Alyrium Denryle wrote:
The telepaths did not do anything via viewscreens on either Whitestars or Sharlins.
What Rock were you under during Walkabout? Initially Lyta was looking through an external window on the bridge, but those are only in the front. When attempting to disable the second Battlecrab she was unable to harm it because she was exhausted, but did not have line of sight with the Mk 1 eye. She was facing the front of the bridge while they were retreating with the shadow vessel behind them. Unless she was using the projector she had no LOS.
The minbari telepaths were apparently in the sleeping quarters of the Sharlin, which if they are anything like those on the whitestar have no external windows, so the only way they were doing it was from a viewscreen, or
not looking at their targets at all.
Telepaths who were in contact with a powerful source of telepathic emissions. This makes that situation different from the one you are attempting to put forth: that telepaths on starships could affect crews of other starships at long ranges. In every situation in which telepaths were up against mundanes, they had to come in close range. In every situation in which telepaths were up against other YR or human telepaths, again they had to come in close range. The Shadow War was a unique situation, and in fact was the first time since the Shadow occupation of Narn that teeps had been used directly in combat.
As further example: Sheridan does not attempt to use telepaths to affect the crews of Clark-loyal ships during the Earth civil war. If telepaths could have been used in this manner, surely he would have done so to gain advantage in his campaign. Nor did the Centauri attempt to use their telepaths against Narn crews in the course of the Centauri/Narn War —and they would surely have used their telepaths in this manner if it were feasible, especially as the Narns had none of their own and thus no means of equalising the battle on the psi front. These two facts from the series suggest that telepaths are not useful in combat situations as you are suggesting in this thread as a means of combatting the stardestroyer crew.
Then again, how is this relevant to the issue before the bar?
It deals with the claim that the shadow ships are telepaths, and also with yours that they can only engage at space combat ranges with other telepaths.
No, actually it does no such thing.
Then how is it that the Shadow vessel proved vulnerable to telepathic interference?
Because those defenses are not perfect, they are inferior to an actual telepath. Lyta also reacted as she would to a mind which was Horrifying. She also has to propagate whatever is the carrier for telepathy across a considerable distance, which is why she was unable to do anything to the second battlecrab.
That does not in any way answer the question of why the Shadow vessels were at all vulnerable to telepathic interference
—if they are just organic machines.
A pilot onboard would have been affected, but the ship in that circumstance would have continued along its vector, albeit uncontrolled.
If the crabs obeyed the laws of physics that should have happened regardless of the mechanism of the telepathic attack, whether it (the crab) is telepathic or not. That it did not just means that there is a strange relationship between the ships drive system and Sir. Isaac Newton. A relationship which is somewhat strained.
Non-answer. Clearly, the ship reacted like a living creature. The mechanism by which the ship killed its own forward momentum is the subject of another discussion but the observed manner in which the ship reacted is not, and in that vein the series suggests that the ships were in some way vulnerable to telepathic attack.
Or, Byron was projecting into Bo's mind the memory of his own experiences as a Black Omega pilot, with his imagination of the current enemy filling in the details of the combat.
You are violating parsimony. Particularly because the context was clearly otherwise.
No,
you are violating parsimony. The easier explanation is that Byron was projecting a combination of his own memories as a Starfury pilot with Black Omega squadron and imagination, or whatever memory traces he picked up from one of the raiding aliens, into Bo's mind. This does not require extensive contact with a distant observer who is moving at tens of kilometres per second relative to the station, which would make it impossible for Byron to focus on him (or any pilot then flying outside the station) even for a second. Parsimony is not "the simplest explanation is the true one", it is "the most economical explanation that fits the available facts is the logical one".
It speaks directly to the issue of range, since they were not able to affect Bester until he came right into the corridor where they were gathered.
It does not when there are confounding factors such as the need to be able to penetrate his blocks, even his subconscious ones. They also had to do it in such a way that when they started and finished would be seamlessly integrated into his memory.
You will now provide the evidence from the series that Talia and the Blips could have done this at any distance they wished to, since you are determined to perpetuate a No-Limits Fallacy here.
Yes an existential threat, or one that could be taken as one, especially after planet killers began to be deployed in the war. But yet we see no Jason Ironheart.
Not that you would see him if he were watching... But no. Not an existential threat to the entire galaxy. It was bad, but if he did care, I imagine he kept an eye on things. If they got out of hand, he may well have intervened. In the event of an ISD which is invulnerable to the actual weapons of the younger races... well...
We're not discussing what you imagine Jason Ironheart may or may not have been doing during the Shadow War. Fact: he vanished after he transformed and never returned. There is exactly
zero evidence in the series to suggest that he would have returned no matter what the circumstances were. You are also attempting to offer as proof of your argument what you imagine Ironheart's state-of-mind might/possibly/could/suppose/may be.
If Ironheart were keeping a close eye on humanity, it would follow that he'd be keeping particular watch on Talia Winters, since they had been lovers. Yet we see no Ironheart intervention to save her either from her death-of-personality or her later dissection by the Psi-Corps. No Ironheart in the picture at all. He does not reappear in human affairs post-"Mind War", period.
She could be surprised whenever she is not focussing, and it's not possible to keep focus on every person in a room, for example.
Except that she has done exactly that. To mundanes. Telepaths are harder, they can defend themselves. If I had a sword, I would find it much easier to kill everyone in a room if those people were unarmed and not moving than I would if they so much as tried to run around and hit me with sticks....
Except she did not detect Sheridan until he had his PPG at her temple. And Bester almost got shot by some of the rogues from Byron's group because he wasn't paying attention and wasn't focussed.
I outlined how a stardestroyer crew could compile charts for navigation in unfamiliar territory the last time a subject like this one came up (then being a lone ISD in the Star Trek universe): by first finding the key landmarks (black holes, pulsars) as a basis for triangulation and a basic grid coordinate system, then using probe data as well as sensor readings and communications intercepts to identify population centres, spacelanes, military command centres, and in the case of the B5 territories the jumpgates, and I did touch upon some of these points in my first posting in this thread. From that, it would be quite feasible to construct usable charts for the navicomps and single out targets of opportunity.
Possibly, that would however take time. It also assumes that they have the capacity to intercept B5 FTL comms which IIRC go through hyperspace. I would not grant that ability.
You would not grant the ability of a stardestroyer, capable of FTL communication and sensing, to intercept B5 comm traffic, which you argue is... FTL. Amusing. I think that's called "moving the goalposts".
it is not a world indicated as holding a populated settlement. It does not have space traffic going toward or from it, nor is there any comm-traffic focussed upon it or emanating from it.
That depends entirely on A) Time Period and B) Their intel. At how distant a range can they detect ship traffic? They have no reasonable way of intercepting FTL comms. It will take them a considerable amount of time even with FTL sensors to sweep the galaxy for all of the relevant map bits they need.
Except they do not need to "sweep the whole galaxy" to compile maps of the sector of the galaxy where the major B5 civilisations are clustered. And a ship which is already capable of FTL communication and sensing can intercept FTL comms, so I don't know what argument you think you're making here. Furthermore, their probes augment the ship's sensor and communications capabilities at distance.
The question is not whether anybody would "hold back", the question is whether they would even get the time to do anything at all before the stardestroyer flattened every major and most of the minor worlds of the B5 civilsations. Their pace of travel is days/weeks, which determines the pace of their warfare, and now they're up against an enemy that can traverse their spaces in hours. That's the problem they face.
Indeed. Though specific worlds will be stumbling blocks unless they either do not attack them, or attack them first. They would have little to no knowledge of the Psi Corps for example because their intel with what they can do, unless they land on and interrogate planets, which exposes them to problems of infiltration if they do it often enough, will be shit. This is where Angurius' prior post comes in.
No, that is a non-argument which a) does not address the issue of how fast the stardestroyer can jump in, strike with the planet-killing force it has at its command (which does not even require BDZ-level bombardment against unshielded worlds) in 60-90 seconds, and jump out again immediately to hit the next target of opportunity in mere hours, which b) renders moot any consideration of the alleged capabilities (undemonstrated by evidence from the series itself) of Psi-Corps given how little time they would have to prepare anything or even to know when or from which direction a strike would be coming.
One wonders where these legions of mind-fuck-capable Psi Cops were during the Earth-Minbari War. Or where the strong, patriotic and fiercly self-serving Centauri telepaths were when they were being bombed by the Narn and Drazi. We could go on.
Caught by surprise, not enough of them to do much given the number of ships, spread out serving their near feudal overlords. Centauri telepaths are basically pawns of the noblemen. Any number of reasons.
Or, the teeps cannot be used in battle as you keep suggesting in your extended No-Limits Fallacy. And congratulations, you've just collapsed your own argument about how effective Psi-Corps would be defending against a surprise attack on Earth.
As for the Minbari war, Teep vs Teep is a stalemate. Bester may not have wanted his telepaths on the front lines, but if you dont think they got used when earth was facing bombardment I have a peat bog in siberia to sell you.
Objection, assumes facts not in evidence.
For example, a P5 reading a persons mind, does not automatically translate to a P5 being able to subvert a persons will, which is what they would have actually needed to do to make this trick anywhere near combat applicable.
Causing a hallucination would work, no need for subversion. A P5 cannot do that anyway, not without close contact. A P5 is weak enough that they need to be within 25 meters or so for a surface Scan, and to avoid undue strain need close proximity or physical contact for a deep scan. Higher level telepaths (and as I said, it appears as if the scale is logarithmic) they have no such problems.
Evidence that the scale of telepathic powers is logarithmic, if you please.
Here's another riddle; if the Vorlons are the Uber-Teeps, why and how were Shadow ships able to engage and destroy them in Coriana 6?
The mind boggles at the frankly outstanding leaps of capability that is being assigned the the B5 teeps.
It is an inconsistency yes. On the other hand, the Vorlons did engineer human telepaths. It is possible that their abilities are weak, or just more limited, compared to the upper levels of Younger Race telepaths. Otherwise they would not have engineered them in the first place.
Vorlon telepathic abilities are well documented in the series and demonstrably powerful, given how they've insinuated themselves as religious figures in the minds of the people of each world they've visited. Kosh's own telepathic abilities are exhibited in his mental communication with G'kar and later with Sheridan as he's dying. They can certainly overpower a human telepath without difficulty. Even one that they enhanced.
It may not be true telepathy either. They are energy beings, it is possible that rather than use telepathy they literally project themselves, which would explain why when a vorlon touches a mind it leaves a fragment as it did in Sheriden.
Ludicrous. See above.
It's not like the shadows would have only recently been vulnerable to this particular exploit. Frankly the idea that they wouldn't have developed a countermeasure tens of thousands of years ago is absurd.
Agreed with an stipulation:
Humans were among the initial crop of humanoids the vorlons experimented with. They basically combined the genetic templates of all available species and then integrated those with a gene for telepathy they found in a sub-sentient. True telepathy cannot, it seems in that universe, evolve on its own in a sentient race. The Nephilim are the results of that experimentation (the vorlons used homo-erectus for the human part of the template). They they went around introducing it into populations of the younger races, maybe just before the last war, perhaps in other cycles. Who knows.
Perhaps the shadows do have a counter measure, but it is just not perfect?
Shadow research also tends to be hampered by the fact that they go into mass-hibernation for millenia after each war they lose. You can't exactly progress when you're doing nothing.
