That's a fair point... on the other hand, a great deal of what was written in canon about the DS-II predates that episode of
Rebels. And the lock on the Jedi Temple door may have been an ancient device whose secrets are now lost (common in Star Wars), or lost specifically to Palpatine (being a Jedi secret he may or may not have ever learned), or may require the active effort of Force users to make it work (in which case either Palpatine does it himself in secret, or enlists others, but can't have droids do it for him).
U.P. Cinnabar wrote:Simon_Jester wrote:True in principle, but the various lesser Force users in the Imperial state are so tightly integrated into the top levels of governance that it would be almost impossible to keep them from finding out in the long run.
How, if Palpatine personally programs the droids which do the actual work? Astromechs and protocol droids seem to be self-programming to an extent, and can be instructed using plain-language Basic commands, while a mouse droid, a robot version of the inter-departmental memo, if that part of the EU's to be believed, shouldn't be that difficult for someone who's not a tech to program. And, those three droid types are fairly ubiquitous throughout the SW galaxy, and would appear to be the least bit out of place on the Death Star.
Well, the big problem is that you're placing a lockout in a location that is fairly important and in a place you may foreseeably need to put a Force-sensitive agent. Note that during its sole period of operation, the Death Star I had Vader aboard. Why? Probably to stop any Imperial naval officer from deciding "Emperor Tarkin I" sounded good and blowing up Coruscant.
The Emperor relies on Force-sensitive agents to ensure that the non-Force-using parts of his own government remain in compliance with his will... and there are very few places where enforcing his will is more critical than aboard the Death Star. So there will be many opportunities for Force users to come into close contact with the systems responsible for telling the Death Star to fire, unless Palpatine resides on the station personally.
In doing the work himself, he restricts the circle of knowledge to himself, and the droids he's using, and those droids are going to either be destroyed, or have their memories wiped(which is of variable effectiveness), leaving only Palpatine in the know.
Another part of the problem is:
CAN a bunch of droids design a mechanism that uses the Force, aside from something relatively obvious and childish like "a doorknob that can only be turned telekinetically or with exotic equipment?" Droids cannot themselves use the Force or even perceive it, as a rule.
MKShepphard wrote:Also, you can combine this fail safe with two factor authentication with Palpatine's biometric signature as others have mentioned before from known secure locations (DS II throne room, or his throne room on Coruscant) to ensure it's secure.
That's most likely what Palpatine would do. He wasn't the one who relied on the Force alone to get him to where he needed to go, at least not in the prequels.
Now, combining Force use with normal biometrics would be prudent and a good precaution. Although anyone who has Palpatine's biometrics is presumably either Palpatine or a clone, and either way he'd have Force ability.
Basically, it's just that relying
only on the Force as a way for Palpatine to exercise his lockout on the firing controls is... imprudent.
I don't know what the % of population that's force sensitive enough to qualify as "jedi" is. It certainly isn't that high; given how fast the Jedi became legends and myth after their annihilation in ROTS.
To some extent they were legends even back when they still existed. Witness how panicked the Trade Federation delegates were when they found out Jedi had shown up to contest their blockade, or how when Anakin was a boy he thought no one could kill a Jedi knight.
And, well...
after that, there were 15-20 years of time in which the Jedi were, officially, a bunch of tricksters out to overthrow the Emperor and take over the state, after dominating the Republic for far too long and permitting the Republic to decay into a state of helplessness so profound that random separatist movements could trigger something as horrible and large as the Clone Wars. During which time it might have been, ah... unsafe to question the official story, and during which time media evidence of the Jedi actually being scary and powerful was probably heavily redacted.
And even then, it's not like everyone actually
forgot about the Jedi, just that there was a public veneer of dismissal of them among, one, the actual Imperial military and, two, the fraction of the population most likely to believe theories about major historical figures and organizations being a hoax (e.g. Han Solo).