Morality of mind control…

[TaranTheWanderer]

Nothing takes away a person’s free will like murdering them.

If the stakes are so high that you are going to be murdered or are considering murdering someone, then I don’t see mind control as any worse.

Obviously, framing the ‘stakes’ will inform me if someone is doing evil acts.

Are you using mind control to sneak past a guard (instead of murdering the guard) because you need to rescue those hostages?

Or are you mind controlling (instead of murdering) that shop keeper because you don’t want to pay for that healing potion?

Obi Wan needed to use the mind trick because, no matter how powerful he was, he couldn’t defeat every storm trooper looking for them and it risked getting Luke killed. I think it was less compassion for the stormtrooper than necessity to protect his charge. In either case I’d say the stakes were high enough. It is also more compassionate than murdering the stormtroopers.

I also agree that corporations are influencing our behaviours with social media and everyone seems to be okay with that. It’s, literally, the closest you’ll get to real life mind control besides drugging someone’s drink.

In the interest of full transparency, I've put a subliminal message in this post compelling you to like it.

It worked!

 

[SkidAce]

Mind control that allows the target a chance to resist, like a save, sure seems like them having the free will or mental fortitude as it were to choose for themselves. Just like with lying, some people are tougher to convince.

I still don't see a clear distinction between them. If it's acceptable to lie sometimes, then it's acceptable to mind control sometimes too. Both are covert forms of mental manipulation. Not saying either is super ethical and great to do, but the morality depends on the particulars of a given situation.

The thread has probably progressed, however...

Lying lets them decide (granted there can be influences on their decision).

Mind Control makes them do what you say...dominating or puppeteering. Which is why they know after it wears off. (You can imagine that they knew the whole time, but couldnt stop it, which is why [in dnd] they are not happy after and knew they were coerced.)

 

[Epic Meepo]

Also he was Daniel Craig.

So is it more or less moral to mind control someone if they're Daniel Craig? Hmm...

 

[Autumnal]

For me, at least, mind control is part of a distinct realm of experience people normally never enter, and I prefer that using it bring its innately eerie nature into play. In my daydreams, all magic (psi, etc) would have the quality Dan Simmons evokes in his novel The Hollow Man:

Bremen was just inside the door—someone had pressed a drink in his hand—when suddenly he had sensed another mindshield quite near him. He had put out a gentle probe, and immediately Gail’s thoughts had swept across him like a searchlight in a dark room.

Both were stunned. Their first reaction had been to increase the strength of their mindshields, to roll up like frightened armadillos. Each soon found that useless against the unconscious and almost involuntary probes of the other. Neither had ever encountered another telepath of more than primitive, untapped ability. Each had assumed that he or she was a freak—unique and unassailable. Now they stood naked before each other in an empty place. A second later, almost without volition, they flooded each other’s mind with a torrent of images, self-images, half memories, secrets, sensations, preferences, perceptions, hidden shames, half-formed longings, and fully formed fears. Nothing was held back. Every petty cruelty committed, sexual experiment experienced, and prejudice harbored poured out along with thoughts of past birthday parties, former lovers, parents, and an endless stream of trivia. Rarely had two people known each other as well after fifty years of marriage.

A minute later they met for the first time.

This is obviously not innately evil. But it is innately strange, and like the mind control in Firestarter, should (to my taste) be prone to unexpected interactions as well as the intended, desired result.

But then if it were up to me, I’d overhaul will-negating powers pretty heavily. I don’t like to crock abilities - if it’s supposed to do something, it should do that thing without booby traps. I’m just unconvinced that that particularly category of effects is an overall gain for the game.

 

[jian]

There are definitely gradations of what counts as magical mind control, so let’s lay out a few examples and my thoughts.

• Improving your own persuasive skills. Hopefully doesn’t actually affect the other person’s mind at all. Probably not evil.
• Reading the other person’s mind in order to learn what might best persuade them. Intrusive and thus at least slightly evil but may be justified under the circumstances.
• Charm Person: the other person suddenly regards you as their best friend and gives you everything you want (if they would do that for their best friend). Near complete removal of the other person’s autonomy, using their own mind to do it. Evil, and just awful. Even if you’re doing it to prevent a greater evil, that doesn’t prevent it from being evil. Two wrongs don’t make a right.
• Hypnotic Mind Control: You completely control the target’s actions, they do exactly what you order for the duration. Evil, of course, but I guess at least they’re not awake for it and might not have memories of complying with your every whim? Some targets might actually prefer this to Charm Person.

By the way, I’d say that Jedi Mind Trick is basically a very short term version of Hypnotic Mind Control. No, it’s not right, but it might be justified under certain circumstances. Avoiding Imperial discovery or preventing a massacre? Sure. Being annoyed that someone is trying to sell you cigarettes? No. But then, nobody accused Kenobi of being a moral paragon.

 

[Micah Sweet]

I think if you are serious about things you'd recognize that in the general case you'd rather be killed by an enemy than mind controlled by an enemy.

I'm not sure that's true (and I mean that literally; it might be true, but I'm not certain). Mind control isn't necessary permanent. Death?

 

[Micah Sweet]

You seem to have misunderstood me.

The Jedi mind trick is 100% obviously mind control.

Lying and deception are 100% obviously not mind control.

They are categorically different things.

It's not good because you're removing someone's free will. Regardless of why, that's evil. It's the circumstances, like mind controlling someone to prevent deaths...where you're committing a lesser evil to prevent a greater evil that things like mind control become acceptable. Acceptable does not equal good. It's still an evil act.

Exactly. Greater and lesser evil. Self defense. Etc.

Exactly.

Just so we're on the same page, are we assuming some kind of objective, black and white morality regarding what's good and what's evil? Because historically that has been a very open question.

 

[Micah Sweet]

I usually limit mind control (of PCs) to combat related things such as "Drop you sword" "stand there and do nothing" "Walk away", etc.

So evil really doesn't come into play.

IMO, if mind control is a thing, then it doesn't work or not work based solely on whether or not the target is controlled by a player. What sense would that make in the setting?

 

[kermit4karate]

The thread has probably progressed, however...

Lying lets them decide (granted there can be influences on their decision).

Mind Control makes them do what you say...dominating or puppeteering. Which is why they know after it wears off. (You can imagine that they knew the whole time, but couldnt stop it, which is why [in dnd] they are not happy after and knew they were coerced.)

I'm aware of what mind control is. Sorry, I just disagree insofar as one being more or less inherently bad than the other. Doesn't matter how one attempts to coerce another being into doing or not doing something, judging which/whether either one is employed ethically comes down to the particular situation, not the tool itself.

Mind control to stop an alcoholic from rock climbing while drunk, a drug addict from overdosing, a distraught parent from taking their life or another's immediately after the loss of a child, etc. Lots of scenarios one could conceive in which the use of mind control could be viewed as a moral act, and likewise lots of scenarios one could conceive in which a lie could be seen as a far more egregious, immoral violation.

 

[grimslade]

Jedi Mind Trick is more like the Command spell, a direct compulsion to the mind. The problem is, Old Ben Kenobi really likes using the JMT, like all the time. How do we know Ben didn't 'persuade' Luke about the 'truth' of the Jedi and his father? The problem with mind control is it is causes doubt in all the character does. It completely erodes trust. It is easy to see Obi-Wan as a master manipulator trying to revive a dying cult through mind control and indoctrination, from a certain point of view.
The Charm Person spell specifically notes that the recipient is aware of the charm and is hostile to the caster. Mind Control is at best unsavory, and at worst a cardinal evil. Murder is wrong. Yet, soldiers are permitted to kill in war in specific ways. Self-defense is also a culturally appropriate way to kill someone. So you can do the same with Mind Control. There are culturally acceptable ways to dominate people. Perhaps self-defense, to prevent harm to another, to prevent harm to the victim of the spell? Are magical oaths and geas acceptable? How about the state? Can a Templar in Balic compel you to tell the truth? What about a cleric of Pholtus?
The other thing is the "why do you know how to that?", question. Why did you feel the need to cultivate this knowledge? Just in case? Much like the ultimate recycler, the necromancer, people are going to think poorly of the Enchanter.