DND_Reborn
The High Aldwin
Well, I made a joke because IMO (and in all honesty) this is a very stupid discussion.
If hit points are meat, then it also doesn't really matter what the hit dice are set for, because you could have a big ol' wizard. With tons o' meat.
It's only when you agree that, to some extent, hit points are an abstraction for various game concepts that you then understand that you can set them at (somewhat) arbitrary amounts; specifically, you are balancing between melee/martial characters and pew pew pew characters.
You can always quibble about the amounts (d4 or d6 for casters, d10 or d12 for martials, etc.), but it is (and always has been) a balancing aspect related to the abstract concept of hit points, not a "meat" aspect.
In short, the differnce has nothing to do with the "meat" v. "abstract," and, worse, this will likely just become another "meat" v "abstract" discussion.
Fine. It is pretty simple. If you don't like a discussion, don't participate. There is no reason to make a joke (even a stupid one) when someone wants to actually have a discussion on the topic.
As I stipulated in the OP, this isn't a "meat" HP issue. It is a carryover from prior editions and something I think warrants discussion and consideration. Other aspects of the game balance things out to make battlers tougher. Also, half the classes already use a d8 anyway. At 10 levels, even, you're typically talking about a difference of about a dozen HP?