D&D (2024) Playtest 8: Cantrips

[Chaosmancer]

Possible content warning regarding the prison system.

Spoiler: prison comparison

The transformation of a living person to a not living person to an undead creature can be seen as symbolic of the dehumanization and vilification of people within the prison system.

The concept of of benefiting from that unpaid labor force is rooted in replacement of enslaved people in the United States. Here is the relevant portion of the 13th Amendment: "Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction." The prison system replaces enslaved people with imprisoned people in the prison industrial complex, with Black People disproportionately represented within that system.

My comparison stems from that symbolic take because of how it parallels dehumanization. When we see a corpse do we remember the person or do we just see a corpse? Do we continue to refer to them by name or just a statistic? Do we fail to remember them at all? The corpse is still tied to the identity of the person, which is why that comparison exists.

Enough on that topic. If nothing else, it demonstrates perspective is relevant. ;-)

Yeah, I know the prison system sucks and slavery is still legal in it.

Like I guessed, your entire point comes from the angle of objectification. But like I said, corpses are objects. We don't go and stare at a corpse to remember someone. We look at pictures, or visit gravestones. Those are objects. Whether or not a person is referred to by name or statisitics is a factor of distance from that person. CEOs, Generals, and Policiticians treat people as statistics because there are too many of them under their command for them to know them as people. And none of that applies to necromancy in any way shape or form.

Additionally, your flowchart is biased. Saying it goes from Living Person -> non-Living Person -> Undead Creature is technically accurate, but it makes it sound like the necromancer killed them. Like they were involved in each step of the process. What about consent? People consent to donating their body's to science for study. They become research tools, does that process also mirror the Prison Industrial Complex and Colonization? I don't see how. Because the moment you include consent you are doing something very very different.

I agree perspective is important, but this perspective seems to assume a lot of negatives, just to force a connection that doesn't exist by default.

 

[Clint_L]

In general, when discussing ethics from a philosophical perspective, we don't use the terms "good" and "evil." They are completely subjective and usually just confuse the issue at hand.

Ethics is concerned with the methodology used to determine morally preferable actions in general so that we know what to do in particular contexts. There are two main schools of thought: consequentialists basically believe that the morality of an action can only be stood in the context of its outcome. So is, say, stealing right or wrong? Depends on the result. In effect, ethics becomes a kind of algebra, where you are constantly doing sums while taking into account complex variables.

Deontologists believe that ethics can be reduced to universal rules, determined through logical reasoning, such as Kant's categorical imperative - to know if an action is right or wrong, imagine a world in which anyone could do it any time for any reason, and if that is not a world a reasonable person would want to live in, then that action is not moral. Ever. No exceptions. Outcomes don't matter.

Obviously, there is a lot more nuances here, and many different flavours of these two branches.

Good and evil as concepts basically come from virtues ethics, which are barely even ethics (there's no real system to them). Basically, virtues ethics are moral rules that are followed because an authority said so. Ten Commandments, that sort of thing. Completely subjective and not particularly useful as a way of discussing ethics in a general context because every argument more or less boils down to "because God/the King/my Mom said so."

So is mind control better or worse than murdering someone? A consequentialist would say that it depends on context, but if you mind controlled someone so that you didn't have to murder them, then that is almost guaranteed to be the most moral choice and you should definitely do that. A deontologist might have a harder time - I would imagine that they might see mind control as definitely not passing the categorical imperative, and murder definitely doesn't pass, so they would conclude that they are both wrong; thus, you should never do either, in any circumstances, even to save lives.

 

[Clint_L]

Continued: A good example of the consequentialist/deontological debate is sort of the crux of the final episode of Loki, where he is presented with two arguments and has to choose which is best.

Spoiler: Spoilers for Loki

He Who Remains argues that preserving the "sacred timeline" while destroying all the rest is the only moral choice because the alternative is a multiverse war that will kill all the times lines. Saving one timeline, particularly the one where he and Loki live along with anyone they care about, is clearly mathematically better than saving no timelines, so that is the right thing to do.

Sylvie argues that the underlying principal is what matters, and she basically asks a Kantian question: would a reasonable person want to live in a universe where every choice is ultimately pre-determined by HWR? No? Then better to let everyone be free and fight for their future, even if ultimately doomed.

 

[Ashrym]

But like I said, corpses are objects. We don't go and stare at a corpse to remember someone. We look at pictures, or visit gravestones. Those are objects.

Open casket funerals are normal so we can see the deceased person and say our goodbyes. That common practice is very much about looking at "a corpse" and remembering the person. The reason I used "a corpse" in quotations is because this is how we dehumanize a person within our language structure. In the case of an imprisoned person we would use words like criminal or inmate or prisoner.

Dehumanization is in how we use that language. The parallel isn't in the necromancy itself, it's in the language and results.

Modern psychology also demonstrates the attachment of the living people associated with the deceased person after that person has become "a corpse". Reducing the deceased person to "a corpse" invalidates the emotions of the people associated with that person in life.

Whether or not a person is referred to by name or statisitics is a factor of distance from that person. CEOs, Generals, and Policiticians treat people as statistics because there are too many of them under their command for them to know them as people. And none of that applies to necromancy in any way shape or form.

I didn't say this applied specifically to necromancy. I said the results parallel something that exists IRL.

Reducing a person to a statistic is also invalidating. That's not to say statistics aren't useful in demonstrating scope or impact, or compartmentalizing a difficult subject, but it's still ultimately reducing a person to a number. I'm not going to get deeper into that here. PM me if you want more information on statistics as they relate to this topic an I will give IRL examples. The concern would be that each one of those statistics is/was still a person.

Saying it goes from Living Person -> non-Living Person -> Undead Creature is technically accurate

Technically is the best kind of accurate?

It is accurate. This gets back to the parallel. In that flow the deceased person was always a person and by reducing them to "a corpse" we're invalidating the memory of that person. In the flow I'm discussing we have a person -> suspect -> convict when words like convict are meant to dehumanize the person.

That dehumanization makes what happens to imprisoned people more acceptable. Getting further into this discussion gets into punitive justice and labor exploitation as opposed to restorative justice and preventative social programs, which is why I don't want to spend a lot of time on the topic. Going deeper in that direction moves away from discussing the morality and ethics of magic in DnD. ;-)

but it makes it sound like the necromancer killed them

I'm not sure why you think this. How the deceased person died isn't relevant to being used as a resource for free labor. The actual question is whether or not we consider this labor.

Free labor so wealthy people can become more wealthy by exploiting that free labor is why this is similar to the prison industrial complex. If we are looking at a deceased person as the remnants of the person they once were working not for themselves or for their families, but for the benefit of the economy then we have a dehumanized labor force being used as that unpaid labor.

If someone were to use the corpse of someone I cared about so that they can make money and I found out about it I would be upset.

What about consent? People consent to donating their body's to science for study. They become research tools, does that process also mirror the Prison Industrial Complex and Colonization?

Okay, let's talk about consent? No one mentioned it in regard to this example until you brought it up. I am an organ donor and consent has been given to my body after I pass. I never said voluntarily signing our bodies to science mirrored the prison industrial complex. The difference is in the use of the bodies of the deceased persons involved so it's a false equivalent.

However, if my fighter says to your wizard "if I die you have my permission to animate my body and save yourself" then consent has been given. If someone walks into a graveyard and starts animating then how was consent obtained? The icky part comes from a sense of entitlement to that person's body after they've passed without gaining that consent. ;-)

We could absolutely change the narrative by offering an upfront pay to the living person for service of their body after they become deceased for a specified amount of time for a specified purpose. At that point both parties have the opportunity to benefit under a contract. At that point we've also moved away from the prison industrial complex comparison. We're still at my point on perspective and context.

To be clear, my comparison was not to say necromancy is necessarily "bad" other than game references to it. The example had given the impression of entitlement to the remains of deceased people by dehumanizing them so that they could be used as unpaid labor. In a game it's easy to distance ourselves from the reality of those deceased people, but I don't agree than we realistically would IRL.

 

[Chaosmancer]

Continued: A good example of the consequentialist/deontological debate is sort of the crux of the final episode of Loki, where he is presented with two arguments and has to choose which is best.

Spoiler: Spoilers for Loki

He Who Remains argues that preserving the "sacred timeline" while destroying all the rest is the only moral choice because the alternative is a multiverse war that will kill all the times lines. Saving one timeline, particularly the one where he and Loki live along with anyone they care about, is clearly mathematically better than saving no timelines, so that is the right thing to do.

Sylvie argues that the underlying principal is what matters, and she basically asks a Kantian question: would a reasonable person want to live in a universe where every choice is ultimately pre-determined by HWR? No? Then better to let everyone be free and fight for their future, even if ultimately doomed.

Perhaps a good example of the two (heavily simplified) schools of thought. But, also... an example that falls into a rather common problem. It is a presented as a binary. And this is where things get hazy. Because whenever you propose that there are only two answers, you are generally wrong.

Take the classic trolley problem. You can kill five people, or you can kill one person. That is the only choice you are given. But, present a table of DnD players with a trolley problem, then they are going to start discussing solutions C through N. Because those options are real, actual options.

I, personally, would say both Consequentialist and Deontologicalist from your simplified versions miss the point. It is not only the consequences that matter in morality, but also intent. You did not commit a good act by trying to kill someone, only to accidentally save their life. It is also equally absurd to take the position that only actions which could be taken under any context can be moral, because then something like taking pictures (which can be done immorally) is never a moral action, because it cannot be done in all ways, at any time, for any reason.

 

[Clint_L]

Perhaps a good example of the two (heavily simplified) schools of thought.

Yes, I was aware that I presented simplified (but accurate) representations of those schools of thought, given that I covered each in a few sentences. If only I had thought to point out that "obviously, there is a lot more nuance here, and many different flavours of these two branches."

But, also... an example that falls into a rather common problem. It is a presented as a binary. And this is where things get hazy. Because whenever you propose that there are only two answers, you are generally wrong.

Okay...what does that have to do with me using this example to illustrate the two fundamentally different approaches to ethics? The plot of that show is basically nonsensical. However, the conclusion did in fact revolve around him being presented with two choices, each representative of one of those schools. That's my entire point. Whether these were the only options is irrelevant - they were the two that were given.

You understand that I was just illustrating two different positions, right?

Take the classic trolley problem. You can kill five people, or you can kill one person. That is the only choice you are given. But, present a table of DnD players with a trolley problem, then they are going to start discussing solutions C through N. Because those options are real, actual options.

The first rule of discussing ethical dilemmas with students is there's no avoiding the dilemma. It's a logic exercise. It's like I asked them to solve the problem "What does 2+2 equal?" and they replied, "what if instead of 2+2 it was 3+potato?" Like, sure, we could just keep altering the premises but if we want to explore the fundamental ethical rules that doesn't really get us anywhere.

I, personally, would say both Consequentialist and Deontologicalist from your simplified versions miss the point.

You seem really hung up on the fact that I presented simplified (but accurate) descriptions of these schools of thought, even though I expressly pointed out that these were highly simplified descriptions.

It is not only the consequences that matter in morality, but also intent. You did not commit a good act by trying to kill someone, only to accidentally save their life. It is also equally absurd to take the position that only actions which could be taken under any context can be moral, because then something like taking pictures (which can be done immorally) is never a moral action, because it cannot be done in all ways, at any time, for any reason.

It's hard to take you seriously in a discussion of ethics if you are going to discuss intent as an automatic issue in all schools of ethics. Deontologists generally care deeply about intent, that is true. Consequentialists, not so much. They care about outcomes. Now we could get into the weeds about act vs. rule utilitarianism, but in essence a fundamental difference between deontological and consequentialist ethics is how they view intent.

So going back to the case in point, let's say your character used a mind control spell to make someone hand over their delicious looking cake because you were hungry and wanted it for yourself. Unbeknownst to you, the cake contained an allergen that would have killed them, so your selfish action actually saved their life. A deontologist would typically argue that your act was unethical, because controlling people for your own selfish ends is inherently wrong, and intending to do so is in itself an immoral act, even if you don't follow through for some reason. But an act utilitarian would look at that mind control as a correct moral action, because you saved a life and enjoyed some delicious cake (both positives, one of them a huge positive) versus the small negative of your victim feeling bad about missing out on cake. Intent is irrelevant to the equation.

All of which is to say that it is pretty hard to make any blanket statements about ethics such as "mind control is wrong" because context matters and there are a lot of different approaches to ethics.

 

[Chaosmancer]

Open casket funerals are normal so we can see the deceased person and say our goodbyes. That common practice is very much about looking at "a corpse" and remembering the person. The reason I used "a corpse" in quotations is because this is how we dehumanize a person within our language structure. In the case of an imprisoned person we would use words like criminal or inmate or prisoner.

Dehumanization is in how we use that language. The parallel isn't in the necromancy itself, it's in the language and results.

Modern psychology also demonstrates the attachment of the living people associated with the deceased person after that person has become "a corpse". Reducing the deceased person to "a corpse" invalidates the emotions of the people associated with that person in life.

It is a common practice, but it is not universal by any means. If the deceased is unpresentable, for example, we will use a closed casket and a photograph instead. Because the importance is in the memories and our perception of how they should look.

I don't see this as invalidating feelings at all. Your link literally leads to an article about seeing visions, dreams, ect of the deceased. Memories, thoughts. None of that changes looking at the body of the person, and knowing that that isn't them. It is that disconnect that can cause extreme anguish during funerals. Seeing the body of the person, and knowing that that body is not the person. Saying that the body is not the person does not trample on that person, the feelings of the berieved or anything else. In fact, it is a necessary disconnect and distance, otherwise you would be like the children who freak out that you are burying the deceased "alive". A corpse is not a human. It is the remains of a human.

I didn't say this applied specifically to necromancy. I said the results parallel something that exists IRL.

Reducing a person to a statistic is also invalidating. That's not to say statistics aren't useful in demonstrating scope or impact, or compartmentalizing a difficult subject, but it's still ultimately reducing a person to a number. I'm not going to get deeper into that here. PM me if you want more information on statistics as they relate to this topic an I will give IRL examples. The concern would be that each one of those statistics is/was still a person.

Right, but I AM talking about Necromancy? Giving examples to refute my discussion of necromancy that you don't intend to equate to necromancy would be sort of like talking about how drowning is a terrible way to die, while the discussion is on people's preferred drinks.

Yes, dehumanizing living people is bad? Yes, sometimes it happens anyways because numbers are useful? Yes, it can go too far and cause problems? If none of this applies to the discussion at hand, I don't see why you even brought it up as your main point of discussion.

Technically is the best kind of accurate?

It is accurate. This gets back to the parallel. In that flow the deceased person was always a person and by reducing them to "a corpse" we're invalidating the memory of that person. In the flow I'm discussing we have a person -> suspect -> convict when words like convict are meant to dehumanize the person.

That dehumanization makes what happens to imprisoned people more acceptable. Getting further into this discussion gets into punitive justice and labor exploitation as opposed to restorative justice and preventative social programs, which is why I don't want to spend a lot of time on the topic. Going deeper in that direction moves away from discussing the morality and ethics of magic in DnD. ;-)

No? Seriously, I don't get it. Accurate words don't invalidate memories. This is like saying that carving a city out of a mountain and calling it a city instead of a mountain invalidates the memory of the mountain. Or that calling a cake a cake invalidates the memory of the wheat or the chicken egg.

Things change states. We can remember them pre-change and not invalidate them by being accurate about what they now are. If you move, and call your new address "your home" you are not invalidating the memories of where you used to live.

Heck, by your logic presented here, Doctor is dehumanizing. Teacher is dehumanizing. Mother is dehumanizing. Because all of them change the word "person" to a different word. Someone could go from person -> student -> graduate -> Doctor after all. Or from person -> wife -> Mother. Your claim doesn't make sense to me, because it keeps assuming dehumanization without cause or reason to assume it.

I'm not sure why you think this. How the deceased person died isn't relevant to being used as a resource for free labor. The actual question is whether or not we consider this labor.

I think this, because the process you laid out was linear. It equated the same step as "corpse to undead" with "person to corpse". But these are not equal things, nor are they even related. It calls to mind the classic trope of the necromancer murdering people to make undead, such as Szas Tam in Honor Among Thieves. And that is very different than the local priest asking a dying old man what he wants to happen with his body after his soul leaves it.

Additionally, "labor" is an incredibly broad term. It can mean many things, and whether or not we consider something labor is kind of immaterial. Again, is what a machine does "labor"? Or is it something else. I don't see what bearing that has on the idea of raising the dead, except to say that if a machine is doing labor, than it is a person, and therefor it is exploitation.

Free labor so wealthy people can become more wealthy by exploiting that free labor is why this is similar to the prison industrial complex. If we are looking at a deceased person as the remnants of the person they once were working not for themselves or for their families, but for the benefit of the economy then we have a dehumanized labor force being used as that unpaid labor.

If someone were to use the corpse of someone I cared about so that they can make money and I found out about it I would be upset.

See, you are making assumptions. Who said it is free labor? Perhaps the religious institution that creates the undead pays a monthly stipend to the family. Now it isn't free labor. Who says it makes wealthy people more wealthy? Maybe the undead are used to guard the town from assault by fiends or monsters like Ankhegs. Now they are performing a civic service for all people in the town, not increasing any single person's wealth, but contributing to societal stability.

You cannot just assume that Necromancy's usage will be for the rich to become richer by exploiting free labor. That is not inherent in the idea.

Okay, let's talk about consent? No one mentioned it in regard to this example until you brought it up.

I'm not going to go digging, but I bring up consent consistently when discussing this idea of Necromancy and it being used for non-evil purposes. It is inherent in the idea, because a big part of the potential pitfall is forcing people into undeath against their will.

I am an organ donor and consent has been given to my body after I pass. I never said voluntarily signing our bodies to science mirrored the prison industrial complex. The difference is in the use of the bodies of the deceased persons involved so it's a false equivalent.

Huh? How is donating your body to be used different than donating your body to be used? Is it because you don't think donating your body to science generates any money? I have bad news for you about transplant surgeries if that is the case.

However, if my fighter says to your wizard "if I die you have my permission to animate my body and save yourself" then consent has been given. If someone walks into a graveyard and starts animating then how was consent obtained? The icky part comes from a sense of entitlement to that person's body after they've passed without gaining that consent. ;-)

Speak with Dead?

Perhaps the consent comes from the Gods and the Divine, who in their communion with the souls of the deceased only allow you to raise those who consent?

There are a lot of ways to do it. I agree doing it without consent can be icky, but that is why I bring it up.

We could absolutely change the narrative by offering an upfront pay to the living person for service of their body after they become deceased for a specified amount of time for a specified purpose. At that point both parties have the opportunity to benefit under a contract. At that point we've also moved away from the prison industrial complex comparison. We're still at my point on perspective and context.

To be clear, my comparison was not to say necromancy is necessarily "bad" other than game references to it. The example had given the impression of entitlement to the remains of deceased people by dehumanizing them so that they could be used as unpaid labor. In a game it's easy to distance ourselves from the reality of those deceased people, but I don't agree than we realistically would IRL.

Right. So this is why I was initially confused. You added in a lot of assumptions. Lack of consent, free labor, use by the wealthy to generate wealth. You didn't state any of this originally, you just claimed helping the economy = prison industrial complex.

My position has always been simply "Necromancy is not inherently evil, it can be used for good." If you insist on adding evil to it, then you must acknowledge what you are adding. Giving clean water to people is not murder. Piping in clean water to drown people trapped in a glass box IS murder. You must provide your context, before making your declaration.

 

[Chaosmancer]

Yes, I was aware that I presented simplified (but accurate) representations of those schools of thought, given that I covered each in a few sentences. If only I had thought to point out that "obviously, there is a lot more nuance here, and many different flavours of these two branches."

I never said you didn't. I was responding to what you presented, acknowledged that you said it was simplified and that I agreed it was simplified. Would you rather me have posted without that acknowledgement, making it unclear what I was referencing?

Okay...what does that have to do with me using this example to illustrate the two fundamentally different approaches to ethics? The plot of that show is basically nonsensical. However, the conclusion did in fact revolve around him being presented with two choices, each representative of one of those schools. That's my entire point. Whether these were the only options is irrelevant - they were the two that were given.

You understand that I was just illustrating two different positions, right?

I wanted to quote your smaller post, and point out the fundamental issue? Yeah, I get you were just illustrating the two positions. You do also acknowledge that more than two positions exist, correct?

The first rule of discussing ethical dilemmas with students is there's no avoiding the dilemma. It's a logic exercise. It's like I asked them to solve the problem "What does 2+2 equal?" and they replied, "what if instead of 2+2 it was 3+potato?" Like, sure, we could just keep altering the premises but if we want to explore the fundamental ethical rules that doesn't really get us anywhere.

Disagree. Because the fundamental ethical rules stop mattering the moment we enter into reality. Perhaps we can call it "practical ethics" if it makes you feel better about it, but you are making my entire point here. These ethical dilemnas start with the premise that you cannot avoid the dilemna, and that the dilemna is binary. However, a fundamental use of ethics and morality is to aid in decision making, and decisions are not unavoidable, binary dilemnas.

The example you gave highlighted a potential problem with the discussions we tend to have around ethics. We tend to lock ourselves into these binary expressions, with only one recourse. However, in practical terms of practical applications, things never look like binary presented. IF you don't acknowledge that, you end up with the old PS2 morality games. Do you feed the starving people and starve yourself or murder them? Those aren't your only choices, and presenting that as a real dilemna causes issues that I feel are important to acknowledge when looking to discuss complex morality.

You seem really hung up on the fact that I presented simplified (but accurate) descriptions of these schools of thought, even though I expressly pointed out that these were highly simplified descriptions.

Right. Next time I won't agree with you and make it very clear we are discussing simplified versions of complex philosophies. Since that seems to have offended you so much you made a point of mentioning it twice, like I could have no reason to make sure I stated that I understood these were simplified versions other than to attack you.

It's hard to take you seriously in a discussion of ethics if you are going to discuss intent as an automatic issue in all schools of ethics. Deontologists generally care deeply about intent, that is true. Consequentialists, not so much. They care about outcomes. Now we could get into the weeds about act vs. rule utilitarianism, but in essence a fundamental difference between deontological and consequentialist ethics is how they view intent.

So no one who disagrees with Consequentialists can ever be taken seriously in a discussion of ethics? Wow. Thought this was two schools of thought, not one school and the correct way of viewing and discussing things. I mean, it isn't like those last two sentences you quoted were in the same paragraph, meaning I started by saying that I think both of them miss points, then pointing out the thing that I feel Consequentialists miss. Then followed that with something I think the Deontologists miss. I mean, that would be like... having a serious discussion of my issues with those philosophies? No one who does that can ever be taken seriously!

Honestly, if you didn't want to discuss the schools of thought, why even bring them up?

So going back to the case in point, let's say your character used a mind control spell to make someone hand over their delicious looking cake because you were hungry and wanted it for yourself. Unbeknownst to you, the cake contained an allergen that would have killed them, so your selfish action actually saved their life. A deontologist would typically argue that your act was unethical, because controlling people for your own selfish ends is inherently wrong, and intending to do so is in itself an immoral act, even if you don't follow through for some reason. But an act utilitarian would look at that mind control as a correct moral action, because you saved a life and enjoyed some delicious cake (both positives, one of them a huge positive) versus the small negative of your victim feeling bad about missing out on cake. Intent is irrelevant to the equation.

Right, so... I disagree with both positions? The Act Utilitarian is including an unintentional action, literally stated to be unknown to the person, as a catalyst creating a moral good, and included your own pleasure as a moral good. Taking this to a logical extreme, you could argue that killing a child is morally justified, because unbenknowst to you, that child would have grown up to kill three people, and so you have saved more lives than you took. I find that obviously problematic and too easy to exploit.

Meanwhile, the deontologist has declared the intent sans action to be immoral. This is literally declaring that thought crimes are real, and that it is possible that even thinking something immoral makes you an immoral person. However, once again, I find that obviously problematic. You must distinguish between thought and action, because if you do not, then once again taken to an extreme, there becomes no reason NOT to follow through on an immoral thought, because you have already committed an immoral action by thinking an immoral thought.

And NEITHER of the positions you outline offers the actual alternative and moral question. Neither addresses how the situation changes if you know about the allergen. And neither then posit if you are immoral for mind controlling to guarantee the person's life versus informing them of the danger. Neither addresses if acting to save the life makes the action different than acting to get the cake for yourself. All of which is where I posit the better moral questions and frameworks are located, compared to if your results matter more than your intentions.

So, as unserious and silly as I am, I once more put forth that I think both positions, which we both agree are highly simplified versions of their respective schools of thought, are flawed and miss out on important details.

All of which is to say that it is pretty hard to make any blanket statements about ethics such as "mind control is wrong" because context matters and there are a lot of different approaches to ethics.

Congrats. You have taken us right back to my own position. Weird. It is almost like you didn't pay attention to the nuance of my posts and what my actual, stated positions have been. Yes, it is hard to make blanket statements about ethics. Never said otherwise.

 

[Yaarel]

A corpse is not a human. It is the remains of a human.

Necromancy precisely blurs the boundaries between a living person and a dead corpse. That is the reason Necromancy is "unkosher".

For example, the Speak with Dead spell interacts with the person in a living way and their memories of being alive.

A way for D&D to explain Necromancy is to emphasize how a soul is complex. There are different levels of the soul. Part of the soul can be safely in the Astral Plane, while an other part of the soul rests in peace within the Shadowfell. An other part of the soul still clings to the remains of the body.

Necromancy manipulates the part of the soul that connects residually to the corpse. The soul of the Astral Plane is aware of what the Necromancer is doing to the soul of the corpse, but is unharmed by it.

Normally, the soul of the Shadowfell rests in peace, but can be Undead when resting less well. The influence of the soul is ethereal, and can exert influence within Material in a ghostly way.


The D&D "soul" is a microcosm of the multiverse.
• Astral (consciousness, thoughts)
• Ethereal (spiritual influence, innate magic, but also ghostly influence after death)
• Material (the life of the body, but still a residual presence of the corpse)

It helps to distinguish between "Shadows", which are the disembodied souls of the ghosts within the ethereal, versus "Undeads", which are when the Shadows magically animate their own corpses that they connect to.

Unlike the Astral soul that is a holistic person, the Shadow soul is an echo of a person. In some ways, a ghost is not all there, often fixating on specific memory and its unfinished task before being able to rest.

 

[Chaosmancer]

Necromancy precisely blurs the boundaries between a living person and a dead corpse. That is the reason Necromancy is "unkosher".

For example, the Speak with Dead spell interacts with the person in a living way and their memories of being alive.

Not really. You can also cast Speak with Plants, but that doesn't blur the line between plants and people. It may blur the line between living and non-living, but not between personhood. Additionally, what about abilities like the knowledge cleric which allows you to pull "memories" from items. Does that interaction make items more like people?

I'm not going to say there is no line blurring, but if you conjure a ghost to ask it questions, you aren't blurring the line between a ghost and a living, breathing person. Those are still obviously different states of existence.

A way for D&D to explain Necromancy is to emphasize how a soul is complex. There are different levels of the soul. Part of the soul can be safely in the Astral Plane, while an other part of the soul rests in peace within the Shadowfell. An other part of the soul still clings to the remains of the body.

Necromancy manipulates the part of the soul that connects residually to the corpse. The soul of the Astral Plane is aware of what the Necromancer is doing to the soul of the corpse, but is unharmed by it.

Normally, the soul of the Shadowfell rests in peace, but can be Undead when resting less well. The influence of the soul is ethereal, and can exert influence within Material in a ghostly way.


The D&D "soul" is a microcosm of the multiverse.
• Astral (consciousness, thoughts)
• Ethereal (spiritual influence, innate magic, but also ghostly influence after death)
• Material (the life of the body, but still a residual presence of the corpse)

It helps to distinguish between "Shadows", which are the disembodied souls of the ghosts within the ethereal, versus "Undeads", which are when the Shadows magically animate their own corpses that they connect to.

Unlike the Astral soul that is a holistic person, the Shadow soul is an echo of a person. In some ways, a ghost is not all there, often fixating on specific memory and its unfinished task before being able to rest.

Sure, you could do it that way. You can also separate the mind from the soul, and allow necromancy to mostly deal with essentially reactivating a mind and body, while the soul is elsewhere (not uncommon for things in DnD to lack souls, yet still function and talk after all).

Or you could have the soul be involved, but again, with consent being a big factor of ethical necromancy. Or honor and appeasement offered for the rudeness of drawing the soul back to the body.

My biggest frustration stems from locking the entire discussion in a single, euro-centric, pop-culture view of what is happening. Dead Guardians coming back to life, ancestral spirits summoned from beyond to guide their kin, there are cultures were these things are not dark, evil, or unkosher but actually seen as holy, sacred, and good. Maybe few cultures still relevant today, but it is easy to see how to get there.