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[Rolepgeek]

Hmmm....

I will support the proposal for a Plane of Battle. The ability to work out differences and train one's soldiers without innocents being caught in the crossfire is too valuable not to have, even if violence should not be the primary manner of doing so.

[Vgray]

Azem opens an eye.

"A new voice joins us. Will they bother with the cosmic debate, or ignore it like most of us do?"

[gman8181]

Grauel looks at the Lords of Hunger.
Care to elaborate? I suppose you may have had something to do with this?

[Stirk]

"Apparently it is already voting, making it unnecessary for my usual speech to go ahead and vote. Although I will still bring up my regular complaint of everyone voting on a 2-essance project...."

[Rolepgeek]

Nothing is so minor it is not worth examining for it's Goodness.

I must ask, though, why the god of Humans goes to war with that of Hunger, if the humans are making their own, informed decision to be consumed? Their souls are not harmed by the process, and while I would object to the practice if the humans were not themselves volunteering for the process, I can see little reason to restrict the free will of the Gruen if they are behaving in a manner not unduly harmful to others.

I believe I will make my own proposal, however new I might be.

A...karmic balance, if you will. One meant to encourage and foster both cooperation and freedom, to keep integrity and fair play active. Rewarding those who merit rewards and would receive none, while punishing to some degree those who would punish others unfairly, and cause harm. If you would allow me to elaborate to some degree the mechanics of the system, I would be grateful.

The behaviour which entails reward and that the system is meant to entice is that of selflessness. The aid of others. This is primarily focused on the intent of the individual, not simply the result,though the result is not important. Thus, true selflessness would be Good. That which already benefits oneself would result in a lesser reward, while that which is actively detrimental would thusly need to be balanced out, in the interest of fairness and justice.

Self-interest that does not harm others is reasonable and expected behaviour in all beings, thus it would be the standard, or neutral in this system.

Selfishness at the expense of others is behaviour which actively degrades society and is a detriment, in the long run, to all beings; if those who practice it are shown as successful, it will encourage others to engage in it, leading to a general decrease in the quality of life; one can harm many to benefit oneself, or benefit many at the cost of only oneself. For those of you interested only in your own power, consider that an unhappy populace is rarely a devout populace.

Some wrongs, or they might be called sins, would include the breaking or betrayal of trust, the restriction of another's free will and choice, and causing harm to others. Unfortunately, sometimes these may come into conflict with one another, or be, in the end, necessary; restricting someone's choices who would otherwise choose to do the same to others, for example, is just and necessary. Reasonable individuals can, of course, understand when this is the case, and it would be unfair to punish someone for an action that is truly necessary,  unavoidable, or just. Again, intent is an important factor. For thia reason, and in the interest if fairness, I would like to propose a sub-council, or committee, of gods that might be in charge of such a system, of varying viewpoints and interests, that would hopefully be able to determine what is right, and what is wrong. As this was my proposal, and I feel that I am the best suited to mediate disagreements -and I may be proven wrong on that point-, I believe that it is only proper that I be the head of any such committee in it's dealings with the karmic system. All gods, would, of course, have at least some small say; that is only fair, after all, for it will affect all of our followers, and possibly all of us.

[Stirk]

"I do not like this "karmatic" system, for what purpose does it serve? You have not defined good and evil beyond, nor the punishments or rewards, nearly enough for this to be effective. 'Selflessness' is not necessarily good, as the God of Greed could no doubt tell you, and 'selfishness' is not inherently bad. Yet your system seeks to punish those who look after themselves, for what? In the case you where not paying attention, unhappy populaces are typically more devout. I do not want my populace to be unhappy, but bringing that up seems foolish. People turn to the gods in times of need, not times of plenty. As for the sins, is this not limiting their free will, and thus a sin itself? Of course you could call it a 'nudge', depending on what the currently non-existing rewards and punishments are, but it is still an attempt to remove their free will away from them. For, what seems to be, selfish purpose. No doubt you would have to face punishment for this if you where mortal. And what, pray tell, is 'causing harm'? You are seeking to make a law with no defined punishment or reward, poorly defined actions that would bring them about, for a purpose that can only be guessed at.

In case it wasn't clear, I oppose."

[gman8181]

I can see too many ways in which that proposal would interfere with my sphere. Apologies but I must oppose

[Vgray]

"Past experience tells me to distrust notions of rules and goodness. Therefore, I oppose."

[Rolepgeek]

The people thank their gods in times of plenty, and curse them in times of loss. As I have said, sometimes a sin is unfortunately necessary. Perhaps one day such a system would be redundant, but today is not that day. Again, self-interest is not evil; it is when it comes at the expense of others and could be avoided that it is wrong. Selflessness encourages cooperation and benefits many, while selfishness causes splintering and factions to form. Selfishness and self-interest are not the same. Self-interest can encourage cooperation, as the God of Greed could also likely tell you. Selfishness can only breed strife.

I did not fully define it because I thought it best to do so with the aid of all the gods. You may presume my actions to be selfish because they will as a consequence aid me in my goals, but my goals are themselves meant for the benefit of all, or at the least the many. Someday, I can hope that a God of Goodness will be unnecessary. Until then, I must work to bring it about, regardless of those who might oppose for the sake of their own benefit.

If you wish to assist in the delineation of the rewards and punishment for such a system, by all means make your proposal. But first, I must ask, on what ground would you believe selflessness, actions that benefit others, to be evil? I can think of few, primarily concerning if those people were being aided to do evil, or if the action helps some at the expense of others. Perhaps I am simply not creative enough, though.

[Stirk]

The people thank their gods in times of plenty, and curse them in times of loss. As I have said, sometimes a sin is unfortunately necessary. Perhaps one day such a system would be redundant, but today is not that day. Again, self-interest is not evil; it is when it comes at the expense of others and could be avoided that it is wrong. Selflessness encourages cooperation and benefits many, while selfishness causes splintering and factions to form. Selfishness and self-interest are not the same. Self-interest can encourage cooperation, as the God of Greed could also likely tell you. Selfishness can only breed strife.

"What do you base this on, young god? As a much-more experienced deity than yourself, I can inform you that this is simply not true from what we have already seen, the few people who have cursed the gods have only done so under the influence of another. 'Sin', as you have poorly defined it, may be necessary because we have no clue what it is. Under what you have already counted as 'sin', every one has been broken by the gods. At least one of them by yourself, so near your birth. Selflessness does not necessarily encourage cooperation, nor selfishness break it. Lets say a Selfless human and Gruen meat in an empty field. The human is so selfless that he lets himself be devoured by the gruen, helping him for one meal but not benefiting the world in any meaningful way. On the other side, selfishness has caused massive caravans to move through the planet, bringing cooperating of all the races for the soul purpose of profit. Aside from that, the definition of Greed is selfishness, and as you have already seen he has taken my side on this."

I did not fully define it because I thought it best to do so with the aid of all the gods. You may presume my actions to be selfish because they will as a consequence aid me in my goals, but my goals are themselves meant for the benefit of all, or at the least the many. Someday, I can hope that a God of Goodness will be unnecessary. Until then, I must work to bring it about, regardless of those who might oppose for the sake of their own benefit.

"You should at least have a base. The other gods obviously do not want this foolishness either. The goal is to spread your sphere, your own idea of goodness correct? How would anyone be benefited by selflessness? Aside from that, once they figure out the karma system is in place, there will never again be such a thing as a selfless action. If every selfless action is rewarded, is it truly selfless, especially if you see the reward coming? "

If you wish to assist in the delineation of the rewards and punishment for such a system, by all means make your proposal. But first, I must ask, on what ground would you believe selflessness, actions that benefit others, to be evil? I can think of few, primarily concerning if those people were being aided to do evil, or if the action helps some at the expense of others. Perhaps I am simply not creative enough, though.

"Not to long ago, the God of Martial Arts had created a new race, a single orc. He gave it powerful combat capabilities, and told it to become legendary. Selflessly, it followed the order of its god to the letter, creating legendary slaughter through the land until my Tykki put it down. Selfless actions do not mean that they help other people, they simply mean you did it without considering themselves."

[Andres]

Yaos goes girl.

I must ask, though, why the god of Humans goes to war with that of Hunger, if the humans are making their own, informed decision to be consumed? Their souls are not harmed by the process, and while I would object to the practice if the humans were not themselves volunteering for the process, I can see little reason to restrict the free will of the Gruen if they are behaving in a manner not unduly harmful to others.

Spoiler: Reasons (click to show/hide)

"If they want to become hybrids that's their choice and I won't interfere. I would even theoretically allow them to be eaten if they consented, but cults tend to spread and so more and more people would allow themselves to be killed and eaten and so it basically becomes murder by extension/association. Look at it this way: suicide is legal, but helping or convincing someone to commit suicide is not."

Children are also getting eaten and they should not have the right to decide to be eaten.
Gruen cultists are also sacrificing their children.
They rejected this treaty.

-everything else-

"Welcome to the Council!" "It's nice to see that at least some gods take an interest in morality. I kinda have to oppose the proposal, though. It'll probably cost a lot of Essence and I already made a system where good people get eternal paradise when they die." ((Here is the book that explains it.)) That should be enough to make people do good and if it's not, well, that's their choice. Messing with natural laws seems like it would almost certainly go bad.
We don't even have to set up a committee to decide what's good or evil; we can just discuss it freely like we're doing now."

"As for people praying to us when they're happy versus when they're not, well.....I can say from personal experience that people didn't really like me when their lives were bad, but when their lives were GOOD. Oh wow. I'd honestly never expected that much gratefulness from anyone before! I can't give specifics because prayer is a private thing between a mortal and its god, but trust me - happy mortals makes for happy gods."

[Vgray]

"Should the proposal pass by some miracle, I would strongly advise that the god of Law not get a seat."

[Rolepgeek]

As much as I detest rudeness, I'm afraid I may come off as such; you have my apologies in advance for it should I appear so. First of these possible statements is the fact that I must say, you are quite good at attacking the arguments I am not making, and ignoring what I have said. And again, self-interest is not evil. Selfishness is self-interest when it comes at the expense of others. But perhaps that is my fault for not defining selflessness, selfishness, and self-interest adequately. For that, I apologize. The definition of selflessness I am using here is that which entails acting for the benefit of others. In addition, I do not refer to stupidity or ignorance. Selflessness may entail, in your example, being eaten by a Gruen; perhaps the Gruen was starving, and would one day make a miraculous discovery that would benefit thousands. Or perhaps the human was ill-informed, and would have served both the Gruen, themselves, and many others more by helping the Gruen to find food; then the human's family and friends are not emotionally distressed by the loss of the human.

Good is neither simple nor easy; few things both significant and worth doing are. Yes, sins have been committed by many; as I've said, even for the truly good, they are sometimes unavoidable. It is a sad fact, and the reason why such a system requires oversight.

It is not 'my own' ideas of goodness. I do not define Good; I am defined by it. I would ask that you not insult me by insinuating otherwise; I do not claim that you do not know what a Weapon is, nor would I tell the god of Balance what Balance entails. I ask that you have the decency to treat me with that same courtesy.

However, you bring up an excellent point, which I will address now, as I did say that intent was important. I have and had no intention of informing the mortals of such a system. Should they figure it out on their own, however, this is not necessarily bad. It is intended to encourage certain behaviour, after all. Those who do it out of interest in a reward will of course not be rewarded as greatly, as intent is taken into account as part of the system. But the beneficiary actions would still be present, and that would still help people.

And as I said, your reference to the actions of the God of Martial Arts is an example of a selfless action that helped another-the God of Martial Arts, presumably-at the expense of others -those who died or lost loved ones at the hand of that orc. To attempt to define what selflessness means is to me as if I tried to define what a sword is for you.

I see, Yaos...thank you for your input. Though I would disagree on some level with the 'should' of your statement, and believe there is merit to the system I've proposed, your points are perhaps the most reasonable ones yet made for opposing the system. It is heartening to see that not all are motivated purely by the desire for power.

Might I ask, Azem, why you oppose the joining of Cim to such a theoretical council? I had envisioned the appointments of Cim, Varee, Kli, and yourself to such a committee.

[Andres]

Might I ask, Azem, why you oppose the joining of Cim to such a theoretical council? I had envisioned the appointments of Cim, Varee, Kli, and yourself to such a committee.

"Because he got mad at Fusil so he started a terrorist organisation that burned a hundred people to death. I think that's why they don't want him in it. I'm indifferent, really."

[Vgray]

"That is indeed the reason. I honestly expected you to care more Yaos."