The D&D Great Wheel of the Planes and Moral Ethical Relativism

[S'mon]

Author Interpretation at work. His fight to keep the city and it's residents safe is the core and his means, however goofy (dressing up like a human bat!?!) achieve his ends. Two levels at work here.

Do you think he's LG, NG or CG?

 

[Slapzilla]

NG. Breaking the law to do the right thing. Seems like an NG to me. Way too much of an obsessive planner to be CG. Too much privacy invading to be LG.

 

[Felix]

Sundragon, I think you have arrived at the idea that the Great Wheel is morally relativistic by perverting the definition of moral relativism.

Take a Good act. A moral absolutist will tell you that a Good act is a Good act is a Good act. There is a yardstick which applies to everyone at all times and they may be measured by that yardstick regardless of their circumstances or the environment they live in.

Take an Evil act. A moral relativist will tell you that this act will only be "Evil" based upon the perspective from which it is viewed. So for the actor who commits the act, it may even be a "Good" act; for the direct object of the action, it may be an "Evil" act. Moral Relativism allows that an act may be both "Good" and "Evil" simultaneously, and perspective is paramount in the judgment; therefore a knowledge of the perspective from which you view actions will help you understand why you think a particular action is "Good" or "Evil".

Sundragon, I, like you, am rather unsympathetic to a relativistic philosophy because terms lose their meaning: when an act can simultaneously be both "Good" and "Evil", what real meaning do those descriptors have?

But note that moral absolutism is more concerned with the existence of a concrete, unchaning, and universal yardstick to measure the morality of actions than it is with the idea of cosmic justice and "correctness". Evil may still be powerful and vie with Good while remaining pure and unrepentant Evil. The Great Wheel does this: there is a clearly defined TRUTH that Evil is Evil, Good is Good, and while it is possible to changes places by falling or by being redeemed, it is not possible to simultaneously be a Solar and a Pit Fiend.

I don't know what you mean by "correctness" when you refer to Good and Evil; moral absolutism doesn't tell you what is "correct": it tells you what is Good, Evil, Lawful or Chaotic. The individual will then be free to choose between then as their own personal morality dictates. A Good person will generally act Good; an Evil person will commit Evil; a Neutral person will have a smattering of both.

But nowhere does it say that because Good is Good that is should be able to eliminate Evil; there is nothing to say that because Evil is Evil, it shouldn't also be powerful. And "correctness" has no meaning in a moral context, even an absolute one. An act is not "correct", it is "Good", "Evil" etc.

 

[Doug McCrae]

Planescape was totally rad.

Has 'rad' come back into fashion or are you using a time machine to post from 1987?

 

[Doug McCrae]

On the Great Wheel there is no objective moral power calling demons "wrong"

There is. The force that assigns alignments. If demons and angels were equally morally right they would both have the same alignment on the good-neutral-evil spectrum.

 

[Korgoth]

@ OP: Good points. I'm not sure I entirely agree... I have to think about it more before I can say if I agree or disagree (though I don't like the "Great Wheel" for other reasons).

But what about this: aren't the infernal creatures miserable? I'd certainly portray them as such. Those creatures are condemned to eternal torment, so it stands to reason that they should be totally miserable, even if they're powerful. That portrayal shows evil up to be a complete and utter lie, a "bill of goods" (pun intended), doesn't it?

Maybe part of the problem is just a portrayal of such creatures as enjoying themselves. If you stick to the notion that, even if a king of the lower realms, such a creature is condemned to complete unhappiness then maybe it won't seem so relativist.

To take a rather gross example, consider Emperor Caligula. When he heard of a slave in the slave quarter who was considered hot stuff by the ladies, he grew so jealous that he had this fellow arrested, tortured and executed. An emperor (and one who was more than willing to spend practically the entire imperial treasury on himself) was jealous of a slave, who possessed absolutely nothing except some good looks. It's quite possible that even though he had every material thing he could have wanted, Caligula never genuinely enjoyed a single moment of his adult life.

So if the greatest king of the lower planes is utterly unhappy, and the lowest servant of the upper planes is utterly happy and satisfied, doesn't that alone make the upper planes objectively better?

 

[Doug McCrae]

I think I see where you're coming from, Sundragon. You believe that in order for there to be objective right and wrong, there must be a Judaeo-Christian God, an omnipotent and omniscient being, who stands above the forces of the outer planes - the gods and demons and so forth - deciding who is right and wrong. This is a not uncommon belief in our own world (that God is required in order for there to be such a thing as morality) and though I don't agree with it, it's perfectly valid. Discussion of these issues isn't allowed on this board however.

In D&D there is no such omniscient being. Instead there is the universe itself. The unthinking universe 'decides' who is right and wrong and doles out alignments accordingly. The inhabitants of a D&D universe don't know this of course, but from our perspective we know it to be true because we've read the game rules and thus know the objective laws of the universe.

EDIT: It could be argued that D&D leaves it open whether or not God exists in the D&D universe. His existence is neither confirmed nor denied in the written materials, and rightly so.

 

[Tyler Do'Urden]

In D&D there is no such omniscient being. Instead there is the universe itself. The unthinking universe 'decides' who is right and wrong and doles out alignments accordingly. The inhabitants of a D&D universe don't know this of course, but from our perspective we know it to be true because we've read the game rules and thus know the objective laws of the universe.

EDIT: It could be argued that D&D leaves it open whether or not God exists in the D&D universe. His existence is neither confirmed nor denied in the written materials, and rightly so.

Actually, such a being is referenced in several D&D settings:

In Dragonlance, the Highfather is the "One God" figure who created the Gods. His relation to his creation is always somewhat ambiguous, however.

In the Forgotten Realms, Ao is the "overgod". He does not answer prayers or have priests; no one truly knows if he exists or not.

In Planescape, the Believers of the Source ("Godsmen") believe in a sort of "over-creator" which all beings eventually join with.

I think that this approach to divine "mystery" is an interesting one, myself, and suggests many interesting possibilities for a sort of pre-monotheistic, pagan setting; all in all, it reminds me of Lord of the Rings, with the distant and benevolent Eru/Illuvatar who set everything in motion, then abdicated to allow the Valar to rule.

 

[paradox42]

Sundragon, I think you have arrived at the idea that the Great Wheel is morally relativistic by perverting the definition of moral relativism.

Take a Good act. A moral absolutist will tell you that a Good act is a Good act is a Good act. There is a yardstick which applies to everyone at all times and they may be measured by that yardstick regardless of their circumstances or the environment they live in.

Take an Evil act. A moral relativist will tell you that this act will only be "Evil" based upon the perspective from which it is viewed. So for the actor who commits the act, it may even be a "Good" act; for the direct object of the action, it may be an "Evil" act. Moral Relativism allows that an act may be both "Good" and "Evil" simultaneously, and perspective is paramount in the judgment; therefore a knowledge of the perspective from which you view actions will help you understand why you think a particular action is "Good" or "Evil".

Sundragon, I, like you, am rather unsympathetic to a relativistic philosophy because terms lose their meaning: when an act can simultaneously be both "Good" and "Evil", what real meaning do those descriptors have?

But note that moral absolutism is more concerned with the existence of a concrete, unchaning, and universal yardstick to measure the morality of actions than it is with the idea of cosmic justice and "correctness". Evil may still be powerful and vie with Good while remaining pure and unrepentant Evil. The Great Wheel does this: there is a clearly defined TRUTH that Evil is Evil, Good is Good, and while it is possible to changes places by falling or by being redeemed, it is not possible to simultaneously be a Solar and a Pit Fiend.

I don't know what you mean by "correctness" when you refer to Good and Evil; moral absolutism doesn't tell you what is "correct": it tells you what is Good, Evil, Lawful or Chaotic. The individual will then be free to choose between then as their own personal morality dictates. A Good person will generally act Good; an Evil person will commit Evil; a Neutral person will have a smattering of both.

But nowhere does it say that because Good is Good that is should be able to eliminate Evil; there is nothing to say that because Evil is Evil, it shouldn't also be powerful. And "correctness" has no meaning in a moral context, even an absolute one. An act is not "correct", it is "Good", "Evil" etc.

QFT. Do not confuse "correct" with "Good," particularly in D&D with its two alignment axes. "Correct" is a relative quality that arises from situational factors; every situation will have a different guage of what is "correct" for its "solution." The alignments are something completely different- they are an "absolute" stick (or, to be more precise, two such sticks since we have Good-Evil and Law-Chaos) by which to measure a label for a particular action.

Does this mean that an action that is Good can be either "correct" or "incorrect," in various situations, or that an Evil one could likewise be in other situations? Of course it does- but this is not because Good and Evil are somehow "equal." It is instead because correctness is a relative quality that has no absolute basis for judgement. "Correctness" is what is in the eye of the proverbial beholder, not morals.

 

[Cheiromancer]

I haven't read the whole thread, so I'm just going to jump in with my response. I think Sundragon is incorrect: specifically, I hold that the Great Wheel has nothing to do with moral relativism.

Suppose that moral relativism is incorrect; suppose there is objective right or wrong. Now suppose that there are different moral and ethical "clubs" - since moral relativism is incorrect, then the positions espoused by most of these clubs are, to some extent, also incorrect.

Now assume that these "clubs" set up planes which are metaphysical equivalents to their positions. Lawful Good types set up Mount Celestia as an illustration and aid to the virtues of Lawful Good; devils set up the Nine Hells as their monument to Lawful Evil. And so on for all the different alignments.

There you have it: the Great Wheel, even though we assume from the outset that moral relativism is incorrect. The exercise can be repeated assuming that moral relativism is correct, and again you will end up with the Great Wheel.

Conclusion: the Great Wheel has nothing to do with the truth of moral relativism.