How Insane Do You Think Lucrecia Was?

[Skan]

Kinda relevant:

Monsters

Living things, both plants and animals, who have been over-exposed to mako and thus suddenly mutated. The two causes are roughly divided between beings affected by natural springs of mako that well up from the soil, and those that were produced through Shin-Ra experiments. Therefore, in areas where there is little natural mako monsters are only seen on occasion, and as for the ones born from Shin-Ra experiments, many have escaped over the course of the war and have begun breeding in the wild.

Always kinda found this funny, 'cause it's not defining "monster" by Jenova, but by mako level. It seems to be what the "SOLDIERs are monsters" spiel in CC is founded on.

Remember that machine that was hunting down monsters in CC at the church? It couldn't distinguish between monsters and SOLDIERs, because SOLDIERs fall under the same umbrella definition for monster -- living beings that've been overexposed to mako. I suspect it was tracking down monsters/SOLDIERs by mako-level, which is why it attacked Zack in the first place.

(With that said, I'm pretty sure people will call anything that seems abnormal and dangerous a "monster," mako mutations or no.)

I think because FF7!people live in a time where they have to worry about these actual, physical monsters attacking people, it makes them more likely to define monster by physical reality rather than by ethics, which is why there's more focus on genetic (in)humanity over actions/choices as the main criteria to defining "monster." CC basically spends the whole game wrangling with this idea through Zack, who (correctly) realizes that being inhuman doesn't necessarily make you a monster.

 

[Ravynne Nevyrmore]

Another thing that's niggling at me now, as I revisit the old Q&A.

Does this imply that Hojo injected embryonic!Sephiroth with cells* only after Angeal and Genesis were born and the results from Project G started rolling in? Not sure what these "improvements" could be except the different methods of Jenova-cell delivery into their hosts, and tangible results from Project G -- results that would make Hojo think, "I can improve my own project by tweaking this or that!" -- wouldn't seem to start coming in until after Angeal and Genesis pop out, right? That might actually make Sephiroth anywhere from half a year to a year younger than Angeal and Genesis.

I had assumed earlier (a misreading of mine) that Project S and G starting at the same time meant that the kids were pretty much conceived around roughly the same time, give or take a few months. (This wasn't helped by the "think of them as the same age!" spiel that got repeated.) But the last sentence is making me rethink that assumption, and of course, Project S and Project G don't actually refer to the kids themselves but the surrounding projects ...

*Before the 10th week of pregnancy, since I think after week 9/10, you get a fetus.

I would say this is correct, and also a good, relevant point that touches on what we were discussing earlier: Sephiroth is even younger than we thought, making his birth occur closer in time to Vincent's shooting event and Lucrecia's disappearance.

 

[LicoriceAllsorts]

Kinda relevant:
Always kinda found this funny, 'cause it's not defining "monster" by Jenova, but by mako level. It seems to be what the "SOLDIERs are monsters" spiel in CC is founded on.

Remember that machine that was hunting down monsters in CC at the church? It couldn't distinguish between monsters and SOLDIERs, because SOLDIERs fall under the same umbrella definition for monster -- living beings that've been overexposed to mako. I suspect it was tracking down monsters/SOLDIERs by mako-level, which is why it attacked Zack in the first place.

(With that said, I'm pretty sure people will call anything that seems abnormal and dangerous a "monster," mako mutations or no.)

I think because FF7!people live in a time where they have to worry about these actual, physical monsters attacking people, it makes them more likely to define monster by physical reality rather than by ethics, which is why there's more focus on genetic (in)humanity over actions/choices as the main criteria to defining "monster." CC basically spends the whole game wrangling with this idea through Zack, who (correctly) realizes that being inhuman doesn't necessarily make you a monster.

I guess not all enemies are monsters, then. Jumpings, skeeskee, even adamantoise, behemoths, sahagin and dragons, are not "monsters" per se but merely indigenous fauna.

 

[Skan]

Don't forget chocobos!

I think as certain animals get more and more aggressive for whatever reason, people may have the tendency to call them monsters (whether or not it's because of mako). Anything dangerous/scary and not human could potentially be considered a "monster," even if they technically aren't by the given definition (let's say that's ShinRa's definition).

Even though the Ultimania provides the static definition, I think it's merely a set-up for CC to waffle its way from monster-as-static-condition to a more complex/nuanced definition.

 

[Ravynne Nevyrmore]

I think as certain animals get more and more aggressive for whatever reason, people may have the tendency to call them monsters (whether or not it's because of mako). Anything dangerous/scary and not human could potentially be considered a "monster," even if they technically aren't by the given definition (let's say that's ShinRa's definition).

Well also, how accurate do we expect the general populace to be as observers?

NPC1: Careful, there's monsters out there!
NPC2: Nope, I tested that dragon for traces of mako exposure and it turns out it's completely natural.

I think they'd tend to see "big scary fucking thing that wants to eat me," disregard the "scientific" definition, and label big scary fucker with giant teeth as "monster." Colloquially.

 

[Skan]

Yeah, that would be the FF7!culture.

Whereas in our world, I think more people are more likely to label humans as monsters for unethical actions/choices, because there's this prevailing thought (whether or not it's correct) that we all have a choice to do right or to do wrong. Whereas we understand that dangerous animals are just that: dangerous animals acting on instinct.

 

[Ravynne Nevyrmore]

Actually, I think it's probably science department policy. You want to experiment on humans? You have to do it to yourself or you children first.

Guys that's it. This definitely happened:

Grimoire: hey guys, I have a problem. I know we're all supposed to genetically experiment on our offspring in utero to keep this job, but I already have this kid, and he's, like, 25 or something.
Gast: send him my way and don't worry about it.
Hojo: leave it to me.
Lucrecia: lol "keep your job."