This is my interpretation as well, the hive is host to a parasite that will use up humanity and kill it off.
Yeah. That makes sense, though a small population will likely survive on applefalls and other scavengable material - but the virus doesn’t care if a small population lives or not, as long as the message gets sent
Number one factor is that it get sent and received by at least one other sentient species. After that having enough survive ongoing to keep it sending would also be marginally selected for.
The analogy to viral infections is cogent: in general viral infections that rapidly kill the host are outcompeted by variants that have the host relatively healthier longer.
How about mass breeding salmon and just waiting for them to die after spawning?
Now wouldn’t that be fascinating? If a second signal came in, and the second signal was encoded for a virus just as efficacious as Pluribus, except that it allows the host species to cultivate and consume vegetables. Like, do agriculture and stuff.
IMHO, that’s what happened with the M60 at the end of Breaking Bad. It was a relatively (at least for BB) humdrum reveal when it finally got used as it did.
So for now I’m kind of hoping that Gilligan takes a page from himself and finds a way to subvert all the built up speculation like they did with the Soylent Green aspect.
re: Hive Mind decision-making
It seems like the Hive decision making is more hard-wired and reflexive. Where my/our thinking is not like that. We could kill for food or we could not. Depends. It feels like their thinking is similar but different to an individuals thinking in a predetermined way. It’s knowable and can be manipulated like Carol is trying to figure out.
Or do I just assume I think differently. It really feels like I don’t.
I think the hive is more like a computer program. Sentient beings can choose to “violate” the biological urges they have. If the Plurbs can’t pick an apple even if it were absolutely necessary, then I think that’s an indication they’re not actually fully sentient on the same way we are.
It could just mean they don’t consider the survival of individual bodies important as losing them does not affect the whole. Maybe a plurb of a few hundred thousand is just as good as a plurb of several billion, as long as their goals are accomplished.
They’ll give Carol an atom bomb if she asks… but they can’t pick an apple, even if she tells them to?
We’ll see.
They didn’t seem too happy about Carol killing millions of them; they left town even though it made coordinating things with her more challenging.
I think losing individuals is more akin to cutting off your fnger versus cutting your hair.
I see no evidence that they love and value each individual in the hive any less than they do any other lifeform on Earth. They haven’t exhibited anywhere that they would equate the loss of one of their own with the loss of an unimportant appendage.
But there are no individuals in the hive.
Of course there are. They may be mentally linked, but they are clearly not physically linked. They respect the life of an individual apple (or bee if you want to get cute) with no sentience whatsoever. What makes you think they would think less of a hive member?
Their…actions? they certainly seem to have zero concerns about the survival of individual members, whether it be by their own inaction or the actions of survivors like Carol and Manousos.
What inaction other than refusing to harm or take a life has led to the death of individual members?
Eating fruit. I mean, not yet… but its gonna.
That is because they can’t harm other lifeforms; not because they don’t care about their individual members.
What are you talking about? They made quite an effort to save Zosia when Carol was killing her, they were pretty upset when Carol semi-accidentally killed millions of them with seizures, and we’ve never seen them throw the lives of their host bodies away for no reason. Because they may have a hire directive (do not kill) that may ultimately result in some of their bodies starving to death doesn’t mean that they don’t care about the individual bodies of the hive, but that they have competing directives.
They have a biological imperative to do no harm, they couldn’t harm someone if they tried. But they were perfectly willing to have Zosia jump on a grenade to save Carol, from something Carol herself did. That, plus the starving, tells me their biological imperative to not harm living beings DOES NOT APPLY TO THEMSELVES. Sure, they’ll treat people in the hive who are injured, but they will toss their lives away without a thought to follow their rules.