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[RanDomino]

(Deontology versus Consequentialism, round 12481, FIGHT!)

It seems like an invented conflict.  Ethics have to be based on results, but those results can only be measured if there are standards.  I suppose the thesis would be the chaotic opinion, the antithesis would be the lawful opinion, and the synthesis would be the neutral opinion.

[Cobbler89]

I would have thought that if you say "ethics must be based on results" then you've taken the consequentialist side in the argument, far from proving the conflict is invented; "deontological" in contrast roughly means "from being" (that's being, the noun, not being, the verb that's a synonym of existing). Unless you mean something much broader by "results" such that even whether something is in keeping with the perfection of a thing according to its nature (that's one particular formulation of the meaning of "good" in a particular deontological ethics, if I'm not mistaken, and it depends upon particular definitions/understanding of "perfection" and "nature" to work -- unfortunately I'm not sure I'm cut out to explain all of that from the ground up, but I want to point out it's there) is thought of nonetheless as a "result", in which case the conflict is still very real inasmuch as it centers around which sort(s) of "results" are actually the important one(s) (which may be what you meant by saying the "results can only be measured if there are standards", but I don't think that putting both standards in a general definition makes them any less different from each other).

With that said, pretty much nobody tries to straight claim that good is evil or vice versa (humans don't generally care for blatant contradictions; paradoxes maybe [depending on what you mean by "paradox" and whether it isn't just a fancy name for contradiction], subtle contradictions sure -- anything I don't like so long as I don't recognise it as that which I don't like! -- but not blatant contradictions), and the moral/ethical philosophy that can be argued about doesn't usually (note: usually) wind up the central conflict of a story without making half the people out there dislike it because it disagrees with them and the other half dislike it because it's preachy (in the sense of making your message tactless so that even if you should have been preaching it you've kinda ruined it by making your preaching tasteless).

Also, as fascinating as it would be to argue one ethic or the other, I'd like this thread not to totally lose the original focus on blatantly labelling Dwarf Fortress creatures. 8^)

I think unicorns are in peaceful good squares, yes? Or just good squares in general? Anyone know any creature that particularly shows up in (relatively) savage good or any that in (relatively) peaceful evil squares?

[Cruxador]

Things in DF don't really fit onto the D&D alignment axis, though. This is silly.

[Kogut]

Lord of the Rings, meanwhile, was basically inspired by The ring of Nibelung. 

No. (but LOTR and Der Ring... shared their roots).

Well, maybe the ents could only be destroyed, not corrupted; it's not totally clear there

Trolls are corrupted Ents.

[EveryZig]

Trolls are corrupted Ents.

Wait, what? Corruption turns them from humanoids made of wood into humanoids make of meat/stone?

[Cobbler89]

Things in DF don't really fit onto the D&D alignment axis, though. This is silly.

(Emphasis added.)

Um... thank you for validating my work as befitting the Dwarf Fortress forums?

[Kogut]

Trolls are corrupted Ents.

Wait, what? Corruption turns them from humanoids made of wood into humanoids make of meat/stone?

oho, this one was my error. LOTR: "Trolls are only counterfits, made by Enemy in the Great Darkness in mockery of Ents".

[NW_Kohaku]

I've definitely learned a few things here (btw, NW, re. "being good without ethics", I've heard some talk about "following your heart" and "intuition" but I didn't quite get it for the reason you point out -- it just seems like the choices are A] seek to understand the heart's reasons or B] hope to goodness your heart is smarter than your head), but I'm with Oli; on-the-spot judgements that deliberately avoid exact definitions are probably the best use of this concept in the first place. Do it for fun rather than science. Or even !!fun!! rather than science. Heck, even do it for !!science!! rather than science.

Everyone has their own internal way of viewing their place in the world, and how their actions define themselves.  Through that, one's behavioral code develops.

You can call it "just intuition" or something like that, but then, you're basically declaring the difference between being lawful and being chaotic the difference between whether you are capable of enough self-reflection to merely recognize and state out loud what you consider right and wrong. 

Much like defining "Lawful" as merely not having committed a crime, this is taking a far too literal approach to the fundamental conflicting viewpoints people take in life.

Even lawful people, after all, are doing what they think is right based upon their own emotional weighing of the issues. 

Consider, for a moment, that in the Egyptian afterlife, you were judged not based upon whether you lead a virtuous life or not, but your heart was weighed against a feather of Ma'at - the god of society.  You were judged based upon your peers, not upon your morality as for whether you would be allowed to exist in the afterlife, or have your soul fed to the great devourer. 

If you were out of step with society, even by being too virtuous, you were considered a terrible person, worthy of ultimate destruction.

The difference between the lawful and the chaotic personal ethical code is that a lawful person is keenly aware of the social mores and customs, and builds their ethical code in part out of peer pressure and conformity to the norms of the society around them.  They bristle when they move into or experience new cultures that challenge them by changing what the norms are. 

Chaotic ethical codes, by contrast, either do not care or openly delight in being flagrantly in opposition to society's norms, and they tend to enjoy "sampling" different cultures. 

The difference is in whether one fundamentally sees being part of or standing out from to the crowd as a core element of their personal identity.  Fulfilling that identity they have chosen for themselves is the place from which that ethical code springs.

[Cobbler89]

What I recall leading up to this fork in the conversation was something where you said (if I recall correct) that both lawful good and chaotic good have some sense of ethics, otherwise they wouldn't be good, and commented offhand that it's not like you can seriously expect to be good acting randomly instead; and it was to that that my comment was addressed regarding some people claiming an undefinable sense of good that they'd rather not analyze into an ethic; but maybe there's a mixup of terms in there... I'd go back and review but some part of my brain is babbling something about a text quantity to relevance ratio -- I'd meant it as a throwaway comment on something that pinged an odd spot in my brain, but 1) probably should have quoted the bit I was commenting on at the time and 2) am not sure now that I didn't misread that bit via the way I'm used to certain terms being used, and 3) should probably not even be posting this followup since it'll just prolong discussion of the matter unnecessarily.

I guess you could say I find the subject matter fascinating but think/feel there are limits to the helpfulness of discussing it, or even to the interestingness thereof outside of a formal effort to outline the whole matter from the ground up. Put simply, I've hit my seriousness quota at least for the moment, sorry. 8^\ Plus I have a nagging fear that derailment of the thread could stifle interest in continuing the meme, inadequate as the premise of it is. (Inadequate or... because it requires tweaking to "work" at all... flexible? I mean, if you open up the door to tweaking/reinterpretation, then you really get the infinite possibilities of tweaks/reinterpretations, right?)

I probably have a bad habit of wanting the last word even when I don't think I'm arguing, though... I think it stems from a social fear of misinterpretation and a (probably unfounded) sense that whatever I put out in clarification of or agreement on any point is more safe somehow. With a dash of honestly not knowing whether I'm expected to reply or to not reply at any given moment in a conversation. (Don't reply = "He just up and left that discussion hanging! Ran away from it!" Do reply = "He always has to have the last word!" I'm probably overthinking it in even considering those two possibilities, but having considered them I don't know how to start figuring which is the less likely concern. It's kinda bizarre what some parts of my brain think of just having a discussion with other human beings that I know full well aren't out to treat me unfairly.) It is, at any rate, one reason I used to try to avoid forums and the like, even if some are pretty awesome to read; but then I let my desire to contribute a few things to the Dwarf Fortress community run away with me. I suppose it's kinda stating the non-noteworthy here to say I'm weird, but... Maybe I have a little bit of the insane blood of nobles in me, or something? Or I was cursed by the gods to wander the forums as an awkwardling except on the full moon? (Wait around and see if I blatantly don't care about where conversation goes or what people think I think the next full moon. Or maybe it's not a werecurse; maybe it'll be the drowning chamber for me...)

Notice I'm trying to keep the theme dwarfy here in hopes nonetheless of steering back to the DF parody and humour area and out of the "life advice" area that has its own subforum that's not this one.

What good/evil and peaceful/savage alignment are carp? Giant sponges? Giant mosquitos seem as far as I know to be true neutral, which is particularly funny since their menace was a bug (pun not even intended, but hey) -- at any rate, I find the notion amusing of true neutral being a creature that wasn't supposed to be noteworthily menacing.

[NW_Kohaku]

Notice I'm trying to keep the theme dwarfy here in hopes nonetheless of steering back to the DF parody and humour area and out of the "life advice" area that has its own subforum that's not this one.

What good/evil and peaceful/savage alignment are carp? Giant sponges? Giant mosquitos seem as far as I know to be true neutral, which is particularly funny since their menace was a bug (pun not even intended, but hey) -- at any rate, I find the notion amusing of true neutral being a creature that wasn't supposed to be noteworthily menacing.

Err... Sorry.

I wrote out the last post I made as soon as I read the post I was responding to, and didn't see the "I want to stay on topic" part until after I posted.  (And then my power went out before I could do something about it.)

For my own part, I enjoy these forums (And DF in general) because I enjoy the encouragement to put my mind to new and diverse subject matter.

Current carp are true neutral, like all creatures that have no particular leanings or purpose except to just survive. Old/memetic carp were probably Chaotic Evil in the "omnicidal maniac" sense.

Swarming types like the bugged giant mosquitos tend towards lawful, especially hivemind types. Formians (ant-people) are the exemplars of Lawful Neutral for a reason.  Always Lawful Neutral means becoming assimilated by the hive.  The mosquitos aren't actually acting in hivemind concert, so it's a weak lawful bent, though.

[friendguy13]

I would just like to note that Tolkien was probably referencing World War one rather than World War two as he was a WWI vet.(Though it was probably some of both.)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tolkien#World_War_I

[Cobbler89]

I wrote out the last post I made as soon as I read the post I was responding to, and didn't see the "I want to stay on topic" part until after I posted.  (And then my power went out before I could do something about it.)

For my own part, I enjoy these forums (And DF in general) because I enjoy the encouragement to put my mind to new and diverse subject matter.

In your defense, I can't seem to help encouraging you and participating in the "off-topic" even as I try to keep it from straying too far...

Current carp are true neutral, like all creatures that have no particular leanings or purpose except to just survive. Old/memetic carp were probably Chaotic Evil in the "omnicidal maniac" sense.

Swarming types like the bugged giant mosquitos tend towards lawful, especially hivemind types. Formians (ant-people) are the exemplars of Lawful Neutral for a reason.  Always Lawful Neutral means becoming assimilated by the hive.  The mosquitos aren't actually acting in hivemind concert, so it's a weak lawful bent, though.

Definitely going with the old carp that made the fish famous.

Good point about swarming types. Will chew over where to put giant mosquitos.

I'm thinking badgers are either chaotic evil (which you've already suggested old carp was) or chaotic neutral; they've definitely got the Disrupt Society Vibe (heck, they're not even dangerous in themselves, just freaking disruptive...)... chaotic neutral is my best guess there.

Giant sponges strike me as perhaps neutral evil owing to being extremely dangerous but relatively passive -- they don't care about your any rules positively (lawful) or negatively (chaotic), they just sit there and woe to those other creatures that lack whatever tag tells idiots and wisemen to ignore things.

I am thinking now that we should peg the famous animals in the standard chart and then do a chart with peaceful/savage and good/evil picking the most stereotypical DF animal of each combo that we can think of (although various zombie forms in evil regions in the latest version kinda make that... interesting; not to mention that the sponsorship drive multiplied the candidates like a rabbit breeding project)... if possible. Whatever people can come up with. 8^)

I would just like to note that Tolkien was probably referencing World War one rather than World War two as he was a WWI vet.(Though it was probably some of both.)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tolkien#World_War_I

Dunno about reference (depending on what you mean, that may or may not be allegory the sort of thing he wanted to avoid), but I know much of his work was inspired by particularly difficult things in his life -- the war, his relationship (or rather the interruption thereof) with his sweetheart (he eventually married her, but was kept away from by unfortunate circumstances [I forget whether it was the war or parents' interference or what] for some time, which inspired some elements of The Silmarillion), etc. Without getting into whether the work is the sum of its influences (I tend to say no less because the author disagreed than because I think a good story is a lot more open-ended and reinterpretable than that), a lot of Tolkien's tone and subject matter definitely draws on his life, including what some Europeans called "the Great War" (when they weren't calling it "the War to End All Wars", which kinda flopped as soon as its sequel showed up).

Well, now I'm back to participating in the off-topic again... 8^) I should probably just tell myself not to worry about it, at least so much.


*EDITS to fix quote close tag*

[Meansdarling]

I'm thinking badgers are either chaotic evil or chaotic neutral; they've definitely got the Disrupt Society Vibe (heck, they're not even dangerous in themselves, just freaking disruptive...)... chaotic neutral is my best guess there.

I think they switch depending on if they go berserk. CN, goes berserk, CE.
The chaotic part is what allows for the switch from neutral to evil.
Is that a thing at all? Switching alignments?

[RanDomino]

I'm thinking badgers are either chaotic evil or chaotic neutral; they've definitely got the Disrupt Society Vibe (heck, they're not even dangerous in themselves, just freaking disruptive...)... chaotic neutral is my best guess there.

I think they switch depending on if they go berserk. CN, goes berserk, CE.
The chaotic part is what allows for the switch from neutral to evil.
Is that a thing at all? Switching alignments?

Not in D&D, generally, if it's based on existing abilities.  Acquiring an ability that causes one to turn into a berserk killing machine that doesn't discriminate between friend and foe might mean an alignment shift, especially if it's willfully gained or even not actively resisted.
Do badgers/giant badgers fight invaders?  Then they'd definitely be CN.

[NW_Kohaku]

Badgers fight basically anything.  Their rage is triggered purely by proximity. 

An alignment shift that occurs with regular frequency would only make sense in the context of something like an alternate personality.  (As in Dr. Jekyl and Mr. Hyde.)  Simply going berserk is merely a facet of a single personality by most counts. 

Chaotic Neutral seems right. 

Honey Badgers - "Oh look at the time, it's KILL EVERYTHING O'CLOCK, AGAIN!"