[CI] Details of the Human Instrumentality Project: D

[ObsessiveMathsFreak]

This thread has emerged out of discussions in the editorium on the canonicity of the NGE2 CI generally. However, I think that a more focused discussion on particular CI passages is what is needed at this point, and there's one passage in particular which I'd like us to examine.

Details of the Human Instrumentality Project

D. In-Depth Information

While the Angels were being engaged in battle, people were also making and advancing the plan for the path that leads to divinity.

The first step is the completion of Eva — the body of a god and throne of a soul — via the installation of an S² Engine. The interfusion of souls follows. Afterward, our final natural enemy, the Spear of Longinus security device, is annihilated. Thus, that which is nearly divine, or perhaps a god in and of itself, is brought to completion, and, with the Spear gone, cannot be destroyed by anyone.

Seele's intention for this man-made god is to guide the elite (themselves) to state near that of God's.

While gchristnsn has raised several objections to the CI, this is the only one which I have been able to clearly understand. On the face of it, the last passage in bold here appears to be in direct contradiction with the show. I believe gchristnsn has objections to other parts of this passage as well.

This is something we need to discuss. But, since CI discussions always seem to get bogged down after a page or two, we need to stay focused while we do so. So, I'm going to abuse modly fiat and lay down some ground rules to keep us on the Topic -- Details of the Human Instrumentality Project: D

Because this passage itself needs to be put to the test, we need this thread to be a Dialectic rather than a debate. As such, I'm instituting a mandatory 500 word limit on all posts in this thread. This limit includes quoted text, so every quote you make takes away from your space to respond to it in. You can check your word count here.

This is a Dialectic. We need a lot of exploration, explanation, consideration of positions, and dialogue in this thread. To start us off, I'm going to open with the hypothesis that "HIP: D" above is in contradiction with what we see and hear in the show. The first thing I'd ask is for someone to explain why this is the case, so that we all understand clearly what the problem with the passage actually is. Only then can we proceed to explore it further.

(This is not how discussion threads are usually managed, but we need to stay on-topic here. Consider this an experiment in handling contentious esoterica.)

[gchristnsn]

The first thing I'd ask is for someone to explain why this is the case, so that we all understand clearly what the problem with the passage actually is. Only then can we proceed to explore it further.

It's not possible to build a non-contradictory theory of that Seele's intention (to complement only themselves in a Eva with S2) based on the facts from the show. As I understand, people who are trying to justify this statement say that Keel hopes that Seele somehow would complement inside Unit-01 and is glad because of this, but Rei/Lilith hijacks the process and transfers souls into the egg. But there are no explanations and reasons how/why they would end up there, and why Lilith hijacks the process.
It's actually enough to show that use of Unit-01 wasn't planned by Seele originally to raise a contradiction with the whole section D. If Seele's intention to complement only themselves would be true in the show, there also no explanation why Seele talks about the conversion of humanity into it's true form, why they intend to complement all souls of humanity, and why they don't need to create a God from Unit 01 and afraid of this.

Instead it's possible to build a non-contradictory theory of the transformation of the whole humanity into a true descendant of Liilth using her egg and Tree of Life used as a medium.

[Monk Ed]

My interpretation of that passage is that it refers strictly to the installation of the S2 engine into Adam-based Evas, namely the Harpies. I have never interpreted it any other way and was rather surprised to see that anyone thought it was referring to Unit 01. Seele's original plan, as I see it, was to use the Harpies as guides, and Lilith as the body of the being they intended to create. When Lilith becomes no longer possible to use for this purpose, they are forced to use Eva-01 instead. However, Lilith/Rei hijacks the process, so we never see in EoE what exactly Seele would have done if Lilith hadn't shown up. All we know is that they were happy enough with the way things started going from there, at least as far as what they knew. We have to make a distinction between Seele's original plan, the contingency plan they went with at the start of EoE, and what wound up actually happening; all three could (and I think are) different things, and all we know about the third and first is that they are similar enough for Keel to die with a smile on his face.

[Shinoyami65]

I originally posted this in the Editorium but I think it is more relevant to this discussion:

However, it is known that every Eva must contain a human soul so that it can be piloted. If this is true for the MP Evas as well, they can be considered to contain a human soul with the Fruit of Knowledge as well as the SEELE-installed Fruit off Life. Thus they have already achieved god-status.

SEELE also talks about bringing forth the "true form" of the Eva Series. It is also interesting to note that Seele originally planned to have twelve MP Evas, up to Eva-16, and there are twelve SEELE Committee members. Keel actually says in EoE: "We have fewer units than planned, but we'll have to make do", indicating that there is a special reason why there were going to be twelve MP Evas. It is not too much of a stretch to say that each SEELE member was going to inhabit a specific MP Eva, hence why they are also referred to as SEELE's "loyal servants" and their originally planned number of twelve.

It is actually possible that by "bringing forth the true form of the Eva Series", SEELE intended to fuse their own human souls with the MP Evas, using Eva-01 as a "medium". Thus the MP Evas would all contain human souls with the Fruit of Knowledge as well as the Fruit of Life, and ascend to God status.

[gchristnsn]

My interpretation of that passage is that it refers strictly to the installation of the S2 engine into Adam-based Evas, namely the Harpies. I have never interpreted it any other way and was rather surprised to see that anyone thought it was referring to Unit 01. Seele's original plan, as I see it, was to use the Harpies as guides, and Lilith as the body of the being they intended to create.

CI: "The first step is the completion of Eva — the body of a god and throne of a soul — via the installation of an S² Engine. The interfusion of souls follows."

You see, that in CI they plan to use a Eva with S2 in CI as the body of a god. Moreover, they don't need to build eight Harpies to complement only themselves, a tiny anti AT-field generator (like they used to extract Lilith's soul at the dogma) would suffice. This means that they want to complement the entire humanity.

We have to make a distinction between Seele's original plan, the contingency plan they went with at the start of EoE, and what wound up actually happening; all three could (and I think are) different things, and all we know about the third and first is that they are similar enough for Keel to die with a smile on his face.

We also need to account Gendo's plan. There is important dialogue between Seele and Gendo at the beginning of EoE before Rei/Lilith interferes. It's known that Gendo's plan is complementation at "Yui's place", inside Unit-01 advanced to a god (with the both fruits). He calls this a evolution into new form. Seele opposes his plan during the whole series and fears of the creation of a god. They would not if they want to complement inside a body of a god.
At the meeting Seele say that Humanity should not cling into an ark called Eva and should not abandon its human nature. Because they oppose Gendo's plan, they don't want to complement inside 01 and thus use this unit as a body of god. They want to use it as a medium for Tree of Life (they intended to use Lilith with implanted embryo for that originally). Because a body made from Lilith and Adam's embryo (or they don't need it) decays after complementation, they can not use Lilith as the body of God originally. The only remaining possibility is the complementaion of the whole humanity inside the egg.

It is actually possible that by "bringing forth the true form of the Eva Series", SEELE intended to fuse their own human souls with the MP Evas, using Eva-01 as a "medium". Thus the MP Evas would all contain human souls with the Fruit of Knowledge as well as the Fruit of Life, and ascend to God status.

This is just a coincidence in numbers. The essence of HIP is the transcendence of human incompletion (and as you remember they don't want to cling into Evas).

[Crow]

Please forgive me, if this comes only from my mediocre Japanese skills, but does 優良な者 necessarily mean elite, as in 'selected few'? Can it not have a more literal meaning of ideal/excellent people - the result of instrumentality? The parenthesis part would then simply mean they are included in the lot, not that they are the only ones that define it.

I would also like to point out, that in English translation point D) is in direct opposition of point C), which openly refers to all people. If D) is true, it would mean that there are some people who think C) is true, but do not know D). Candidates for such slot are very limited and this would maybe mean that Gendo himself did not know about SEELE potential 'instrumentality kidnap' plan. However, as far as I can understand the Japanese C), it does not necessarily refer to entire humanity the way it does in English translation. I think C) could as well be read as referring to a single individual, who could become God, rather than entire humanity achieving this goal.

[gchristnsn]

Please forgive me, if this comes only from my mediocre Japanese skills, but does 優良な者 necessarily mean elite, as in 'selected few'? Can it not have a more literal meaning of ideal/excellent people - the result of instrumentality?

Don't know, but the whole phrase may probably be interpreted as: Seele's man-made god is intended to promote chosen people themselves to a god. Probably MPEs used as tools are meant here as man-made god (because a yet another god as the target of instrumentality is also mentioned), this excludes version of Seele's merging with individual MPEs. Because a Eva with S2 is mentioned earlier as a body of god, only Unit 01 could be it, and this exactly fits with Gendo's plan (who mentions that Eva series are also necessary for his plan at the meeting with Seele).

I would also like to point out, that in English translation point D) is in direct opposition of point C), <...> I think C) could as well be read as referring to a single individual, who could become God, rather than entire humanity achieving this goal.

I'd say that the section C may reflect Seele's plan, and section D may refer to Gendo's plan (which is at the bottom of this four-layer conspiracy, Gendo hides his plan from Seele). Seele may mean humans in general, thus they mean Humanity (including themselves) complemented in the egg, but all this means that Gendo secretly wished to complement himself with Yui and probably Shinji.

Personally for me this case is closed, because this interpretation perfectly fits with the show.

[Shinoyami65]

I'd say that the section C may reflect Seele's plan, and section D may refer to Gendo's plan (which is at the bottom of this four-layer conspiracy, Gendo hides his plan from Seele). Seele may mean humans in general, thus they mean Humanity (including themselves) complemented in the egg, but all this means that Gendo secretly wished to complement himself with Yui and probably Shinji.

Personally for me this case is closed, because this interpretation perfectly fits with the show.

Upon closer inspection I find it somewhat strange that Section C fits your interpretation (that SEELE wanted to use Eva as a medium to complement the entirety of humanity) whereas Section D flies in the face of that and states that SEELE only intends to complement their own Committee members. Possibly Section C is the "official" interpretation based on information from Anno (and thus supported by the show) whereas Section D was created to fit the ingame logic.

[riffraff11235]

Upon closer inspection I find it somewhat strange that Section C fits your interpretation (that SEELE wanted to use Eva as a medium to complement the entirety of humanity) whereas Section D flies in the face of that and states that SEELE only intends to complement their own Committee members.

You're reading too much in between the lines here. That part only states Seele's intentions for themselves. It doesn't preclude the rest of humanity being part of the Human Instrumentality Project as well.

[Shinoyami65]

You're reading too much in between the lines here. That part only states Seele's intentions for themselves. It doesn't preclude the rest of humanity being part of the Human Instrumentality Project as well.

Hmm, true.

[gchristnsn]

Upon closer inspection I find it somewhat strange that Section C fits your interpretation (that SEELE wanted to use Eva as a medium to complement the entirety of humanity) whereas Section D flies in the face of that and states that SEELE only intends to complement their own Committee members. Possibly Section C is the "official" interpretation based on information from Anno (and thus supported by the show) whereas Section D was created to fit the ingame logic.

The subtle thing here that section D actually may not mean "that SEELE only intends to complement their own Committee members". It may mean just some chosen people complemented inside Unit 01 by Seele's MPEs. This may fit with Gendo's ending, and Gendo's plan in the show. This means that my assumption that CI contradicts to the show here is incorrect but the assumption that Seele intended to complement only themselves is also incorrect. Thus CI completely reconciles with the show (yes, you may punch me to the face), but ambiguous at the points of the 3I from angels and Eva's resident soul.

[Shinoyami65]

Thus CI completely reconciles with the show (yes, you may punch me to the face), but ambiguous at the points of the 3I from angels and Eva's resident soul.

Well I guess that the big rampage eventually came to naught. At least we got really deep into the source material and tested the bonds between the CI and the show. Although I think I will take the liberty to punch you in the face if I ever meet you in person.

[ObsessiveMathsFreak]

While this consensus is unexpectedly harmonious, I'm afraid that I'm going to have to disagree with it. Even with Crow's note on the translation, the passage still means that a complementation is meant for a minority of all human beings. While riffraff is correct in that this statement does not technically exclude the rest of humanity, I can't help but read it in that way no matter how many times I go over it.

Seele's intention for this man-made god is to guide the elite (themselves) to state near that of God's.

This last sentence of HIP: D seems to be saying that Seele want complementation only for a select few. Not for everyone. But the show makes it clear that Seele want everyone to be complemented. They even go to great lengths to program the MP Evas to pierce their cores and join in.

The only way I can see this making sense on the face of it is to interpret this as being Seele's intention for after the HIP has actually been carried out. That once the man-made God has been created, that is once complementation is complete, then Seele have further plans, completely unreferenced in the show. The placement of the sentence at the very end of the the HIP CI might support that interpretation.

Up to now, we've been assuming that Seele simply want Complementation as a goal in and of itself. They might have had further plans. Might. I'm skeptical of this too however. They stated that they didn't want to use Eva-01 as an Ark, or build a new world for humanity. They wanted to stay.

Or maybe there's more to the post-3I than an eternity of listening to other people's thoughts. Put that way, that might actually make Seele make more sense.

Maybe.

[Shinoyami65]

It's also possible that SEELE intended for their souls to enter the MP Evas and retain a physical form while the rest of humanity were complemented and tanged. This would allow Eva to guide them "to a state near God's" by allowing them to inhabit Eva units with S^2 Engines, while the rest of humanity becomes Lilith's "true descendant" and is complemented in the Sea of LCL. Notably while the MP Evas spear themselves and release their souls, they still remain floating around after that, as seemingly vacant shells. It is only after Eva-01 emerges from Lilith and fires off a strange array of light that the Spear replicas burst into LCL and the MP Evas solidify. Possibly SEELE was planning to enter the empty MP Evas after they and the rest of humanity had been complemented, but Yui prevented this by destroying the Spear replicas and rendering the MP Evas inert.

[gchristnsn]

While this consensus is unexpectedly harmonious, I'm afraid that I'm going to have to disagree with it. Even with Crow's note on the translation, the passage still means that a complementation is meant for a minority of all human beings. While riffraff is correct in that this statement does not technically exclude the rest of humanity, I can't help but read it in that way no matter how many times I go over it.

Let's approach to interpretation of Gendo's scenario of complementation in Unit-01 from the point of view of Seele, let's assume that this is the intel Seele have on Gendo's scenario. This may be actually the case, because the section describes the people who fight angels (it seems that they opposed to Seele in the section C), installation of the S2 engine may be the accident with 01, and Gendo actually planned to destroy the lance or make it unavailable, because Seele needs it. In this case the phrase may be interpreted as "According to Seele this man-made god was intended to advance chosen people (and only them [or they themselves tried to do this in spite of Seele's plan]) to the level of God".
These chosen people may be Gendo and Yui (in EoE Gendo tells Ayanami: "Guide me to the place where Yui is") and may be Shinji. This also fits with the show.

[UrsusArctos]

I can't see any logic at all to Human Instrumentality Project unless Seele stood to benefit in some special way. What conceivable benefit do they get if they turn everyone to tang and lose their individuality? Why would they set off Second Impact, spend so much in creating the Evas and attacking the Angels? Why is Gendo's version of Instrumentality so much of a threat to them if it ends up with everyone being complemented?

The only logical explanation is the one that the CI provides - that Seele wanted godhood through the Evangelions, and leave the rest of humanity in a soup where they would be forever under Seele's control. They wanted things to go a very specific way - and they went poof without knowing that their plans had been hijacked.

[NemZ]

I'm not a fan of the CI in general, but this is just a mess.

1) If making a god-eva is part of the plan why does Seele react so poorly to the news? Probably just because it gives Gendo more power than they wanted, but clearly this was not the original plan. Much more likely they originally planned to just use Lilith herself, not an eva.

2) The lance was not meant to be disposed of, as Fuyu warns Gendo in 22. It had some other part to play in the plan, thus the CI is wrong again. Quite possibly they intended to repeat the 21-causing contact experiment with Lilith rather than Adam, and we know the lance was a critical component of the mysterious procedure.

3) Seele may have had some plan to continue ruling the world after instrumentality, but I don't believe the plan involved instrumentality only for themselves. They might be deluded jerks but they seem to genuinely believe what they are doing is the one true path for humanity's future and that this will justify all they've done. We also know from earlier conversations they did not plan to ride out the storm using an eva as an 'ark' as seems to have happened in EoE (which would also preclude the idea that they wanted to put themselves in the MPEs), so whatever they actually meant to do is still a mystery.

[Monk Ed]

Before this topic and its sister in the Editorium, I had never heard of the idea that Seele wanted to place themselves in the Harpies. That's not even what happens in the Seele Ending in NGE2. I don't know where this comes from but I don't like it and think it's just clouding up the issue.

[Shinoyami65]

That's not even what happens in the Seele Ending in NGE2.

What does actually happen in Seele's ending in NGE2? Did they place their souls into Eva-01, or was the entirety of humanity tanged like in EoE?

[Monk Ed]

Both, actually.

...

I want to go over something I just found, which explains why I don't think the use of the word "Eva" mentioned in part D is supposed to refer to Eva-01. Consider part C:

The Human Instrumentality Project is a plan aimed at divinity. The Evas are absolutely essential to Seele, for they are the sole key that can open the Path to God. This is because they were copied from Adam, the being nearest to a god.

The Evas are also described as the "body of a god" elsewhere, completely independently of hte context of Seele's plans. In other words, the reason for the term "body of a god" is because they are copied from Adam, not because of whatever role any Eva is supposed to play in Seele's plans. (Before anyone jumps on the fact that Adam is referred to here as merely "near" to a god, Adam is described elsewhere as "essentially a god incarnate" and other such things.)

Anyway, there's another interpretation I came up with of part D which is another way to reconcile it with the show even if the Eva referred to is supposed to be Eva-01: What if part D is not referring to Seele's original plan, but instead to the plan that Gendo's interventions forced them into? Maybe it's describing Gendo's plan as well, that is, the elements in common, which Gendo has forced Seele to do most of (namely, to use Eva as the body of the man-made god instead of Lilith). The only part where Seele is mentioned is in the last paragraph; perhaps everything before that is actually what their plans have in common after Gendo forced them into the path of using an Eva as the destination of souls. The first paragraph even omits mentioning exactly whose plans these are, referring instead to just "people".