Phm

okay First thing first. This is mostly about Stratt in the book. (I Have also seen the movie) Why do people find her action justified? This isn't hate but a genuine thing that I don't understand.

I understand why people compare her situation to the trolley problem at first glance. But the trolley problem is usually about being forced into an immediate choice where there are no other options and no time to find one. You either pull the lever and one person dies, or you do nothing and five people die.

But In the book I find it be more the equivalent of taking a person that stood willing on the other track, and replacing them a person fighting to get of the tracks and than pulling the leather.

There was another volunteer scientist with the required skill set, even if Grace was more qualified. Stratt herself tells Grace she kept him around mainly because he had the right gene and wanted him as a backup.

Even if we assume Grace truly was humanity’s best chance, I still don’t think drugging him with an experimental memory-erasing substance was logically justified, because it introduced enormous additional risks into an already fragile mission.

(before I go on, yes I know it is just a book and it was all planned out from the start but humour me.)

There are multiple different ways that could have ended. Even though Stratt makes it seem like she planned it all perfectly, this seems simply not the case. One variant could have been that the Drug did something with Grace in the coma that led to his death along side the other crew. Or in a scenario where the remaining crew survived they might have sabotage the mission. Yao said very clearly that he wouldn't do the mission if someone was forced after all. Or maybe a scenario where Grace didn't remember that he was a Teacher. Here he might have still sabotaged the mission because he didn't have that reason as before. (Given that he only went back to the project at all for his students)

or what if Grace had first remembered Stratt hunting and forcing him to this "sacrifice".

There would have been only a small chance that it would happen as it did and even than it only worked because Rocky was also there.

The mission succeeding doesn’t necessarily prove Stratt was right. To me, it proves she got lucky.

That’s why I struggle with the trolley problem comparison. A trolley problem is usually about choosing between terrible but relatively known outcomes. Stratt instead introduced a huge number of unpredictable variables because she believed she could control every aspect of the situation.

And honestly, I think hubris is one of her defining traits in the book. She repeatedly dismisses experts when she doesn't derelict understands the subject or thinks that her own solutions is better.

I understand why people find her compelling as a character. I just personally don’t see her decisions as logically justified, even if I understand the pressure she was under.

1. Using the other back-up back-up scientist (who had a bachelor's degree in sciences? Or something but not much else) would have delayed the mission immensly in terms of the training alone, so it simply made sense to rely on Grace instead and proceed with the same timeline (or risk months of delays and tens of thousand more deaths)

2. I agree with you that the drug was probably a big risk with the potential of killing him (I have a theory that it was the reason why grace did survive at all), and in that sense it was most definitely a gamble on stratt's part. At the same time, i vehemently disagree that grace's reaction to waking up would have ever compromised the mission. In the start of the book itself we see grace panic and give up on the mission altogether only to rush back after less than five minutes of one class. He likes to think of himself as a coward and unreliable and underskilled but (Stratt especially knows that!!!) his most reliable trait is how quickly he will jump to help with the problem in the most impossible of situations. He is full of tears and anxiety but also a significant amount of "well🤷 sucks for me 🤕 now what 🔧 can I do 🧪 about ☄️ it 🥼?"

3. She did get lucky. They all did. That's why it's a hail Mary.

On point 1) I do agree that training the other volunteer would have taken too long, but maybe you could’ve gotten around that with video locks or just. The Hail Mary was given a staggering amount of knowledge. Which someone who has even just the basic ground knowledge to a higher degree in biology could have used. That would eliminate that risk.

and to 2) I totally agree that Grace has that character suit of “oh well sucks for me let’s get this done.” And I also agreed that stratt probably knew that Grace would not sabotage the project even if he remembered what she did to him but what if he hadn’t had the memories of where he trusted her, if he would first have gotten back the memories of her hunting him down. It’s just a problem that even though we have Graces character on Earth, Stratt could have not known if it would still be the same after administering the drug. His kids make up a big part of that jumping to action character of his. If he doesn’t remember them, would he still have it? (from my point of view it’s really just a drug that is the big gamble. Because Stratt couldn’t have known How it would alter grace as a person. I always find that memories make up a big part of who we are.)