The Illusion of Control

Published April 13, 2020 · Updated July 6, 2022

Hey, Shatters!

What a great episode this was! I loved it as much as you did.

One of the things I enjoyed the most was that Serac is masking his desire to play God with the whole “create a God” scheme. All his talk about letting Rehoboam be the god to guide manking is clearly false. If he truly wanted to “create a god”, he would’ve created something capable of whitstanding adversities by itself. Rather, he wants to be the so called god to guide makind while “hiding” behind the shadow of Rehoboam. Just like Incite’s symbol is the outline of the “sun and moon aligning” as said by Serac himself, he’s the sun and Rehoboam is the moon (the AI is even looks like a enormous dark sphere). If there was still any doubt, this to me is evidence enough that Serac is indeed human.

It’s interesting to see that, if that’s the case, with Serac playing god and designing a perfect society for people to live in, just like Eden, Dolores would actually be the serpent luring people into “consuming knowledge of good and evil”. And going back to the “is he/she human or host” path, it was also interesting that Bernard said “She’s sending off their loops”; as you guys mentioned in past seasons of the pod, and this season has shown time and again, people behave like hosts in many instances, so, does it make any difference?

Another moment that showcased one of the most intrinsic aspects of the human mind was Caleb’s “I’d rather live in a world of chaos than in one controlled by you” line to Liam. This illusion of having control is one of the things that mankind has grappled with since its formation. But I’m sure you all can discuss this better than I ever could, so I’ll stop here for now.

I hope you all are safe and home.
Cheers,

Thiago Waldhelm

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