S01.E07: Bring Your Dad to Work Day

[AnimeMania]

Nathan takes Nora’s dad on a do-or-die upload decision tour, but things go awry when Luddites sabotage Lakeview. Nora does some sleuthing on Lucy’s computer in the confusion.

Airdate: May 1, 2020

[ElectricBoogaloo]

Awww, it was sweet to see Nathan bonding with Nora's dad. I totally cracked up when the power went out and he and the horses turned into blocky versions of themselves.

I'm glad that Nora has finally accepted her dad's decision not to upload. That is something that each person should decide for themselves (as opposed to basing their decision on what someone else wants as Nathan did).

[Danny Franks]

Another good joke to kick off the episode - the woman who thinks her husband hasn't been sending her messages, but it was only because she hadn't agreed to the privacy settings.

I liked how utterly foreign and baffling Lakeview was to Nora's dad, a man who has made the conscious decision to avoid a lot of modern technology.

 I wish they hadn't made Nora's dad a religious man. It devalues the power of his choice, that he thinks he's actually going somewhere better than Lakeview when he dies. If he was just accepting that he's dying and whatever happens happens, it would be far more poignant.

It's interesting that they looked at how Nathan's account is also a shackle for Ingrid - she can't move on with her life while she's responsible for him, but she can't stop being responsible for him, or he ends up being deleted. The obvious answer would be to hand over control of the account to Nathan, but I would assume he can't afford it.

Luddlyfe? Okay. And they forced the server into low res settings? Again, that's a fun gag.

[talktoomuch]

On 5/17/2020 at 3:15 PM, Danny Franks said:

 I wish they hadn't made Nora's dad a religious man. It devalues the power of his choice, that he thinks he's actually going somewhere better than Lakeview when he dies. If he was just accepting that he's dying and whatever happens happens, it would be far more poignant.

I think the message comes across pretty clearly whether Nora's dad is religious or not. That each person should be able to make their own decision. 

[bettername2come]

Third destroyed head episode!

The Uploads turning into block people was an interesting moment. I 

I liked Mr. Antony getting into the concept of the soul. I hadn't thought about the idea that someone's soul might move on, even if their consciousness was in Upload. But that concept seems to be the only reason anyone who believes in an afterlife might choose Upload - if he thought his soul would move on and get to be with his wife, why wouldn't he care if his daughter was still able to talk with him and see him? It seems he was thinking it's not an either/or, he gets what he wants, the three of them together eventually, even if he chose Upload. Granted, there's still issues around not being able to properly grieve and whether his daughter would be wasting her money on a simulation of him, but still. 

[Guest]

35 minutes ago, bettername2come said:

I liked Mr. Antony getting into the concept of the soul. I hadn't thought about the idea that someone's soul might move on, even if their consciousness was in Upload. But that concept seems to be the only reason anyone who believes in an afterlife might choose Upload - if he thought his soul would move on and get to be with his wife, why wouldn't he care if his daughter was still able to talk with him and see him? It seems he was thinking it's not an either/or, he gets what he wants, the three of them together eventually, even if he chose Upload. Granted, there's still issues around not being able to properly grieve and whether his daughter would be wasting her money on a simulation of him, but still. 

It may be either/or in his mind given the fact that choosing to upload is effectively committing suicide. 

[CigarDoug]

On 5/24/2020 at 6:08 PM, bettername2come said:

I liked Mr. Antony getting into the concept of the soul. I hadn't thought about the idea that someone's soul might move on, even if their consciousness was in Upload. But that concept seems to be the only reason anyone who believes in an afterlife might choose Upload - if he thought his soul would move on and get to be with his wife, why wouldn't he care if his daughter was still able to talk with him and see him? It seems he was thinking it's not an either/or, he gets what he wants, the three of them together eventually, even if he chose Upload. Granted, there's still issues around not being able to properly grieve and whether his daughter would be wasting her money on a simulation of him, but still. 

I think you misread that scene. Nora's dad made it clear, there were two choices: Either Upload, in which case you never die, so you never get to heaven; or die, and your soul goes to heaven. He knows his wife is already in heaven (since Upload was not an option at the time), and if he gets Uploaded, his soul/consciousness lives on, and he will never be with his wife (assuming they can afford Upload forever).

He said, explicitly, that the only way the three of them would be together was in heaven and all three had to die. It was absolutely an either/or, and he chose to be with his wife, and hoped Nora would make the same decision.

[Paloma]

On 3/16/2022 at 1:20 PM, CigarDoug said:

Nora's dad made it clear, there were two choices: Either Upload, in which case you never die, so you never get to heaven; or die, and your soul goes to heaven. He knows his wife is already in heaven (since Upload was not an option at the time), and if he gets Uploaded, his soul/consciousness lives on, and he will never be with his wife (assuming they can afford Upload forever).

He said, explicitly, that the only way the three of them would be together was in heaven and all three had to die. It was absolutely an either/or, and he chose to be with his wife, and hoped Nora would make the same decision.

Thanks for this explanation, although I might disagree with the idea that you never get to heaven if you upload--most people would probably think of Lakeview as heaven (based on the advertising and initial impression).  But it's true that you will not get to the religious version of Heaven if you don't die, and if you believe that you already have loved ones in "real" Heaven you would probably want to be reunited. So in making the decision of Upload vs. die normally, people have to weigh how strongly they believe in a real Heaven and whether they are likely to earn a spot there vs. how much you trust that the Upload technology is real and reliable and that you or your family will be able to afford it forever.  For someone like me who is a skeptic about both religion and technology, I would probably feel that the Upload was a bigger risk than whatever may come after death.