Spoilers. Obviously.

This has been wandering around my head for awhile. The fallout universe is set primarily after the apocalypse happens, usually a few hundred years after the event. The primary cause was resource starvation and overpopulation; the result of unrestricted technology expansion and reliance on limited resources.

Sounds somewhat like our current society..

In fallout 4, you come across the institute. They are the only grouping with active technology expansion and thought, and what appears to be a fully active primary to tertiary industry tree — they get raw materials, process them (primary to secondary), and then provide services upon them (research & design). Politically speaking, they’re all nuts, but they’re the only group within the fallout universe operating a full tech tree. Everyone else is simply scavenging and repairing, not actually designing or building anything new. Eventually all the fusion cores will be dead, then how will you use power armor? Etc, etc.

Even diamond city in fallout 4, it’s nothing but a scavenged trading town. At best most populations will be living at medieval level technology.

Assuming that you’d want to ensure society stops the slow drift into the stone age that it’s in, you need a fully operational tech tree, you need primary industry.

Therefore, as a primary player character, the best choice in fallout 4 is to take over the institute, not destroy it. Of course, doing that means you are required to do some unpleasant things. I wish there were another way, a more peaceful way to take control of the institute.

Fallout 4 as a game is flawed, but it does make you think.