User blog comment:The Milkman/Mass Effect in Retrospect/@comment-24174486-20130418150425

"Reaper Rationalisation" This is going to be fun.

"If you're going to liquefy these species, what's being 'preserved' exactly?" The knowledge and history of these races. After all, in Synthesis, the Reapers share their knowledge with galactic civilization.

"How many Reapers are created each new cycle exactly? We saw plenty of Reapers get blown up during this cycle." And this cycle was different than the average cycle. The current cycle had some warning of the Reaper threat. More importantly, the current cycle prevented the Reapers from carrying out the cycle via their usual means: striking directly at the Citadel to cripple galactic government and transportation. The current cycle had the ability to fight, which is much more than can be said for previous cycles.

"The Catalyst claims that their solution won't work anymore. Why?" Because galactic civilization has the means to make their solution stop working—the Crucible.

"Why is the Crucible necessary? What's stopping the Catalyst from simply telling the Reapers to turn off?" What indication is there that the Catalyst has a degree of control over the Reapers sufficient to forcing them to stop, let alone any control? After all, the Reaper cycles were made to be completely autonomous, to function without the Catalyst's involvement.

"What is Shepard’s essence? What energy are you using? Even if you broke Shepard down and spread them around, there wouldn't be enough of Shepard's 'essence' to go around." Possible explanation for Synthesis: Shepard's body is broken down to form a blueprint of sorts for Synthesis, then nanomachines like those used to convert organics into husks are spread through the galaxy via the Crucible and Mass Relays. Regardless, you're still dealing with an extremely-advanced AI that is clearly knowledgeable about creating organic/synthetic hybrids.

"How do you 'perfect' organics with technology? How does giving Synthetics 'understanding' solve anything?" For the former, just look at Shepard, and the benefits of their enhancements from the Lazarus Project. For the latter, just look at EDI, who strives to improve herself via altering her programming based on Shepard's advice.

"If the Reapers are concerned with organics being wiped out, why do they assist the aggressors?" Except they do not assist them but use them for the Reapers' own ends.

"Use of absolutism. How can you guarantee every cycle will create genocidal synthetics?" Given that the point of the cycles is to harvest galactic civilizations before they reach the point where they could create synthetics that could pose a threat to organics...

"Which brings me to the Catalyst's biggest flaw. It lacks evidence." Do you ask it for evidence? Is the moment where the Reapers are trying to destroy the means of stopping them the perfect time to interrogate the Catalyst?

Frankly, it doesn't really matter. Why the Catalyst believes so is not important—in the end, what does it matter? Your survival depends on stopping them, not understanding them. It's an AI that was created to address a specific "problem", so that means it was created either out of its "problem" actually occurring or paranoia that the "problem" would occur.

But as you have a fondness of ignoring the whole "preservation" aspect, then that leaves a very good example right in front of you in the ending: the Catalyst itself, a synthetic that turned on and "wiped out" its organic creators.

"Shepard, an cyborg, along with the help of Legion, a synthetic, ended a conflict the Reapers instigated." Because the Reapers totally provoked the quarians into turning on the geth. Because the Reapers totally provoked the quarians into striking at the geth in an attempt to reclaim their homeworld.

And it's funny that you use this example, because achieving peace is not guaranteed. It may be entirely impossible to achieve peace, based on prior decisions. And in the case of siding with the geth over the quarians, guess what happens? To make it even better, had Shepard not prevented Saren from opening the Citadel relay and had the Alliance not destroyed the Alpha Relay, the Reaper harvest would have begun before galactic civilization reached a point where a synthetic race could wipe out an organic race.

And finish it off by throwing in a snide insinuation and disingenious assertions at the end of this little section. (Insert "tabloid journalism" quip here.)