Interpreting the Lore of the Digimon Reference Book

[Theigno]

The Digimon Reference Book has a lot of things to say about Digimon and the setting in general. Some of those things are controversial and come up in all sorts of different contexts.

So here's a general thread for discussing all manner of lore related things, and for redirecting overly lore centric discussions from other threads.

 

[Darklabo]

And in terms of power-scaling, Ardhamon and Beowolfmon seem particularly weak for Ultimates (but are correct if we consider them as Perfects).

And at the same time we have Duskmon, who even being an Adult, is clearly presented to us as being more powerful than Seraphimon, an Ultimate (in Frontier anyway).

What gives you the impression the Fusions aren't Ultimate-class? Aldamon debuted fighting BlackSeraphimon and Beowulfmon fighting Duskmon, which you say was presented as Ultimate-class. Aldamon defeated his opponent and Beowulfmon matched his.
I think what may be causing this feeling is that the main Ultimate threats were handled by the Transcendents. But Cherubimon absorbed a huge chunk of the world's data to empower himself, while the Royal Knights are naturally very powerful and were boosted by Lucemon. And the latter breaks the scale.

Besides, both Fusion Hybrids profiles state that they inherited the full power of their Ancients, so you're arguing that the Ancients are Perfect-class when they're stated to be more powerful than present-day Ultimates?

Seraphimon is notorious for losing the majority of his fights, often against lower level Digimon.
This is even the case in Frontier since he is defeated by Mercurimon (who returned his attack, of course, but it remains a defeat).
Duskmon is comparable to an Adult in terms of Level.

Ardhamon and Beowolfmon need to team up to defeat Velgrmon, which puts them on par with MetalGreymon and WereGarurumon in Adventure 2020.

They need to evolve even more to be able to face Cherubimon, and again it's 2v1.

And finally, during the final battle of Xros Wars II, Ardhamon is unable to harm the Vamdemon before evolving into Susanoomon, while the other Megas wreak havoc in their ranks.

I know that the description of these two Digimon indicates that they inherited all the strength of AncientGreymon and AncientGarurumon, but in terms of feat this is far from the case.
Or there was a huge power difference between the Legendary Warriors, since half of AncientSphinxmon's power remains greater than all of AncientGreymon's.

By the way, Mugendramon's profile describes him as the strongest Digimon, which is contradicted by almost all of his appearances and the profiles of other Digimon.
DRB is therefore clearly not an irrefutable source.

 

[Lord Bearmon]

By the way, Mugendramon's profile describes him as the strongest Digimon, which is contradicted by almost all of his appearances and the profiles of other Digimon.
DRB is therefore clearly not an irrefutable source.

It was the stongest when it first debuted.

 

[Darklabo]

By the way, Mugendramon's profile describes him as the strongest Digimon, which is contradicted by almost all of his appearances and the profiles of other Digimon.
DRB is therefore clearly not an irrefutable source.

It was the stongest when it first debuted.

And it is no longer.
Yet it’s profile hasn't been changed or anything.

 

[Theigno]

By the way, Mugendramon's profile describes him as the strongest Digimon, which is contradicted by almost all of his appearances and the profiles of other Digimon.
DRB is therefore clearly not an irrefutable source.

It was the stongest when it first debuted.

And it is no longer.
Yet it’s profile hasn't been changed or anything.

The profiles are written as reports on newly discovered species at at the time of their debut in the franchise. There was never an expectation that they would be updated over time.

When astronomers record the "brightest supernova ever observed" and a few years later they observe an even brighter one, no one expects researchers to scramble back and revise the text of year old reports to "second brightest" or "third brightest" or whatever is the case now.

The only contradiction is people refusing to apply the logic of basic continuity.

 

[Darklabo]

By the way, Mugendramon's profile describes him as the strongest Digimon, which is contradicted by almost all of his appearances and the profiles of other Digimon.
DRB is therefore clearly not an irrefutable source.

It was the stongest when it first debuted.

And it is no longer.
Yet it’s profile hasn't been changed or anything.

The profiles are written as reports on newly discovered species at at the time of their debut in the franchise. There was never an expectation that they would be updated over time.

When astronomers record the "brightest supernova ever observed" and a few years later they observe an even brighter one, no one expects researchers to scramble back and revise the text of year old reports to "second brightest" or "third brightest" or whatever is the case now.

The only contradiction is people refusing to apply the logic of basic continuity.

This is exactly what is happening though.
When a new star that is brighter than the previous ones is discovered, the databases are updated to match the new information.

We are not going to rewrite the dictionaries, but the new ones will take into account the new reality.

My initial point therefore remains correct, the DRB is not an absolute reference since it is not updated in relation to new discoveries.

Mugendramon was therefore the strongest Digimon only until proof of the opposite.
Evidence that has come a long time ago.

 

[Notus]

Seraphimon is notorious for losing the majority of his fights, often against lower level Digimon.
This is even the case in Frontier since he is defeated by Mercurimon (who returned his attack, of course, but it remains a defeat).
Duskmon is comparable to an Adult in terms of Level.

The other notorious defeat of Seraphimon was to Arkadimon Adult, who ate another Ultimate as a Baby. He being a lower level is not an indicative of lack of strength of Seraphimon's part in this case.
As you said, in Frontier Seraphimon was basically defeated by himself. We can make a guess of his strength by looking at Ophanimon and Cherubimon, as the three are stated to be comparable before Lucemon's corruption of Cherubimon. So Seraphimon should at least be average Ultimate strength.
Duskmon, as you said yourself, was treated with Ultimate-class power in Frontier. And Lowemon's profile explicitly states his strength to be on the same level as the Fusion Hybrids. As there's no indicative of difference in power between these versions of the Warrior of Darkness, we can conclude the Fusions are intended to be Ultimate-class.

Ardhamon and Beowolfmon need to team up to defeat Velgrmon, which puts them on par with MetalGreymon and WereGarurumon in Adventure 2020.

After a buff from Angemon, whose mere presence weakened Velgrmon. So this version has a weakness to light, which the Frontier version didn't. From this we can imply Frontier's version was stronger.

And finally, during the final battle of Xros Wars II, Ardhamon is unable to harm the Vamdemon before evolving into Susanoomon, while the other Megas wreak havoc in their ranks.

I'll note Xros Wars overall disregard of levels and that BelialVamdemon was weaker than VenomVamdemon, which is usually not the case. But you do have a point here.

 

[Sparrow Hawk]

I like this idea for that topic. I worry about my terrible English to read "normally" to misinterpret a lot, like certain topics here I often got told about certain digimons like Parasimon.

I noticed Sagomon and Shawujinmon's profiles about their bead/skulls if one of those is lost or touched, they transform into a terrifying digimon. Does it count as instant berserk evo in Breakdramon style?

Also Sagomon was banished from the Heaven of the Digital world so he was once Angel type or simply was resident there or simply reference from Journey to The West? ChoHakkaimon was banished by Ofanimon but weirdly it said her current appearance was due to Ofanimon according to Jintrix. Is it similar case of Cyclomon whose was injured so heavily by Leomon to be doomed with this current appearance forever?

 

[DPTronazel]

I remember the reference book states that the Andromon species have no will nor emotions but ironically the Andromons depicted in the video games, anime, and manga were shown to possess their own will and emotions. (Remember Digimon Next shown Andromon shedding a tear? Especially where he was comforting Yu?) Though, I’ve noticed the Andromon from the original Adventure acts emotionless only when he's under control of something.

The only time I remember of an Andromon being emotionless (or looked emotionless?) is the one from the Reigitize Encode manga.

 

[Ragnalord]

Drb serve as a small introduction or about the digimon, nothing more, I think most of them are even outdated, since digimon lore increases in each media entry.

 

[Darklabo]

Seraphimon is notorious for losing the majority of his fights, often against lower level Digimon.
This is even the case in Frontier since he is defeated by Mercurimon (who returned his attack, of course, but it remains a defeat).
Duskmon is comparable to an Adult in terms of Level.

The other notorious defeat of Seraphimon was to Arkadimon Adult, who ate another Ultimate as a Baby. He being a lower level is not an indicative of lack of strength of Seraphimon's part in this case.
As you said, in Frontier Seraphimon was basically defeated by himself. We can make a guess of his strength by looking at Ophanimon and Cherubimon, as the three are stated to be comparable before Lucemon's corruption of Cherubimon. So Seraphimon should at least be average Ultimate strength.
Duskmon, as you said yourself, was treated with Ultimate-class power in Frontier. And Lowemon's profile explicitly states his strength to be on the same level as the Fusion Hybrids. As there's no indicative of difference in power between these versions of the Warrior of Darkness, we can conclude the Fusions are intended to be Ultimate-class.

Ardhamon and Beowolfmon need to team up to defeat Velgrmon, which puts them on par with MetalGreymon and WereGarurumon in Adventure 2020.

After a buff from Angemon, whose mere presence weakened Velgrmon. So this version has a weakness to light, which the Frontier version didn't. From this we can imply Frontier's version was stronger.

And finally, during the final battle of Xros Wars II, Ardhamon is unable to harm the Vamdemon before evolving into Susanoomon, while the other Megas wreak havoc in their ranks.

I'll note Xros Wars overall disregard of levels and that BelialVamdemon was weaker than VenomVamdemon, which is usually not the case. But you do have a point here.

- I admit that Arcadiamon was a special case, but not Mercurimon.
Seraphimon has indeed lost to an Adult, reflection is no excuse. In Digimon this type of ability is subject to the power of its user.

Could Mercurimon be able to deflect Lucemon's or even Cherubimon's attacks, I doubt it (or it would be extremely inconsistent).

Making the comparison between Seraphimon, Ophanimon and Cherubimon is useless since we are explicitly shown that Cherubimon is by far the strongest of the three.
It's not even the first time, in the movie he one-shot Seraphimon and Holydramon.
And we have no clear indication of how powerful he was before the start of the series.

Regardless, Duskmon is an Adult, not a Perfect and even less an Ultimate.
Besides, he is only Ultimate-Class compared to Seraphimon, who as I said is exceptionally weak in Frontier.
Duskmon poses no threat to Cherubimon and the RKs.

The feats of Ardhamon and Beowolfmon make them Perfect-Class.
What is written in the DRB is not canon in the series as long as feats do not come to demonstrate it, which is also why I started talking about Mugendramon.

By the way, if I remember correctly, Lowemon's single solo fight pits him against two Phantomon.
Clearly not a major threat.

- Angemon is an Adult, so the power-up he gave to MetalGreymon and WereGarurumon in no way allowed them to catch up with a Digimon Ultimate-Class (which is not the case, even with his buff MetalGreymon remains much weaker than Wargreymon).
We can, however, deduce that Angemon in Adventure 2020 is most likely more powerful than Seraphimon in Frontier.

- In any case, the writers consciously showed us that Ardhamon was weaker than the Megas of the other main characters.
My other examples are subject to interpretation since we can never be 100% sure that the same Digimon is as powerful in two different media (it even seems to be the other way around).
But in Xros Wars, under the guise of fan-service, we are clearly shown what these different universes are worth between them.

 

[Theigno]

This is exactly what is happening though.
When a new star that is brighter than the previous ones is discovered, the databases are updated to match the new information.

I was not talking about Databases but about articles and other publications, since those remain the same. And that's how the profiles work since they are published for new additions and reflect the state of knowledge at that time. The DRB is not even a Database in an exhaustive sense, as besides the very basics of level/type/attribute nothing about the data in the profiles is treated in a database-like way.

We are not going to rewrite the dictionaries, but the new ones will take into account the new reality.

But there is only one DRB and with the way its updated it would be hard to say when an old or new one should end or start.

My initial point therefore remains correct, the DRB is not an absolute reference since it is not updated in relation to new discoveries.

Mugendramon was therefore the strongest Digimon only until proof of the opposite.
Evidence that has come a long time ago.

And my point is that a reference does not need to be "absolute" in this way to be both canonical and reliable.

Updating past profiles is not actually necessary because whenever you encounter to profiles making the same claim about "the most x" or the "the best y" all you have to do is check which Digimon debuted last and that completely resolves contradiction.
Sure, if the data was presented in a way that resolved it for you that would be more convenient. But convenience was never the question, that would be moving the goalposts, the question was reliability. And data can both be very inconvenient to work with and very reliable at the same time, this is not mutually exclusive. A single sample in a collection might not give you an accurate picture but multiple samples in combination might very well do. That each individual sample does not in itself reveal the big picture is not in itself a reason to claim that the samples are inaccurate as a whole.
Therefore whether an individual DRB entry takes future entries into account when presenting a fact or you infer the same fact from comparing multiple entries, you arrive at the same understanding of the current situation. The overall information content is more or less identical. Only the method of obtaining the information differs.

The only assumption I am making so far is that a later Digimon profile superseding claims stated in an earlier profile does not prove that that the previous claims were inaccurate in their original context.
So yes, you can't just go by single profiles, you have to look at the wider context, and I understand that for many that's roundabout and frustrating.
But the illogical part is that this idea of relativity is turned into some weird slippery slope argument that generalizes everything into oblivion.

Let's say I followed my cat around my apartment and took photos of it in different spots and posted them online.
If people looked at those cat photos the way they look DRB entries, they would immediately point out that a cat can't be in more than one spot, so the photos totally contradict each other.
Then they'd claim that because the photos contradict each other, most or even all of them must have been faked or manipulated.
From that they finally conclude that because most or all of the photos are fake then any future photos I might post of the cat are also probably fake and can't be taken as proof that the cat ever was at the locations shown in the photos.

reflection is no excuse. In Digimon this type of ability is subject to the power of its user.

What's your source for that claim?

Could Mercurimon be able to deflect Lucemon's or even Cherubimon's attacks

I'd argue that he could. There's nothing unfair about that since they could simply kill him using physical non-special attacks.

 

[Darklabo]

This is exactly what is happening though.
When a new star that is brighter than the previous ones is discovered, the databases are updated to match the new information.

I was not talking about Databases but about articles and other publications, since those remain the same. And that's how the profiles work since they are published for new additions and reflect the state of knowledge at that time. The DRB is not even a Database in an exhaustive sense, as besides the very basics of level/type/attribute nothing about the data in the profiles is treated in a database-like way.

We are not going to rewrite the dictionaries, but the new ones will take into account the new reality.

But there is only one DRB and with the way its updated it would be hard to say when an old or new one should end or start.

My initial point therefore remains correct, the DRB is not an absolute reference since it is not updated in relation to new discoveries.

Mugendramon was therefore the strongest Digimon only until proof of the opposite.
Evidence that has come a long time ago.

And my point is that a reference does not need to be "absolute" in this way to be both canonical and reliable.

Updating past profiles is not actually necessary because whenever you encounter to profiles making the same claim about "the most x" or the "the best y" all you have to do is check which Digimon debuted last and that completely resolves contradiction.
Sure, if the data was presented in a way that resolved it for you that would be more convenient. But convenience was never the question, that would be moving the goalposts, the question was reliability. And data can both be very inconvenient to work with and very reliable at the same time, this is not mutually exclusive. A single sample in a collection might not give you an accurate picture but multiple samples in combination might very well do. That each individual sample does not in itself reveal the big picture is not in itself a reason to claim that the samples are inaccurate as a whole.
Therefore whether an individual DRB entry takes future entries into account when presenting a fact or you infer the same fact from comparing multiple entries, you arrive at the same understanding of the current situation. The overall information content is more or less identical. Only the method of obtaining the information differs.

The only assumption I am making so far is that a later Digimon profile superseding claims stated in an earlier profile does not prove that that the previous claims were inaccurate in their original context.
So yes, you can't just go by single profiles, you have to look at the wider context, and I understand that for many that's roundabout and frustrating.
But the illogical part is that this idea of relativity is turned into some weird slippery slope argument that generalizes everything into oblivion.

Let's say I followed my cat around my apartment and took photos of it in different spots and posted them online.
If people looked at those cat photos the way they look DRB entries, they would immediately point out that a cat can't be in more than one spot, so the photos totally contradict each other.
Then they'd claim that because the photos contradict each other, most or even all of them must have been faked or manipulated.
From that they finally conclude that because most or all of the photos are fake then any future photos I might post of the cat are also probably fake and can't be taken as proof that the cat ever was at the locations shown in the photos.

reflection is no excuse. In Digimon this type of ability is subject to the power of its user.

What's your source for that claim?

Could Mercurimon be able to deflect Lucemon's or even Cherubimon's attacks

I'd argue that he could. There's nothing unfair about that since they could simply kill him using physical non-special attacks.

- Well these articles and these publications were relevant in their time, but are no longer today, so there is no reason to take them into account.
And again, relevant does not mean truthful.
The brightest star observed at a T-time is not and never has been the brightest star in the Universe.
It's just that it was the only one we could observe from our limited perspective.

If we apply the same logic to the DRB, it is only a concentrate of subjective observations which can be invalidated at any time.
The fact that it never gets updated makes it lose a lot of interest in reality.

- And my point is the exact opposite, a reference has to be absolute to be canon and reliable.
Hence the interest of updates.

It is not a question of "for me", this is how research works in all fields.

If you claim that the Sun revolves around the Earth, not only is it wrong but it always has been, it is only the truncated observations of a bygone era that could have made people think otherwise.

If you apply the logic of any science to the DRB, Mugendramon was never the strongest Digimon, he was only the strongest to have been observed at one point in time.
Observations must be proven by examples, that's all.
To say that such a star is the brightest or that such a monster is the strongest without providing objective and irrefutable proof has no value.

Besides, science tends to avoid value relationships, or else it pays great attention to the choice of words.
We would not have had "the brightest star", but rather "the brightest star observed to date", which changes everything.

I'm not really following you in your cat example.

The DRB claims Mugendramon is the strongest Digimon. It's wrong.
This erroneous information is not updated, so the DRB is not a reliable source.
So the DRB is not a reference.
It doesn't matter that it was at one time, today the DRB is no more consistent and canon than an old dictionary printed 20 years ago, when Pluto was still a planet (even if it’s not Pluto which changed classification, but our interpretation of what a planet is).

- Regarding Mercurimon, it falls under the scope of "No Limit Fallacy".

To pretend that an ability or a hax is "invincible" has no value until it has been proven by feats.
This is all the more true in Digimon where abilities deemed "invincible" like All Delete or God Matrix have been countered more times than they have been effective.

Until proven otherwise, it is the same for Mercurimon.
You have the right to think that Mercurimon can deflect the attacks of Cherubimon and Lucemon, yes, in the same way that I have the right to think that Numemon is the most powerful Digimon and that he is withholding his strength so as not to destroy the Multiverse.
But in a serious debate, I don't think it holds up.

 

[TMS]

I always have to roll my eyes when people start talking about “feats” in fiction and trying to use them to prove absolutes. The author is free to ignore anything or make up anything.

Making up arbitrary rules like, “Mercuremon can only reflect weak attacks” (something that’s never been stated or even implied) is also pointless.

I’d also like to point out that Hybrids are Hybrid-level, not Adult-level or anything else, making arguments based on a Digimon’s level even more irrelevant than usual.

 

[Darklabo]

I always have to roll my eyes when people start talking about “feats” in fiction and trying to use them to prove absolutes. The author is free to ignore anything or make up anything.

Making up arbitrary rules like, “Mercuremon can only reflect weak attacks” (something that’s never been stated or even implied) is also pointless.

I’d also like to point out that Hybrids are Hybrid-level, not Adult-level or anything else, making arguments based on a Digimon’s level even more irrelevant than usual.

« Making up arbitrary rules like, “Mercuremon can only reflect weak attacks” (something that’s never been stated or even implied) is also pointless. »

Just as much, if not more, is to consider a statement to be true.
The characters are subjective by nature, and their claims are often biased.
And even the author is not immune to a contradiction.

Personally, I tend to trust feats more, seeing one character beat another is more concrete than hearing him say that he can do it.

You make a point about hybrids, I'm just trying to find a logic in their evolutions even if there is not necessarily.
Most media, however, try to associate them with more common levels (video games, V-Pets or even card games).

 

[PCN24454]

I always have to roll my eyes when people start talking about “feats” in fiction and trying to use them to prove absolutes. The author is free to ignore anything or make up anything.

Making up arbitrary rules like, “Mercuremon can only reflect weak attacks” (something that’s never been stated or even implied) is also pointless.

I’d also like to point out that Hybrids are Hybrid-level, not Adult-level or anything else, making arguments based on a Digimon’s level even more irrelevant than usual.

« Making up arbitrary rules like, “Mercuremon can only reflect weak attacks” (something that’s never been stated or even implied) is also pointless. »

Just as much, if not more, is to consider a statement to be true.
The characters are subjective by nature, and their claims are often biased.
And even the author is not immune to a contradiction.

Personally, I tend to trust feats more, seeing one character beat another is more concrete than hearing him say that he can do it.

You make a point about hybrids, I'm just trying to find a logic in their evolutions even if there is not necessarily.
Most media, however, try to associate them with more common levels (video games, V-Pets or even card games).

When you're skeptical of everything, it just comes out as denial.

 

[Theigno]

- Well these articles and these publications were relevant in their time, but are no longer today, so there is no reason to take them into account.
And again, relevant does not mean truthful.

I'd say there's plenty of reasons to take them into account if the newer publications don't actually go into detail about the same topic and generally a single aspect of the older publications being updated does not inherently indicate anything else about them having been overturned.
In regard to truthfulness, the fact that in the end we're dealing with fiction should in some ways modify the way we think about sources; since generally any untruthfulness in fiction exists for a specific narrative purpose and otherwise I'd be skeptical about being skeptical for reasons elaborated further down.

- And my point is the exact opposite, a reference has to be absolute to be canon and reliable.
Hence the interest of updates.

Well, that's simply your personal view of canon and clearly not everyone shares your standards on that topic.
Plenty of settings don't bother being absolute about anything whatsoever and don't provide proof for much at all, yet that doesn't stop them from having a canon, and people having discussions about said settings and its canon and so on.
That Digimon even offers the concept of Digimon research going on and its results being released is already far more generous in its specificity than what we get from many other franchises, even if the data isn't flawless.

Observations must be proven by examples, that's all.To say that such a star is the brightest or that such a monster is the strongest without providing objective and irrefutable proof has no value.

Then 99% of fiction will never have value to you since "objective and irrefutable proof" aren't really a thing around these parts.
Sure, a random claim by a fan may (and probably should) be subject to such scrutiny but that's not the context we're talking about, as you seem to attempt to apply that kind of extreme skepticism to statements that have already been published. And that just seems bizarre, because then how can you believe anything?
If a book contains the statement "his eyes were green" we can assume that this in fact the case. No one would make the argument "well... the book didn't include a detailed analysis of the waveform of the light bouncing back from his eyes that would have irrefutably proven that they would indeed be seen as being green, therefore they could be actually any color".
Like, I'm absolutely of the opinion that once a fictional setting establishes something you can dissect and analyze it all day, that's the whole reason I'm on this forum, but at some level fiction has the right to state its facts and rules in somewhat of an axiomatic way; at some point the fact that those were the words that were officially published and not some other words that they could have just as easily published has to count for something.
If you want to reject a direct statement from a source, the burden of proof is totally on you to produce an "objective and irrefutable" reason for why you believe something else to be true.

And going back into the specific example of Digimon, it's just not feasible to expect anything to be proven or disproven as exactly as you demand it. The entire structure of the franchise isn't really suited for accumulating evidence "irrefutably" since for example different continuities portray Digimon differently and have wildly different rules. In Zero Two Mummymon's gun shoots warped lightning, in X-Evolution it shoots red lasers. In Tamers Orochimon was taken down by Leomon using LadyDevimon's power, so basically by the power of a single perfect if not less, while in Adventure: It takes the combined power of 8 perfects to take it down, etc.
This means that you cannot reliably use the abilities and/or strength of a Digimon in a certain setting to predict their ability or strength in a different setting.
So from this perspective it is questionable if any "feats" shown in the anime or manga would actually even apply to the setting of the DRB profiles in the first place, or at least not with the absolute certainty that you seemingly demand.

It is not a question of "for me", this is how research works in all fields.
If you claim that the Sun revolves around the Earth, not only is it wrong but it always has been, it is only the truncated observations of a bygone era that could have made people think otherwise.

As much as I believe that particular transition to be a very interesting topic, it simply does not apply here as you cannot equate basic addition of data into an existing system with a complete paradigm shift revolutionizing not (just) the data but the entire methodology including principles and methods of an entire discipline.
If you think it does apply and you truly want to claim that, even if adjusted, the data presented in older profile isn't applicable due to some large scale paradigm shift in the fictional science of Digimon research, you'll have to present independent evidence of such a paradigm shift actually having occurred.

And good luck with that, because if that were the case it's unlikely that just the results would change but also the entire discourse surrounding them. Different concepts and perspectives, different terminology, different properties and factors that are that are taken into consideration and so on.
The point being that it would be pretty easy to pick out if some astronomical description was is based geocentrism or heliocentrism, one might bring up things like equants and epicycles or, well, the general assumption that the earth doesn't move, the other model does not.

As my evidence for such a shift not having occurred, I would point to the concepts and terms used in the profiles being pretty much stable. If a difference existed that was significant enough to make all statements basically incommensurable, I'm pretty sure it would have involved some very noticeable changes.

Besides, science tends to avoid value relationships, or else it pays great attention to the choice of words.
We would not have had "the brightest star", but rather "the brightest star observed to date", which changes everything.

At no point did I claim that the profiles in terms of their use of terminology their exactness or rigor would fully satisfy the requirements of actual scientific research papers.
My main point in bringing up the topic was simply that, even as research moves on, prior articles and the papers they're based on remain archived in their original form and are not continually updated.

But we do know that many if not all of the profiles are based on what can be assumed genuine research, as they do mention Digimon researchers, facilities and experiments (KoKabuterimon's strength was said to be demonstrated in an experiment that involved him lifting a Tortamon for instance), so reasonably, statements that are not clearly designated as hearsay are already proven by in-universe research. Of course we don't have the exact experimental results, or the (fictional) research papers, and what we end up in the profile is more of a kind of second-hand account obviously targeted at non-specialists.
But I don't think all evidence or all claims need to be already science grade specific in order for for some theory or some model to be applied to it.

So it rubs me the wrong way to see some rejection based on exactness standards that simply can't be expected to apply, and I would argue that much of the process of science or rather logical discussions and systematic analysis (as nothing we do here is proper science either) should consist of establishing patterns and models to process, interpret and account for as much of the available data we have at our disposal and not just to throw away data you don't like until whatever is left fits your theory.

The brightest star observed at a T-time is not and never has been the brightest star in the Universe.
It's just that it was the only one we could observe from our limited perspective.

Since we cannot see into the future and the profiles are not written from an omniscient perspective, "until now" and "as far as we know" is always implicitly true for any statement ever made except perhaps highly theoretical abstracts. There is no need to explicitly add that qualifier to every statement.

I'm not really following you in your cat example.

It was meant to describe a situation where absurd problems arise by ignoring obvious context.
If you look at a photo of a cat sitting in my office taken at 11:00 and a photo of my cat in my kitchen taken at 12:00 you might ask yourself how the cat can be both in the office and in the kitchen.
Except you probably don't ask yourself that at all because you can reasonably infer that my cat moved from the office to the kitchen at some point between 11:00 and 12:00, which accounts for the discrepancy of the cat's position.

The same applies for DRB profiles. From A profile written in 1999 describing Mugendramon as "the strongest" and a profile written in 2006 describing Leviamon as "the strongest" we can reasonably infer that progressively stronger Digimon have debuted between 1999 and 2006, accounting for the statements in both profiles as the practical meaning changes with time.

Both cat pictures and profiles remain "valid" in their respective contexts.

If you apply the logic of any science to the DRB, Mugendramon was never the strongest Digimon, he was only the strongest to have been observed at one point in time.

Exactly, and that's all we need to know to confirm that his profile does indeed hold canonical and valuable information.

Your notion of completely dismissing old data is far too broad in proportion to the actual criticisms you present for it since the faults you point out relatively easy to correct for.

You main criticism for profiles such as Mugendramon's basically boils down to "things are no longer how they used to be back then" ...but so what? Change rarely happens randomly, it's often a definite pattern. If you identify a pattern chances are you can reverse it. If the meaning of words has changed you can understand from context how much the meaning has drifted, and translate. If units have changed, you convert. If values have shifted, you counteract with an offset.
People, especially in science, don't just just give up and throw all their accumulated knowledge away the moment they have to merely recontextualize something.

Let's look at an obvious example from economy: Inflation.

In 1953 the movie House of Wax was shot with a budget of around 1 million dollars. But well, time moves on and $1 in 1953 is not at all the same as $1 in 2021 and in terms of the amount of actual value that was spent on the movie the 1 million figure is only true as long as we are talking about the time around 1953 and is completely incorrect by today's definition of what the dollar is worth nowadays.
But only because it no longer applies doesn't mean that this one million has no meaning at all anymore and that we could somehow never ever know how much the movie actually cost in 2021 dollars. Rather, because we know when the movie was shot, we can take that value and process it, using some fancy math/economy and something called a "Market basket" of goods (that obviously can't be comprehensive) with prices tracked over time to arrive at a conversion rate that tells us that the value of the dollar has basically multiplied by ten since the fifties and we're looking at a value of around 10 million dollars in 2021.
So only because some definite value or statement has become obsolete doesn't mean that its practical meaning in the current context cannot be restored. So here I will demonstrate a way to adjust a DRB profile by inflation... or perhaps rather deflation in this case.

In the same way as "$1" means different values at different times, even though it still always "$1" the term "the strongest" denotes different things in different contexts as well. If we understand its intended context we can reformulate the statement it in a way that remains valid in our current context without contradictions.

So we start by asking the basic question: In which context was Mugendramon's profile supposed to apply?
The answer is simple: The Digimon franchise at the time of Mugendramon's debut, which is early 1999.
No statement in the profile can be said to apply at anything beyond that point, since neither the authors of the profile, in the out-of-universe sense, could know about any Digimon they haven't designed yet, nor could the Digimon researchers, whose discoveries the profiles are based on in-universe, be able to take into account the ability or even existence of any Digimon species they haven't even discovered yet.

So now we know the context. And while that context may change in the future, what stays the same are the practical qualifications that have to be met for a statement to be true in that particular context. The statement in this case is being Mugendramon being the strongest, and the qualification is simply all other Digimon in that context being weaker. Duh.
This sounds like a pointless reversal but it illustrates the factor of scope: Even once Mugendramon is no longer the strongest in general, it will not change the fact that these other Digimon are still weaker.
Because we know when Mugendramon debuted, we also know which other Digimon existed at the time and luckily for this particular example the setting back then was pretty limited. Ultimates as a concept were only recently introduced via the first few Pendulums and for simplicity's sake we can assume that Perfect levels and below aren't really competition.

So with that in mind here's what the profile actually tells us: HerakleKabuterimon, SaberLeomon, MetalEtemon, Holydramon, MarinAngemon, MetalSeadramon and Pukumon cannot equal Mugendramon in terms of power. I don't think that's a particularly shocking claim and the introduction of progressively more powerful Digimon doesn't change anything about it.

But since I feel you'd insist on doubting it anyway I have prepared another metaphor because that's how I like to spend my time: Let's say some European biologist who is for some reason completely unaware of other continents measures the top speed of animals on land. He compares the top speed of running turtles, chickens, cats, hedgehogs, pigs horses, you name it. And lets say he finds that hedgehogs are faster than turtles and chickens faster than hedgehogs, and cats faster than chickens and honestly I'm not actually going to google how fast all of them go so I'll just go out on a limb and say he finds out that the horse wins out.
Since he only knows about Europe he declares that the horse is the fastest animal.
But one day he finds out about Africa and he goes there and there he sees Cheetahs which are faster than horses (And I guess this thought experiment takes place in the future where the last Asiatic cheetahs are completely extinct).
That certainly disproves that the horse is the fastest animal, but does it disprove anything else? According to your logic, the moment that the Cheetah disproves the the statement "the horse is the fastest animal", we have to consider that turtles and chickens could be faster than horses. Hedgehogs could be faster than cats, because all previous data is completely worthless, right?
I think most would disagree with that. That cheetahs are faster than horses does not disprove the previous result of horses being faster than turtles. The biologist would have received the same results in those measurements with or without knowing about cheetahs. Put more abstractly: A simple shift of boundary values does not impact the relation between preexisting values in the same system.

So there we go. We can adjust the data ourselves without Bandai doing it for us.

- Regarding Mercurimon, it falls under the scope of "No Limit Fallacy".

To pretend that an ability or a hax is "invincible" has no value until it has been proven by feats.

I don't think I've ever heard of that type of fallacy in any actual theory of argumentation.
I would say your arguments would fall under the"Made up limits" fallacy where fans pretend there are some arbitrary limits to something even though there's no proof for their existence.

Personally, as long as we are talking about magical computer monsters that violate countless laws of physics by generally existing, I am completely on board with the idea of them being able to use any supernatural ability their profile ascribes to them to its fullest imaginable extent until shown or stated otherwise.

I mean they and their abilities are manifested computer programs. Computer programs have a tendency to apply their logic quite indiscriminately to any input they get. If efficiently written, the same a tiny compression program can compress both a kilobyte sized file and a gigabyte sized file. Even the biggest, meanest universe ending explosions are just a chunk of data in context of Digimon.
So if Mercuremon's ability simply cut-and-pastes any data it receives, I don't see why it should care about limits.

This is all the more true in Digimon where abilities deemed "invincible" like All Delete or God Matrix have been countered more times than they have been effective.

The only people deeming those attacks invincible have always been idiots though. The actual wording of All Delete merely states that the blade erases all data it comes into contact with, which doesn't exactly make it invincible as there are plenty of Digimon capable of fighting in a way that avoids getting into the range of a sword.
Neither was invincibility of Dot Matrix/God Matrix ever any more than villainous gloating; Anyone who was surprised or felt cheated that the villain's data erasing ability would at some point be cancelled out by the hero's data rewriting ability just straight up doesn't understand foreshadowing.

You have the right to think that Mercurimon can deflect the attacks of Cherubimon and Lucemon, yes, in the same way that I have the right to think that Numemon is the most powerful Digimon and that he is withholding his strength so as not to destroy the Multiverse.

That Numemon is weak is explicitly stated in its profile.
That there are any limits to Mercuremon's Generous Mirror attack is not stated in its profile and we've already seen him kill an Ultimate with it.
So much for that.

 

[Muur]

Well, considering the profiles are all still up with Machiendramon and Leviamon both making the claims of being the strongest that is them right now stating that. They've updated and edited profiles before (such as Patamon not once, but twice, to include Holy power to justify Angemon, then ancient descent to justify armor digivolution) so they should update those profiles to remove that information. Right now, if you go to Machiendramon's profile in 2021 it outright still says he is the strongest Digimon. When actual scientists prove new things they make sure to refute their old claims and remove them. If they had a report that said some metal is the strongest but they found some new metal that is stronger they would edit the original to remove that. the profiles are all currently a thing. its not like they removed that profile when adding other digimons. and they *do* remove things, because they removed a good 80% of Spadamon's profile to remove the stuff about super xros wars and him being the strongest legend arm when they made other legend arms.

 

[Theigno]

Well, considering the profiles are all still up with Machiendramon and Leviamon both making the claims of being the strongest that is them right now stating that.

Only because two texts exist at the moment doesn't mean they describe the same moment.

They've updated and edited profiles before (such as Patamon not once, but twice, to include Holy power to justify Angemon, then ancient descent to justify armor digivolution) so they should update those profiles to remove that information. [...]and they *do* remove things, because they removed a good 80% of Spadamon's profile to remove the stuff about super xros wars and him being the strongest legend arm when they made other legend arms.

That is an entirely different case of entire concepts being manipulated retroactively. My point is that the progression of discovery is a part of the "narrative" they form and would therefore not be treated in the same way as changes from "outside" as most changes are clearly caused by general external causes impacting the franchise as a whole, or at least significant parts of it such as the removal of tsunami references after 2011.
And neither of the two examples is really relevant at all since the old versions were changed before they were introduced into the DRB in the first place. I never claimed that a Digimon could not have different profiles across the franchise.

the profiles are all currently a thing.

Nope, they are clearly not.
Etemon's profile is written in present tense and tells of its journeying around the world searching for battles "even now", while MetalEtemon references that same journey and explicitely treats it as having happened in the past. Time has moved on.
V-mon's profile still claims that it was discovered recently even though by now the majority of Digimon are more recent than him.
Imperialdramon DM's profile still treats fighter mode as some undiscovered mystery that's "never been seen".
Demon's profile doesn't mention him being a member of the SGDL because the group wasn't known at the time.
Dukemon's profile only lists Omegamon and Magnamon as other Royal Knights, because those two were the only ones confirmed at the time.
Goddramon's profile was never updated with Megidramon's inclusion in the Four Great Dragons either.
And there's plenty of similar examples.

 

[Bancho]

After certain episode, and it had me thinking.

"The Digital World's Strongest Digimon" mentioned in Mugendramon's profile. Isn't it better if it goes like "The Strongest Weapon Digimon Crack Team made and it's the most proudest creation they ever made." something like that?

Because I realized, why say Digital World while Mugendramon being artificial manmade developed by Crack Team? Sorry I'm not that great in English but this is actually bothering me. It sounded like Crack Team won a Nobel Prize to Yggdrasil and it was approved something like that.

when Mugendramon's profile was written, it was the strongest Digimon seen up until that point by the mysterious researchers who have been writing the profiles and the Crack Team was still a secret they didn't know about. If reference book profiles were to ever be updated, Mugendramon's would look different.

Another example of this is Mamemon's profile still saying it's the second strongest species of digimon because it was written by researchers back when we only had 14 digimon ever discovered from the original Digital Monster toy to compare it against; since then we've discovered Megas and "Super Ultimate" digimon that far surpass Mamemon