Oh my god this is so cool I just love this story

"And Then There Were Ponies.

... oh god, the title has already got me hooked. This is going to be awesome!

This is a very interesting story, and I would very much like to see where this goes next.

In particular, I want to hear the humans' side of the story in it's entirety. As far as I can tell, both sides have lied about what really happened, but their stories are so different that it is hard to tell by comparing the two what REALLY happened.

I can't say I'm feeling very supportive of Celestia right now. I regard brainwashing/memory wiping as one of the greatest evils one could inflict on another being. Regardless of her intentions, she effectively ERASED another sentient being (though fortunately not fully, it seems). If you subscribe to the belief in an afterlife, then that is worse than murder. That person no longer EXISTS. As a result, I consider Celestia's actions unforgiveable.

On a side note, it is darkly amusing to me that Celestia had mentioned murder earlier, noting that it was something ponies never did (and was implied to be something exclusive to humans, which isn't true anyway since animals such as dolphins have been documented murdering each other), and yet did something just as bad if not worse herself.

Also, given the fact that Twilight was able to use programming to perform impressive feats of magic, it seems clear that magic and science are not mutually exclusive, something that actually seems rather obvious (if something can be observed, tested, and studied, it can be included within scientific study). I find it odd, then, that Celestia would make a distinction between the two.

Actually, as a scientist, I find the rather "soulless" depiction of science to be not only somewhat annoying but flat out wrong. I cannot articulate my reasons clearly enough or concisely enough here, and so instead I simply recommend reading the Tvtropes article titled "Measuring the Marigolds" (notably the fact that it is only really true in fiction). Alternatively, watch Carl Sagan's "Cosmos".

Obviously, as you can tell by my username, I am rather biased. However, from what I have read so far it seems to me that the Princesses are not as innocent as they would have their ponies believe, and humans are not the monsters they have been made out to be (though they don't seem to be all nice and good either). Ultimately what I am hoping for is an all-grey conflict rather than the standard Black and White conflicts where one side is obviously good and the other clearly evil. It's just much more interesting that way.

isn't it possiable if twilight really was human she may have had a family, she could have been married or even had a child or a brother and celestia just yanked her away from all of that

>>227234227234

Anything is possible.

>>225303225303

I'm glad to see someone thinking about my story, and the morality of the choices being made by the characters in it. When writing about ponies, in my view one has three options. The writer can either a.) keep the plot of their story completely innocent and basically make it like another episode of the show b.) claim that the show is more or less showing us a filtered version of their world, and claim that their world isn't really so innocent after all. c.) claim that the world in which they live is innocent but that it is capable of being disrupted by some sort of outside force. I of course choose the third and went with humans as being that force, as they seemed to fit the bill perfectly. Honestly any realistic sentient life might do, but humans are the only example as of yet, so it is hard to say. How does the pony society manage to not collapse despite being so naive? Honestly I don't know, but in my opinion, that is part of the suspension of disbelieve that is needed to enjoy the show, thus I have not bothered, and will not bother to explain how this is possible.

However with a race of beings that isn't so innocent it is interesting to see how the decisions of these ponies made in innocence can lead to terrible outcomes, and can be very questionable from a moral perspective. It seems like if these decisions came up completely within their own little world (the way it seems they should) then it would collapse, but since this hasn't happened, the interaction with some third party seems necessary to me. As for the princesses being innocent? Well I would argue they are in the naive sense of the word. In terms of being not guilty, so to speak, I would agree they probably aren't, but having lived as long as they have, how could they be?

As for implying that murder is strictly a human quality, that was not intentional, so much as a matter of perspective. To the ponies it would seem like such, though what you say about dolphins and the like is true. However it is doubtful that very many ponies have paid that close of attention accept maybe Fluttershy who would certainly seek to overlook such a thing. Besides which in my view the ponies innocence in some weird way is a characteristic not only of them but the world in which they live in, otherwise how would they not collapse as a society due to their naive nature?

As for science being soulless, it may admittedly seem that way to many ponies, because they are largely unfamiliar with it, however I still don't think that is what Princess Luna was trying to convey. I think it has more to do with balance. It was more the notion of what can be explained and what can't, that I believe she was trying to put at odds. That is to say, it is important to know when to accept that we can't explain something, which one could argue is a part of science, but clearly Luna didn't think of it as such when she used the term science. Certainly both sides have a murky understanding of the past though, so it isn't as though her research is without bias.

As for the nature of the conflict, I will continue to give the characters Lauren Faust has developed (and a few of my own), what seems like the most suitable reactions for them, and if this makes it seem like one side was right and the other was wrong, please do not take this as my official endorsement. I do not say this, because I know it will be this way, but because even though I have a very good idea what will happen, things are always subject to change until I post it.

Is this story cancelled?

YAY I'm so glad you decided to keep going. I gotta say It's been so long I had to read the story again to understand what was going on. XD But after that I gotta say this was a great chapter and look your thumbs down turned into a thumbs up!

Image: http://www.progarchives.com/forum/uploads/19034/Cry_Guy2.png

>>11338751133875 What can I say, you've inspired me to take a slightly different stance on writing. (It basically amounts to screw it, I enjoy writing this, I am going to continue... which is true of all of my work.) I don't know exactly how periodic updates will be but I'll see this through to the end, and they won't be so sparse as to forget what is going on. Even I had that problem to some degree when editing this, and I'm the writer. It came back pretty quickly, but still... yeah... that means it has been far too long.

And what do ya know about that thumbs? I had that happen with a couple of thumbs down on another story. I guess my writing improves as it goes along. *shrug* Regardless, yay!

>>11357031135703

Glad to hear it. I'll share this story around a bit and who knows maybe it will get a bit more popular. I think it would be if more people knew it existed XD

Good concept, but the mane 6 seem somewhat flat and your story lacks conventions. Otherwise good work.

>>11493061149306 I agree with the characterization issues, particularly in the earlier chapters. I'm currently working on it. I'm not sure I know what your latter remark means though. Example perhaps?

Update! wooooot :D

wow didn't see that coming! so Twilight was really a dude? wow lol

>>13008911300891

Image: http://i0.kym-cdn.com/photos/images/original/000/121/527/Celestia%20troll%20face.jpg

I remember first reading the first 3 chapters of this story back in February, and the distinct lack of updates since then led me believe that it had been abandoned. Glad to say I was wrong. Anyways... take back the Earth comrades!

>>13577751357775 Yeah, that was back before I knew about the on hiatus radio button and some feedback from EQD wisely pointed out there were so serious problems with it. But thanks to macoman1 I eventually decided to heck with it, onward with the story!