First Ones Mysteries - exchanges of ideas needed

[Truth_Seeker]

I think that the Walkers of Sigma 957 are somehow wiser than the Shadows or the Vorlons, because they chose not to interfere at all with the development of the younger race.They really care about us and they want us to learn from our own mistakes.If you grow a wild animal in a protected enviroment it could never survive in the wilderness.

 

[Alluveal]

Unimportant as to whether or not he is a telephath, they could simply read his replies. Or genetically alter him to be one. After all they must have done something to him to make him able to understand their language.

Weren't all the survivors of Morden's crew "altered?" Whether they gave in or not? I mean, we know Anna refused and was likely put into a shadow ship to fuel it. They had to frack with her brain to do it.

I wonder if Morden had the same thing? I'm sure something could have been implanted that allowed him to understand, or, they just used that time to learn the language. I remember "creepy Anna" saying that she learned about them, etc.

I don't think they ever communicated telepathically, I think they had their own little whispery weird language.

They both don't have physical bodies

See, I never saw evidence that the shadows didn't have physical bodies. I saw evidence that they used stealth abilities to hide themselves, but they were definitely physically there. Again, when Londo had two wasted who were standing (invisible) next to Morden, and he made the comment about having to "paint that over," I assumed they were there physically, but unseen.

As for shadow telepathic ability, no idea. I know that they channeled information through Lyta (same as the Vorlons) in "Into the Fire." But, maybe that was more her than the Shadows themselves? Her and her uber-growing abilities.

Someone with a better memory of the Techno-mage novel trilogy will have to provide better details than I can, but Galen does discover some means of Shadow-to-Shadow communication that he's able to pop into using his techno-mage tech. I've always figured that that was some form of Shadow telepathy.

Interesting. Could the Shadows be of a hive type mind? Like the Borg?

And then there's the whole Eye thing that telepathically tries to coerce Ivanova and Delenn to land their ship when they go looking for Sheridan.

Good points....

As for Kosh in The Gathering, I think that maybe JMS had one thing in mind at first, then that changed over time? I seem to recall that coming back to bite him in the butt a bit. Or am I remembering incorrectly?

I know it's not canonical, but the book "Wars of the Ancients" brings the theory that, in ancient times, the Walkers had two planets where they stored their knowledge in vast databases, and one of these planets was obliterated by an asteroid that collided with it, destroying much of the database. The Walkers suspected that the asteroid came from Vorlon space. At the time, the Vorlons disliked the Walkers because of their refusal to give away the Hyperspace technology that they had perfected.
While not everything in the book can be taken too seriously, it's worth reading for those interested in the first one races.

That sounds interesting! I may have to pick those books up. I realize they may not be canon, but still might be fun to read.

Kosh_Fan / Truthseeker, I can't find anything I disagree in your statements. I think the Vorlons were quite full of sass. I mean, I think the norm was more like Ulkesh as opposed to Kosh. I think Kosh was the exception and not the rule. I assume that most Vorlons were like Ulkesh.

 

[Truth_Seeker]

The comment by Londo about having to "paint that over" is a good point,Alluveal.This means that the Shadows actually have physical bodies but they are cloaked most of the time.I was pretty convinced in the opposite but maybe it's not true. I think the only time they look solid in the series is the scene from "In The Shadow Of Z'Ha'Dum" when Kosh shows to Sheridan the fate of the Icarus and the appearance of a Shadow.In the other scenes they look transparent.That's why I came to the conclusion that they have evolved to pure energy but obviously that,s not the case.

 

[Marcelo]

The comment by Londo about having to "paint that over" is a good point,Alluveal.This means that the Shadows actually have physical bodies but they are cloaked most of the time.I was pretty convinced in the opposite but maybe it's not true. I think the only time they look solid in the series is the scene from "In The Shadow Of Z'Ha'Dum" when Kosh shows to Sheridan the fate of the Icarus and the appearance of a Shadow.In the other scenes they look transparent.That's why I came to the conclusion that they have evolved to pure energy but obviously that,s not the case.

The Technomages trilogy states that the Shadows are also beings of energy, and that's why they were able to kill Kosh. They only use their physical form when they want to.
This page has some answers: http://en.allexperts.com/q/Babylon-5-1098/First-Ones.htm

 

[Truth_Seeker]

If it's explained in the Techno-Mage Trilogy that the Shadows are beings of energy there should be no hesitation what they actually are.

 

[vacantlook]

...I think the only time they look solid in the series is the scene from "In The Shadow Of Z'Ha'Dum" when Kosh shows to Sheridan the fate of the Icarus and the appearance of a Shadow....

Shadows are shown in their purplish-black solid appearance in "In The Shadow of Z'ha'dum" when Sheridan has Morden in the jail cell and has Zack scan the cell on different wavelengths and frequencies. They only show as their purplish-black selves for a moment before they adjust and vanish again. Also, a Shadow is fully visible entering the room in "Z'ha'dum" when Sheridan is meeting with Justin; the Shadow enters in the background over Sheridan's shoulder as Sheridan grabs his PPG and quickly turns and shoots the Shadow. I can't remember if there are any other such appearances.

 

[puzzle]

In my opinion, they are certaintly either telepathic or capable of being immaterial, and likely both.

Here's why I think so:

If they were fully material (not capable of avoiding collision with objects of matter) and not telepathic either (uncapable of getting people to walk around them and leave doors open for them) the covert presence of Morden's two companions on Babylon 5 would quickly run into numerous problems:

1) humanoids would walk into them
2) doors would not open, or stay open for them to pass

In fact, it seems like they'd need to hack into computer systems to open doors for themselves, provoking quickly the interest of security personnel, so additionally they'd need to hack surveillance systems to erase any trace of oddities.

There are some plausible ways to avoid this:

a) they pass through walls instead of doors, and let people walk through themselves, materializing only when needed
b) they influence people telepathically to avoid collision and linger near doors for Shadows to also pass,
and nobody notices, not even the strongest telepaths
c) they walk on ceilings instead, and still hack systems to get around

The problem with C concerns height and doors - a Shadow walking on the ceiling would likely still run a risk of colliding with humanoids on the floor, since Shadows are considerably larger than most humanoids. Also, considering the physical dimensions of a Shadow, and the size of doors on Babylon 5, a possibility remains that a Shadow simply won't fit through them without extremely silly maneuvers.

Door size notwithstanding, there are two additional incidents which speak strongly in favour of Shadows being telepathic. It is naturally left unclear whether they are telepathic by biological or technical means, but it appears fairly certain that they are so:

a) When Sheridan arranges it so that Talia Winters passes by Morden in the hallway, an effect happens which causes Talia to see an approximation of the Shadows who accompany Morden (perhaps as a result of seeing into Morden's mind)... and for some additional reason, she proceeds to lose consciousness.

b) When the White Star captained by Susan arrives near Z'ha'dum, a presence bearing some resemblance to a Shadow manipulates every person on board to proceed towards landing on Z'ha'dum. It fails however to neutralize a failsafe in the ship's computers, telling the ship to flip around and jump into hyperspace. It also seems to lack the attention to find information about the failsafe from the mind of the person who installed it.

I thus think that Shadows are definitely telepathic enough to influence people, influence even telepaths, and influence people from great distance, if the subjects are in the same type of space (meaning, the barrier between normal and hyperspace seems to block the influence). Whether they are telepathic enough to read thoughts, is left uncertain because it seems plausible that the Shadow near Z'ha'dum did not attempt to read the mind of every White Star crewmember.

As for the Shadow individuals who "died" on Centauri Prime, I am increasingly convinced that they faked their death, just to discover what Londo would do with Morden. They had ample time to kill the guards physically or incapacitate their minds... yet stood there and let humanoids shoot at themselves with plasma guns. It sounds so unlikely.

I suspect they were probably aware of the events at Coriana 6, aware of any communications between the Centauri, aware of Londo's plan to blow up the island... aware of the quantity of Shadow vessels which would be lost... and that they, having done the math, were content with the loss, or if the vessels mattered, had arranged it so that the signal to detonate the bombs (or the beginning of the detonation, a process which is not instantaneous for a fast enough computer) would also be a signal for the Shadow vessels to disappear from normal space, escaping the nuclear blast.

I suspect these individual Shadows undertook a pretty similar move, and disappeared before a little shower of plasma just like their vessels later disappeared before a little shower of gamma rays, neutrons and notable quantities of notably high-velocity air.

P.S.

Finally, if the Shadow "foot soldier" (apparently not one of the Shadows themselves but some assistant to them) sized multiple times the height of a human, which came aboard Babylon 5 from the old ship Copernicus... could originally get on the ship without damaging its material structure, and could subsequently move around the station through doors and hatches meant for humans, then it would be prudent to assume that Shadows themselves enjoy the same abilities.

If we proceed along the same line of thought, then we should note that Shadows gave technomages the technical basis of their "magic", and likewise gave the Drakh ability to communicate in thought. Unless technomages' communications spells were something fundamentally new, or the Drakh engineered themselves and likewise gave themselves the ability to maintain links to Keepers... then it would follow that Shadows had these options available, and likely in much more refined form, having had them available already for ages.

 

[KoshFan]

I mean, I think the norm was more like Ulkesh as opposed to Kosh. I think Kosh was the exception and not the rule. I assume that most Vorlons were like Ulkesh.

Kosh had a few allies, I believe, but he was most decidedly in the minority. Only through his age and stature, and the respect this gave him, allowed Kosh to keep the Vorlons anywhere near friendly to the younger races.

 

[Truth_Seeker]

Kosh had a few allies, I believe, but he was most decidedly in the minority. Only through his age and stature, and the respect this gave him, allowed Kosh to keep the Vorlons anywhere near friendly to the younger races.

Yes we see that there are at least two different Vorlon ideologies about the younger races.Kosh's point of view is much more different than Ulkesh's.If they could be compared to humans I would say that Kosh acts like a wise old man and Ulkesh is more like a stubborn young soldier.Did the Vorlons have different castes like the Minbari?

 

[Alluveal]

Very interesting points, Puzzle. I'll have to absorb it a little more and get back to ya. Some things to consider: the whitestar incident (Certainly) and the Drakh's abilities.