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I generally agree with your restatement of the premises. I was particular in phrasing Good as "altruism, respect for life, and a concern for the dignity of sentient beings", and I think that implies premise 4 (make of that what you will), but I think "Good is selflessly helping others" is...

Well... fair enough! That's a reasonable take on the premise. What are some interesting external forces that might fit the bill, and were there any cool ideas you have seen so far? I started writing a long argument in response to your #251 post, but thought better of it; I want to yes, and...

You bet, I'll look for your response. The clarification is that in a world in which Good triumphs, there would still be selfish and cruel beings who arrived to their orientation by nature or nurture. They wouldn't be killed or 're-educated' by the Good, they would continue to live, pursue their...

I gave my answer to this in general terms on page 4. (with apologies to @Steampunkette I guess I did explicitly state it) I'm guessing you don't consider this a reasonable position, no? Charlaquin's phrasing in the other thread frames muscular neutrals as something like this. Can you think of...

I like this idea. Muscular neutrals want to prevent the conflict from escalating. Good wants to prevent the conflict from escalating too but, by themselves, they can't. Their gains cause Evil to escalate the conflict, which is bad for everyone--and Evil's gains force Good to escalate, for fear...

I didn't explicitly state that, though it captures the spirit. Really, it's simpler: Unless you're a Evil jerk, why would you ever actively oppose Good? And can you (ENWorld poster) contrive a reasonable basis for someone to do so? Yeah, that's most of what the thread has come up with so far...

Misc. thoughts and responses after 18 pages :rolleyes: I now think "metaphysically valid" was not good phrasing. Really, I meant "reasonable"; not foolish or misguided on its face. Also not explicitly correct, but a position that you could see a thoughtful, intelligent, decent person taking...

Good lord did this thread grow quickly. Reminder--it isn't meant to be a thread for arguing about alignment (though I am guilty of that myself on checks notes page 5 o_O). It's meant to take two apparently contradictory positions and come up with an interesting reason why they aren't...

Admittedly, the thought experiment all sort of breaks down under the scrutiny of ethics, since--while I believe there are world views that are clearly better than others--there are also a lot of reasonable conceptions of Good which vehemently disagree with each other. That conceded, lets...

I think that conception is a sort of carefully articulated muscular neutral as defense of the status quo, which, runs toward Charlaquin's critique of muscular neutrality in the earlier Grayhawk thread as it being an ideology that some NPCs hew to and not a cosmologically justified position. I...

This is a proper answer to the premise but, I feel, it's an unsatisfying one. Why are things set up in a way that evil outer planes are necessary? We know (because we live in a multiverse without a great wheel) that this isn't literally physically necessary. So, did some callous creator decide...

To clarify the initial premise a bit: A world where Good has won and the multiverse is under its rule doesn't mean that there can no longer exist people and creatures who are non-altruistic or even selfish and inclined to cruelty. Presumably, the Good rulers would permit those beings to exist...

This comes back to definitions again, I think. Part of the premise was that good represents "altruism, respect for life, and a concern for the dignity of sentient beings." I think implicit in that formulation is that individuals aren't compelled do things--and certainly aren't compelled to...

Ah, ok, I think that's a good solution to the premise. Muscular neutrals have a (possibly) reasonable fear that once the Good folks are in control, they won't rule as advertised. So, neutrals as utilitarians to Good's deontologists. I think that's also a solution but, like the problem of evil I...

Ha! love it. I didn't consider militant atheism as a form of muscular neutrality rejecting Good. Great response. Yeah, the goal is to come up with a muscular neutrality that isn't just wrongheaded on its face. This is the dilemma you set up in the other thread, so I'm curious to see if it's a...

These responses, I think, are rejecting the premise in the "fudging "Good" somehow" sense. Capital "G" Good isn't intolerant, stifling, idealism or 'told you so' obnoxiousness, it is genuine compassion for other people and care for their well-being in the deepest sense... at least as I've...

Why thank you :), and I am not averse to quibbling over the definitions. How would you have defined Good and Evil? I define good and evil in the OP, which is from the 3.5 definition (via Wikipedia), mainly because the 5e descriptions are so tepid (or I would have used them instead). I'd be...