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<blockquote data-quote="Riley37" data-source="post: 6458447" data-attributes="member: 6786839">See also, TH White's &quot;The Once and Future King&quot;, in which Merlin polymorphs young Arthur into a fish, and then an ant, to broaden his perspective. Arthur, in antform, has thoughts which I don't believe could fit in the brain of an ant, if thought were entirely an epiphenomenon of neurons and synapses. But it's maaaaaagic!A person in Gaseous Form keeps their INT and WIS, and remembers their identity and purposes, even though their brain is vapor, even though they are literally an airhead. A ghost has ZERO MASS and has conscious thought. So it's pretty clear that in D&amp;D magic, the mind is not entirely dependent on the brain.A person could possibly *increase* their WIS by being polymorphed into a beast. (Belkar Bitterleaf, I'm looking at you.) Would that work kind of like the &quot;Owl's Wisdom&quot; version of Enhance Ability? Do you lose the elephant's memory, when your time polymorphed into an elephant comes to an end?I love high-granularity simulation gaming. D&amp;D is not a simulation of *our world*. It is a simulation of a *fantasy world*, or rather, a way to simulate any one of a large set of fantasy words. The relationship between matter and thought may vary, between those various fantasy worlds. It's not as if we even have consensus on how it works in our world. Some say that it's all neurons, synapses, hormones, etc.; others say that we are bodies, but have spirits; others say that we are spirits, but have bodies.See also &quot;Form of... Bird!&quot; in Kingdom of Loathing.</blockquote>

[QUOTE="Riley37, post: 6458447, member: 6786839"] See also, TH White's "The Once and Future King", in which Merlin polymorphs young Arthur into a fish, and then an ant, to broaden his perspective. Arthur, in antform, has thoughts which I don't believe could fit in the brain of an ant, if thought were entirely an epiphenomenon of neurons and synapses. But it's maaaaaagic! A person in Gaseous Form keeps their INT and WIS, and remembers their identity and purposes, even though their brain is vapor, even though they are literally an airhead. A ghost has ZERO MASS and has conscious thought. So it's pretty clear that in D&D magic, the mind is not entirely dependent on the brain. A person could possibly *increase* their WIS by being polymorphed into a beast. (Belkar Bitterleaf, I'm looking at you.) Would that work kind of like the "Owl's Wisdom" version of Enhance Ability? Do you lose the elephant's memory, when your time polymorphed into an elephant comes to an end? I love high-granularity simulation gaming. D&D is not a simulation of *our world*. It is a simulation of a *fantasy world*, or rather, a way to simulate any one of a large set of fantasy words. The relationship between matter and thought may vary, between those various fantasy worlds. It's not as if we even have consensus on how it works in our world. Some say that it's all neurons, synapses, hormones, etc.; others say that we are bodies, but have spirits; others say that we are spirits, but have bodies. See also "Form of... Bird!" in Kingdom of Loathing. [/QUOTE]

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