Print

Please login or register.
1 Hour 1 Day 1 Week 1 Month Forever
Login with username, password and session length

[Neonivek]

I think that since we have Elves we are pretty much obligated to give animals souls. (Remember we arn't apply this to real life)

In fact "Forces" were originally supposed to be Non-sentient gods or at least ones who are more animal in nature (I am unaware if that is still the case judging by Threetoe's last Elf god in the story)

Anyway here are the original soul stats (that may not apply)

Rationality
Focus
Willpower
Creativity
Intuition
Patience
Memory

All of these apply to animals. Crossovers drive me nuts: Patience, Focus, and Willpower; and Rationality, Creativity, and Intuition

[Keiseth]

In my case, I'd simply say the mindless undead, being garden variety skeletons and zombies, have no souls. They're animated husks. The truly evil dead-- your liches, skeletal warlords or what not- they're not mindless, and maintain their souls, or at least a connection to their souls.

However, if I ever gain the chance to discuss this metaphysical question with a skeleton or zombie over a cup of tea, I'll be sure to convey the results to my colleagues here at the Bay 12 Games University of Undead Studies.

[Neonivek]

As someone pointed out in another thread. They are not truely mindless they just don't think for themselves.

They can tell the difference between a Hand and a pile of dirt, they may be able to tell that if you run behind a corner that it is likely that your behind that corner, they could even be able to weild weapons and fight (like current zombies and Skeletons)

Heh, I have to admit this is probably the most interesting conversation (or debate) I've had on this forum... I don't know if I want Toady to solve it or not anytime soon.

[Ascii Kid]

For most animals, there is no direct path from stimulus to response, except for pure reflexes. Compare to, say, a tree, which only makes any action at all due to chemicals within being directly affected by the environment. So most animals have some free will (if not a wide range of things to choose between). Hence, animals would have souls.

  Right, but they also cannot move against their nature, or make moral decisions.  The monkey is never evil, it's just a monkey.  A monkey can never murder some one, they kill.  So monkeys don't have the free will that people do.  Only peoples' actions (or elves or goblins) can be judged as good or evil, based on deviation from a pattern we feel should be innate and natural.  The beastial man, without morals, is an animal.  He becomes a civilized man when he limits his actions by virtue of some code that ensures the safety of all.  So the thing that seperates animal from man is this sense that we can do things that are wrong for our ideal society, actions which we call evil.  Evil and Good is what religion, the science of the soul, deals with.  Ergo I would argue that animals and sentients have similar but distinct souls.

[Tenebrais]

For most animals, there is no direct path from stimulus to response, except for pure reflexes. Compare to, say, a tree, which only makes any action at all due to chemicals within being directly affected by the environment. So most animals have some free will (if not a wide range of things to choose between). Hence, animals would have souls.

  Right, but they also cannot move against their nature, or make moral decisions.  The monkey is never evil, it's just a monkey.  A monkey can never murder some one, they kill.  So monkeys don't have the free will that people do.  Only peoples' actions (or elves or goblins) can be judged as good or evil, based on deviation from a pattern we feel should be innate and natural.  The beastial man, without morals, is an animal.  He becomes a civilized man when he limits his actions by virtue of some code that ensures the safety of all.  So the thing that seperates animal from man is this sense that we can do things that are wrong for our ideal society, actions which we call evil.  Evil and Good is what religion, the science of the soul, deals with.  Ergo I would argue that animals and sentients have similar but distinct souls.

How does this apply to a psychopath? Or someone else with no sense of morality. Does such a person have no soul?

[Neonivek]

Well some philsophers say that humans will always have a soul because the potential for them to have one is there...

However that is kinda jumping away from the point of this thread since this is kinda about Dwarf Fortress

[Keiseth]

They can tell the difference between a Hand and a pile of dirt, they may be able to tell that if you run behind a corner that it is likely that your behind that corner, they could even be able to weild weapons and fight (like current zombies and Skeletons)

So can a moderately sophisticated computer with the right hardware apparatus (though I'm not about to start an argument about whether or not your iPod dreams of electric sheep!)

This depends on whether or not the undead in question is being externally directed ("Go kill that!") or externally controlled, like some sort of hive mind with the necromancer that raised it. Usually it's the former, so you raise (hehe) a good point.

It is weird, however, to think that the dead thing that came back to life, came back with its soul intact. If anything, it seems they have a more computer-like intelligence. Reacting in certain ways to certain actions, but not making personalized choices or having any individuality. Even animals exert a good sense of individuality and personality, while undead typically have none (minus the "mindful" undead, like the lich-necromancer, etc.)

[Neonivek]

It depends on the kind of Zombie (Freekishly Skeletons are usually much more intelligent then Zombies in most videogames). Some do have limited to a lot of intelligence.

"It is weird, however, to think that the dead thing that came back to life, came back with its soul intact"

It really says something about the importance of a body to the soul.

So can a moderately sophisticated computer with the right hardware apparatus

Yeah but it is running on hardware... the Undead definately arn't running on brainpower alone (Soul POWER!!!)
Note: Ignore the above sentence

[DJ]

I say that no undead have souls. However, some retain intellect of the dead person.

So, a vampire would know everything he knew before death and would have the same level of intelligence. What's the difference then? Well, let's just say that emotions are stored in the soul part. Therefore the vampire could recognise somebody as his child, but would have no qualms about killing the child for it's blood because he has no attachment to it.

Obviously, if we strip all emotions from the undead we'll end up with undead that sit on their ass all day and do nothing. What I suggest is that the emotional void be filled by the forces which reanimated the corpse in the first place. Since they are traditionally evil forces, the undead would be filled with hate, malice and stuff like that.

[Tormy]

I don't think sentient undead should be the only ones with souls. Afterall animals have souls as well.

Why, exactly, do animals have souls?  What is a "soul"?  I think it's something that's unique to creatures that have higher thought.  Creatures that are intelligent (or have an intelligent tag), are able to make choices.  They can do good, or evil.  They can be greedy, they can love.  Look at how Toady is breaking away from making Goblins just an "evil" race - they have souls, and they have free choice.

Yeah, now what about "mind". If you don't have mind, you don't have soul, is that logical?..or am I wrong? Undead creatures are immune to mind spells in the various fantasy universes. Why? Because they don't have mind. We can call them "mindless" and in that case "soulless".
Either way, probably we will be able to change everything in the RAWs, so whatever Toady has in mind about this issue, it won't end up as a problematic gameplay element.

[Neonivek]

Well Yes Tormy in the end this is all about what Flavor Toady wants in his undead, or some of his undead.

I don't think anyone here will complain if the undead end up with souls or without souls.

Personally one of my major drives bidding for "all undead have souls" is because I am really tired of the Soulless undead.

[Fieari]

Dungeons and Dragons has a very good gamish way of describing it, distinguishing between body, soul, and mind.  But that's simplistic.  Toady, as we all know, likes to go into DETAIL.  I mean, when assigning personalities, he didn't go with the simple Myers-Briggs typology with its 4 axis, but with another system with THIRTY.  So we should be looking at systems with the maximum number of distinctions in souls.  With more distinctions, we can have effects like selling PART of one's soul to various powers, have differing types of undead who lack different parts of the soul, and so on.

And here, I'm looking at the Jews. Basic Judaism posits 5 souls, (while kabbalah adds a couple more which should be useful).  I can't think of any religion that has so many distinctions, so for this I think it may be what Dwarf Fortress needs.

We have:

• The "Mind/Body" connection.  The part of your soul that grants access to your body.  This part of the soul can be killed, which incidentally also kills you.  If your body were to die but not your nephish, presumably you'd be able to be a ghost and possess people. (Nephish)
• Emotions. (Ruach)
• Intellect. So skills and such would be associated here. (Neshama)
• "Spirituality" / "The ability to know G-d".  In Dwarf Fortress, this would be the part of the soul that you'd likely barter with various powers, who would use it to power their abilities, I'd guess. (Chayyah)
• "You".  The you who is you.  The one wondering, "who am I?"  The "I think, therefor I am" part.  In Dwarf Fortress, this part would make a creature self-actuated, and lacking it would make them unable to do anything except on command by another. (Yehidah)
• Prophesy / Magic. Clearly, not everyone has this part of the soul.  Having this could be what distinguishes wizards from everyone else. (Ruach HaKodesh)
• Joy.  Lacking this would make happy thoughts work, but would still allow unhappy thoughts. (Neshamah Yeseira)
• The "adult" spirit.  (Neshamah Kedosha) While I don't think this translates into the game well, it's convenient to have 8 bits... so why not bit let this be the PRESENCE of a body, not just the means to control it.

So, by combining or lacking various forms of these, we can can see various forms of undead arise naturally.

Ghosts would lack a body.  Zombies would lack intellect and emotion.  A lich would possess magic, but lack joy.  Vampire Spawn would lack themselves, making them slaves of their Vampire master.  And so on and so forth.  Various varieties could be easily created by just tweaking an undead possessing or not possessing various parts of the soul.  And each would be creepy in its own way.

[Tormy]

Hm, interesting approach Fieari...that was a good post. Yeah, with a detailed mind-body-soul system like that, it would be acceptable to have various undead creatures with soul.

[Neonivek]

It would be like a Soul has a body and some souls don't have arms while others have wings

[Tormy]

It would be like a Soul has a body and some souls don't have arms while others have wings

..oooor a wing has a soul and some bodies don't have wings, or what about...
..on a more serious note:
I really like Fieari's detailed "suggestion". That would just work perfectly, at least that is my opinion.