If there were a God, don't you think he would've made him or her self known by now?

[begbert2]

@9thFloor

"This is all independent of any extra end-game punishment, or anything like that; if you go around screwing the game for others; you up the odds that they’ll try to screw the game for you, no admin help needed."

That’s secular morality, right? We’re on the same page if so; it can essentially be reduced to cause and effect, mathematics as it were.

Yep: secular morality. Though I dunno about reducing it to math; in my model there’s an element of nonpredictability infused by the interaction of other players’ avatars into the mix - players are defined in the model as having that ephemeral and poorly-defined quality of “free will”.

(And no, I don’t state where they got it. Don’t even go there.)

@9thFloor

Does your RPG concept contemplate the possibility of an avatar screwing over another avatar – and **not **suffering any ‘negative’ in-game results. Possible? No? I assume it does if you meant to use the term ‘odds’ literally as in chances.

My RPG model allows for people to do evil and not get an in-game comeuppence - it would have to, to model life as we know it, wouldn’t it?

@9thFloor

I think human history has shown that the trend is clearly cause and effect and karma (secularly understood). But in every instance, for every avatar, in all cases, in equal measure?

One presumes not, though with a large number of successive plays, presumably the player will sometimes come out ahead, and sometimes come out behind. Does it matter? Is there some problem with a model of the universe that does not reward every single good deed and punish every single transgression?

The fact is, my RPG model does not define what deeds are “good” or “bad”, beyond that nearly-irrelevent score system which I’d probably not include at all if I was rewriting the model without the jokes; pure sandbox is the way to go, with all statistics tracked, and players choosing what they want to max. Beyond giving you ‘achievements’, meaningless little awards for things like saving x number of kittens, killing x number of cops, or eating x number of snickers bars, there’s really no other sensible way to give extra-world awards/punishments in a pure sandbox model.

Though if you want a model which tells you exactly what to do and promises lots of awards and punishments for things, I’m sure you could find one if you looked hard enough. :rolleyes:

[9thFloor]

"One presumes not, though with a large number of successive plays, presumably the player will sometimes come out ahead, and sometimes come out behind. Does it matter? Is there some problem with a model of the universe that does not reward every single good deed and punish every single transgression?"

Absolutely not, in my view. Just inquiring as to the nature of the concept to clearly understand what the concept states and what its ramifications are were it true.

[9thFloor]

"The fact is, my RPG model does not define what deeds are “good” or “bad”, beyond that nearly-irrelevent score system which I’d probably not include at all if I was rewriting the model without the jokes; pure sandbox is the way to go, with all statistics tracked, and players choosing what they want to max. Beyond giving you ‘achievements’, meaningless little awards for things like saving x number of kittens, killing x number of cops, or eating x number of snickers bars, there’s really no other sensible way to give extra-world awards/punishments in a pure sandbox model."

That was my understanding of it. Cool.

[9thFloor]

"The fact is, my RPG model does not define what deeds are “good” or “bad”, beyond that nearly-irrelevent score system which I’d probably not include at all if I was rewriting the model without the jokes; pure sandbox is the way to go, with all statistics tracked, and players choosing what they want to max. Beyond giving you ‘achievements’, meaningless little awards for things like saving x number of kittens, killing x number of cops, or eating x number of snickers bars, there’s really no other sensible way to give extra-world awards/punishments in a pure sandbox model."

That was my understanding of it. Cool.
"If Jeffery Dahmer was acting for his own enjoyment do you suppose he screwed the game for others?"

I don’t know, and “neither do you.”

That can’t be known, by definition of the concept. If you’d been paying attention, you wouldn’t even smugly ask such a question.

Killing was explicitly included as a possible action that may have no in-game morality that necessarily screws the game for others as far as we know. Peace, you’ll remember, might end the game. Ending the game = not good **insofar **as avatars invested in the game POV is concerned.

It was also stated, somewhat facetiously, that the point might be eating Snickers (for all we know).

There is no way to know if there is any in-game morality difference between Jeffrey Dahmer killing someone and eating Snickers. They could be morally equivalent. Or one could be worst than the other. Morality = in-game cause/effect karma.

Furthermore, you posited that suffering isn’t real. Beyond which, it’s even possible some are NPCs. Dahmer inflicting suffering that’s not real on NPCs? That bastard.

Finally, I’d just like to take this time to point out that Jeffrey Dahmer worked at a chocolate factory.

He ate a lot of Snickers. ROFL

(Oh, and sorry for repeating the first part from that previous post; I can’t even manage that; some chance I have of figuring out the cosmos lol)

[begbert2]

@9thFloor

"If Jeffery Dahmer was acting for his own enjoyment do you suppose he screwed the game for others?"

I don’t know, and “neither do you.”

That can’t be known, by definition of the concept. If you’d been paying attention, you wouldn’t even smugly ask such a question.

Killing was explicitly included as a possible action that may have no in-game morality that necessarily screws the game for others as far as we know. Peace, you’ll remember, might end the game. Ending the game = not good **insofar **as avatars invested in the game POV is concerned.

It was also stated, somewhat facetiously, that the point might be eating Snickers (for all we know).

There is no way to know if there is any in-game morality difference between Jeffrey Dahmer killing someone and eating Snickers. They could be morally equivalent. Or one could be worst than the other. Morality = in-game cause/effect karma.

Furthermore, you posited that suffering isn’t real. Beyond which, it’s even possible some are NPCs. Dahmer inflicting suffering that’s not real on NPCs? That bastard.

Finally, I’d just like to take this time to point out that Jeffrey Dahmer worked at a chocolate factory.

He ate a lot of Snickers. ROFL

(Oh, and sorry for repeating the first part from that previous post; I can’t even manage that; some chance I have of figuring out the cosmos lol)

Actually, I think I’m the one that positied that suffering isn’t real (though, that doens’t help the suffering avatar much). When being snarky, 'tis best to strictly accurate.

Also, if morality = in-game cause/effect karma, then slaughtering people is probably not morally equivalent to eating snickers. Now, outside of the game, from the Player perspective, there’s negligible moral difference between having your avatar kill other avatars, and having it chomp chocolate; even the player who got PK’d will probably just laugh it off, having a much more eternal perspective than I. But this isn’t “in-game cause/effect karma”, and it only holds as long as you don’t conflate the Player and avatar perspecives. I mean, in avatar perspective, the avatars take quite a lot of offense to being PK’d. Just try it sometime and you’ll see.

The trick here is there’s a double standard. There are essentially no consequences to Players’s game actions as far as the Players themselves are concerned. They can have their little avatars fight and kill and destroy just as easily and possibly more entertainingly than they can have them live peaceful, hardworking lives, to die peacefully of old age. However, from the perpsective of the avatar, aka of the Player when they’re role-playing the avatar, one needs to be aware that there are consequences to one’s actions, like if you fall down the pit or jump on the spikes, you’ll die, or if you collect enough mushrooms you’ll get a nifty buzz, or if you jump on the back of the turtle the aspca will come after you: not moral decisions, persay, but just the in-game consequences of actions. These are the things the Player needs to plan and account for, in controlling his avatar to try and successfully accomplish his objectives without getting killed or harassed too much in the process. They’re the obstacles that make the game interesting. They only look like moral quandries from the inside.

(The point of the snickers thing is to hamstring the notion that Person A or Religion C has some kind of hotline into what will get you kudos after this life. Unlike some models where they tell you what to do, the RPG model proposes that Players, and therefore us, are free to choose what their objectives are going to be without any post-life consequences, and thus we avatars can make decisions without chaining ourselves to somebody’s agenda based on chasing some pipedream of a heavenly reward or fleeing some pipebomb of a hellish punishment.)

[9thFloor]

"Actually, I think I’m the one that positied that suffering isn’t real (though, that doens’t help the suffering avatar much). When being snarky, 'tis best to strictly accurate."

Actually, I was being strictly accurate. I see that you posited that, but I was referring to #242 in an earlier series about suffering and the notion that there’s no risk involved because it’s not real.
**“cosmosdan
Member
Quote:
Originally Posted by 9thFloor
Therefore, it’s god’s fault since he made us able to choose that and – being omniscient – knew that we would, and what would happen as a result.
It’s god’s fault that this is very fleeting and there’s no real risk?? That bastard.”
**

There’s others where explicit reference is made to the word ‘suffering’ as well in terms of it not having extra-world meaning. That’s what I was talking about.
But anywho…

"Also, if morality = in-game cause/effect karma, then slaughtering people is probably not morally equivalent to eating snickers. Now, outside of the game, from the Player perspective, there’s negligible moral difference between having your avatar kill other avatars, and having it chomp chocolate; even the player who got PK’d will probably just laugh it off, having a much more eternal perspective than I. But this isn’t “in-game cause/effect karma”, and it only holds as long as you don’t conflate the Player and avatar perspecives. I mean, in avatar perspective, the avatars take quite a lot of offense to being PK’d. Just try it sometime and you’ll see."

I see that, and yeah keeping the Players, Players-playing-as-avatars, Avatars, and Admins straight can get a bit messy (at least for me).

To me, what’s fascinating is that if morality=in-game karma, then slaughter vs. gluttony (to oversimplify the terms for conversational ease) would seem to be morally equivalent only insofar as they led to similar karmic results for the “perpetrator” avatar. I’d concede that your use of the word “probably” in that seems reasonable. But that’s, I think, as far as one can go is probably. It’s not even definitively immoral to kill vs. overeat in terms of karmic result in-game for the avatar. Which will cause the avatar more in-game harm? I think it could vary.

If an avatar’s only moral consideration, in-game, is basically an evolutionary type of idea: that is, survive and don’t die then it would lead to reflections on whether or not killing helps or hurts that cause. Analogizing to humanity as it is, which I think was the idea, it seems clear that killing isn’t necessarily bad, in-game, often enough to be certain that it’s a necessarily karmically stupid thing to do in all cases. Or is it?

Unless one states that in-game killing, per se, is a definitively karmically bad for the avatar except in strict self-defense. That doesn’t seem to be necessarily the case to me. And the only reason to state that, it seems to me within this concept, is the statistical probability of that action leading to the avatar’s demise.

Insofar as that goes, I’d agree that over the long haul with consistent and wanton killing you’ve got to be considered to be increasing the likelihood of suffering a similar fate; however, statistically speaking (and if we’re talking the point here is to avoid the avatar’s “death”) your avatar might be accurately said to be in more statistically reliable, predictable peril by overeating.

What do you think?

(btw, I don’t have an agenda. I’m genuinely intrigued by the idea and wanting to explore its implications and logical implications. In terms of the elegance of the concept’s logic, it concerns me that it could otherwise slip into a specific type of ideology that’s “nice” but not necessarily consistent.)

[begbert2]

@9thFloor

But anywho…

"Also, if morality = in-game cause/effect karma, then slaughtering people is probably not morally equivalent to eating snickers. Now, outside of the game, from the Player perspective, there’s negligible moral difference between having your avatar kill other avatars, and having it chomp chocolate; even the player who got PK’d will probably just laugh it off, having a much more eternal perspective than I. But this isn’t “in-game cause/effect karma”, and it only holds as long as you don’t conflate the Player and avatar perspecives. I mean, in avatar perspective, the avatars take quite a lot of offense to being PK’d. Just try it sometime and you’ll see."

I see that, and yeah keeping the Players, Players-playing-as-avatars, Avatars, and Admins straight can get a bit messy (at least for me).

To me, what’s fascinating is that if morality=in-game karma, then slaughter vs. gluttony (to oversimplify the terms for conversational ease) would seem to be morally equivalent only insofar as they led to similar karmic results for the “perpetrator” avatar. I’d concede that your use of the word “probably” in that seems reasonable. But that’s, I think, as far as one can go is probably. It’s not even definitively immoral to kill vs. overeat in terms of karmic result in-game for the avatar. Which will cause the avatar more in-game harm? I think it could vary.

If an avatar’s only moral consideration, in-game, is basically an evolutionary type of idea: that is, survive and don’t die then it would lead to reflections on whether or not killing helps or hurts that cause. Analogizing to humanity as it is, which I think was the idea, it seems clear that killing isn’t necessarily bad, in-game, often enough to be certain that it’s a necessarily karmically stupid thing to do in all cases. Or is it?

Unless one states that in-game killing, per se, is a definitively karmically bad for the avatar except in strict self-defense. That doesn’t seem to be necessarily the case to me. And the only reason to state that, it seems to me within this concept, is the statistical probability of that action leading to the avatar’s demise.

Insofar as that goes, I’d agree that over the long haul with consistent and wanton killing you’ve got to be considered to be increasing the likelihood of suffering a similar fate; however, statistically speaking (and if we’re talking the point here is to avoid the avatar’s “death”) your avatar might be accurately said to be in more statistically reliable, predictable peril by overeating.

What do you think?

(btw, I don’t have an agenda. I’m genuinely intrigued by the idea and wanting to explore its implications and logical implications. In terms of the elegance of the concept’s logic, it concerns me that it could otherwise slip into a specific type of ideology that’s “nice” but not necessarily consistent.)

Well, I’m having a hard time equating murdering people to eqating snickers bars with regard to the amount of consequential risk. Maybe they make snickers bars much bigger and meaner where you come from.

Once one puts aside issues of scale, though, and assuming that other Players don’t “hold grudges” (ie: “Hmm, Fred’s started another avatar, and he always goes on killing sprees eventually, so let’s snuff him out as a child and save ourselves the trouble”), then yes, there’s not any significant difference to the Player between killing people and eating snickers bars, assuming he thinks that both actions are equally beneficial/detrimental to whatever he’s trying to achieve in the game. If the deterrents posed by in-game society and whatever mannerisms and preferences the Player has decided to role-play their avatar as having don’t deter them from killing people, then one could reasonably expect the Player to have their avatar kill somebody, just as they could expect them to eat the snickers bar, if societal and role-played personality constraints don’t prevent it.

One detail I think I should correct, though: the Player’s goals might not merely be to stay alive. Staying alive is probably good for most objectives, but a player might also have their own ‘agenda’ when they play the character. To get a lot of money. To sleep with lots of women. To go out in a blaze of glory. To be remembered in in-game history. Depending on the Player’s goals, there might be a time when risking or forefiting their avatar’s life might be a preferred option. Just like at other times for other goals might include cutting through everyone that stands in thier way, or eating every snickers bar in sight.

[9thFloor]

"One detail I think I should correct, though: the Player’s goals might not merely be to stay alive. Staying alive is probably good for most objectives, but a player might also have their own ‘agenda’ when they play the character. To get a lot of money. To sleep with lots of women. To go out in a blaze of glory. To be remembered in in-game history. Depending on the Player’s goals, there might be a time when risking or forefiting their avatar’s life might be a preferred option. Just like at other times for other goals might include cutting through everyone that stands in thier way, or eating every snickers bar in sight."

Yeah, that’s exactly how I see it; I wondered if you meant to suggest that staying alive was the overarching in-game goal. As it isn’t, which IMO keeps the logic of the idea sleek and coherent, then if someone makes their agenda going out in a blaze of glory killing might fit there. Especially if there’s no risk of being killed as a relevant consideration if that isn’t even my in-game agenda in the first place.

If it’s getting lots of money and the results cause me to be killed, it wouldn’t matter if I nonetheless achieved my goal of getting a lot of money; the one with the most toys at the end wins in that view. LOL

The killing/gluttony comparison was extreme yeah, but in terms of risk of death (assuming that’s the agenda in this hypothetical), I suspect the risk of ‘losing’ by dying from revenge for having killed people vs. ‘losing’ by ruining your health and dying of diabetes and other illnesses associated with obesity (an example of a consequence for your actions) probably isn’t statistically that far apart. But it’s not important to make the point that those two things are terribly similar in terms of risk given a don’t die agenda, just a stark example to clarify the point.
This whole thing reminds me of analogues that we used to conceive of back in the 80’s about computers and operating systems, the applications (or programs as we called them back then!), users, etc.

Ironically, I’m just reading an article in Atlantic magazine called “The Unselfish Gene” that explains a notion based on evolution of why ‘good’ deeds would evolve given the parameters of “survive/procreate” that the evolution construct implies. There’s similarities, a few, in terms of trying to understand behavior within a very specific hypothetical construct that is agenda-free and tries to proceed on logic give a couple basic premises.

Anywho, I think we’ve gotten millenia off thread. LOL

Solid stuff, bb2.

[cosmosdan]

@begbert2

I’d say that if you want to play the game as though humanity is self-bettering, go for it! I think that humans are largely selfish, which can have an extremely similar effect to a humanity-bettering instinct if enough people in it see personal benefit to a bettered community, or if they see profit in spreading generally beneficial things (like inventions). And, even though I don’t think that most people contribute to a bettered humanity much, clearly when the dust settles, we’ve been in general advancing, for several values of “advancing”. (Perhaps not the ecological one though.)

Essentially we look at the world and infer different underlying mechanisms. I think on this, we can agree to disagree.

We can.

I thought this deserved special note, since human perception of the “admin(s)” and the post-end-game tends to have a huge effect on how many people play the game. That is what most of most religion is, after all; and whe you assume a rigid enough scoring system, only one play through the game, and drastic enough post-end-game consequences based on your score for that play, then you can be driven to do all sorts of crazy stuff in order to assist yourself an others in “scoring properly”.

No argument about that. That’s why I phrased it the way I did.

On the other hand, in the RPG scenario as I’m presenting it, there is very little (and no lasting) penalty for playing any which way. This lack of penalty would drain the metaphysical impetus for people to act in strange ways or try to control other people’s behavior, which I see as a good thing. It’s a large reason I like the model, above and beyond the fact that it’s very simple and consistent.

I’m having some trouble figuring this out. Is the lack of penalty hell? I can see how that might deter some efforts to control others but not much. What prevents poeple from useing a false penalty teaching to try and control players that are easily nifluenced. We also see that there are other reasons to try and control others, and if that’s what some players enjoy then they can.

You can’t really fault people for being concerned about how to play; there’s this meme going around that if you play wrong, you’ll be smacked down hard. That’s an intimidating notion.

The people who go around spreading this meme should stop. I M H O.

I agree, but until the nature of the players change if it isn’t that meme being used to manipulate it will be another. Something like, “those players over there are terrorists out to kill us” for instance. It’s a strange balance between personal freedom and cooperation with the group.

Now, if you don’t mind, I’ll bring in 9thFloor; I think answering him will answer you.
Pretty much; that’s what opportunity cost is about after all: what you spend on one thing, you can’t spend on another. cosmosdan proposed that “Believing there may be another level doesn’t have to restrict fun”, and my response was, basically, “Wait, is that correct? Unless having and acting on that belief is fun for you, doesn’t spending time and effort on the belief take time away from your fun?” A minor point, really, but I have this bad habit of arguing minor points too.

I can see that. I know several people who repress their fun because of what someone else told them the head admin said. However, if you feel the reward in game is enough then no problem.

It’s not that there’s necessarily something wrong with doing things for reasons other than fun either; simple fun’s a high priority for me but I know other people get their giggles from altruism or education or various other things. I was just questioning the notion that level-chasing wouldn’t cut into the fun-time, is all.

It might, but it doesn’t have to. Lot’s of things might. As you point out. Pursuing your own fun too selfishly has it’s own repercussions that might be less than fun.

Firstly, the RPG model I proposed is pretty much an open sandbox; in my model, if you want to go around PKing people, you are fully able to try and do so. Of course if you do then other players who have avatars who are in the roles of ‘policeman’ are likely to see about bringing your fun, and perhaps your avatar, to an early end.

Right. Our choices in game have consequences.

Similarly, if you go around ripping people off, mouthing off to people, being a jerk, bully, or thug - all of these actions have direct in-game consequences in the opinions of the avatars around you, which have a pretty high and moderately consistent response on your avatar’s quality of life, if the other avatars you injured get their hands on you. This is all independent of any extra end-game punishment, or anything like that; if you go around screwing the game for others; you up the odds that they’ll try to screw the game for you, no admin help needed.

Once again I agree and that links back to my idea that supposition about admins or end game rewards or punishment have no real application except how it affects actions in game. The consequences in game should be enough to deal with.

<snip>

(I’m actually so use to finding harmless entertainments for myself that I found it odd that cosmosdan went from “selfish entertaiment” to “screwing over others”. That’s just not a connection I can draw from my usual selfish entertainments.)

but you understand it right?

[cosmosdan]

@9thFloor

"If Jeffery Dahmer was acting for his own enjoyment do you suppose he screwed the game for others?"

I don’t know, and “neither do you.”

That can’t be known, by definition of the concept. If you’d been paying attention, you wouldn’t even smugly ask such a question.

I said {from the avatars view} in that same post. bb2 already explained it…

It has nothing to do with any guesses about suffering. From the avatars view when someone kills you, rapes you, steals your stuff, declares you a terrorist, unexpectedly and for no reason, your game is effectively screwed. Unless of course you find that stuff part of the fun.

[9thFloor]

@cosmosdan

I said {from the avatars view} in that same post. bb2 already explained it…

It has nothing to do with any guesses about suffering. From the avatars view when someone kills you, rapes you, steals your stuff, declares you a terrorist, unexpectedly and for no reason, your game is effectively screwed. Unless of course you find that stuff part of the fun.

Yes, that’s what I meant. From the avatar’s view, in-game.

And, more specifically, from the point of view of the avatar **doing **the killing. Especially if what that avatar is killing is a NPC. That could be fun. And morally neutral, in-game, depending on your own created goals; particularly if avoiding your own death isn’t an in-game goal for you.

Hence, screwing the game for others may be an avatar’s in-game goal.

If they get killed as a result of pursuing that goal, and if ‘not dying’ isn’t one of their in-game goals, then it’s a moot point because they’ve still furthered their goal. And then, as I asserted, even if ‘not dying’ is one of their in-game goals, killing someone doesn’t necessarily increase the odds of that either. Millions of people have killed others without losing their own life as a result.

From the other avatar’s point of view, being killed – as you stated – can be fun.

And therefore also not conflicting with **their **in-game goal either.

That, for example, is a provable established fact. It’s even notoriously so. The two most recent cases I read about was the North Carolina and Germany incidents. In the former, a woman apparently made it clear and unambiguous that she wanted to be raped and then killed by a guy in NC. Having driven down to meet him for that purpose, charging him with the crimes that resulted was problematic insofar as intent, first degree, 2nd degree, etc. But the point is that they both furthered one aspect of their in-game goals in so doing.

The other case was the cannibal dude in Germany who placed ads on the internet for people he could eat. He got lots of replies. He met a few of those people, they met, had dinner, talked, and then he killed and ate them.

That is morally okay. In-game, from the POV of both avatars, given their goals.

So, it seems we agree. How refreshing.

[cosmosdan]

@begbert2

Actually, I think I’m the one that positied that suffering isn’t real (though, that doens’t help the suffering avatar much). When being snarky, 'tis best to strictly accurate.

Also, if morality = in-game cause/effect karma, then slaughtering people is probably not morally equivalent to eating snickers. Now, outside of the game, from the Player perspective, there’s negligible moral difference between having your avatar kill other avatars, and having it chomp chocolate; even the player who got PK’d will probably just laugh it off, having a much more eternal perspective than I. But this isn’t “in-game cause/effect karma”, and it only holds as long as you don’t conflate the Player and avatar perspecives. I mean, in avatar perspective, the avatars take quite a lot of offense to being PK’d. Just try it sometime and you’ll see.

In game gets more complicated as the number of players increase. One thing we haven’t touched on in this RPG is supply and demand. You can’t chomp all the snickers unless someone is making them and then you have to strike some deal to get the snickers unless you have something to offer. Of course you can deceide to steal the snickers but then the maker can choose to stop making them and come after you with freinds who have decided you’re a threat.

In some ways wouldn’t what passes for “morality” be whatever the group in charge decides it should be?"

The trick here is there’s a double standard. There are essentially no consequences to Players’s game actions as far as the Players themselves are concerned. They can have their little avatars fight and kill and destroy just as easily and possibly more entertainingly than they can have them live peaceful, hardworking lives, to die peacefully of old age. However, from the perpsective of the avatar, aka of the Player when they’re role-playing the avatar, one needs to be aware that there are consequences to one’s actions, like if you fall down the pit or jump on the spikes, you’ll die, or if you collect enough mushrooms you’ll get a nifty buzz, or if you jump on the back of the turtle the aspca will come after you: not moral decisions, persay, but just the in-game consequences of actions. These are the things the Player needs to plan and account for, in controlling his avatar to try and successfully accomplish his objectives without getting killed or harassed too much in the process. They’re the obstacles that make the game interesting. They only look like moral quandries from the inside.

Well,…they might be banned from play if they were too unruly.
Jokes aside , the idea of the consequences ultimately dictating actions without moral labels of good and bad works great for me. It does seem that it has a lot to do with the perceptoin of the other players. It takes usually takes groups working togther to be effective and once that group forms then the rules and who decides them crap begins.

(The point of the snickers thing is to hamstring the notion that Person A or Religion C has some kind of hotline into what will get you kudos after this life. Unlike some models where they tell you what to do, the RPG model proposes that Players, and therefore us, are free to choose what their objectives are going to be without any post-life consequences, and thus we avatars can make decisions without chaining ourselves to somebody’s agenda based on chasing some pipedream of a heavenly reward or fleeing some pipebomb of a hellish punishment.)

Which I think is a good idea. In game consequences are enough to deal with. Still, it’s up to each player to decide what they will buy into and whether it helps or hurts their in game status. So if killing people has no morallity beyond in game consequences then telling people about supposed admins and end game rewards has none either right? PLay the game however you want and see what happens?

[9thFloor]

"Well,…they might be banned from play if they were too unruly. "

And since we don’t know the parameters of the game, posting on message boards might be defined as “unruly.”

[cosmosdan]

@9thFloor

Yes, that’s what I meant. From the avatar’s view, in-game.

That makes me wonder why you included the stuff about suffering since that’s the player controling the avatar , but no matter.

The other case was the cannibal dude in Germany who placed ads on the internet for people he could eat. He got lots of replies. He met a few of those people, they met, had dinner, talked, and then he killed and ate them.

That is morally okay. In-game, from the POV of both avatars, given their goals.

bizarre.

It occurs to me though that telling people about supposed admins and end game reward and punishment also has a null moral status. The manipulators find people who agree to be manipulated. It’s morally ok…right?

[cosmosdan]

@9thFloor

"Well,…they might be banned from play if they were too unruly. "

And since we don’t know the parameters of the game, posting on message boards might be defined as “unruly.”

and often is…

[9thFloor]

"That makes me wonder why you included the stuff about suffering since that’s the player controling the avatar , but no matter."

Two reasons. First, if it’s an NPC you’re killing there is no suffering from any avatar’s POV, in-game. Secondly, sarcasm not germane to the point. You know, like your question, “That didn’t turn out to be your last point, did it?” (paraphrased)

Both sarcastic and not germane. Perhaps that’s one of my in-game goals.

[9thFloor]

"It occurs to me though that telling people about supposed admins and end game reward and punishment also has a null moral status. The manipulators find people who agree to be manipulated. It’s morally ok…right?"

I guess I’m not sure what you’re referring to here or what it has to do with anything maybe I’m being thick headed.

Morals = consequences for your actions. Those consequences mattering to your avatar depend on the avatar’s in-game goals.

Cannibal dude couldn’t be convicted of murder by definition so they got him on manslaughter and he went in for a while and then got out. That was fine by him, as it was worth furthering his in-game goal. So that consequence, which was societally imposed, was an acceptable cost (and the only cost, if we’re relegating for the sake of discussion his in-game goals down to only this one, was only one of opportunity cost of the people he couldn’t kill and eat while in prison).

What I’d say, if I’m understanding your point – and actually it’s true even if I’m not understanding your point because it applies to the whole concept regardless, is that we can’t know if it’s morally okay since morality is karma and we don’t know what the manipulators’ and manipulated’s in-game goals are.

I think there has to be a shared value system of what the in-game goal is in order to determine what’s moral if you’re going beyond one person’s own individual goals and trying to extrapolate to some kind of societal morality. There are few.

People get together and publicly declare, “these are our in-game goals” which, of course, conflict with the in-game goals of others. So they have at it.

In reality, of course, this whole in-game goal isn’t the normative moral perspective people consciously take (even though I do think it’s the practical one most people behave on), and instead they seize upon claims of extra-world rewards.

At which point, I call bullshit.

[9thFloor]

@cosmosdan

and often is…

Which, of course, we can’t know to be true since we’re just avatars. :dubious:

[9thFloor]

" bizarre. "

No more bizarre than the actions of jesus, in-game.

Get killed to further in-game goals. People do it all the time. Of course, the person dong it may be operating on a delusion (like jesus was, IMO) that they’re getting extra-world rewards for it but nonetheless from all we can know it’s still in-game.

I wouldn’t say it’s statistically common, but it’s not unheard of. Sati/suttee is a routine part of Indian cultural heritage. Kill yourself to further your in-game goal of honoring your husband.

[cosmosdan]

So it seems in the RPG we’re saying, no universal moral good or bad can be decided by tha avatars. Each one pursues their own goals and is left to deal with in game consequences without any concern for what happens after the games end.

Strangly enough that is completely compatible with certain religious philosophies. Buddhism comes to mind which has no supreme deity concept. IMO there are more parrelels than not in what Jesus taught and what Buddha taught especially concerning our play in game. I’m sure many Christians disagree.

Each player pursues their own goals which is what they truly value, apart from any lip service, and reflected in thier in game actions. Their actions have consequences and those consequences may or may not alter their choices depending on how good they are at connecting the consequence to the action.

I know this may also smell like prostylisizing but honest, it’s not meant to be. I was just amused by the similarities.