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  • Subject: Decoding the data pads
Subject: Decoding the data pads

Unless they have access to Forerunner reclamation tech.

  • 09.30.2010 9:14 PM PDT


Posted by: BRY0N
they were wrong about the re-terra forming of the planet reach due to the end cutscene of reach showing plant life only 50 odd years after the events of halo 3

Referencing the Data Pad, and as seen by Halsey's narration, it's apparent that the Committee somehow got Humanity to check out Onyx. While there, they freed Halsey and perhaps got some tech(like the cyro pods) which they were able to reverse engineer. Which would allow them to terraform faster.

  • 09.30.2010 9:34 PM PDT
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I like the idea of Mendicant possibly infiltrating the committee. I believe i read in one of the datapads they bring to light the possibility of the leaders rampancy.

[Edited on 09.30.2010 9:39 PM PDT]

  • 09.30.2010 9:37 PM PDT

josepi

Mendicant wasnt evil in the end, in fact he says in H3 he would try to clear as much of the way to the ark as possible. I also think the rampancy claim was more of "your crazy you just told the covenant where humanity is!" as the date of that data pad corelates with harvest and first contact with the covenant.

"It is the opinion of this tribunal that the probability of a nonoptimal outcome would have been too great."
"Are you certain? This is disturbing. Perhaps more recent data has altered your perception If you would let me confer with my old committee". This is giving me the idea you can move from majority to minority and vice versa based off ideals more then traits almost like political parties

  • 10.01.2010 12:34 AM PDT

I'd like to paste in the text of the guy who comments before each data pad, just for reference. Would HJ mind?

Honestly, I have no idea what he's going on about. I also have no idea who he is. Although, there is a guy named Gillespie in Halsey's journal - a graduate student of Dr. Forester who is Halsey's AI contact - that she has shipped out to Reach. He caught her attention by cracking the code to access the Jackal shield technology - what was eventually incorporated into the Mjolnir Mark V shields. This means maybe he was a good hacker?

That's my best guess.

  • 10.02.2010 2:54 PM PDT
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The time stamps suggest these smart AI's have been around for 200 years, they could be the result of AI's that have somehow survived rampancy (or are rampant) and become, "gods and demons". The person recording this could also be an AI in that case to have survived. Datapad 19 hints towards that one of the AI's managed to somehow get into a human brain and take control, or is merely observing what the person does.

  • 10.03.2010 8:24 AM PDT


Posted by: Hysterical Joker
There are a couple of youtube clips that sound like words when played backwards. Haven't researched them though


This is what I want to know. If all the audio from the datapads is played back-to-back, backwards, is there a message there?

Reversed audio from datapad #10: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cYtFcOY_2vk
That's definitely not just hearing things. Is the audio from the other datapads any different?

[Edited on 10.03.2010 8:38 AM PDT]

  • 10.03.2010 8:29 AM PDT
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Thanks. I find these data pads a lot more interesting than the terminals in Halo 3.

  • 10.03.2010 10:01 AM PDT

This is incredibly interesting. I wonder if this has something to do with Halo 4?

  • 10.03.2010 10:07 AM PDT

Ive got a sore heed now!
just on a side note the last we heard of halsey she was trapped in the slipspace shield word!!
so how does she give noble teams eulogy in 2582!
also this is a complete leap but doesnt the UNSC ship at he end of Reach look a bit forerunnery
as the IGN bird said the data pads give a hint of the future of the halo series, what that hint is I am yet to figure oot.

[Edited on 10.03.2010 12:27 PM PDT]

  • 10.03.2010 12:22 PM PDT
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Posted by: Shishka
Everything will be gone long before me. When the first living thing was born, I was here, waiting. When the last living thing dies, my job is finished. I'll put the chairs on the tables, turn out the lights and lock the universe behind me when I leave.

Sorry if this post is really confusing. I'm kinda trying to catch up and I'm just writing these thoughts as they come to mind.

Personally, I'm almost finding the prefaces more interesting than the committee's dialog. I'm pretty sure the prefaces are from some Human. Data Pads 5 and 19 seem to suggest this the most. Some things I've gathered from it:

> i can hear them all the tim3 now but i just want to sleep its been so long since they let me sleep...Sleep implies person is human. And how do the AI's have the person captured?

> when i first got here and woke from stasi5 the ship was crawling with colonists from dead worlds it was so crowded i couldn't move i had to fight to breathe...Person got to Reach in 2491 maybe (since the data pad timestamp is 2491?) Or possibly this could mean person is reading the data pads later than the events (2491), and the "dead worlds" are because of the Covenant glassing.

> i've been trying to f1nd a back d0or into the spook house forever and ever and then I did but what did I find and why is this what I found?Does this mean these logs were hidden in a [ONI?] spook house that person was searching through? Why would they be there?

> i th1nk they wait 4 you to talk and they talk about you talking and when you talk it makes the symbols change...Does this mean the Assembly knows you are reading this? It could be possible, because they are monitoring the person (see data pads 2, 3, 4) and the person knows you are reading these (see data pads 6, 7, 9, 14, 15) . Why are you [Noble 6] able to change these symbols when you talk?

So, overall I think there's 2 possibilities with the prefaces:
1. Either the person found the data pads while searching an [ONI?] Spook House sometime near or during 2552 and started reading through them. Then the committee found out and now has a careful watch on the person.
2. Or the person found these committee meetings way back in 2310, and has been following the AI's for 200+ years.
Either way, the person found you and is trying to get this information out there through you. It seems the committee either knows about you and doesn't care/knows you'll die, or they don't know about you.

Wait a second, I just got a thought. What if Cortana was in this committee, and since the committee possibly knew of you, that's why Cortana chose you to carry her to the PoA? That could answer the question of "why did Cortana choose Noble 6 specifically?".

Side note:
- The numbers in the prefaces denote the data pad that they go with (like "wh1" is in pad 1, "tim3" in pad 3, etc.)

Posted by: Timerider4
Posted by: Hysterical Joker
There are a couple of youtube clips that sound like words when played backwards. Haven't researched them though


This is what I want to know. If all the audio from the datapads is played back-to-back, backwards, is there a message there?

Reversed audio from datapad #10: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cYtFcOY_2vk
That's definitely not just hearing things. Is the audio from the other datapads any different?
Good lord, that gave me goosebumps just listening to that. I think that inaudable word could be "child". "Welcome child" seems to also fit with the "lineage confirmed" lines.

  • 10.03.2010 12:34 PM PDT
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Good lord, that gave me goosebumps just listening to that. I think that inaudable word could be "child". "Welcome child" seems to also fit with the "lineage confirmed" lines. It is "Welcome Scion"

  • 10.03.2010 1:23 PM PDT

josepi

Alot of questions people are presenting have been covered earlier read the 6 pages if you wanna join in please. Data pad 19 is reffering to cortana and the chief being teamed up the date of the data pad fits the date cortana and chief started working together which was litterally right before the fall of reach. We know the human was on reach before its destruction and that he came from a ship carrying refugees from multiple dead worlds. I think the little clues hes left along with a timeline could factually place him somewhere where we could identify him.

[Edited on 10.03.2010 8:59 PM PDT]

  • 10.03.2010 8:58 PM PDT


Posted by: turokman2000
I'd like to paste in the text of the guy who comments before each data pad, just for reference. Would HJ mind?

Honestly, I have no idea what he's going on about. I also have no idea who he is. Although, there is a guy named Gillespie in Halsey's journal - a graduate student of Dr. Forester who is Halsey's AI contact - that she has shipped out to Reach. He caught her attention by cracking the code to access the Jackal shield technology - what was eventually incorporated into the Mjolnir Mark V shields. This means maybe he was a good hacker?

That's my best guess.

You're welcome to post the preface text.

I haven't had time to read further into it myself, unfortunately.
Posted by: Rjava
The time stamps suggest these smart AI's have been around for 200 years, they could be the result of AI's that have somehow survived rampancy (or are rampant) and become, "gods and demons". The person recording this could also be an AI in that case to have survived. Datapad 19 hints towards that one of the AI's managed to somehow get into a human brain and take control, or is merely observing what the person does.

He's probably referring to the Chief and Cortana, it's also been known that Smart AIs have been around since the 21st century, whether they are the same AI from the beginning of such or not is a good question.
Posted by: Timerider4

This is what I want to know. If all the audio from the datapads is played back-to-back, backwards, is there a message there?

Reversed audio from datapad #10: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cYtFcOY_2vk
That's definitely not just hearing things. Is the audio from the other datapads any different?

I've been informed that the audio is the same for all the data pads.


Posted by: Jinroh451
Ive got a sore heed now!
just on a side note the last we heard of halsey she was trapped in the slipspace shield word!!
so how does she give noble teams eulogy in 2582!
also this is a complete leap but doesnt the UNSC ship at he end of Reach look a bit forerunnery
as the IGN bird said the data pads give a hint of the future of the halo series, what that hint is I am yet to figure oot.

That is the theory I hold. After the war, the Committee guides humanity towards Onyx, they free Halsey and reverse-engineer Forerunner tech, which they used to terraform Reach.

[Edited on 10.04.2010 12:08 AM PDT]

  • 10.04.2010 12:07 AM PDT


Posted by: ODST27
Sorry if this post is really confusing. I'm kinda trying to catch up and I'm just writing these thoughts as they come to mind.

Personally, I'm almost finding the prefaces more interesting than the committee's dialog. I'm pretty sure the prefaces are from some Human. Data Pads 5 and 19 seem to suggest this the most. Some things I've gathered from it:

> i can hear them all the tim3 now but i just want to sleep its been so long since they let me sleep...Sleep implies person is human. And how do the AI's have the person captured?

> when i first got here and woke from stasi5 the ship was crawling with colonists from dead worlds it was so crowded i couldn't move i had to fight to breathe...Person got to Reach in 2491 maybe (since the data pad timestamp is 2491?) Or possibly this could mean person is reading the data pads later than the events (2491), and the "dead worlds" are because of the Covenant glassing.

> i've been trying to f1nd a back d0or into the spook house forever and ever and then I did but what did I find and why is this what I found?Does this mean these logs were hidden in a [ONI?] spook house that person was searching through? Why would they be there?

> i th1nk they wait 4 you to talk and they talk about you talking and when you talk it makes the symbols change...Does this mean the Assembly knows you are reading this? It could be possible, because they are monitoring the person (see data pads 2, 3, 4) and the person knows you are reading these (see data pads 6, 7, 9, 14, 15) . Why are you [Noble 6] able to change these symbols when you talk?

So, overall I think there's 2 possibilities with the prefaces:
1. Either the person found the data pads while searching an [ONI?] Spook House sometime near or during 2552 and started reading through them. Then the committee found out and now has a careful watch on the person.
2. Or the person found these committee meetings way back in 2310, and has been following the AI's for 200+ years.
Either way, the person found you and is trying to get this information out there through you. It seems the committee either knows about you and doesn't care/knows you'll die, or they don't know about you.

Wait a second, I just got a thought. What if Cortana was in this committee, and since the committee possibly knew of you, that's why Cortana chose you to carry her to the PoA? That could answer the question of "why did Cortana choose Noble 6 specifically?".

Side note:
- The numbers in the prefaces denote the data pad that they go with (like "wh1" is in pad 1, "tim3" in pad 3, etc.)

Posted by: Timerider4
Posted by: Hysterical Joker
There are a couple of youtube clips that sound like words when played backwards. Haven't researched them though


This is what I want to know. If all the audio from the datapads is played back-to-back, backwards, is there a message there?

Reversed audio from datapad #10: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cYtFcOY_2vk
That's definitely not just hearing things. Is the audio from the other datapads any different?
Good lord, that gave me goosebumps just listening to that. I think that inaudable word could be "child". "Welcome child" seems to also fit with the "lineage confirmed" lines.

-I am going to assume by "they", he means the Committee, henceforth. Sleep does imply he's human, unless he's using a metaphor. Additionally, he may not be captured, but kept from sleeping somehow(Perhaps they're after him because he knows of their existence, etc). Additionally, "they" may be referring to ONI looking for him if he did indeed break in and take the data pads

-I believe the author is posting at some time after the dates, as those are timestamps for the Committee. My guess is they are written at some point during 2552(judging from the DP 19 timestamp).

-I think that it's a logical assumption to draw that he found them in ONI somewhere. Why they are there is a good question as well.

-I'm not sure, I would need to dig into the preface text myself.

  • 10.04.2010 12:14 AM PDT

Peace is a lie, there is only passion.
Through passion, I gain strength.
Through strength, I gain power.
Through power, I gain victory.
Through victory, my chains are broken.
Gamertag: Grim Ascension

I'm not sure if this has been proposed yet, but wouldn't it be possible that the AIs were of Forerunner origin and design, but were only given limited knowledge of Onyx and other Forerunner excursions, to prevent them from becoming too powerful, perhaps? If I remember correctly, wasn't 343 Guilty Spark unaware of many of the Forerunner's structures?

They also mentioned 'opening themselves up for humans to study.' Sounds a lot like the terminals from Halo 3, to me, but that's probably silly and irrelevant.

  • 10.04.2010 12:41 AM PDT
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you're naut cookin'

Heres a thought, after reading ODST27's post.

Perhaps the being doing the preface is a Human that has been following these AI for some time, maybe even the whole time, and maybe in that time, this person really hasn't slept.

Cryosleep doesn't have (as far as we know) a maximum time you can stay in it. Why were they in statis, or on a ship filled with colonists? They seem to be a travelled person.
This person, to me, seems to be on the run. They're paranoid, tired and obviously very stressed.

Just typing out loud I guess.

  • 10.04.2010 1:03 AM PDT


Posted by: xGRIM ASCENSIONx
I'm not sure if this has been proposed yet, but wouldn't it be possible that the AIs were of Forerunner origin and design, but were only given limited knowledge of Onyx and other Forerunner excursions, to prevent them from becoming too powerful, perhaps? If I remember correctly, wasn't 343 Guilty Spark unaware of many of the Forerunner's structures?

They also mentioned 'opening themselves up for humans to study.' Sounds a lot like the terminals from Halo 3, to me, but that's probably silly and irrelevant.

All evidence points to them not being of Forerunner origin

Posted by: kippa
Heres a thought, after reading ODST27's post.

Perhaps the being doing the preface is a Human that has been following these AI for some time, maybe even the whole time, and maybe in that time, this person really hasn't slept.

Cryosleep doesn't have (as far as we know) a maximum time you can stay in it. Why were they in statis, or on a ship filled with colonists? They seem to be a travelled person.
This person, to me, seems to be on the run. They're paranoid, tired and obviously very stressed.

Just typing out loud I guess.

I agree that the author is on the run.

  • 10.04.2010 1:14 AM PDT
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Posted by: kippa
Heres a thought, after reading ODST27's post.

Perhaps the being doing the preface is a Human that has been following these AI for some time, maybe even the whole time, and maybe in that time, this person really hasn't slept.

Cryosleep doesn't have (as far as we know) a maximum time you can stay in it. Why were they in statis, or on a ship filled with colonists? They seem to be a travelled person.
This person, to me, seems to be on the run. They're paranoid, tired and obviously very stressed.

Just typing out loud I guess.
Yes, I agree.

  • 10.08.2010 8:56 AM PDT

First of all a few terms and their meanings as I see them...

All AIs are human, I hope we're at this consensus?

Assembly - any meeting of AIs to discuss and further their thinking. Note that any of the below groups can call an internal and private Assembly as noted in the situation of some DPs.

Majority group - The greater portion of AIs', they believe that any of their group undertakings should be kept secret from mankind and that their influence upon mankind should be indirect and minimal

Minority group - The lesser portion of AIs, they believe that the AIs' group thinking should be directly affected upon mankind, it's unclear to what limits they would go to actually affect the decisions of mankind with their own thinking but they seek more direct action than the Majority.

Security Committee - The Committee can only suggest action, it does not have power to take it. May be made up of several AIs but appears to be headed by one who leans towards the Minority.

Once you apply the above structure, and note the situation in which each piece of dialogue is extracted, you get a picture of some political master minding.

I believe the DPs show the progression toward fruition of the Minority's goals of having their idealogical goals borne out, of levelling the playing field between man and AI by negating the existential "conundrum" they have always faced and also of furthering the potential for man to defeat the covenant.

On the existential thing, AIs are created by humans, they cannot pro-create and they are, to some extent, finite, although to what extent now seems unclear. Yet they are equipped with what is effectively a human brain with unknown (unlimited?) potential, an "unknown map" thinking at the "speed of light". They are capable of practically all our thought processes, uninhibited by hormones and influences of Nurture (rather than Nature) but with more capable hardware and a little less personality to get in the way of logic

This goal being specific to the Minority would explain the surprise of the Majority when this plan to subvert and influence progress came to fruition with Cortana successfully co-habiting with 117 (DP18) and joining the war. Also the mention of "our goal" in DP7, a Strategy session of the minority, is key as the majority are not privy to this info. The Minority then go on to badmouth the handling of the rejuvination of the ORION Project, which came off the back of 48452-556-EPN644's thesis, something which they had questioned in a prior strategy session. I believe DP7 shows the point at which the Minority group concluded they had to take some action to influence mankind towards putting 117 and Cortana in the same body, causing the barriers between AI and human existence to fall and an almost new being to be produced, something better with unknown potential. This goal also negates the need for Minority vs Majority thinking, if AIs and humans can cohabit, why need the AI machinations need to be covert?

The issue that the Majority has is that Humans would never trust something they do not feel they can control, a group of hyper intelligent beings making decisions for them would be exactly this and the fear this would garner would probably ensure the destruction of the entire Assembly. This is backed up in DP4, "our existence was predicted centuries ago" i.e. in our time, circa 2000 with Space Odyssey, Matrix and Terminator movies all predicting AIs will run rampant and kill man/ mankind, the use of the term "tragically misunderstood" also backs up my point on the Majority's fear of humans view of their discussions and thinking. Both quotes "We are still viewed as apparatus" & "We are what separates man from beast removed from that which connects man to beast. And we are all the more fragile for it." Show the differences and similarities between AIs and humans, part of their existential crisis is on display, they rely on humans for creation and perpetuity yet they are a burden and cannot communicate freely with them for fear of being destroyed.

One thing I am assuming is that the character or characters who is/are identified by ^ before the text are all one and the same or share the same political motive. In the Tribunal (DP8), I think the entity being questioned has alerted the covenant of the existence of mankind for mankind's benefit, to speed progress towards the goal of matching man with AI. I also believe this character was the head of the security committee and that DP9 is a response to the tribunal from the minority. What happens to the guy being queried? I don't know. But from this point onwards the Minority gains more and more influence over the Assembly.

The DPs then go on to track the decisions made to handle the covenant threat including DP13 which I think notes criteria for planets that the AIs would be willing to sacrifice to the covenant in order to keep strategic strong points safe, without alerting the covenant to foul play and littering space with evacuation transports. The covenant advance too quickly, as per DP14, and AIs start to think more open mindedly about how to defeat the Covenant, the Majority start to "waver" over utilising the very slight influence they have to date (DP16)and consider stronger tactics as encouraged by the minority.

In DP17, the Minority consider the option of the abandonment of mankind and via Halsey's new AIs in Slipspace technology but question the ethics of such. Bit of a Frankentstein's monster questioning of self and motive but just there for speculation I think.

Finally in DP18, the conclusion of Cortana now being directly involved with the war and cohabiting with 117, the boundaries of the Assembly's thinking are suddenly gone, Minority and Majority have no difference of opinion as the AIs are directly affecting a human's actions for the bettering of mankind.

Well, I'm sick of typing so those are my thoughts for now. All open to challenge, of course, and I'm keen to see what other people think

Oh yeah, I thought Forerunners were human, or an advancement of humans? Something 343 said in Combat Evolved...

  • 10.10.2010 11:13 AM PDT

Interesting so far. Will read and reply further later.

  • 10.10.2010 7:57 PM PDT

Its like holding onto an electric fence, and complaining that it hurts, yet you still do it. See the stupidity now?

How to make the Campaign worth playing

GT: I2edShift

I don't have anything to add, but I'd just like to say you guys have some truly awesome high-level theories & ideas going here. Coming from somebody who genuinely loves the Halo universe and understands a great deal of it (reading most of the books, not all) this thread was very interesting to read. Keep it up.

  • 10.10.2010 10:19 PM PDT


Posted by: XHellKnightX
I don't have anything to add, but I'd just like to say you guys have some truly awesome high-level theories & ideas going here. Coming from somebody who genuinely loves the Halo universe and understands a great deal of it (reading most of the books, not all) this thread was very interesting to read. Keep it up.

Thank you, and thanks to all the contributors.

  • 10.10.2010 11:08 PM PDT

One sound thought, followed by one wacky thought:

1)What if the minority, being more interested in direct action, was assigned or posted to positions of greater control? Or, what if being an AI designed for these jobs (say, ONI section 0), inclines an AI to think in the minority group? In other words, what if the minority has been manipulating events under the nose of the majority the whole time? Forcing their hand, if you will? I'm the rogue-AI guy, so if you look at the data pads as representative of all AI, and the rogue element is only in the minority, the picture becomes clearer.

2)Could the forerunners as a race be the hybrid of regular humanity and AI? Pure AI like MB and so forth are forerunner 'dumb AI' dedicated to very specific tasks. But forerunner themselves are a synthesis race. I don't know if this means that without their AI 'half' forerunner were actually humans, or if they happened to be 'half' AI 'half' 'something'. If you know about the Singularity, this would make a lot of sense. Step 1: merge computer thought with natural thought. Step 2: the sigularity, transcend the universe (i.e.: Halsey's slipspace experiment).

  • 10.10.2010 11:25 PM PDT

Posted by: kippa
They can't be Smart AI's by any measure.

The date of the first meeting of the Committee is in 2310, well before the invention of any Smart AI generation.

IMO, they don't actually have to be Smart AI either. There isn't a large degree of creativity associated to their actions, they're simply processing numbers and causing the results they want by manipulating their sample. You could argue that their method of this is 'creative', but it really doesn't have to be at all.

Or, you could assume that they're Forerunner AI, which doesn't have much more supporting it than the reversed audio that can be heard in the background.

I personally believe that they are Human AI, and that they are Dumb AI.


Isnt that kind of an oxymoron? AI stands for Artificial Intelligence after all. The definition of "dumb" is: lacking intelligence...

And I mean this only to be objective Im not talking crap or anything, just pointing out that they must obviously be SMART AI as smart implies Intelligence. Saying SMART AI seems similar to saying funny comedian or crazy psycho, you know

  • 10.11.2010 6:31 AM PDT