Aldryami Mystics and Runic Powersets.

From: Alex Ferguson <abf_at_cs.ucc.ie>
Date: Sat, 20 Jun 1998 04:39:07 +0100 (BST)


T-T-Trotsky:
> * - judging from the latest Greg Sez myth, I view Aldryami as mystics - which
> makes sense to me, because that's more or less how I had already thought of
> them. Mystics (like the Kralori) don't believe in gods as such, but they
> aren't atheists in the sense that the four cultures listed are.

I think the Kralori, Aldryami and Pelorians are all at different points on a mystic/theist spectrum, if one can imagine such a thing. Specifically, I think the Aldryami lie somewhere between the other two, insofar as a comparison of their cosmology is at all meaningful, bearing in mind how alien the elves' thinking on such matters really must be.

But there's a very important difference, I think, between Aldryami and human mystics; the latter have to go to elaborate and sometimes extreme lengths for their religious experiences and insights. For Aldryami, knowledge and communion with their Ultimate is as easy and natural as falling off a log. (Sorry.) At least a some "lowest common denominator" level; I'm sure powerful Aldryami "shaman" have much deeper and profound insights.

Jeff Erwin:
> If Orlanth dies... his Runes, even the combination of those Runes, still
> exist. One can posit a hypothetical god for each combination of Runes, but one
> should acknowledge that one set of runes can have more than one god as well.

Peter Metcalfe constructed a rather nifty God Learner Fallacy from the former proposition; I'm sure one could do much the same for the converse notion, and suppose that some sort of Divine Pauli Exclusion Principle operates. Counterexamples? Only "generic" deities a la GoG cookie-cutter River God, City God, etc spring to mind, which could certainly be questioned -- while River Gods seem mostly interchangeable (and hence ultimately the same, or related?), City Gods are in reality a highly differentiated bunch.

This is leaving aside the whole question, pan-Digest flamebait as it is, of how univeral the idea of a fixed, given set of Runes is in any case...

Slainte,
Alex.


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