dealing with parahumans.

Click to shrink...

So, you didn't say "jurisdiction", and what you said doesn't hold if you meant jurisdiction. Being deemed a parahuman and thus under PRT jurisdiction wouldn't give Tagg access to Scientia's weapons. It probably doesn't even give him unrestricted access to Armsmaster's tech, let alone someone who isn't a Protectorate member. Independent parahumans exist and they very blatantly don't dance to the PRT's demands.

The PRT is not a court. Maybe possibly they make a preliminary evaluation, but the actual resolution of all the questions you're claiming they control would be in a court case.

 

[LostArchivist]

If she produced actual products

Click to shrink...

Wasn't she discussing either doing that or selling various materials to make up her "pay villains to behave" fund? The latter'd be a shoe-in for a "power-provided/made goods" suit, although there's still the issue that they can't prove she has powers.

Also, the PRT could possibly pull some sort of "we're sure she's Mastered" card and lock her up indefinitely. Not that they could grab her or keep her contained, but they could heavily discourage the average person's interactions with her.

 

[Aineko]

Also, the PRT could possibly pull some sort of "we're sure she's Mastered" card and lock her up indefinitely. Not that they could grab her or keep her contained, but they could heavily discourage the average person's interactions with her.

Click to shrink...

They could try, but if I were calling the shots for the PRT I would not be eager to pick a fight with Scientia in the court of public opinion.

And of course given that Cauldron is in fact calling the shots for the PRT and they're on-side with Scientia, they definitely aren't going to go all-in on trying to crush her.

 

[TaliesinSkye]

Selling things is a possibility in the future, but as of yet not happening. The PRT would most likely be one of the first customers.

 

[BurnBright]

Then they'd have to prove that she is, in fact, a parahuman. Depending on how expansive the legal definition is, that might be quite impossible.

Click to shrink...

I highly doubt it'd be hard at all. Remember, Corona Pollentias and Gemmas are not easily findable, so the definition for Parahuman won't involve them. The simple fact of what she's producing means that, no matter what she claims, she will be considered a parahuman. As things stand, no one but idiots (and people in the know) think she isn't a parahuman, because for all intents and purposes, she is.

 

[TaliesinSkye]

It really depends on how the definition was drafted. Parahuman powers are so broad it would have to be somewhat vague, but it would also necessarily have to exclude stuff that obviously wasn't parahuman. Something like 'Individuals with unique powers or abilities' or something about 'abilities or technologies that defy scientific understanding', perhaps.

I suspect that most definitions of 'parahuman' that included Scientia would necessarily risk including regular scientists and engineers, but of course all of this is highly speculative.

 

[BurnBright]

It really depends on how the definition was drafted. Parahuman powers are so broad it would have to be somewhat vague, but it would also necessarily have to exclude stuff that obviously wasn't parahuman. Something like 'Individuals with unique powers or abilities' or something about 'abilities or technologies that defy scientific understanding', perhaps.

I suspect that most definitions of 'parahuman' that included Scientia would necessarily risk including regular scientists and engineers, but of course all of this is highly speculative.

Click to shrink...

My off the cuff definition would be 'someone who has abilities that are considerably outside the human norm and should not be possible by our understanding of human limitations', which, yes, would cover Scientia. Maybe her individual breakthroughs wouldn't be covered by that, but collectively she's far outside the human norm. And, if Cauldron wasn't puppeting things, Scientia would have an exception carved out to refer to her as a Parahuman, because it's obvious that she is one.

 

[Anti-No]

My off the cuff definition would be 'someone who has abilities that are considerably outside the human norm and should not be possible by our understanding of human limitations', which, yes, would cover Scientia. Maybe her individual breakthroughs wouldn't be covered by that, but collectively she's far outside the human norm. And, if Cauldron wasn't puppeting things, Scientia would have an exception carved out to refer to her as a Parahuman, because it's obvious that she is one.

Click to shrink...

...meaning that anyone with money could say that their political opposition obviously was a parahuman, get them sent towards the birdcage on trumped up charges... and that would be it, because you can't even contest that decision once it has been made. I'm sure nobody in the history of ever would even think about abusing that loophole.

 

[Ravenwood240]

I highly doubt it'd be hard at all. Remember, Corona Pollentias and Gemmas are not easily findable, so the definition for Parahuman won't involve them. The simple fact of what she's producing means that, no matter what she claims, she will be considered a parahuman. As things stand, no one but idiots (and people in the know) think she isn't a parahuman, because for all intents and purposes, she is.

Click to shrink...

There is one line in Worm that says they are hard to find... but everyone focuses on it.

Note that that was Bonesaw talking and she was talking about finding them without tools. No MRI, CAT scan, hell, not even an xray. Everything in the body is hard to find using the mk 1 eyeball and scalpels.

Later on, in Ward, Bonesaw was discussing them again and stated the tumors were between a quarter and a golfball in size.

Any qualified technician would easily see something that big on an MRI.

Plus, the national sports leagues use MRIs to screen for parahumans and considering the amount of money involved in pro sports, do you really think they'd be allowed to do so if the evidence wasn't conclusive?

"Wait, I'm losing out on a 40 million dollar five year contract, just because I have some growth?"

Anyone who thinks that wouldn't lead to lawsuits doesn't know Americans.

And, they would be right to sue the leagues. If an MRI cannot prove the parahuman conditions, you cannot use it to deny employment.

So, since Triumph was unable to join the league, not because he was scanned, but because he didn't want to take the scan, it has to be effective in detecting parahumans.

In this case, though, there are no tumors to detect. Our hero doesn't have the second one, and may not have the first one anymore.

That means that whether she is a parahuman is up to the OP. At some point over the ladt 30 years, Earth Bet has created a legal definition of a parahuman. The OP has to decide what that definition is, how it is worded and how it is proven in a court of law.

Weld, clearly parahuman.
Skitter, not so much.
And yet, the courts are going to have to prove that this person sitting here, is the person that did X action. Without some physical evidence that this person is Skitter/Tattletale/other normal appearance person is the evil parahuman, too many of the masters, tinkers and other normal appearing criminals would escape justice by creating reasonable doubt.

No, whatever legal defination of a parahuman Earth Bet settled on, it has to include some physical component and the two tumors are the one thing that all parahumans have somewhere. The only ones that you can't MRI to find it are Garrote and Weld. The first because of uncontrolled tentacle death and the second because metal.

But if you need proof that those two are parahumans, you don't live on Earth Bet. There is no X-gene there, no Spider-Man, Daredevil, Hulk,etc. In Earth Bet, there is only one way to get super powers, and that way comes with two tumors.

After 30 years of dealing with this, the definition should be very clear by now, and cover identifying every parahuman from Crawler to Heartbreaker.

 

[TaliesinSkye]

I suspect the issue would rarely come up, outside of athletics. A villain is unlikely to be caught committing crimes in any situation where they could realistically claim to have no power, for instance. There'd generally be physical evidence, witnesses, etc. It'd probably take pretty unusual circumstances to make it a viable enough defense that an MRI to resolve the matter would even be necessary. Maybe a tinker villain who tried to claim that they didn't actually make all the stuff they were using, or something of that nature. But even then, and even if MRIs weren't reliable and the defense worked, it wouldn't really help them because all the stuff they did was still a crime. It might get them out of assault with a parahuman power, but that's probably a minor charge compared to felony larceny or aggravated assault or homicide or whatever.

 

[Ravenwood240]

I suspect the issue would rarely come up, outside of athletics. A villain is unlikely to be caught committing crimes in any situation where they could realistically claim to have no power, for instance. There'd generally be physical evidence, witnesses, etc. It'd probably take pretty unusual circumstances to make it a viable enough defense that an MRI to resolve the matter would even be necessary. Maybe a tinker villain who tried to claim that they didn't actually make all the stuff they were using, or something of that nature. But even then, and even if MRIs weren't reliable and the defense worked, it wouldn't really help them because all the stuff they did was still a crime. It might get them out of assault with a parahuman power, but that's probably a minor charge compared to felony larceny or aggravated assault or homicide or whatever.

Click to shrink...

Heartbreaker. How do you prove this man is a cape?
Skitter. If you catch her out of costume, how do you prove she is a master?
L33t. How do you prove he's a tinker, let alone a specific one?
There are hundreds of parahumans that show zero sign of being a cape. Short of them using their power openly, with no costume, how do you prove to a jury that A. This is the cape in question, and B. That they are not the minion of a master cape, using them as a cutout to avoid being arrested.

I would think that the question has come up many times in the thirty years since Scion appeared.