Your RL alignment?

[SiuiS]

Of course it does. What you would do if you are all powerful – if you had no consequences – is a sign of what you would do if no one saw you – and you had no consequences.

[Boci]

Of course it does. What you would do if you are all powerful – if you had no consequences – is a sign of what you would do if no one saw you – and you had no consequences.

But why would use being all powerful, a purely academic concept with widely ranging theories on exactly what changes it would produce in the humanmind, as oppose to far more real real and less subjective example of no one is watching?

Say, being armed with a gun and finding an old couple and their young attractive daughter/son, all of them unarmed, carrying their valuable possessions through war torn (insert country name) whose police force is corrupt, incompetent and has little to no forensic capabilities?

Personally I imagine that being all powerful I would eventually turn evil, but I would not do anything evil in the second scenario.

[SiuiS]

You can spin hypotheticals all you like. Divining someone's character by what they would do if they could do anything isn't some bizarre concept. It's pretty straightforward. No amount of redefining technicalities is going to really change that.

[Boci]

You can spin hypotheticals all you like. Divining someone's character by what they would do if they could do anything isn't some bizarre concept. It's pretty straightforward. No amount of redefining technicalities is going to really change that.

What? No it isn't straightforwards. The concept of unlimited power is many things, straight forwards is not one of them. To an extent we are of course limited in this discussion, but if we look at someone born human and then given unlimited power, you have several very not straightforwards issues. The fallacy of unlimited power (can they make something so X not even they can Y it). You can say its childish, but it raises that valid point that omnipotence doesn't make sense in the human mind, and thus maybe shouldn't be used to determine someone's alignment. Then you have the issues of are biases carried forwards. If they were racist do they remain that? If they were petty do they remain that? What about insecure? What does unlimited power do to insecurity? Finally there is the issue of emotions and control. They have unlimited power, how much control do they have over it? If they wish someone dead in the heat of the moment, will that person die? If he imagines "I wonder what it is like to be burnt alive?" Would he be burned alive/receive the exact sensation? Can he use his power to give himself the one true understanding of life? Is there even a one true understanding of life?

And yes it is a bizarre concept. The idea of divining someones morality from an comprehensible scenario that will in all likelihood never happen to them but is possible (encounter in a war torn nation) is already questionable, divining it from something beyond our understanding that could never happen and if it did would be a curve ball to our whole civilization, is bizarre, no matter how much you insist it isn't.

[MLai]

Sadly, in your "Wartorn Country" example, I would also not do anything evil. I would probably help them to the extent that it does not impact my own safety/ welfare, and will heavily imply the need for payment. But my frame of mind as it is currently, would not spur me to evil as soon as I see them crossing the wartorn city ruins.
I say "sadly" because even while helping them, a part of me would likely definitely bemoan the wasted opportunity to indulge in bestial evil.

The "Magical Omnipotence" example is indeed bizarre, but I think an apt analogy is what you would start doing if you suddenly realize you're in a lucid dream, i.e. a Grand Theft Auto situation. You may say that the situations aren't equivalent, but I think they are. When you're a godlike being, after a short while the small mortal fleshbags below you stop being "real." I can step on an ant at a whim.

[Boci]

Sadly, in your "Wartorn Country" example, I would also not do anything evil. I would probably help them to the extent that it does not impact my own safety/ welfare, and will heavily imply the need for payment. But my frame of mind as it is currently, would not spur me to evil as soon as I see them crossing the wartorn city ruins.
I say "sadly" because even while helping them, a part of me would likely definitely bemoan the wasted opportunity to indulge in bestial evil.

Pretty much same as me I imagine, which shows a neutral outlook and an upbringing in a culture that has a strange relationship with the culture of evil in its ideology and pop culture. That#s my guess at least.

The "Magical Omnipotence" example is indeed bizarre, but I think an apt analogy is what you would start doing if you suddenly realize you're in a lucid dream, i.e. a Grand Theft Auto situation. You may say that the situations aren't equivalent, but I think they are. When you're a godlike being, after a short while the small mortal fleshbags below you stop being "real." I can step on an ant at a whim.

Not worth much for me, because I've never Lucid dreamed. Or if I have I either missed the opportunity or forgot about it. Furthermore I would take with a pinch of salt the idea that what you do in your dreams is any true reflection of your actual self. Do you become evil in your lucid dreams?

[SpectralDerp]

Alignment questions are problematic, because definitions change. At some point, true neutral used to be about being concerned about balance. Anyone remember how Baldur's Gate described it? It was ridiculous.

The fallacy of unlimited power (can they make something so X not even they can Y it).

1) That's a paradox, not a fallacy (You keep using that word ...)
2) There are many answers to this paradoy, some involve losing omnipotence, some involve claiming the given task isn't defined and some just give a {Link Scrubbed} better definition of omnipotence. Claiming that the concept makes no sense in the human mind is just begging the question.

Anyhow, the idea to judge an individual on what he or she would do if that person were to find itself in a situation where it's possibly to get away with a lot of things that would previously result in negative concequences is a good one. It's important to ask not only what someone is doing, but why.

This also makes it somewhat questionable if there is such a thing as "an alignment", but again, depending on the definition de jour.

[NichG]

Omnipotence will skew someone's responses. Being in a situation of extreme stress will skew someone's responses. Being in a completely day-to-day situation will skew someone's responses. Real people don't have a static alignment in the D&D sense or a particular 'true character'. You might have someone who is great to everyone around them and also wants to be, but when a situation of extreme stress descends (for example, something that forces them to choose between two things they value as highly important such as their family and their friends) then it can produce a complete change in behavior.

Or in other words, someone can be LG until the world turns into a post-apocalyptic landscape, at which point they're NE because they're forced to rank things that they previously gave completely equal value and the decisions induce a sort of hardness. And if they gained omnipotence maybe they'd be CG, because the 'L' part of their alignment was always the fear that they could make a mistake they couldn't fix if they took their own path, but with literal omnipotence they know they can always put things back together if they screw it up.

Not to mention things like embracing order and law in order to understand how to slip their bonds and gain true individuality and other such cross-alignment philosophies.

[Boci]

1) That's a paradox, not a fallacy (You keep using that word ...)

Right you are.

2) There are many answers to this paradoy,

I know, but "many answers" tends to imply something is not straightforward, which is what SiuiS claimed. If it were straightforward it would not produce multiple potential answers.

Claiming that the concept makes no sense in the human mind is just begging the question.

I stand by my statement. "People have ideas about it" hardly proves we can comprehend unlimited power, and I do think there are too many implications of omnipotence for humans, being of such limited power, to properly grasp. Also, see above. "Many ideas" tends to prove we cannot comprehend something, because if we could, there would only be one answer.

Anyhow, the idea to judge an individual on what he or she would do if that person were to find itself in a situation where it's possibly to get away with a lot of things that would previously result in negative concequences is a good one. It's important to ask not only what someone is doing, but why.

Potentially yes, but I don't think this situation should involve omnipotence. Hence my counter example of the war torn nation with a police force that would never catch you.

[MLai]

Not worth much for me, because I've never Lucid dreamed. Or if I have I either missed the opportunity or forgot about it. Furthermore I would take with a pinch of salt the idea that what you do in your dreams is any true reflection of your actual self. Do you become evil in your lucid dreams?

When you lucid dream, you're no longer guided by your subconscious. You become consciously aware, as if awake. Best analogy is as if you're playing the most immersive video game ever.
I say that because I'm getting the impression that you're mistaking my meaning. I don't mean lucid dreaming being a reflection of your actual self because we peek into your subconscious. No, you're quite "conscious".

Do I become evil in my lucid dreams? Yes, because I suddenly realize I'm playing Grand Theft Auto in my brain. But also because the situation was conducive.
For example, if a particular dream had me being a big damn hero, and I just saved the world, and I'm basking in my ticker tape parade when I suddenly become lucid... I'm not going to go postal and start mowing down my adoring fans. Because it took hard work for me to get this far and have my own parade, dammit! In that case, the situation wasn't conducive and I would remain lawful.

Edit: I don't know, but... maybe... That is the same reason why I wouldn't immediately do evil things to that hapless family in the wartorn ruins scenario? Not because I'm squeamish, but because I place an intrinsic value on my own humanity? That is, it took my entire life of being moral to become the Me that I am today. It was "hard work", an "achievement". I've done good things in my life: Save a kid's life, gave a homeless man back the money he dropped, made a girl smile, etc etc. If I do something obscenely evil, all those things I like to look back on are lost. I have to weigh the pros and cons of throwing that entire self-identity away, for a moment's perverse pleasure.

[Dienekes]

Which is why Cosmic Good is as hostile to life as Cosmic Evil is - it has no room for mortal failures and foibles (Because those are inherently wrong, and screw up people's lives)

Doesn't this presuppose that your Cosmic Good does not have mercy, forgiveness, kindness, love and all that crap. Which many folk find rather define good. It also seems to be hostile to life because of things that screw up life. Which means it places some value on life so why would it be hostile to it?

The stance the Cosmic Good puts up a false equalization. Someone can dislike aspects of someone or want them to not make the same mistakes and not despise and want to kill them.

[Sartharina]

Say, being armed with a gun and finding an old couple and their young attractive daughter/son, all of them unarmed, carrying their valuable possessions through war torn (insert country name) whose police force is corrupt, incompetent and has little to no forensic capabilities?

If you're implying most people would kill said couple, I think you're way, way off.

Doesn't this presuppose that your Cosmic Good does not have mercy, forgiveness, kindness, love and all that crap. Which many folk find rather define good. It also seems to be hostile to life because of things that screw up life. Which means it places some value on life so why would it be hostile to it?

Because real people lack mercy, kindness, forgiveness, love, and all that crap, which it stops tolerating as Evil is reduced. I guess I should say it's "Hostile to life as we know it".

[Boci]

If you're implying most people would kill said couple, I think you're way, way off.

I'm not, I think most people would not kill or rob them. I presented this scenario as an alternative one to omnipotence for the purpose of resting someone's behavior when no one is looking.

[Tragak]

I just found a new test if anybody's interested: http://www.mjyoung.net/dungeon/javalign.html

I got Chaotic Neutral again.

[Jeff the Green]

Say, being armed with a gun and finding an old couple and their young attractive daughter/son, all of them unarmed, carrying their valuable possessions through war torn (insert country name) whose police force is corrupt, incompetent and has little to no forensic capabilities?

Personally I imagine that being all powerful I would eventually turn evil, but I would not do anything evil in the second scenario.

I agree that's a better measure of evil, but I think it's not a sensitive enough test. War, and particularly more modern (post-WWI) military training and propaganda, is very good at making people conditional psychopaths. This is a good thing from the point of view of actually getting soldiers to fire their weapons, but bad from the point of view of preventing war crimes like My Lai or the (thankfully quite rare compared to Vietnam) atrocities in Iraq and Afghanistan. Because of this it's really hard to predict in advance who is going to be capable of limiting that ability to kill without regret to people who are actually shooting at you or harming other people and you can't really present this scenario to someone sitting on their couch and expect a useful answer (even if you could expect an honest one, and I doubt that too).

Tl;dr:
War changes you, man.

[Boci]

I agree that's a better measure of evil, but I think it's not a sensitive enough test. War, and particularly more modern (post-WWI) military training and propaganda, is very good at making people conditional psychopaths.

Sorry for being unclear, I didn't intend for the individual to be a soldier in that scenario, just someone traveling down a road in a war torn nation and carrying a gun for protection.

[Dienekes]

Because real people lack mercy, kindness, forgiveness, love, and all that crap, which it stops tolerating as Evil is reduced. I guess I should say it's "Hostile to life as we know it".

Even then, your version of a Cosmic Good is equating all life as we know it with a select group of people who lack all that crap. Which means your Cosmic Good is using a logical fallacy first off. It also creates the assumption that good's ultimate purpose is to destroy evil as opposed to teaching others how to be good. So your version of a Cosmic Good is missing a few of the key traits to be good, so it's not really a Cosmic Good it's a Cosmic Thing, that destroys without mercy, and all that crap necessary to actually be Good.

[Sartharina]

Even then, your version of a Cosmic Good is equating all life as we know it with a select group of people who lack all that crap. Which means your Cosmic Good is using a logical fallacy first off. It also creates the assumption that good's ultimate purpose is to destroy evil as opposed to teaching others how to be good. So your version of a Cosmic Good is missing a few of the key traits to be good, so it's not really a Cosmic Good it's a Cosmic Thing, that destroys without mercy, and all that crap necessary to actually be Good.

Nah. It rewrites where it can, instead of destroys. But there is nobody that is free of evil, because life lives at the expense of life.

[hamishspence]

there is nobody that is free of evil, because life lives at the expense of life.

I'm pretty sure the DMG definition of Evil is not so rigorous as to define accidentally killing the microbes in the food you eat as an Evil act - otherwise Paladins would be constantly falling, even if they were vegetarians.

So why define "an evil act" so rigorously here?

[Sartharina]

I'm pretty sure the DMG definition of Evil is not so rigorous as to define accidentally killing the microbes in the food you eat as an Evil act - otherwise Paladins would be constantly falling, even if they were vegetarians.

So why define "an evil act" so rigorously here?

I'm not talking about microbes. There's an inherent problem simply because of scarcity of resources. And that's before we get onto crimes of passion, ingratitude, and other evils that cannot be completely purged.

[hamishspence]

There's an inherent problem simply because of scarcity of resources.

Not all scarcity is due to people robbing other people though.

If a person has earned their way to the top, especially from poverty- never robbing or cheating anybody - their mere possession of resources can hardly be deemed "life living at the expense of life".

[Boci]

Not all scarcity is due to people robbing other people though.

If a person has earned their way to the top, especially from poverty- never robbing or cheating anybody - their mere possession of resources can hardly be deemed "life living at the expense of life".

In order for their to be winners, there must be losers. Consciously or not, willingly or not, anyone who has succeeded at anything has done so at the expense of others, because in doing so they participated in the system of an imperfect society.

[hamishspence]

In order for their to be winners, there must be losers. Consciously or not, willingly or not, anyone who has succeeded at anything has done so at the expense of others, because in doing so they participated in the system of an imperfect society.

That's one theory. Another is that "winners" make life easier for everyone else, not harder - and that the world is not a zero-sum game.

[Tragak]

In order for their to be winners, there must be losers. Consciously or not, willingly or not, anyone who has succeeded at anything has done so at the expense of others, because in doing so they participated in the system of an imperfect society.

So in a perfect society - one molded over billions of years by the forces of Cosmic Good - life would not have to live at the expense of life, and the game would not have to be zero-sum?

[Boci]

That's one theory. Another is that "winners" make life easier for everyone else, not harder - and that the world is not a zero-sum game.

Right, and have people who hold this theory studied history or the current economic climate?

So in a perfect society - one molded over billions of years by the forces of Cosmic Good - life would not have to live at the expense of life, and the game would not have to be zero-sum?

I have no idea. I don't even know if a perfect system could exist. I just know ours isn't.

[hamishspence]

Right, and have people who hold this theory studied history or the current economic climate?

I got that impression. Admittedly it tends to be individualist-types like Heinlein and Rand - still, the basic idea is that wealth can be made - it doesn't have to be looted.

A factory worker has a much better standard of living than a medieval blacksmith, was one example given. And that factories cannot exist without "winners" - industrialists. With it being because of them, that the workers have their elevated standard of living - and don't have to work with metal at an "individual scale" - a much less productive one.

[Dienekes]

I got that impression. Admittedly it tends to be individualist-types like Heinlein and Rand - still, the basic idea is that wealth can be made - it doesn't have to be looted. A factory worker has a much better standard of living than a medieval blacksmith, was one example given.

This is incorrect. Well, ok, depending on the time period. Today? Maybe. During the industrial revolution? Hell no. Medieval underclass had about 5 to 15 years longer life expectancy.

[Boci]

I got that impression. Admittedly it tends to be individualist-types like Heinlein and Rand - still, the basic idea is that wealth can be made - it doesn't have to be looted.

A factory worker has a much better standard of living than a medieval blacksmith, was one example given. And that factories cannot exist without "winners" - industrialists. With it being because of them, that the workers have their elevated standard of living - and don't have to work with metal at an "individual scale" - a much less productive one.

Right, and the factory system ruined loads of smaller business. No winners without losers. I'm not saying winners cannot then be generous or beneficial to society, but the system that allowed them to get there is not its casualties.

[hamishspence]

Right, and the factory system ruined loads of smaller business. No winners without losers. I'm not saying winners cannot then be generous or beneficial to society, but the system that allowed them to get there is not its casualties.

If myself and another person apply for a job - and the other person gets it - and doesn't refuse so the employer can give it to me - I certainly wouldn't say they have "cheated me" or that their decision to keep the job was "an evil act".

Same principle applies on bigger scales.

[Boci]

If myself and another person apply for a job - and the other person gets it - and doesn't refuse so the employer can give it to me - I certainly wouldn't say they have "cheated me" or that their decision to keep the job was "an evil act".

Same principle applies on bigger scales.

Not the same princicple. A more apt comparison would be you are both going to be hired, but the other guy has a system whereby he can do both his job and yours whilst only working 20% more hours, so the company hires him for 150% of his original salary. He gets more money for proportionally less work, the company saves money, and you lose out on a job. Winners and losers.