Reply to thread

Message: <blockquote data-quote="AbdulAlhazred" data-source="post: 7349706" data-attributes="member: 82106">Its hard to even critique this, as it lacks any logical coherence as a  meta-physical position, an ethical position, etc. I guess maybe we could  approach it in the realm of aesthetics? Maybe??? I'll try to  comment....Where to even begin. First your 'second definition of causality' is utter gibberish. Its self-referential to start with 'causality is the relationship between cause and effect' except 'cause' means 'the thing which is responsible for an effect (which is itself a condition of being or quality, a state of the universe at a time) definitionally after the cause. So your definition doesn't make sense, it cannot be analyzed. There may be a relationship between cause and effect, but it is definitional what that relationship IS.A rogue attempts to use a want of fireballs in the fiction - This is simply a story told by a participant in an RPG, probably an action declaration.A UMD check is made, successfully, a fireball appears in the fiction - OK that COULD HAPPEN, but it is NOT CONDITIONAL ON THE FIRST PART OF THE NARRATIVE. A convention of the RPG being played is that a declaration by a PC of the first type should be followed by a declaration and a check, etc. However one does not lead inevitably, causally to the other. The actual chain of causation (at least in common parlance, I won't get into higher metaphysics) is a series of social conventions and shared concepts being exchanged between minds of people playing a game. They are not obliged to do one thing vs another, and no one thing they do is any more a 'cause and effect' relationship (in terms of the fictional narrative) than any other!No no no no no!!!!! Even by YOUR concept of causation this is bunkum! BECAUSE you cannot describe why the fireball won't work underwater you have PROVEN that it isn't 'causation', but mere convention. There is no chain of proximal effect which can bridge from one state to the other, merely a social convention "in this game, fire doesn't burn underwater." IT COULDN'T BE MORE CLEAR. The fact that things happen on Earth for reasons we have not determined (and may not be able to determine in specific) doesn't mean the same thing at all! It just means we don't have all knowledge. There is still a complete reality in which we can express conservation laws, symmetries, etc which would describe why these things happened, if we DID have that perfect information. Reality is ENTIRELY DIFFERENT IN CHARACTER from your RPG fiction. In fact they have virtually nothing in common. No causation of any kind exists in D&D, except at the table in the real physical world!</blockquote>

Verification