Lohengrin

You have to make some broad assumptions yes. But when your entire ideology is based on broad assumptions alone or things you think are axioms(Like humans are mainly motivated by greed), then you are trying to shoehorn social science into becoming a natural science.

While this may be true, it does put me in mind of the modern-day communists: Communist: We should nationalise the whole economy, and collectivise agriculture, and all work for the common good instead of selfish gain. Me: Yes, but they tried that in Russia (and elsewhere), and it was a disaster. Communist: Ah, but that wasn't 'pure' Communism, because of X, Y and Z, and pure Communism would definitely work and we should definitely give it another chance. Me: No. Anyway, fair or not, American-style capitalism has taken a massive reputation hit across the globe, and I look forward to seeing how this affects the dynamic between the World Bank and IMF and developing countries. It is not suprising. Ayn Rand developed her ideology in direct opposition to the communists, and she did it by adapting their style of rhetoric and their naive faith in the idea that human society can be understood and predicted simply like cogs in a machine, if only one applies the correct scientific formula in social science. It was a popular idea in many political circles at the beginning of the 20th century that human society could be understood and predicted using the same principles as was being proven very succesful in natural sciences. It is largely discredited now, but communists and objectivists still cling to it because without it their whole ideology falls apart.

I know people who have had problems installing games with securom, despite the fact that they had legitimate copies of the games. Anyway, Bioware doesnt seem to know what it really does besides what EA tells them; and I really wouldnt be surprised if EA tried to sneak in some malware that infects my machine. So I am highly sceptical. I am not willing to pay for a game if I know that those who steal it dont have to worry about it not installing or messing up their machines.

Anyone who starts drawing analogies to Tarkovsky when discussing computer games, will not sound credible when he tells other people to get some perspective.

Age and physical fitness means very little when it comes to a jedi or siths strenght. Look at Yoda, Palpatine and Tyranus in the movies. Not excactly spring chickens or olympic athletes. Wich is also why I find it funny when some people argue that woman would be poor Jedi guardians because of their lack of strenght. Like its Yodas awesome 20kgs of muscles that makes him a match for Tyranus after Obi-Wan and Anakin have had their asses handed to them by the old man.

Yes, and they so rarely want to rule the galaxy because they have innovative policy solutions to social deprivation or inner-city housing. Unless you count Taris. Still, Malak is the better Sith Lord, in that he fulfills all the stereotypes. We don't want subtlety in our Sith, we want crazed sociopaths and Malak delivers! <{POST_SNAPBACK}> The prototypes for sith are Palpatine and Vader neither of whom are crazed sociopaths. Palpatines plans are particularly subtle and Vader is quite cunning(In the OT anyway) and only kills his underlings when he finds them incompetent and in need of replacing. Malak is a self-destructive clown who hitched himself to Revan, got a lucky break and then destroyed everything Revan had been building making his own destruction inevitable.

I enjoyed the game very much and its just a few tweaks away from being a truly great game imo. Thank you for giving us a storyline and characters with actual depht.

Congratulations. A well deserved tactical victory. I really excepcted the early Greece goal to open the match up and force the best out of Portugal. Instead it looked like they where put in check mate and completly dissolved as a team. I cant remember the last time I saw Figo look so ineffective.

That is social darwinism not darwinism. Social darwinism is a pervertion of Darwins theorys. Darwin never mention anything about the strongest, and even the term "survival of the fittest" is one he sort of reluctantly borrowed from the populist philosopher Herbert Spenser. When Darwin uses the term "fittest" he simply means the ones who are the most able to adapt to their enviroment, be it cokroaches or worms. Nothing about strenght or superiority. Social darwinism twists the theory of evolution into the idea of it being a competition between species and races, where the strongest and best will defeat the weaker and inferior, and that this somehow represents some kind of natural morality that is needed to ensure the continued survival and well being of ones race/species. Social darwinists will even seek to impose their misguided brand of darwinism on economic policys, claiming that it is moraly right for the poor to remain poor, and the suppressed to remain suppressed, because it is supposed to reflect the natural order of things.

Really, you don't think there is a lot of Nietzsche in the Sith teachings? I know that the Nazis distorted a lot of his ideas....but isn't the 'Will to Power', the triumph of the new man over conventional morality, still a part of those beliefs? The Sith ideology, btw, is like taking Nazism to the point of absurdity. Instead of having a 'Master Race', the Sith ideology promotes each individual as his or her own 'Master Race' without acknowledging any real need for loyalty to the whole. Judging by what you learn at the Academy, a proper Sith should lie to his superiors, steal credit for things he didn't do, advance his own power to the detriment of the Sith as a whole, and generally and at all times undermine the group in favor of himself. Even the Nazis, wacky Social Darwinists that they were, weren't so enslaved to those ideas that they let them override common sense. Nietzches philosophy is to complex to be in any way accuratly portrayed by simple slogans such as "will to power" For me, he is one of the most difficult philosophers to understand , but reducing his social theories to soundbites is certainly doing him grave injustice. The Star Wars version does take nazism to absurd lenghts (Not that it isnt absurd to begin with), but this is Star Wars and it holds up as an analogy even if it is sillier than its real life counterpart.

He does say that the cnpc quests arent tied solely to romances. Wich to me suggests that there will be romances to.

With all due respect to Herr Gaider, I'm a World War II buff....and the Sith on Korriban are not preaching much that resembles Nazism. There's a lot of Nietzsche in what they're saying, but Uthar and Yuthura are too big on the 'every man for himself' doctrine; 'National Socialism' preached the sublimation of the individual towards the state, whereas the Sith teachings seem to teach 'look out for number one and screw everyone else.' In practice, of course, the Nazi higher-ups were corrupt and often looked out for themselves to the detriment of the state....but that certainly wasn't part of their doctrine. I dont think there is a lot of actual Nietzche in their ideology.Only the populist understanding of Nietzche, wich the Nazis also incorporated into their ideology/propaganda.The sith ideology isnt a perfect match with nazism, but its close enough for it to be an apperant inspiration.

Looking at that Bioware thread is a bit disturbing actually. Im surprised that so many apparantly missed the obvious Nazi analogy when the sith explained their philosophy. I certainly didnt find Uthar Wynns words seductive or reasonable. They were repulsive to me, because I immidiatly recognised the trail of thought and saw where it would lead. As such, I thought Korriban worked quite well. The base brutality of the lower sith ranks and the thin veil of respectability of the upper ranks where a Nazi trademark in many of the areas where their military held absolute control. They were all, like the sith, thugs with an ideology that doesnt hold up to any sort of critical scrutiny. The analogy isnt perfect but I feel it should be obvious to most people, and if it isnt, thats actually kind of scary.

Some of those quotes are promising, but I fear the damage is already done. I seriously doubt I can see Anakin again without associating him with that idiotic, annoying and whining little brat from ep II. The problem is, Lucas seems to think his audiences are all either 5 year old kids or retards who have to have everything spoonfed to them. There almost isnt a scene in ep II where Anakin appears, that we arent shown how filled with angst he is. It gets annoying real fast and I really wanted him to just use his lightsaber on himself and end his miserable little existence . His only good scene is the one where he is confronted by Amidala after he had slaughtered the sand people. That scene told us everything we needed to know about his inner conflict. If Lucas had used the rest of the movie to actually make him a interesting and likeable character his eventual fall to the dark side could have been meaningful and had some emotional resonance.

I thought so to until I replayed it recently. The coversation where the voice actor starts refering to "he" where the text says Revan, actually ends with the sentence "Not even Mandalore could stand against him." So it is perfectly understanable that the actor took some liberties earlier in the conversation, since the end of the text calls Revan "him"