I am actually curious. Forget the sentient water. Do you believe animals like wolves, tigers, bears etc. are inherently evil because they cannot sustain themselves without eating other animals?
What about us? We must eat something, and even if you're vegetarian you kill plants, which are living beings.
If carnivores aren't inherently evil, Mindflayers aren't evil for eating brains, either.
Being carnivorous is different from being cannibalistic (I'm defining cannibalism as being sentient and consuming another sentient creature). Wolves, bears, tigers and other predators aren't evil because they're not smart enough to know the difference between sentience and animal. Being a carnivore or vegetarian isn't evil, but cannibalism of a living creature is evil (yes, only of living creatures. In the real world there are/were cultures that practiced cannibalism on the dead. That's not evil, but eating a dead person, or someone you killed, is evil).
But what defines “sentience.” To the Mind flayer perspective, we’re more like talking cows than “people.”
From the pig’s perspective, we’re more like Mind Flayers than “people.”
Simple definition, invented by me:
Being able to communicate with other sentient creatures, being capable of forming questions and new ideas.
My dogs communicate very effectively with me, they most definitely occasionally form that communication as questions, and they are also most definitely capable of forming new ideas.
I quite literally watched one of my dogs select a perfect stick, specifically remove bark and pointy bits in strategic locations to suit his preference, and then brought it to me and asked me if I would play with him.
Let me repeat that, I watched a dog invent and make a tool, and ask me a question.
Your average pig is at least as smart as your average dog, if not smarter.
I eat pork.
Am I evil?
By communicate, I meant language in some form. Some dogs (and maybe pigs) can do this.
All animals can do it. Whenever you hear birds chirping you can tell which ones mean “**** me” and which ones mean “my tree!”
Every dog can communicate like that, just most people don’t speak dog. Cats too. Basically every animal can communicate like that if you know how to speak their language.
I am very glad to see how this conversation has changed since my bring up the Mind Flayers. But I want to loop back around to why I brought up these other beings.
From the arguments I've seen on both sides it seems people are okay with mind flayers being good, but that's a DMs choice and doesn't matter what the source material says about Mind Flayers. So we let each table and each material plane decide if beings are good or evil. Each setting was it's own morality and therefore depending on the world Mind Flayers might be evil or good.
So if this is a belief that each table can decide to ignore the inherent evil built into Mind Flayers or not, why do we not let each table decide if Orcs and Drow are inherently evil? Why do we argue that the source material must change? If each table to free to ignore what they want when it comes to these other beings (or not due to our own opinion on morals) why I ask do those that argue for Orcs lore and history to change to be more neutral in morality do you not argue for Mind Flayers lore to also change?
The reason that they're different in terms of rules is because Mind Flayers are built for killing and eating brains, and Orcs and Drow are not, and are player races. Mind Flayers are aberrations, Orcs and Drow are humanoids. There is a difference.
No difference they are all sentient beings right? So we can't have 1 sentient race evil in nature and then argue these other 2 can't be. Humanoid, Abberation, Fey, Dragon don't inherently grant evilness or goodness as was pointed out by others when arguing why some of the other beings I mentioned. Those beings were not granted "evil in nature" by their creature type, but by transformations. Or are you saying creature type does grant evil or good in nature?
You can answer that or ignore it. But I think I stumbled upon the crux of this issue. Orcs and Drow are player races. Therefore we must allow for open endedness in their general lore? So if Mind Flayers became a player race, we must then also open them up to being neutral in nature. So why wait till they are granted player race status? Also why does player race status matter when it comes to general culture and nature? Why do we only care that player races are changed to be more general?
I am very glad to see how this conversation has changed since my bring up the Mind Flayers. But I want to loop back around to why I brought up these other beings.
From the arguments I've seen on both sides it seems people are okay with mind flayers being good, but that's a DMs choice and doesn't matter what the source material says about Mind Flayers. So we let each table and each material plane decide if beings are good or evil. Each setting was it's own morality and therefore depending on the world Mind Flayers might be evil or good.
So if this is a belief that each table can decide to ignore the inherent evil built into Mind Flayers or not, why do we not let each table decide if Orcs and Drow are inherently evil? Why do we argue that the source material must change? If each table to free to ignore what they want when it comes to these other beings (or not due to our own opinion on morals) why I ask do those that argue for Orcs lore and history to change to be more neutral in morality do you not argue for Mind Flayers lore to also change?
As I understand it, this is essentially what they are proposing.... to say 'there are cultures like' (or perhaps 'a potential culture is like') <insert cultural description> but individuals vary... and basically letting any given DM sort it all out however they feel best.
And that is great. I shared a seminar given by the Devs back in 2015 a few pages ago and this is what they said there too. The Stuff in the books they print is not the be all end all. If you want Orcs to be kind hearted and good in nature and want all humans to be spawn of Gruumsh then you can. Nothing is stopping anyone from doing that. But the Devs simply created lore to help those that didn't want to have to do all the work of forming these groups of beings.
I just really wanted to get people to think about the argument they are so heavily invested in. Why fight for 2 races that are considered evil in the written lore to not be treated as evil, but not fight for the 3rd one too and go as far as saying "It's okay they are evil, it is in their nature." Personally, I don't think they need to change anything since they themselves say it you can do what ever you want. But if I were to argue for one or two races to be changed, I would not stop there. I would also insist that the general lore leave all beings open ended. It would be annoying to me that one or two beings got changed to neutrality but others were left untouched when the argument used two change those races was "Why should they be inherently evil in nature." But like I said I'm of the opinion you run the game the way you want to, but I do not understand the need to push for a change in the lore that is heavily wrapped around published worlds.
I am actually curious. Forget the sentient water. Do you believe animals like wolves, tigers, bears etc. are inherently evil because they cannot sustain themselves without eating other animals?
What about us? We must eat something, and even if you're vegetarian you kill plants, which are living beings.
If carnivores aren't inherently evil, Mindflayers aren't evil for eating brains, either.
Being carnivorous is different from being cannibalistic (I'm defining cannibalism as being sentient and consuming another sentient creature). Wolves, bears, tigers and other predators aren't evil because they're not smart enough to know the difference between sentience and animal. Being a carnivore or vegetarian isn't evil, but cannibalism of a living creature is evil (yes, only of living creatures. In the real world there are/were cultures that practiced cannibalism on the dead. That's not evil, but eating a dead person, or someone you killed, is evil).
But what defines “sentience.” To the Mind flayer perspective, we’re more like talking cows than “people.”
From the pig’s perspective, we’re more like Mind Flayers than “people.”
Simple definition, invented by me:
Being able to communicate with other sentient creatures, being capable of forming questions and new ideas.
My dogs communicate very effectively with me, they most definitely occasionally form that communication as questions, and they are also most definitely capable of forming new ideas.
I quite literally watched one of my dogs select a perfect stick, specifically remove bark and pointy bits in strategic locations to suit his preference, and then brought it to me and asked me if I would play with him.
Let me repeat that, I watched a dog invent and make a tool, and ask me a question.
Your average pig is at least as smart as your average dog, if not smarter.
I eat pork.
Am I evil?
By communicate, I meant language in some form. Some dogs (and maybe pigs) can do this.
All animals can do it. Whenever you hear birds chirping you can tell which ones mean “**** me” and which ones mean “my tree!”
Every dog can communicate like that, just most people don’t speak dog. Cats too. Basically every animal can communicate like that if you know how to speak their language.
Just because you don’t understand what they’re saying, doesn’t mean they aren’t communicating.
As someone who works with animals for a living this! Many animals communicate with each other, just not in way we understand unless you have studied the physiology and behavior of the species in question. Even then, we can still understand them without verbal communication. I know when I get bit by a bird I'm working with what that meant. Sometimes is means I did something it didn't like, or I'm not paying enough attention to it, or even hey, I see the food now give me. The bite is the same in all three of those situations, but thanks to my understanding of the bird I know what it meant based on context. That is really all verbal communication is: listening to what was said and using context clues to interpret it. But I think if you asked most people birds are not sentient, however I would argue against that.
If you are thinking like a Mind Flayer, then you make a good point. To them who they are is normal and what they are doing is right. Is any creature/animal considered evil if that’s their essence of life? That’s a great question. Let’s look at it this way, if a human were to eat a human that’s seen as cannibalism and is classified as evil. If the Mind Flayer only is able to live by eating the brains of others than it is logical for them to do so in the act of self-preservation. Another example, if a man were to attack you with the intent of killing you, would you not fight back? Would it be murder/evil to kill this man in self-defense of your own life? The Mind Flayer sees others as it’s source of food, like it has a choice? In our minds we think that this is pure evil and that it shouldn’t be done. If the Mind Flayers are aware that what they are doing is evil yet still choose to do this without a care in the world and not even try to find a different way, that is now evil with evil intent. How does someone know that what they are doing is evil if they don’t have a law? Can someone judge another person who doesn’t know the laws that you and everyone else lives by? Example: A person goes to someone’s house and isn’t aware that they have a few house rules, he does something that breaks the rules. Does the host have a right to judge a person for breaking the rules if the host himself neglected to tell him the rules?
How does the Mind Flayer know if that is evil in the first place? I’m curious as to if in a campaign someone was able to get to the Mind Flayer and get it to change its ways? But isn’t that the same as walking up to someone who has an Asian culture and saying,”Yo, you’re doing it wrong, you’re supposed to do it this way.” How does anyone think that’s going to go? Horribly.
It might actually be immoral for you to fight back against the other human. You might be in their land. You might have taken something of theirs, even if innocently.
Mind Flayers are not just very intelligent. They have good wisdom scores too. Philosophy is a thing and is not 'merely something someone told us to do' but rather the result of millennia of ongoing thought and debate. Ironically, in modern society, it is more likely to be set aside in favour of expedience, simply because it is a much more complex world and what once seemed like easy answers, things that were once taken for granted, are both harder to dismiss (for those of us who do think along such lines) and easier to dismiss (by those without the patience for such deep thinking). (And no judgement intended in there either. Patience is not always a virtue and ignorance can actually be bliss).
I do agree with this, but who is to say Mind Flayer philosophy is the same as other sentient beings.
I remember philosophy in college; I angered alot of people by looking at morality as something different to each individual and something that can change overtime. What is morally evil today might have been morally neutral in 1805, and vice versa. This is an interesting topic especially when you transfer to the D&D worlds. Each sentient being would define morals in a different way, even more so than in the real world. Not only will different cultures be morally opposed, but different species will too! Then you add in the over arching cosmology and you've got three layers of morality to deal with.
can we get back on topic? i agree that in these times, 'race' is an unnecessarily antagonistic word, but species is wrong as well. if anything the word should be 'creatures' and 'playable creatures'
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“I will take responsibility for what I have done. [...] If must fall, I will rise each time a better man.” ― Brandon Sanderson, Oathbringer.
can we get back on topic? i agree that in these times, 'race' is an unnecessarily antagonistic word, but species is wrong as well. if anything the word should be 'creatures' and 'playable creatures'
If you are thinking like a Mind Flayer, then you make a good point. To them who they are is normal and what they are doing is right. Is any creature/animal considered evil if that’s their essence of life? That’s a great question. Let’s look at it this way, if a human were to eat a human that’s seen as cannibalism and is classified as evil. If the Mind Flayer only is able to live by eating the brains of others than it is logical for them to do so in the act of self-preservation. Another example, if a man were to attack you with the intent of killing you, would you not fight back? Would it be murder/evil to kill this man in self-defense of your own life? The Mind Flayer sees others as it’s source of food, like it has a choice? In our minds we think that this is pure evil and that it shouldn’t be done. If the Mind Flayers are aware that what they are doing is evil yet still choose to do this without a care in the world and not even try to find a different way, that is now evil with evil intent. How does someone know that what they are doing is evil if they don’t have a law? Can someone judge another person who doesn’t know the laws that you and everyone else lives by? Example: A person goes to someone’s house and isn’t aware that they have a few house rules, he does something that breaks the rules. Does the host have a right to judge a person for breaking the rules if the host himself neglected to tell him the rules?
How does the Mind Flayer know if that is evil in the first place? I’m curious as to if in a campaign someone was able to get to the Mind Flayer and get it to change its ways? But isn’t that the same as walking up to someone who has an Asian culture and saying,”Yo, you’re doing it wrong, you’re supposed to do it this way.” How does anyone think that’s going to go? Horribly.
It might actually be immoral for you to fight back against the other human. You might be in their land. You might have taken something of theirs, even if innocently.
Mind Flayers are not just very intelligent. They have good wisdom scores too. Philosophy is a thing and is not 'merely something someone told us to do' but rather the result of millennia of ongoing thought and debate. Ironically, in modern society, it is more likely to be set aside in favour of expedience, simply because it is a much more complex world and what once seemed like easy answers, things that were once taken for granted, are both harder to dismiss (for those of us who do think along such lines) and easier to dismiss (by those without the patience for such deep thinking). (And no judgement intended in there either. Patience is not always a virtue and ignorance can actually be bliss).
I do agree with this, but who is to say Mind Flayer philosophy is the same as other sentient beings.
I remember philosophy in college; I angered alot of people by looking at morality as something different to each individual and something that can change overtime. What is morally evil today might have been morally neutral in 1805, and vice versa. This is an interesting topic especially when you transfer to the D&D worlds. Each sentient being would define morals in a different way, even more so than in the real world. Not only will different cultures be morally opposed, but different species will too! Then you add in the over arching cosmology and you've got three layers of morality to deal with.
Again, philosophy over time has evolved away from a blind assumption that only humans are sentient and evolves as information about our world improves. Every major religion in the world has significant similarities in basic tenets.
Most D&D worlds have civilizations much older than our world has. Even in 5e, there are races with significantly longer lives than humans. Plus there are immortal beings. There has been more time to think about and refine such ideas, rather than less, and unlike technology, thought and political evolution are usually not artificially capped.
My point was you are applying human real world philosophy to D&D, so that does not need to hold true. Even a long lived race need not have a similar philosophy. Look at the cosmology, if philosophy was meant to converge to a single way of thinking why are there 9 planes of philosophy? Why are they all still at odds with each other? Why have the all not adapted the one true philosophy (Not saying there is one but we can't scrutinize this other worldly place under our scope of thinking). Yes D&D is a human creation but I think it is way more fun to use it as an explorative tool instead of a direct reflection of how philosophy developed in our world.
There is a line of thought that 'species' is 'too scientific'
That's fine I just don't want to have to repeat the same conversation we had on page one about breeding and what not. If people disagree that it is too scientific, than maybe we should just create a world like Shakespeare did to define all the beings in D&D instead of trying to apply a world already containing a definition.
can we get back on topic? i agree that in these times, 'race' is an unnecessarily antagonistic word, but species is wrong as well. if anything the word should be 'creatures' and 'playable creatures'
And why is species wrong?
Well, it's not obviously true (half-elves and half-orcs exist, though it's not specified whether this is crossbreeding or interbreeding, and other mixes might exist and just aren't common enough to get their own entry) and it implies fantasy genetics that work like real-world genetics, which is pretty clearly not the case in D&D.
can we get back on topic? i agree that in these times, 'race' is an unnecessarily antagonistic word, but species is wrong as well. if anything the word should be 'creatures' and 'playable creatures'
And why is species wrong?
Well, it's not obviously true (half-elves and half-orcs exist, though it's not specified whether this is crossbreeding or interbreeding, and other mixes might exist and just aren't common enough to get their own entry) and it implies fantasy genetics that work like real-world genetics, which is pretty clearly not the case in D&D.
If the argument for why species is wrong is due to viable offspring between Orcs and Humans or Elves and Humans, I do have to point to plenty of species on our current planet that are able to create viable offspring even though they are called different species.
But if the argument against species is because D&D genetics does not work like real-world genetics then why can we not keep race and say D&D race is not like real-world race?
If species is not good due to definitions than why get caught up on the real-world definition of race? Just saying btw you could call all Playable Characters "Xoragit" and I wouldn't really care. But a thing I'm not a fan of is changing a term for reason x but then using then using the reverse of that reason to argue against the new term. Not saying this is what you are doing, but it is a pattern in this thread.
I am not certain you understand the basics of philosophy. The only degree to which it is race-centric has been assumptions on the nature of anything or anyone any given culture has had no real experience with. Over time, as more is learned, it is refined based on the new information. It is not wild, random ideas, but rather applied logic.
Well, frankly I'm not certain you understand philosophy either and going after someone's intelligence in a philosophy battle little hypocritical, right (Or actually exactly what has happened over the years just depends on how you look at it)? I mean the whole point of philosophy is differing viewpoints answer the fundamentals of our universe. Have you even looked as the thoughts and philosophies of famous philosophers throughout the ages? So many of them answered the same fundamental questions in different way and some even disagreed entirely with the other. If philosophy as you say goes in one single direction and no randomness is allowed the the Greeks would not have disagreed as much as they did.
I realize that you guys have made a valid point. Real life can’t be put into comparisons with the world of D&D. We can only speculate on small bits of information. I apologize for my ranting, I did/don’t have the right amount of information to completely break down certain aspects of this. I’m sorry. :(
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can we get back on topic? i agree that in these times, 'race' is an unnecessarily antagonistic word, but species is wrong as well. if anything the word should be 'creatures' and 'playable creatures'
And why is species wrong?
because that is assuming that all races fall under not only the same animal family, but the same kingdom altogether. Imagine this, you have a wolf, a domestic dog, and a fox. all 'canis' but different species. now dnd races. Human, elf, orc, and a few others would fall under mammal, but aarakocra and kenku would be avian, and lizard folk are clearly reptile. this is dnd, and these creatures do not exist in real life, but if we want to stick to realism, and treat them scientifically, then they are creatures. however, i have thought of a better word. they should be 'peoples'. this signifies that they are all intelligent creatures capable of moral and rational judgement, and are not railroaded into being "evil" or "good", just as humans in real life are not.
because that is assuming that all races fall under not only the same animal family, but the same kingdom altogether. Imagine this, you have a wolf, a domestic dog, and a fox. all 'canis' but different species. now dnd races. Human, elf, orc, and a few others would fall under mammal, but aarakocra and kenku would be avian, and lizard folk are clearly reptile. this is dnd, and these creatures do not exist in real life, but if we want to stick to realism, and treat them scientifically, then they are creatures. however, i have thought of a better word. they should be 'peoples'. this signifies that they are all intelligent creatures capable of moral and rational judgement, and are not railroaded into being "evil" or "good", just as humans in real life are not.
Aarakocra and Lizardfolk and Dragonborn and Humans are pretty obviously different species, no matter how you define the word. Sure, some may be in separate classes or a different genus (pardon my lack of taxonomic knowledge), but that doesn't prevent them from being different species in any sense.
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because that is assuming that all races fall under not only the same animal family, but the same kingdom altogether. Imagine this, you have a wolf, a domestic dog, and a fox. all 'canis' but different species. now dnd races. Human, elf, orc, and a few others would fall under mammal, but aarakocra and kenku would be avian, and lizard folk are clearly reptile. this is dnd, and these creatures do not exist in real life, but if we want to stick to realism, and treat them scientifically, then they are creatures. however, i have thought of a better word. they should be 'peoples'. this signifies that they are all intelligent creatures capable of moral and rational judgement, and are not railroaded into being "evil" or "good", just as humans in real life are not.
Aarakocra and Lizardfolk and Dragonborn and Humans are pretty obviously different species, no matter how you define the word. Sure, some may be in separate classes or a different genus (pardon my lack of taxonomic knowledge), but that doesn't prevent them from being different species in any sense.
Kingdom. Order.
Kingdom
Phylum
Class
Order
Genus
Species
When something is that far removed, “species” is the least of anybody’s worries.
can we get back on topic? i agree that in these times, 'race' is an unnecessarily antagonistic word, but species is wrong as well. if anything the word should be 'creatures' and 'playable creatures'
And why is species wrong?
because that is assuming that all races fall under not only the same animal family, but the same kingdom altogether. Imagine this, you have a wolf, a domestic dog, and a fox. all 'canis' but different species. now dnd races. Human, elf, orc, and a few others would fall under mammal, but aarakocra and kenku would be avian, and lizard folk are clearly reptile. this is dnd, and these creatures do not exist in real life, but if we want to stick to realism, and treat them scientifically, then they are creatures. however, i have thought of a better word. they should be 'peoples'. this signifies that they are all intelligent creatures capable of moral and rational judgement, and are not railroaded into being "evil" or "good", just as humans in real life are not.
As someone who works in biology - very presumptions to assume only "peoples" can have intelligence and being capable of moral and rational judgement. Plenty of "species" exhibit these same things. And that is a great point. But a presume you are someone who doesn't believe that Homo sapiens belong to the Animal kingdom nor are they species. But they are in fact a species. So if they can be defined that way why can't we define lizardfolk, dragonborns, and other D&D races in a similar fashion.
because that is assuming that all races fall under not only the same animal family, but the same kingdom altogether. Imagine this, you have a wolf, a domestic dog, and a fox. all 'canis' but different species. now dnd races. Human, elf, orc, and a few others would fall under mammal, but aarakocra and kenku would be avian, and lizard folk are clearly reptile. this is dnd, and these creatures do not exist in real life, but if we want to stick to realism, and treat them scientifically, then they are creatures. however, i have thought of a better word. they should be 'peoples'. this signifies that they are all intelligent creatures capable of moral and rational judgement, and are not railroaded into being "evil" or "good", just as humans in real life are not.
Aarakocra and Lizardfolk and Dragonborn and Humans are pretty obviously different species, no matter how you define the word. Sure, some may be in separate classes or a different genus (pardon my lack of taxonomic knowledge), but that doesn't prevent them from being different species in any sense.
Kingdom.
Kingdom
Genus
Species
When something is that far removed, “species” is the least of anybody’s worries.
I mean, the taxology has lots of levels for this reason. Always remember, King Philip came over from Germany Sunday. (Kingdom, Phylum, Class, Order, Genus, Species)
uuuummm of COURSE they are, but they are so different that the classification of 'species cannot cover their differences. my god what has dnd come to...
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“I will take responsibility for what I have done. [...] If must fall, I will rise each time a better man.” ― Brandon Sanderson, Oathbringer.
uuuummm of COURSE they are, but they are so different that the classification of 'species cannot cover their differences. my god what has dnd come to...
you..... you do realize that a dolphin and a crocodile are different species (both d&d creature too btw) So how is that classification okay, but calling a playable race a species is "They are too different to be called that."
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All animals can do it. Whenever you hear birds chirping you can tell which ones mean “**** me” and which ones mean “my tree!”
Every dog can communicate like that, just most people don’t speak dog. Cats too. Basically every animal can communicate like that if you know how to speak their language.
Just because you don’t understand what they’re saying, doesn’t mean they aren’t communicating.
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No difference they are all sentient beings right? So we can't have 1 sentient race evil in nature and then argue these other 2 can't be. Humanoid, Abberation, Fey, Dragon don't inherently grant evilness or goodness as was pointed out by others when arguing why some of the other beings I mentioned. Those beings were not granted "evil in nature" by their creature type, but by transformations. Or are you saying creature type does grant evil or good in nature?
You can answer that or ignore it. But I think I stumbled upon the crux of this issue. Orcs and Drow are player races. Therefore we must allow for open endedness in their general lore? So if Mind Flayers became a player race, we must then also open them up to being neutral in nature. So why wait till they are granted player race status? Also why does player race status matter when it comes to general culture and nature? Why do we only care that player races are changed to be more general?
And that is great. I shared a seminar given by the Devs back in 2015 a few pages ago and this is what they said there too. The Stuff in the books they print is not the be all end all. If you want Orcs to be kind hearted and good in nature and want all humans to be spawn of Gruumsh then you can. Nothing is stopping anyone from doing that. But the Devs simply created lore to help those that didn't want to have to do all the work of forming these groups of beings.
I just really wanted to get people to think about the argument they are so heavily invested in. Why fight for 2 races that are considered evil in the written lore to not be treated as evil, but not fight for the 3rd one too and go as far as saying "It's okay they are evil, it is in their nature." Personally, I don't think they need to change anything since they themselves say it you can do what ever you want. But if I were to argue for one or two races to be changed, I would not stop there. I would also insist that the general lore leave all beings open ended. It would be annoying to me that one or two beings got changed to neutrality but others were left untouched when the argument used two change those races was "Why should they be inherently evil in nature." But like I said I'm of the opinion you run the game the way you want to, but I do not understand the need to push for a change in the lore that is heavily wrapped around published worlds.
As someone who works with animals for a living this! Many animals communicate with each other, just not in way we understand unless you have studied the physiology and behavior of the species in question. Even then, we can still understand them without verbal communication. I know when I get bit by a bird I'm working with what that meant. Sometimes is means I did something it didn't like, or I'm not paying enough attention to it, or even hey, I see the food now give me. The bite is the same in all three of those situations, but thanks to my understanding of the bird I know what it meant based on context. That is really all verbal communication is: listening to what was said and using context clues to interpret it. But I think if you asked most people birds are not sentient, however I would argue against that.
I do agree with this, but who is to say Mind Flayer philosophy is the same as other sentient beings.
I remember philosophy in college; I angered alot of people by looking at morality as something different to each individual and something that can change overtime. What is morally evil today might have been morally neutral in 1805, and vice versa. This is an interesting topic especially when you transfer to the D&D worlds. Each sentient being would define morals in a different way, even more so than in the real world. Not only will different cultures be morally opposed, but different species will too! Then you add in the over arching cosmology and you've got three layers of morality to deal with.
can we get back on topic? i agree that in these times, 'race' is an unnecessarily antagonistic word, but species is wrong as well. if anything the word should be 'creatures' and 'playable creatures'
“I will take responsibility for what I have done. [...] If must fall, I will rise each time a better man.” ― Brandon Sanderson, Oathbringer.
And why is species wrong?
My point was you are applying human real world philosophy to D&D, so that does not need to hold true. Even a long lived race need not have a similar philosophy. Look at the cosmology, if philosophy was meant to converge to a single way of thinking why are there 9 planes of philosophy? Why are they all still at odds with each other? Why have the all not adapted the one true philosophy (Not saying there is one but we can't scrutinize this other worldly place under our scope of thinking). Yes D&D is a human creation but I think it is way more fun to use it as an explorative tool instead of a direct reflection of how philosophy developed in our world.
That's fine I just don't want to have to repeat the same conversation we had on page one about breeding and what not. If people disagree that it is too scientific, than maybe we should just create a world like Shakespeare did to define all the beings in D&D instead of trying to apply a world already containing a definition.
Well, it's not obviously true (half-elves and half-orcs exist, though it's not specified whether this is crossbreeding or interbreeding, and other mixes might exist and just aren't common enough to get their own entry) and it implies fantasy genetics that work like real-world genetics, which is pretty clearly not the case in D&D.
If the argument for why species is wrong is due to viable offspring between Orcs and Humans or Elves and Humans, I do have to point to plenty of species on our current planet that are able to create viable offspring even though they are called different species.
But if the argument against species is because D&D genetics does not work like real-world genetics then why can we not keep race and say D&D race is not like real-world race?
If species is not good due to definitions than why get caught up on the real-world definition of race? Just saying btw you could call all Playable Characters "Xoragit" and I wouldn't really care. But a thing I'm not a fan of is changing a term for reason x but then using then using the reverse of that reason to argue against the new term. Not saying this is what you are doing, but it is a pattern in this thread.
Well, frankly I'm not certain you understand philosophy either and going after someone's intelligence in a philosophy battle little hypocritical, right (Or actually exactly what has happened over the years just depends on how you look at it)? I mean the whole point of philosophy is differing viewpoints answer the fundamentals of our universe. Have you even looked as the thoughts and philosophies of famous philosophers throughout the ages? So many of them answered the same fundamental questions in different way and some even disagreed entirely with the other. If philosophy as you say goes in one single direction and no randomness is allowed the the Greeks would not have disagreed as much as they did.
I realize that you guys have made a valid point. Real life can’t be put into comparisons with the world of D&D. We can only speculate on small bits of information. I apologize for my ranting, I did/don’t have the right amount of information to completely break down certain aspects of this. I’m sorry. :(
Do’ Taba the Honest Merchant
Malwyn the Barkeeper of The Tales of Adventurers’ Tavern
because that is assuming that all races fall under not only the same animal family, but the same kingdom altogether. Imagine this, you have a wolf, a domestic dog, and a fox. all 'canis' but different species. now dnd races. Human, elf, orc, and a few others would fall under mammal, but aarakocra and kenku would be avian, and lizard folk are clearly reptile. this is dnd, and these creatures do not exist in real life, but if we want to stick to realism, and treat them scientifically, then they are creatures. however, i have thought of a better word. they should be 'peoples'. this signifies that they are all intelligent creatures capable of moral and rational judgement, and are not railroaded into being "evil" or "good", just as humans in real life are not.
“I will take responsibility for what I have done. [...] If must fall, I will rise each time a better man.” ― Brandon Sanderson, Oathbringer.
Aarakocra and Lizardfolk and Dragonborn and Humans are pretty obviously different species, no matter how you define the word. Sure, some may be in separate classes or a different genus (pardon my lack of taxonomic knowledge), but that doesn't prevent them from being different species in any sense.
Please check out my homebrew, I would appreciate feedback:
Spells, Monsters, Subclasses, Races, Arcknight Class, Occultist Class, World, Enigmatic Esoterica forms
Kingdom. Order.When something is that far removed, “species” is the least of anybody’s worries.
Creating Epic Boons on DDB
DDB Buyers' Guide
Hardcovers, DDB & You
Content Troubleshooting
they are different species tru, but a better classification is needed IMO.
“I will take responsibility for what I have done. [...] If must fall, I will rise each time a better man.” ― Brandon Sanderson, Oathbringer.
As someone who works in biology - very presumptions to assume only "peoples" can have intelligence and being capable of moral and rational judgement. Plenty of "species" exhibit these same things. And that is a great point. But a presume you are someone who doesn't believe that Homo sapiens belong to the Animal kingdom nor are they species. But they are in fact a species. So if they can be defined that way why can't we define lizardfolk, dragonborns, and other D&D races in a similar fashion.
I mean, the taxology has lots of levels for this reason. Always remember, King Philip came over from Germany Sunday. (Kingdom, Phylum, Class, Order, Genus, Species)
uuuummm of COURSE they are, but they are so different that the classification of 'species cannot cover their differences. my god what has dnd come to...
“I will take responsibility for what I have done. [...] If must fall, I will rise each time a better man.” ― Brandon Sanderson, Oathbringer.
you..... you do realize that a dolphin and a crocodile are different species (both d&d creature too btw) So how is that classification okay, but calling a playable race a species is "They are too different to be called that."