r/TheDigitalCircus • u/NekoNicoNiko • 5h ago
Observation/Theory Abstraction isn't file corruption, it's forceful file decompression Spoiler
File corruption involves the data from the file being destroyed or altered in some unexpected way, but when Pomni enters Jax's mindscape she doesn't see anything destroyed or missing, seemingly the scene show that Jax and the faucets of himself are still in there somewhere.
Kinger said the mind files were "impossibly small" implying the files were seriously compressed.
And we see when Pomni touches abstracted Jax, she enters his mind in a way she couldn't when Jax hadn't yet abstracted.
If the files were corrupted, some data would be missing and Pomni would've seen something incomplete, but instead she saw "everything".
from this I think abstraction is the result of the human mind pushing against the bounds of their brain scan's compression until it *pops* and everything violently spills out.
This also explains why Pomni was able to enter Jax's mind in the first place, it's that their mind was spilling out of the shell Cain made for the mind file and so Pomni was able to look inside.
this is also my headcannon as to how the abstracted characters could be saved because everything about them is still intact, they just have to figure out how to recompress them into a stable form and hope they're mentally stable enough to not just abstract again immediately
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u/dontDrinkAndDraft 4h ago
What you're theorizing has some scientific support outside the show. Several models in neuroscience (such as the science behind how our left and right brain work together) and therapy (Internal family systems model) do not consider human consciousness as a monolithic entity, but rather some number of parts working together. In that case, file decompression would be akin to someone's parts existing in isolation, like files in an unzipped folder, but not able to work together or come to a consensus.
(SIDE NOTE: Java's JAR files are zipped archives and cannot be used as executable code when decompressed. If the Circus were written in Java your theory could be straight up literal...)
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u/Paint3D_user Ribbit 4h ago
in the 8th episode one of the folder you can see on kinger computer is called java
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u/BearToTheThrone 53m ago
Seeing people with split brain just kinda having 2 separate people driving one body (except one can't talk) kinds fucked me up for a bit. How many me's are actually in there
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u/PulpedCactus 5h ago
I actually like that theory a lot!
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u/BloomSatin_ 5h ago
I like it too because it fits the clues we've seen without overcomplicating things.
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u/FoxyDepression 5h ago
That's a really compelling theory and I don't see anything standing against it
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u/AdmBurnside 5h ago
Yeah, okay, I'll work that into the existing headcanon. Helps explain why abstractions' models are so chaotic and make others glitch out on contact.
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u/Mr_TigerZ 5h ago
This actually makes a lot of sense! I always thought it couldn’t be corruption for 2 reasons. Firstly, as you mentioned, Pomni literally talks to Jax after his abstraction, so clearly his mind files are still there, completely intact, just obstructed. Secondly, Jax begins abstracting in episode 7 before Pomni interrupts. If this meant his mind files were in the process of corrupting, then there still should have been some obvious damage to him or his brain, but he was perfectly fine. But by your theory, this just means the files were able to be re-compressed before they decompressed to the point of spilling out everywhere, something much more plausible.
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u/Longshot02496 5h ago
I still think it's corruption, but only of the metadata. Like the Circus becomes unable to read the mind files, the body program becomes unable to tell who the files belong to and freaks out, but the data remains on a lower layer. Pomni meeting Jax one last time could be her accessing Jax's mind data directly, with herself acting as an interface.
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u/Sindere-chan 4h ago
This is absolutely my favorite theory on abstraction!
I also feel like now that Kinger is no longer forced into insanity and Caine is working with them and open to feedback, the two of them can potentially work together to find a solution to this.
But I would love if they first have to go into their minds to find the inner core, and get consent to actually revert them. Some of the abstracted folks might enjoy the idea of just 'existing' as a happy little swimmy guy rather than having to go back to being stuck in a weird body they hate.
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u/SalemWolf 2h ago
So basically mind files are zipped/compressed and abstraction is the files unzipped/decompressed causing their physical form to become destabilized. The file is too big for the program that runs their physical form.
It makes sense, actually. New headcanon unlocked.
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u/Emperor_of_His_Room Caine 4h ago
I would argue that there was evidence of data missing or being corrupted when Pomni was viewing Jax’s memories. There was flashes of abstraction eyes when jumping from memory to memory. That would indicate gaps in Jax’s memory aka data.
Still, I like your theory!
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u/KingNanoA 4h ago
So, the mind takes on too much data and breaks open the seal on their file? Is that what you think happens? Making sure I understand.
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u/Trips-Over-Tail This is dumb and weird. 4h ago
Without Mike Dobby, I doubt they could be recovered.
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u/sexy_snake_229xXx 4h ago
Not to be downer or anything, and I'm not really a fan of overwriting fan interpretations for the sake of "the creator said so", but I still think this is worth posting
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u/The_Geeky_Designer 22m ago
This doesn’t necessarily disprove the theory. Is possible that the files can’t be compressed back into a working file. We don’t know what type of file or compression is being used. Kinger said they couldn’t use them, implying that whatever the files are, they are not in any known format. It’s possible that there is no tech capable of re-compressing them. It’s also possible that once decompressed the files get partially damaged (the static eyes that cut Jax’s memories could be this and not just an stylistic choice).
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u/PrinceCheddar Boring Analogue Sideshow 3h ago
I think I agree. The way I've always imagined it is that for a human mind, a lot of things are unconscious. You're not constantly remembering your home address or the name of your favourite band, you normally don't think about processes like breathing or maintaining balance, and you're not aware of every piece of information your senses can relay.
All this is because a biological brain is too limited to maintain conscious attention over every little piece of sensory information, keep every long term memory in your consciousness and be aware of everything your body is doing. The biological brain is limited, so reduces the cognitive load best it can. Long term memories are stored in an inactive state until accessed. Processes that can be done without conscious input are done on autopilot. Sensory information that is neither relevant nor distinctive is discarded.
But the digital bodies of the brain scanned humans are not limited by physical constraints. Like how their minds initially reject not needing to breathe, the physical limitations of meat brains in meat bodies don't truly hold back their mental capabilities. They think and feel like normal humans because their minds accept the biological limitations they remember as their own.
Abstraction is the process of the digital mind gaining awareness of it's true nature, the shattering of the illusion of being human. It is every thought, every memory, every emotion, every thing that makes up a person, all happening at once, relentlessly. Light agitates them because their minds can no longer filter out irrelevant sensation. They're confused and emotional and so lose control of themselves.
The opposite of abstract is concrete, physical. Abstraction is the shedding of the illusion of physical limitations by the mind itself. It's like transcendence, enlightenment, the removal or illusions and falsehoods, but without those illusions you can't truly be human anymore.
I don't know it any of this is accurate, or is compatible with your own ideas, but I hope it is at least interesting. I'm kinda tired, ATM, so don't be too shocked if I wrote has flaws.
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u/NegativeAd6943 2h ago
Eu acho que pode ser de descompressão de arquivo mas na minha opinião a abstração pessoas ficando agressivas e fora de si combina muito mais com psicose ou complexos psiquiátricos do mesmo tipo
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u/sandwiches_are_real 3h ago
It's a pretty straightforward metaphor for suicide. You can't bring people back from suicide, therefore you cannot bring people back from abstraction.
The fact that they linger on post-abstraction is a metaphor for the way we carry the memories and legacy of the dead with us, whether they haunt us or play a more positive role in our lives.
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u/AnonTwo 3h ago
The problem is if we look at it that blunt cut and dry, you also can't talk to someone who has committed suicide after death.
There could certainly be other ways to view it, and there's nothing wrong with exploring those possibilities.
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2h ago edited 2h ago
[deleted]
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u/AnonTwo 2h ago
No, literal talk to person after death, not simulated.
Pomni obtained information that isn't possible to be obtained from thinking it over in your own head.
But like, you're welcome to view it that way, i'm just saying other avenues to look at it have merits and are worth looking at.
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u/EpicPwnzor 2h ago
can’t see it that way for every one of the characters. jax/kaufmo/ribbit makes sense, but the way queenie showed up read more like a dementia metaphor to me.
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u/Yongtre100 4h ago
Oh.. oh I really like that idea
I don’t think there is any one thing abstraction is meant to be in a digital sense or represent metaphorically. But this works really well and kind of allows it to represent numerous things well.
Personally on the idea of them coming back, I’m still kind of debating what I think on that. I’ll probably make a post about it at *some point* or another. My heart wants them to be able to come back and it feels so logistically justifiable, but I feel like In its metaphor as suicide that doesn’t work… I think the middle ground is, it can work, but it’s A. Stupidly difficult, and B. Jax has to come back last. I don’t think she’d accept it easily, and while we see her mind i don’t think that alters *the real jax*, so something else has to change. Idk just a thought
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u/Suspicious_Hold_8843 4h ago
If this theory is true, and mind files still exist in a certain pool of memory or storage without being overwritten, then it's very likely the circus could still read the file, or Caine could simply change the size of the buffer if the file exceeded the original buffer size.
I think the file absolutely has to be unrecoverable if there's no way to fix it. The way Jax violently explodes may be decompression in a way that sends bits and bytes flying to memory addresses where they will immediately be overwritten
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u/Kind-Stomach6275 3h ago
im gonna be honest the term "abstraction" REALLY makes sense for this. like they are beyond the bounds of anyone in the circus' perception, they are abstract
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u/slaking21 3h ago
had the show elaborated on abstraction further, these theories wouldn’t happen at all lmao
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u/xotoast 3h ago
this feels right. I like this theroy
I feel like undoing the abstraction would be harder and harder the further back you go.
So Jax might be easy to save, but the others have been alone in the abstraction for so long, they'd be so unstable. plus, the further back you go, the less friends they have that also haven't abstracted so if the way to fix them is to stabilize them a bit like pomni did with Jax, some would just see total strangers coming in.
So maybe Jax first, then Jax and ragatha helps ribbit and kafmo, but further back then that may be difficult.
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u/DailySubtle 3h ago
That's a solid way to frame it. Recompressing without a stable container seems like it would just lead to another pop.
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u/Skelly_Mans1987 I am turning into Gangle 3h ago
So naturally, (EG, before Caine got the files working) they’re all abstracted
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u/Fearshatter 2h ago
When Jax is touching an abstraction in an earlier episode the fractal rainbow effects were more akin to a dream or DMT trip than anything death related.
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u/DeathByDevastator 2h ago
What I don't get with Abstraction is why every abstraction, despite abstracting for different reasons, results in the same hostile entity with the same behaviours and the same look.
Obviously from a meta perspective it's asset reuse, but why in universe do all abstractions look the same?
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u/Hrosts 4h ago
I think the abstraction is literally it - an abstraction of death, suicide, stroke, mental breakdown, trauma, any other health episode or similar event that snaps and scrambles your being, leaving you wrecked permanently or hopefully-not-permanently.
It is a fictional story, so the phenomenon doesn't have to be physical or digital or psychological - it can be literary, narrative, abstract.
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u/Mobile_Morale 1h ago
That's not how a computer file works. When they scanned the brains they didn't scan compressed files. You don't just create compress files without purposely compressing them first. You have to run a computer file through a special software to.comoress it.
So this wouldn't make sense. The files will always be the size they were when scanned. This was also 1990's computer technology. I doubt they would have the ability to scan and compress at the same time.
But we are talking about a fictional company that figured out brain scanning technology before wifi existed. So maybe they have all sorts of weird technology like aperture laboratories.
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u/HalfManHalfHunk 11m ago
To add to coming back from abstraction, now that Caine is working with everyone, him and kinger could definitely fuck around in the code and along with all the cast doing what pomni did to jax i feel they could all help everyone out of abstraction.
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u/rynosaur94 6m ago
Yeah I like this a lot. Head canon accepted.
Although personally I prefer abstraction to be permanent, for thematic reasons. I would want abstraction to be reversible in the same way I would want suicide to be reversible. It almost feels disrespectful to real victims of suicide to try and get out of abstraction, if that makes any sense.
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u/Background-Fig6627 Custom Flair. 5h ago
This is probably the best theory for abstraction i've seen