472 réponses à ce sujet

[EmperorSahlertz]

Killjoy Cutter wrote...

Except, of course, that the isolation of a quarantine is not immediately followed up with the deliberate slaughter of all the contained persons.

Often not. But if the disease was dangerous enough, I wouldn't put it past us, to carpet bomb an entire city with napalm (28 weeks later), to make sure the infection doesn't spread.

[Addai]

Satyricon331 wrote...

Addai67 wrote...
Quarantine is an example of when a society- even one which recognizes individual rights in principle- decides to forfeit those for certain people even though they may be personally innocent, because the risk of not doing so is too high.  I did not use it as a one to one comparison with the RoA, rather as a moral equivalent.

Addai, I disagree with you here.  The reason involuntary quarantine is compatible with a rights-based moral outlook is because the outlook views people as having a right (against the world) to their lives, which implies an individual duty to respect that right.  A disease carrier actively jeapordizes those rights by not voluntarily submitting to quarantine, and in this respect an involuntary quarantine is just the remedy to the rights violation.  Expecting someone in a quarantine to submit to killing to protect others just turns the framework on its head.  

And Ian, I see you again asserting there is no analogy between magic and diseases, which is an irrational position.  If you have a new argument, then offer it.  I agree there's no analogy to the RoA,but it doesn't follow there's no analogy to magic.

I'm not following you.  People in a quarantine zone don't get to decide whether they leave alive or not.  Someone else decides that.  They don't "submit."  They're forced, else it's not much of a quarantine.

Now granted, most quarantines do not end in extermination of everyone inside, but no one in our world can get a disease that allows them to control others' minds and cause mass destruction by a flick of their finger.  Don't get hung up on whether or not magic is a disease.  That's not the point.  The point is that societies can and do decide that a whole group of people represent a threat to the greater good.  If it's the choice between the many and the few, the few should be sacrificed.  That's not just morally feasible, it can be- in the right circumstances- a positive moral good.

[Cobra's_back]

Addai67 wrote...

Satyricon331 wrote...

Addai67 wrote...
Quarantine is an example of when a society- even one which recognizes individual rights in principle- decides to forfeit those for certain people even though they may be personally innocent, because the risk of not doing so is too high.  I did not use it as a one to one comparison with the RoA, rather as a moral equivalent.

Addai, I disagree with you here.  The reason involuntary quarantine is compatible with a rights-based moral outlook is because the outlook views people as having a right (against the world) to their lives, which implies an individual duty to respect that right.  A disease carrier actively jeapordizes those rights by not voluntarily submitting to quarantine, and in this respect an involuntary quarantine is just the remedy to the rights violation.  Expecting someone in a quarantine to submit to killing to protect others just turns the framework on its head.  

And Ian, I see you again asserting there is no analogy between magic and diseases, which is an irrational position.  If you have a new argument, then offer it.  I agree there's no analogy to the RoA,but it doesn't follow there's no analogy to magic.

I'm not following you.  People in a quarantine zone don't get to decide whether they leave alive or not.  Someone else decides that.  They don't "submit."  They're forced, else it's not much of a quarantine.

Now granted, most quarantines do not end in extermination of everyone inside, but no one in our world can get a disease that allows them to control others' minds and cause mass destruction by a flick of their finger.  Don't get hung up on whether or not magic is a disease.  That's not the point.  The point is that societies can and do decide that a whole group of people represent a threat to the greater good.  If it's the choice between the many and the few, the few should be sacrificed.  That's not just morally feasible, it can be- in the right circumstances- a positive moral good.

I agree with what you are saying. I just don't think all mages are containable. Many mages are born of parents that haven’t had any magic. If mages are killed, any parent having a child with magic goes into hiding and now you have a possible Connor. They don't have the man power to check every family all the time. Connor's dad didn't know the kid was a mage. They needed to compromise. Change the system so it has checks and balances but allow these people to have families. Mass extermination would just get the public to turn away from the Templar. The system is too one sided now. I also read a codex that stated the veil in Kirkwall was too thin because of all the death. This really wasn’t a good location for a circle.

[Satyricon331]

Addai67 wrote...
I'm not following you.  People in a quarantine zone don't get to decide whether they leave alive or not.  Someone else decides that.  They don't "submit."  They're forced, else it's not much of a quarantine.

Now granted, most quarantines do not end in extermination of everyone inside, but no one in our world can get a disease that allows them to control others' minds and cause mass destruction by a flick of their finger.  Don't get hung up on whether or not magic is a disease.  That's not the point.  The point is that societies can and do decide that a whole group of people represent a threat to the greater good.  If it's the choice between the many and the few, the few should be sacrificed.  That's not just morally feasible, it can be- in the right circumstances- a positive moral good.

Rights-based theories always rely on the action-inaction distinction.  In one scenario, you have a quarantine, an isolation.  If people die, it's not directly from the authorities' actions, even though it's indirectly attributable to the authorities acting to protect other people's rights.  In another (analogous to the RoA), the authorities are actively slaughtering people who haven't acted against anyone.  If you want to argue the latter is moral, you can't do it in a rights-based framework.  

You seem to depart from rights-based arguments in the end of your post, and re-reading your earlier post, perhaps you're saying that greater good trumps rights there as well.  I took your "recognizes individual rights in principle" to mean that sacrificing people in that way was compatible with recognizing rights in principle, which might have been a misunderstanding.  

[Killjoy Cutter]

Addai67 wrote...

Satyricon331 wrote...

Addai67 wrote...
Quarantine is an example of when a society- even one which recognizes individual rights in principle- decides to forfeit those for certain people even though they may be personally innocent, because the risk of not doing so is too high.  I did not use it as a one to one comparison with the RoA, rather as a moral equivalent.

Addai, I disagree with you here.  The reason involuntary quarantine is compatible with a rights-based moral outlook is because the outlook views people as having a right (against the world) to their lives, which implies an individual duty to respect that right.  A disease carrier actively jeapordizes those rights by not voluntarily submitting to quarantine, and in this respect an involuntary quarantine is just the remedy to the rights violation.  Expecting someone in a quarantine to submit to killing to protect others just turns the framework on its head.  

And Ian, I see you again asserting there is no analogy between magic and diseases, which is an irrational position.  If you have a new argument, then offer it.  I agree there's no analogy to the RoA,but it doesn't follow there's no analogy to magic.

I'm not following you.  People in a quarantine zone don't get to decide whether they leave alive or not.  Someone else decides that.  They don't "submit."  They're forced, else it's not much of a quarantine.

Now granted, most quarantines do not end in extermination of everyone inside, but no one in our world can get a disease that allows them to control others' minds and cause mass destruction by a flick of their finger.  Don't get hung up on whether or not magic is a disease.  That's not the point.  The point is that societies can and do decide that a whole group of people represent a threat to the greater good.  If it's the choice between the many and the few, the few should be sacrificed.  That's not just morally feasible, it can be- in the right circumstances- a positive moral good.

Much evil has been done in the name of the greater good.  I don't trust it.

[EmperorSahlertz]

Much evil has been allowed to happen, because people didn't have the "right" to do anyhting about it...

[IanPolaris]

EmperorSahlertz wrote...

Much evil has been allowed to happen, because people didn't have the "right" to do anyhting about it...

That rates right up there with "Freedom is precious; so precious it must be rationed out carefully."  That is a quote from Iosef Stalin and I consider your quote in the exact same light.

-Polaris

[Urzon]

EmperorSahlertz wrote...

Much evil has been allowed to happen, because people didn't have the "right" to do anyhting about it...

I think it's more of a: lack of knowledge, apathy, laziness, or just people not seeing what they DON'T want to see.

[Killjoy Cutter]

What's the old saying, "Two wrongs don't make a right"?

[EmperorSahlertz]

IanPolaris wrote...

EmperorSahlertz wrote...

Much evil has been allowed to happen, because people didn't have the "right" to do anyhting about it...

That rates right up there with "Freedom is precious; so precious it must be rationed out carefully."  That is a quote from Iosef Stalin and I consider your quote in the exact same light.

-Polaris

Thank you.

[MichaelFinnegan]

Satyricon331 wrote...

I'm trying to understand this better. So please bear with me...

Consider a disease that is very quickly fatal for nearly all infectees - in fact it kills them off so quickly those people can't infect others, as the virus is too fragile to survive the death of the host.

What the analogy seems to be considering at this point is an example of a non-communicable disease, since the virus cannot hop. Yet you use the term "infectees." I'm confused.

The virus persists in the population because some people are carriers, having the virus incubate in them.  While the virus incubates, it is noninfectious,

To be clear, who are the "carriers" in this sentence? Mages? And the infection can spread to other mages?

but sometimes the person can (for whatever reason) become a transmitter, infecting everyone around them (killing the non-carrier people off altogether, or at least risking it).

The non-carriers meaning common folk? And the infection spreading to mages and non mages and killing non-mages outright?

(To complete the analogy to mages, the carriers transmit the disease to their carrier children, but not to their non-carrier children.)  You can tweak the analogy as needed for templars, combat magic, etc.

The mode of transmission is purely via genetics, and that too specifically from parents to children? Sorry, I think you're using the term "transmission" or "infection" in two different senses here: 1) when the mage turns abomination and possibly kills all mages and non-mages in the vicinity and 2) when the mage as a carrier "transmits" magical ability to children. In each case, then, the definition of "disease" shifts.

I think there are reasonable arguments for quarantining the carriers, and if the carriers have to do something volitionally to become a transmitter (as a mage who chooses to become an abomination and endangers everyone around them),

The game gave a sense that this happened rather frequently in Kirkwall, at least. Causes, unknown. Could be the thin Veil, could be the disposition of mages over there to turn to demons at the drop of a hat. The essential point is that a quarantine doesn't address the cause - doesn't consider an effective prevention or cure.

I think there are reasonable arguments not to quarantine the carriers if other disincentives to that choice exist.

Indeed.

But the disease analogy does not fail

The major problem with this analogy I think is that at least a communicable disease spreads based on aspects beyond one's control. The same cannot be argued for mages turning abominations. Indeed, it isn't even this. Your whole argument is that there is simply a "danger" of this happening. And in order to carry the "communicable" disease analogy to the level of a quarantine one'd have to show at least one case of a disease actually existing in the said population - and you cannot argue that it is possibly magic or the risk of abmoniation being born at some unknown time in the future. A quarantine happens after the fact, not before it.

I think it's best to view Circles more as training and probably rehabilitation centres for this reason, and not simply as quarantine zones.

- although I agree I don't see an argument here for killing off all carriers in a quarantine zone.  The US and most other countries have laws for involuntary quarantines, but not culling the entire quarantine zone.

Assuming the containment is somehow necessary: There is not much of a basis for culling all mages, at least without a determination that the "disease," when it happens that is, is uncontainable. Even then we run into issues about what a templar's duties at this point in time are - whether he with reckless abandon proceeds to kill every mage in sight or whether he is willing to evaluate on a case by case basis. And let's note that he's somewhat equipped to combat the "disease" and he's simply not prone to it.

[MichaelFinnegan]

Addai67 wrote...

Satyricon331 wrote...

Addai67 wrote...
Quarantine is an example of when a society- even one which recognizes individual rights in principle- decides to forfeit those for certain people even though they may be personally innocent, because the risk of not doing so is too high.  I did not use it as a one to one comparison with the RoA, rather as a moral equivalent.

Addai, I disagree with you here.  The reason involuntary quarantine is compatible with a rights-based moral outlook is because the outlook views people as having a right (against the world) to their lives, which implies an individual duty to respect that right.  A disease carrier actively jeapordizes those rights by not voluntarily submitting to quarantine, and in this respect an involuntary quarantine is just the remedy to the rights violation.  Expecting someone in a quarantine to submit to killing to protect others just turns the framework on its head.  

And Ian, I see you again asserting there is no analogy between magic and diseases, which is an irrational position.  If you have a new argument, then offer it.  I agree there's no analogy to the RoA,but it doesn't follow there's no analogy to magic.

I'm not following you.  People in a quarantine zone don't get to decide whether they leave alive or not.  Someone else decides that.  They don't "submit."  They're forced, else it's not much of a quarantine.

Yet, the point that was made was that the very reason why those people at risk might even consider a "peaceful" quarantine is because by spreading the disease they'd risk the lives of others, and therefore infringe on the latters' rights, which the law protects. If this disease communicability could not be properly established, those people who're now under the influence of the disease would not submit to the said quarantine without a fight. In fact, since the rights applies to everyone, equally, the conditions of quarantine must be very strict - the conditions of infringment estabilished clearly.

Now granted, most quarantines do not end in extermination of everyone inside, but no one in our world can get a disease that allows them to control others' minds and cause mass destruction by a flick of their finger.  Don't get hung up on whether or not magic is a disease.  That's not the point.

The point is that there might not even be a single person with manifestations of disease (in this case of being an abomination, or even a mind-controlling blood mage) in the said population. There is simply the "risk" of that existing - not a certainty.

The point is that societies can and do decide that a whole group of people represent a threat to the greater good.  If it's the choice between the many and the few, the few should be sacrificed.  That's not just morally feasible, it can be- in the right circumstances- a positive moral good.

But the other point is that mages need not submit to the said right, if it's not universally applicable. The only way the "system" can work is if there is an understanding of give-and-take. The argument of "greater good" is subjugation and tyrannical at best.

[Addai]

Quarantines don't depend on the people in them submitting voluntarily. Like I said, otherwise it's not much of a quarantine. And the RoA is not meant to be called lightly or without proof of something gone horribly wrong. Whether mages fight an annulment or not is a side point. We're talking about the right of a society to protect itself against a threat. If you're going to argue natural rights for mages, you have to argue natural rights for non-mages too. The problem being that IanPolaris does not acknowledge that society has a legitimate right to protect itself against mages and apparently thinks that the Circle exists merely as an expression of Chantry-promoted racism.

Modifié par Addai67, 01 octobre 2011 - 05:38 .

[The Baconer]

Addai67 wrote...
If you're going to argue natural rights for mages, you have to argue natural rights for non-mages too.

Not really. The beings in question aren't equal.

[MichaelFinnegan]

Addai67 wrote...

Quarantines don't depend on the people in them submitting voluntarily. Like I said, otherwise it's not much of a quarantine.

But what is the underlying principle involved? I think it's that tomorrow you and I might find ourselves inside a quarantine and we'd very much like to co-operate and go along with it because we'd know that's really the best for everyone involved - us and them, both; and we'd like to think that others in the same postion might act similarly. The military/enforcers if required at all is just to enforce something we all kind of tacitly agreed to beforehand. It's not that they're there to force us against our wills. At least that is how I tend to think of it.

And the RoA is not meant to be called lightly or without proof of something gone horribly wrong.

In theory, yes.

Whether mages fight an annulment or not is a side point.

But resistance is bound to happen. We can accept that as a certainty. And, in any case, I do not blame a mage for clinging on to his/her life, if he's not in danger of possession.

We're talking about the right of a society to protect itself against a threat.

It gets tricky here. Who all comprise the society in this context? To you, are mages really not a part of it? And if society not including mages considers mages a threat from the start, is there some reason why mages shouldn't return the favor?

I can take this a bit further. Let's say you or I as non-mages in Thedas don't have any family members who are mages. We watch as templars come one day and drag a neighbor's daughter/son to the Circle. Yes, we'd think, this is best for all. Mages are really a threat, so there really isn't an option. Then, bang!, the newborn in the family turns out to have magic some years later. Then we're faced with the same issue but looking at it from a different perspective. Would we still look at the possiblity of RoA and the harrowing as necessary things? The Circle way as the only way?

If you're going to argue natural rights for mages, you have to argue natural rights for non-mages too.

It can become a bit confusing introducing law or natural rights into all this. We can just look at what might happen in different scenarios, put ourselves in different people's shoes and see how things really are. And consider whether we still think the Circles are an equitable solution for all, and whether it could somehow be improved upon.

In any case, as I argued earlier, even if mages have to be imprisoned in the Circles for life, others really have to make it worth their while - kind of like give and take. Otherwise, it's simply asking for trouble.

The problem being that IanPolaris does not acknowledge that society has a legitimate right to protect itself against mages and apparently thinks that the Circle exists merely as an expression of Chantry-promoted racism

Sometimes people use emotionally charged terms, but that doesn't necessarily invalidate the rest of what they have to say. Just my two cents...

[Satyricon331]

MichaelFinnegan wrote...
What the analogy seems to be considering at this point is an example of a non-communicable disease, since the virus cannot hop. Yet you use the term "infectees." I'm confused. [...] To be clear, who are the "carriers" in this sentence? Mages? And the infection can spread to other mages? [...]The non-carriers meaning common folk? And the infection spreading to mages and non mages and killing non-mages outright? [...]
The mode of transmission is purely via genetics, and that too specifically from parents to children? Sorry, I think you're using the term "transmission" or "infection" in two different senses here: 1) when the mage turns abomination and possibly kills all mages and non-mages in the vicinity and 2) when the mage as a carrier "transmits" magical ability to children. In each case, then, the definition of "disease" shifts.

Look, I'm not sure I see what the diificulty is.  If a communicable disease is too rapidly lethal in too many of its hosts, it can't survive since the host dies before the disease can infect others (thus, that fact alone implies that if the virus is to survive there must be people who are merely carriers).  And mothers can pass viruses to their children, so there's no need to make it a genetic disease.  There is no shifting definition - it just affects two sub-populations differently.  There are RL diseases that do so; West Nile virus is an example that has 3 sub-populations (apparently, via wiki, one sub-pop shows a "mild febrile syndrome," another has "a neuroinvasive disease," and the third group shows no symptoms).  In the hypothetical, I take that idea to a bit of an extreme, admittedly, but there's nothing that shifts the definition.

I think there are reasonable arguments for quarantining the carriers, and if the carriers have to do something volitionally to become a transmitter (as a mage who chooses to become an abomination and endangers everyone around them),

The game gave a sense that this happened rather frequently in Kirkwall, at least. Causes, unknown. Could be the thin Veil, could be the disposition of mages over there to turn to demons at the drop of a hat. The essential point is that a quarantine doesn't address the cause - doesn't consider an effective prevention or cure.

Yes, I agree, but I wasn't discussing treatment  Just that quarantine can be a reasonable response (not that it always is/that circumstances can't exist where it's unreasonable).

The major problem with this analogy I think is that at least a communicable disease spreads based on aspects beyond one's control. The same cannot be argued for mages turning abominations. Indeed, it isn't even this. Your whole argument is that there is simply a "danger" of this happening. And in order to carry the "communicable" disease analogy to the level of a quarantine one'd have to show at least one case of a disease actually existing in the said population - and you cannot argue that it is possibly magic or the risk of abmoniation being born at some unknown time in the future. A quarantine happens after the fact, not before it.

I think it's best to view Circles more as training and probably rehabilitation centres for this reason, and not simply as quarantine zones.

Its precisely the individual's lack of volition in choosing whether to be a disease carrier in my analogy that makes it parallel to the mages, who did not choose to be mages.  I analogized abominations to when carriers become transmitters, not to the disease itself or anything.  I left open the possibility there that there's a volitional aspect (like popping a pustule or spreading ooze or something) in shifting from carrier to transmitter, just like mages can choose to be abominations.

And I don't see import of your sentence, "And in order to carry the "communicable" disease analogy to the level of a quarantine one'd have to show at least one case of a disease actually existing in the said population."  Obviously in the hypothetical, the disease existed in the population.  Mages and abominations exist in the population.  And I didn't offer my opinion on how best to view Circles (other than to state that I think the RoA is bad).  I think your view of them is reasonable; all I was doing was defending the disease analogy.  

Addai67 wrote...
Quarantines don't depend on the people in them submitting voluntarily. Like I said, otherwise it's not much of a quarantine. And the RoA is not meant to be called lightly or without proof of something gone horribly wrong. Whether mages fight an annulment or not is a side point. We're talking about the right of a society to protect itself against a threat. If you're going to argue natural rights for mages, you have to argue natural rights for non-mages too. The problem being that IanPolaris does not acknowledge that society has a legitimate right to protect itself against mages and apparently thinks that the Circle exists merely as an expression of Chantry-promoted racism.

Quarantines don't depend on people submitting voluntarily, but the justification in a rights-based framework is that people who resist are infringing other's rights, so using coercion is justifiable.  Also, not all rights theories are natural rights theories, although I'm not sure if you're claiming that or if you're just addressing Ian's position (he believs in natural rights iirc).

[Killjoy Cutter]

EmperorSahlertz wrote...

IanPolaris wrote...

EmperorSahlertz wrote...

Much evil has been allowed to happen, because people didn't have the "right" to do anyhting about it...

That rates right up there with "Freedom is precious; so precious it must be rationed out carefully."  That is a quote from Iosef Stalin and I consider your quote in the exact same light.

-Polaris

Thank you.

Why on earth would you thank him for comparing your statement to one by Stalin? 

[IanPolaris]

Killjoy Cutter wrote...

EmperorSahlertz wrote...

IanPolaris wrote...

EmperorSahlertz wrote...

Much evil has been allowed to happen, because people didn't have the "right" to do anyhting about it...

That rates right up there with "Freedom is precious; so precious it must be rationed out carefully."  That is a quote from Iosef Stalin and I consider your quote in the exact same light.

-Polaris

Thank you.

Why on earth would you thank him for comparing your statement to one by Stalin? 

Because it's very much the same thing, that's why.  In both cases you are justifying morally abominable actions based on a (deliberate...at least in the case of Ieosef Stalin) misunderstanding of personal rights.  Essentially Emp is saying that the Tyranny of the Majority is always acceptable and it's not.

-Polaris

[Killjoy Cutter]

When you say "you", I assume you mean the general you, and not me specifically?

[IanPolaris]

Killjoy Cutter wrote...

When you say "you", I assume you mean the general you, and not me specifically?

Sorry I mean you generally, as in the casual version of "one".

-Polaris

[Dave of Canada]

The Quarantine analogy isn't too great, however. Should it be decided that the people in the Quarantine cannot be treated and are too dangerous, they'll let them die (the "how" depending on the officials in charge).

[Satyricon331]

Dave of Canada wrote...
The Quarantine analogy isn't too great, however. Should it be decided that the people in the Quarantine cannot be treated and are too dangerous, they'll let them die (the "how" depending on the officials in charge).

Alright, I'll bite.  How is that a problem for the quarantine analogy?  It seems beside the point to me, unless you mean to analogize to the RoA (by saying they are analogous where I've said they aren't), in which case the action-inaction distinction would still apply to say they're different for a rights-based theory.

[MichaelFinnegan]

Satyricon331 wrote...

Look, I'm not sure I see what the diificulty is.

Which is why I asked you to bear with me. I think it's not as simple as you're making it out to be, and I'm still discerning...

If a communicable disease is too rapidly lethal in too many of its hosts, it can't survive since the host dies before the disease can infect others (thus, that fact alone implies that if the virus is to survive there must be people who are merely carriers).

True, but what exactly is being "carried" by the carriers, the mages? That was my whole question earlier.

And mothers can pass viruses to their children, so there's no need to make it a genetic disease.

At least the "disease" you bring up isn't since it is merely transmitted from mother to kid, but magic supposedly is inherited, at least part of it.

There is no shifting definition - it just affects two sub-populations differently.

Here I think we arrive at the crux of the problem. If I'm not mistaken, in your analogy disease as it is being carried is supposed to represent merely the "potential" to become an abomination, which is as good as saying it is the magic in and of itself. This simply won't work because that is not how a real-life quarantine works - there must be at least one (or maybe two, come to think of it) abomination for it to work, i.e. when the disease has already manifested itself and has become a contagion, going by the analogy.

There are RL diseases that do so; West Nile virus is an example that has 3 sub-populations (apparently, via wiki, one sub-pop shows a "mild febrile syndrome," another has "a neuroinvasive disease," and the third group shows no symptoms).  In the hypothetical, I take that idea to a bit of an extreme, admittedly, but there's nothing that shifts the definition.

Let's look at that more closely. There is a statistical ratio in there for the affected population subcategories. WR : MR : SR = 110 : 30 : 1 (where, with my own labels, WR = weak reaction, M = mild, and S = strong). Apparently there is no vaccine for this, at least for humans, so one who gets it doesn't become immune. So, at various stages in life, it is reasonable to assume that if he gets it again, there is no certaintly into which category he'd fall - it might depend on the potency, the "volume" of the pathogen, and so on and so forth. The point is that the populations you mention is a shifting one. Whereas for magic, it isn't. When one gets it, it's for life.

Incubation periods for WNV is different, at least I didn't see that it is "for life," which I'd think'd play a big role in deciding whether a quarantine approach would be considered "reasonable" by the "affected" population, and so on.

Point being this: according to you, where exactly are the lines to be drawn between this analogy between a real life disease and "potential" for becoming abominations, aka just one of the "cons" of having magic?

Yes, I agree, but I wasn't discussing treatment  Just that quarantine can be a reasonable response (not that it always is/that circumstances can't exist where it's unreasonable).

Well, not treatment, then. Let's discuss the reasonableness of the approach. Who decides? And why should all mages agree? I thought the whole thing with this deal was that, long ago, when Tevinter Imperium fell from its mighty position, with things like the Inquisition hunting mages, the common folk fearing magic, it was in everyone's best interests to have formed the Circles, and "confined" mages to it. The question is whether that is still as reasonable an approach. And whether some quarantines, aka some Circles, aren't pushing mages toward another disaster.

Its precisely the individual's lack of volition in choosing whether to be a disease carrier in my analogy that makes it parallel to the mages, who did not choose to be mages.

Just to be clear once again, not choosing to be mages = not choosing to be disease carriers. So the disease itself is the "potential" for becoming abominations. I do not see then the disease to be different from magic - one cannot have the one without the other.

I analogized abominations to when carriers become transmitters, not to the disease itself or anything.  I left open the possibility there that there's a volitional aspect (like popping a pustule or spreading ooze or something) in shifting from carrier to transmitter, just like mages can choose to be abominations.

But what is the disease? Sorry to be asking this again and again. There are some things: the pathogen, the carrier, the contagion itself. This is thinking in terms of the disease. What exactly do these things mean when applied to the context of mages?

And I don't see import of your sentence, "And in order to carry the "communicable" disease analogy to the level of a quarantine one'd have to show at least one case of a disease actually existing in the said population."  Obviously in the hypothetical, the disease existed in the population.  Mages and abominations exist in the population.

But what constitutes the population? Surely, it cannot be every one of the mages, without considering the specific Circles involved. Looking at how quarantines work, it should at least have two individuals who are infected and are speading the disease. That is the whole reason why a quarantine is formed. It's after the fact. At any moment in the Circles, it's not clear whether there are at least two abominations who're being contained. So, really, are the two things even comparable?

And I didn't offer my opinion on how best to view Circles (other than to state that I think the RoA is bad).  I think your view of them is reasonable; all I was doing was defending the disease analogy.

Yes, I know. I'm merely debating the applicability of the analog itself. We might in fact agree about how the Circles work - so it might be irrelevant for our discussion. But to me labeling magic as a disease has consequences, and some of which I think is bad. Which is the whole reason why I'd like to understand whether the analogy is really applicable.

Modifié par MichaelFinnegan, 02 octobre 2011 - 05:29 .