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Overview

Sibyl System
Sibyl System
Sibyl's Symbol
Headquarters
Beneath the NONA Tower
Leader
Shared
Purpose
To create and manage all Dominators and Psycho-Pass Scanners in-country and to monitor the behavior of law enforcement personnel
Status

Active

The Sibyl System is the name given to a law enforcement organization working in cooperation with the national government to manage crime in 22nd century Japan. It is the sole operator and manager of proprietary hardware and software used to analyze the criminal tendencies of the entire country's populace. The Sibyl System established the Ministry of Welfare Public Safety Bureau and rules over its personnel, along with all Psycho-Pass technology and weaponry, with an iron fist.

Overview[]

The Sibyl System, also known simply as Sibyl, is a hive mind made up of people who, like Shogo Makishima, are criminally asymptomatic - unreadable by cymatic scan so their Psycho-Passes cannot be determined. There are 247 known members in total, with 200 of these members working non-stop to scan and determine the Psycho-Pass of everyone in the country. Originally developed as a tool to assist humans, Sibyl eventually took over and was accepted as a superior decision-making power because of its objectivity, thoroughness and accuracy, as well as the results it achieved in helping Japan become the only peaceful nation during a time of global strife. The actual mechanics of the system remain secret to non-members except to a select few, like Akane Tsunemori and Mika Shimotsuki. It possesses near-invincible sway over society insofar that it can neither be recognized nor categorized by any method known except Sibyl itself and, to some extent, the criminal organization, Bifrost.

Sibyl's primary purpose is to maintain constant vigilance over the entirety of Japan's populace through cymatic scans of brain wave patterns that are analyzed to determine every individual's propensity towards criminality. Such analyses include determining one's numerical Crime Coefficient, one's color-coded hue as it changes within a specified time period and one's basic societal profile from birth to the moment of scanning. The data is processed and analyzed instantaneously to produce what is termed a Psycho-Pass.

While Sibyl is a hive-mind and a collective of personalities, certain minds can control android bodies and perform real world duties such as governing the bureau. Such is the case in Psycho-Pass 3 when the body currently serving as Chief of the Public Safety Bureau is Harumi Hosorogi. Thus far, there are five known personalities known to be members of the system: Kozaburo Toma, Misako Togane, Akira Karasuma and Joshu Kasei. The rest of Sibyl's members remain anonymous. In Psycho-Pass 3, Koichi Azusawa's fondest wish is to be absorbed into the system, but is denied access while Arata Shindo is invited to join, but refuses because he wants to remain a human being[1] (as his father, Atsushi Shindo wished for him).

Membership[]

The most important qualifications needed to become a member of Sibyl:

  1. You must possess a personality that doesn't fit in with humanity's conventional standards.
  2. You must be able to oversee human actions from an objective viewpoint, without empathy or sympathy clouding your judgment.
  3. You must be criminally asymptomatic; that is, unreadable by the Sibyl System.

Membership is determined by existing members who will use any means necessary to persuade you to join them. Once approved, your brain is surgically excised from your body, then housed in a bio-engineered container with wires attached to many parts of the brain itself, then integrated into the hive mind where your personality co-exists with those of other members.

Etymology[]

The system is named Sibyl after the "Cumaean Sibyl" of ancient Greek mythology. Known as a prophet with oracular powers, she was once mortal but wished to be immortal. She is granted her wish by the god Apollo, but her boon becomes her bane when she forgets to also ask for eternal youth. Sibyl eventually withers away to be tiny enough to fit in a jar, then hung from a tree where children below taunt her saying, "Sibyl, Sibyl, what do you wish for?" to which she replies, "I wish to die."[2] This version of Sibyl is reinforced in two instances: the first during Tsunemori's first mission when Tomomi Masaoka calls Sibyl's judgment an "oracle"[3] and the second when Joshu Kasei declares to Makishima, "I feel like a prophet right out of a myth" during one of their conversations.[4]

A second possibility for the origin of Sibyl exists in the adage, "Be careful what you wish for; you may just get it." This phrase is attributed to several sources including: The Aesopica, the Book of Proverbs, Edgar Allen Poe's The Monkey's Paw and several other sources that have expressed similar sentiments.

Sibyl's Core[]

The core is located in one of the deepest sub-basement of the NONA Tower.[5] Sibyl does not rely on computers entirely, as was originally thought for, as Tsunemori learns, Sibyl is comprised of clear interlocking chambers, each housing a member's brain that is connected to all the other present brains via wiring. The members have to discard their original bodies so their brains can work in their chambers, day in and day out, scanning and measuring every person's Psycho-Pass in Japan at every moment.

Job Assignment[]

In addition to managing crime, Sibyl controls what one can do following high school graduation. Everyone takes a Sibyl exam that determines their next step and decides everything, such as whether or not you require further education, for which industry you may be hired and the job/profession to which you are best suited. As has been stated by Rina Takizaki, Japan is no longer a democracy because Sibyl decides who runs the government. The officials elected by the citizenry are just figureheads, often elected based on the popularity of their platform instead of genuine need for change.[6]

Foreign Policy[]

Upon taking control, Sibyl closes the borders of Japan for both entry and exit by any and all individuals. This is done for several reasons:

  1. Monitoring the Psycho-Pass of everyone crossing the border for any reason is too much for the system to handle.
  2. It jeopardizes international diplomatic relations should a foreigner be designated a latent criminal.
  3. Foreigners deemed to be active criminals are subject to the same consequences as natives.

In fact, when Sibyl was activated, many people were exiled: social critics, political groups, students, university teachers, and some farmers; basically, anyone deemed useless or threatening in the new order.[7][8]

Trivia[]

  • The use of the Sibyl System to determine latent criminals with the help of Crime Coefficients is introduced at some point between 2090 and 2100.[9]
  • The first version of the Sibyl System was introduced between 2030 and 2049. At that point, it was solely a supercomputer able to make precise and extensive cymatic scans to increase the accuracy of the Employment Aptitude Exam of the Ministry of Health, Labor and Welfare. Along with the cymatic scans, the Psycho-Pass measurement was developed and introduced.[9]
  • A replacement for the Sibyl System was proposed by the Ministry of Economy called the Panopticon to monitor the economic and traffic activities of its citizens. As Jeremy Bentham designed Panopticon to be a prison with covert monitoring capability, inmates would always behave as if being monitored all the time. Its employment as a trial system to monitor traffic was both met with controversy and failure, thus the Sibyl System remained active.[10]
  • Based upon visual inspection, the physical structure of the Sibyl System seems to contain 2,601 slots in total, despite having only 247 members.
  • The Sibyl System's Crime Coefficient is revealed to be over 300, even though it consists of only criminally asymptomatic brains. The brains contributing to this Coefficient are destroyed, lowering the number to zero.[11]
  • In case of emergency and/or if the System thinks that it is in danger, it can falsify the judgment of the Dominator in order to suppress the threat.[5][12][11]
  • There are locations where the Dominator cannot read a citizen's Psycho-Pass, such as the buildings housing the Ministry of Foreign Affairs throughout the country, for example, and military bases. [13] However, whether or not this remains the case by the beginning of Psycho-Pass is unknown.
  • It may be speculated that Shizuka Homura is also a member of the system because his origins are unknown, he is likely criminally asymptomatic, Hosorogi seems content to turn over the reins of the PSB to him at the conclusion of First Inspector and he insists that Akane Tsunemori work with him closely as his aid.
  • The system's name may be a reference to Sybil Eysenck, a real-world personality psychologist.

References[]

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