Trekkies: is SDMB similar to the Borg “Hive Mind”?
I am just sketching a raw idea here, I hope you people can elaborate on it.
Remember the episodes early in Startrek Voyager, when Captain Janeway had first rescued/kidnapped the former human girl Seven of Nine from the Borg?
Seven of Nine, locked in the brigg, is sick with misery and loneliness because she is now cut of from the “Hive Mind”, the Borg’s collective linking of drone-minds.
“I’ll go mad with just this one voice in my head”, Seven cries in despair to a sympathetic Janeway.
Later in the series, Seven of Nine gets used to the human condition and even refuses to go back to the Borg Collective.
Now, it always seemed an interesting idea to have my mind linked to a “Hive Mind”. How would it feel? Would I feel less or more then one individual?
Then I discovered this SDMB, and actually, I think the SDMB is the closest thing yet to a Hive Mind I’ve seen.
I sit behind my computer, write down my thoughts, and I get other thougts in return. There is no direct contact from person to person interaction.
Personal appearance and non-verbal communication, that both get so much emphasis in RL, play no part. It’s almost pure mind-mind-interaction. That is: one mind linked to 5000 minds.
Well, non-contact message boards predate the SDMB by quite some time, and unlike the fictional Borg, there’s no compelling need for conformity, nor is there a single “Queen” running the show.
It makes sense the Hive Mind would have actually encouraged different ways of thinking. Ther is no point in linking a zillion minds id they all came with the same solution to a problem.
I think the Hive Mind would have actually encouraged different ways of thinking among its linked minds. If a solution to a problem was needed, linking a zillion minds would be pointless if they all came up with the same solution.
An old Heinlein story, Have Spacesuit, Will Travel
I see an advantage in processing power, but how are they supposed to be connected?
If a genius type is stuck but gets a nudge in the right direction by the creative thought of another mind, that would be a serious advantage. But, again, how are they to be connected? Would transmission of thoughts be an automatic function, like breathing? Or would it take a conscious effort, like speaking?
The Collective has determined we are not a hive mind.
The Collective has determined we are not a hive mind.
The Collective has determined we are not a hive mind.
The Collective has determined we are not a hive mind.
The Collective has determined we are not a hive mind.
The Collective has determined we are not a hive mind.
The Collective has determined we are not a hive mind.
The Collective has determined we are not a hive mind.
The Collective has determined we are not a hive mind.
The Collective has determined we are not a hive mind.
The Collective has determined we are not a hive mind.
The Collective has determined we are not a hive mind.
The Collective has determined we are not a hive mind.
The Collective has determined we are not a hive mind.
The Collective has determined we are not a hive mind.
The Collective has determined we are not a hive mind.
The Collective has determined we are not a hive mind.
We are the SDMB. You will be assimilated. Resistance is futile. The distinctiveness of your web site and your message boards will be added to our own. Your servers will now service us.
[meanwhile, in another sector of the world, another voice rings out]
We are Microsoft. You will be assimilated. Resistance is futile…
See? It works! My computer talks back to me! Thanks for the answers so far.
Easyphil, “the Matrix” is also an interesting comparision. But I always thought the scenario did not explain how two people, who were actually located in different slimy pods, could think they were all interacting in their familyhome in Pleasantville, Ill. I mean, would the creeps that ran the Matrix actually keep track of the crappy items virtually bought by familymember A, so they could place those same crappy item in a virtual box in the virtual bedroom in the virtual home in family member B? They would have to, if Matrix member A were to successfully ask member B, over at another pod: “Honey, where did we put our camping-trip-dishes?”
Now, does the Borg Queen “run the show”? Or is she merely a symbol, a spokesperson, a mouth?
Or is she the “connecting brain” of the Borg, in much the same way as a bee-queen or a termite-queen?
I do not think Cecil Adams or Ed Zotti are a big influence on the actual messageboards, other then by setting some standard that attracts people in the first place…To keep up th comparison with a Beehive, they give of something of a Nest scent.
Aesiron do you mean Unimatrix Zero, the place some “free” Borg went in their dreams?
Unimatrix One was the headquarters, for lack of a better term, for the Borg and the Borg Queen… it was totally different from Unimatrix Zero.
By the way, I always took the Queen as the culmination of all the minds in the Hive and not as a single person that’s literally the ruler. That way, whenever any one queen is destroyed, a new body can be fabricated and her personality uploaded from all the drones once again.
Thanks for the answers so far.