I honestly was not expecting the Institute to be who they were. All of the factions seemed to have their own sense of uniqueness to them, but the Institute did stand out a bit as the boogeyman of the Commonwealth as they say in my opinion. They want to institutionalize synths and replace humans in many different ways which I found to be arbitrary. The people of the Institute are all very smart and organized individuals seeking personal gain, just like everyone else in the Commonwealth, but I believe the way they go about solving what they believe to be "problems" as no different than two groups of raiders fighting over some turf. Also, the fact that Father is who he is, I was severely disappointed.

@"Woox" Yeah, I was severely underwhelmed with what Bethesda had managed to come up with in the factions department.

It's like the Institute was supposed to be this grandiose puppetmaster faction, but all Bethesda managed to create was a time-machine; because it felt like Mass Effect: Andromeda two years before it actually came out, complete with the white plastic aesthetics! Lifeless characters with almost no relatability.

3/10 characterization. 5.5/10 characterization with rice.

I think it's entirely up to who ever was running the institute at a certain point in it's history to judge what the institute is like, for example Shaun was brought up within the institute and was most likely groomed for role, he'd have the view that'd forward the institutes goals in the safest and most successful and safe way for the people within the institute even it'd involved kidnapping and replacing wastelanders with synths, i personally don't know much about the institutes history but i'd assume it'd be pretty linear and similar pre-shaun, however, the institute could completely change after the events of fallout 4 because it's up to the player, let's say they canonically were nuked by any of the other factions and they survived we could potentially see a very vengeful institute bent on killing ''the sole survivor'' rather than further their projects, or if the 'SS' became director well the institute would become what ever the player made it, so ima go with the institute is evil simply because i made it that way, and as director i'd probably go with something like ''The Ends Justify the Means'' as a slogan... much like the current institute actually

They aren't in whole evil. THey are however incredibly stupid for how smart they are. Think about it, they make the gen 1 and 2 synths perfectly. They follow orders, they carry out tasks; they are tools. Then they decided to put something in the gen 3 synths that make them feel and give them emotions. Of course this will lead to rebellion! What they need to do is take the part that lets them feel emotion and take it out. What makes this worse is that we saw in far harbor that coursers can end up feeling emotion as well its just far more rare for it to happen. Going back to what you are shown in the base game; we see a rogue synth became a viscous raider after he was freed. Now imagine if a courser, synths said to be better than humans in every way, got emotions and did the same thing. Absolutely no one, save for a protagonist with plot armor could beat him especially if he remembered his time as a courser. So no the institute isnt evil they are just stupid and could cause a terminator class end of the world scenario.

I personally hated the institute, the fact that they literally kidnap people and indirectly turn families against each other is just sickening. I also found that the institute were just quite bland, as in, the armour for example just looked like pyjamas, whereas the BOS, Railroad, and even minutemen had bad ass clothing which reflected on their goals. Bethesda really messed up the institute, especially when it was firstly announced as this mysterious and secret organisation in fallout 3 on board rivet city with the Doctor and his Synth bodyguard. I don't know why, but Bethesda seems to have this constant feel of underwhelming factions in most of their video games. Overall, the institute just isn't my cup of tea, and I'm quite frankly annoyed at how Bethesda portrayed them.

You can't remove what makes mark 3 synth's feel because they're literally artificially created carbon based lifeforms in other words there organic artificial humans.
Synthetic means a material not based an biochemistry carbon based but when they confess to using humans for synth production its clear that these are organic androids controlled by chips in their brain. Much like the xylons from battlestar Galactica
Mark 1s are robot s with rudimentary AI and most are insane.

Mark 2 's are true sapient  AI but aren't carbon based lifeforms.

Nick is a prototype between extremely advanced AI and some sort of artificial skin grafted onto its body like the terminator only smart.

Mark 3s are apparently carbon based copy's of humans with all functioning organs glands pheromones and brain.
In other words youd have to lobotomize one to erase its base urges and animal instincs or"emotions".

Coursers are psychologically conditioned recovery agents mark 3's with superior muscles and physical therapy than the infiltration units. They are also controlled via courser chips and as said before extremely brainwashed being the guardians of the institute they follow orders without question they make me remember blade runner or the Smith's from the Matrix.

The question is why aren't all synth's brainwashed and if you're just gonna use artificial humans why not kidnap lobotomize and release victim's rather than build copy's of them its faster cheaper and safer since synth's will rebel anyway because you've made them carbon copy's of humans in other words able to rebel. If you're gonna be an evil villan who wants everyone to serve him be a smart one.