Thread:Mabian/@comment-4383275-20160827050912/@comment-4383275-20160831045409

Mabian wrote: What I'm actually trying to get at is not the idea of "what does it take for a theory to be disproved." Instead, the question is "how do we determine which points of evidence are valid, and which are not." Yes, and you've rejected the parameters I've proposed. Since you've already indicated that your criteria would be more objective than mine were, what exactly would you suggest instead?

One of the pitfalls of interpretation, especially when we encounter a theory that we find particularly enjoyable and wish to cling to, is that we twist and morph every possible piece of evidence to fit the theory. If this is intended to be an accusation of personal bias on my part, I have none. I'd happily classify this "theory" as head-canon when we agree on a set of parameters and if my claims don't satisfy them.

But we're still not engaging in the process of elimination. Are you trying to understand and counter my claim or solely attempting to criticize the semantics of my verbage? Between the worlds of Undertale and EarthBound, only the Franklin Badge is seen in the latter, with no reason existing for a badge to be carried by anyone in the former. The underground has no police, no Secret Service, no FBI, or any such organizations whatsoever.

As a means of granting my theory some falsifiability, I could play Devil's advocate and say, as was suggested in the original forum thread, that Sans' badge and various scientific paraphernalia, as well as his mention of "our reports" concerning alternate timelines, suggest that Sans is not Ness at all but is on some sort of timeline-monitoring police force or research team, possibly with Dr. Alphys (as proven by her expertise in science) and/or W.D. Gaster (as Sans' blueprints have something resembling Wingdings on them).

However, Dr. Alphys does not seem to have Sans' level of meta-game knowledge, as shown by her failure to account for the concept of turns in battle when constructing Mettaton NEO (hence the reason why he is defeated in one hit) and Gaster is hardly a part of Undertale's main story any more than the world of EarthBound is.

I looked into the Flying Men, and they appear to be a manifestation or representation of Ness's courage specific to the magical world of Magicant. That does not really correspond to a physical property (much less a sort of physical goo). The "physical goo" exists as a result of Dr. Alphys' experiments and Undyne's uniquely high level of determination. Both of these, incidentally, may be related to one another.

But then we've departed from our point of contact: there is a specific enemy called a Dust Ghost which could be a type of Monster, but it exhibits no properties that are similar to Monsters besides being made of dust. The Dust Ghost is more similar to other monsters in the Underground than actual ghosts like Napstablook or the Mad Dummy, making its name a misnomer.

Dust Ghosts:

-are made of dust

-appear to be naturally inclined towards pacifist tendencies

-live in a dark, isolated area without seeing the light of day

Most of the monsters in the Underground (Froggitt, Moldsmal, etc.):

-are made of dust

-appear to be naturally inclined towards pacifist tendencies

-live in a dark, isolated area without seeing the light of day

This is once again begging the question. We cannot use the premise "Sans is a character from the Mother universe" to help prove that Sans is Ness. The Mother universe and the Undertale universe appear to be the same due to their geography. From this, we can conclude that Sans lives in the Mother universe, has a badge, blueprints that appear to be written in the handwriting of Mr. Saturn (or Wingdings, as mentioned previously, but those would make less sense in context due to the reasons outlined above), and the trademark grin, stance, and fashion choices of Ness. Note: henceforth, I will refer to all these physical characteristics of Sans' that resemble Ness' (badge, clothes, etc.) as "Nessthetics" in order to keep things simple.

I had specifically referred to the bones that appear in the menus. Are you saying that they remove Sans' fighting style from EarthBound's battle mechanics completely? If so, I'd be willing to accept this if there were more evidence to separate Karmic Retribution from EarthBound's rolling HP meter, since Sans' menu bones could be any number of things from a revenant-exclusive attack to a power-up acquired within the underground.

But then the premise here is that the dust retains its original coloration. Every other organic component of Ness's body - his skin, his hair, his organs - should also retain their color by the same principle, meaning that Sans would not revive as a plain white skeleton. To contrast this with a more realistic example, in a nuclear explosion, thermal radiation would alter the outer surface of the human body more visibly than any internal organs or body tissue.

Indeed. He bobs and moves his arm. But that still doesn't respond to the important factor of his breathing, and why he physically moves when he breathes and Papyrus does not, which I provided an explanation for.

Sans' movement raises and lowers his torso ever so slightly, suggesting a pattern similar to breathing, which is not present in Papyrus' fight. Moreover, if I understood your aforementioned explanation correctly, Sans' movements are meant to display his exhaustion as a means of signalling to the player that he's nearing exhaustion, which makes little sense when considering the fact that Sans' torso moves with each breath he takes from the start of his fight to its finish.

What evidence points to that? All we get from the fictional accounts is that revenants (sometimes) consume souls, presumably in the same way that we "consume" food.

And the statement that Sans is the only main character without his own soul mode is flatly untrue. Flowey, Asriel, Asgore, and Toriel all use only the red soul mode. Meanwhile, the purple soul mode is restricted to a miniboss. Muffet seems too significant to call a miniboss, but if that's her official classification, I won't argue with that.

And Sans shares his soul mode with Papyrus, indicating that Sans' soul is not unique in nature. The red soul mode is exempt from this distinction, being the default mode of Frisk/Chara's soul.