300 réponses à ce sujet

[Rawgrim]

Something supernatural does not equal something divine. I see no reason whatsoever, according to the lore and the setting, that makes it impossible for anyone to be an atheist in Thedas.

[Auintus]

EntropicAngel wrote...

Gaider himself defined it as "not atheism." That's all I can tell you.

And, yes. But changing words makes them meaningless. There is either a stantardized definition, or series of definitions, but there is not "personal interpretation."

And on it just being the Maker--what about the Dalish? They have very distinct gods. Would not a disbelief in them also result in an "atheistic" viewpoint?

Well that's frustratingly unhelpful. Then again, I suppose the particular term doesn't matter, so much as what we intend by it.

There is a standard baseline. There is alwasy wiggle room for personal usage. What matters is the intent which is why I tried to clarify how I meant "atheist." Connotation and Denotation are the words here, I think.

Point taken. I thought the thread was only with regards to the Maker and the Chantry, considering the original Inquisition allied with the Chantry. I concede your point.

[MichaelStuart]

I support the options to be Atheist, Theist and Agnostic.

[Todd23]

No. They already said we can't be kossith.

[budzai]

ohh man are atheist really that depressed? they have to make a hundred threads about this?

Modifié par budzai, 19 novembre 2012 - 09:23 .

[Todd23]

budzai wrote...

ohh man are atheist really that depressed? they have to make a hundred threads about this?

https://encrypted-tb...8ypUtEfLOCd-Ohz

[Auintus]

EntropicAngel wrote...

Auintus wrote...

Well that's frustratingly unhelpful. Then again, I suppose the particular term doesn't matter, so much as what we intend by it.

There is a standard baseline. There is alwasy wiggle room for personal usage. What matters is the intent which is why I tried to clarify how I meant "atheist." Connotation and Denotation are the words here, I think.

Point taken. I thought the thread was only with regards to the Maker and the Chantry, considering the original Inquisition allied with the Chantry. I concede your point.

And I concede in reference to the middle.

Agreement? On the BSN? But, but...the world's not supposed to end yet.

budzai wrote...
ohh man are atheist really that depressed? they have to make a hundred threads about this?

Nonsense. Depressed people are depressed. Atheists don't believe in a god. There's no direct correlation between the two.

[Twisted Path]

Being a raging 21st-century-style atheist in a place that's basically medieval Europe under the heel of the church seems like a really bad idea. You would think people who don't believe Chantry dogma would keep that stuff to themselves for fear of being ostracized from society and/or killed.

[Herr Uhl]

Todd23 wrote...

No. They already said we can't be kossith.

But there are Qunari that aren't Kossith.

[Plaintiff]

Lotion Soronnar wrote...

I don't get this line of reasoning.

People claim to want proof of the supernatural.
Yet then they claim anything they can see and work with (ghost, spirits) is not supernatural (since it exists).

By that logic, the second you can "prove" supernatural it ceases to be supernatural. How then can one demand proof?

Seriously?

The "supernatural" is just a concept, defined as "any manifestation or event that is attributed to some force beyond scientific understanding or the laws of nature". If something is proven to exist, it ceases to be supernatural, but it doesn't cease to exist.

If science can observe and explain ghosts, just as an example, then they become a natural phenomenon, rather than a supernatural one, but the people who believed in and claimed to see those ghosts would still be completely validated.

[LobselVith8]

Flamingdropbear wrote...

As more of a real life atheist it tends to blead overing into ingame characters, from my talk with Ash in ME1, to various character in DA:O, but since it seems  I'll be playing the churches muscle in DA3 think that may limit my in game belief options.

It has nothing to do with real world beliefs for many people. The Chantry of Andraste is a fictional religion. Playing as a character who is atheist in a society dominated by a morally reprehensible and fictitious religion doesn't mean the player is atheist in real life. Personally, I don't see much point in playing a mage who believes in an anti-mage religion; simple enough. Some people simply want the same level of freedom that Origins provided for players. The Cousland and the Surana protagonists could express atheism in Dragon Age.

I played as an atheist Surana Warden. Hawke, in contrast, was a mostly pre-developed character who was religiously Andrastian, with no imput from me on the matter, and I really didn't warm up to the character. The game options were limited in the last game; it remains to be seen if Inquisition will continue that pattern, or return to the freedoms provided in Origins. From what was announced so far, I don't think that Inquisition is for me.

[Dabrikishaw]

xsdob wrote...

Silcron wrote...

xsdob wrote...

I think in the dragonage universe, where darkspawn, archedemons, actual demons, spirits, ghost, the spirit world, and all this other spiritual occurrences are not one shot events with no proof but actual physically observable occurrences that everyone knows about and can prove exist, that being atheist and proclaiming that nothing supernatural or spiritual exist in the world is a very illogical choice.


Atheist: I don't belive in the maker or in demons.
Normal person: But theres a demon attacking your villiage right now.
*Rage demon burns down house*
Atheist: Nope, doesn't exist. That's just more of your peoples mumbo jumbo religious bs.

Atheist means you don't believe in a supreme being, or several. In DA you would know demons are real, but there's no real proof the Maker exists. You just wouldn't believe the maker or whoever religion's god exists.

Why not just say can we choose to not believe in the maker? That would be a much easier, less charged, less massive conotations to it implication that the term atheist.

I'm agnostic myself, not enough things to convince me but there are some stuff that's a little too strange to just chalk up to cooincidence, so I'm on the fence about god and what type of god or gods there are.

That said, atheism from what I've seen has pretty much been against anything that can't be proven either scientifically or empirically, and that incluces the afterlife, magic, demons, spirits, the supernatural, and all of that.

It just seems much easier to say "let us be able to not believe in the maker" than to use the word associated with disbelieving all these things and working to prove they don't exist.

It's just a gripe, but I feel a different word would work better in this instance than the term atheist, but that's just me. Espically since you kinda prove the existence of jesus in this game back in dragon age 1.

This makes a lot of sense to do for the game.

[Phatose]

Atheism as exists in this world makes no sense in Dragon Age. A disbelief in a particular claim is uninteresting when no one is actually making it to begin with, and the maker is not equivalent to the Abrahamic god. Despite his name, the Maker didn't actually create everything according to the Chantry (Wynne: "Ohgren is a dwarf - they're not really from the Maker").

By comparison, a skeptical view of the specific claims the Chantry actually does make is perfectly reasonable and already established - one of the gifts for Wynne was a book particularly challenging the claims on Andraste, claiming she was actually just a powerful mage. That makes much more sense in universe.

[Varus Praetor]

Atheism in a fantasy game including magic, demons, spirits, and spirituality based healing makes about as much sense as Scientology does in the real world, which is to say, none.

[Silfren]

Okay, everyone trying to put forth the claim that atheism is a 21st century concept that has no place in a pseudo-Middle Ages setting...do a little research on the history of atheism. Start here: http://en.wikipedia....tory_of_atheism

While I'm at it, there are several characters in Dragon Age that come close enough to some form of atheism to make an argument for its existence in Thedas, including Morrigan, Avernus, and Aveline.  Morrigan makes it clear she does not believe in the Maker, and Avernus dismisses Chantry theology with the utmost scorn.  Aveline never calls herself an atheist, and I think it's more accurate to call her an agnostic, but the fact is, she explicitly states that she does not find the Chantry's claims compelling.

The definition of atheism has been rather fluid over the years, granted, and the current usage of it to mean someone who doesn't believe in any god of any sort, from any religion, ever, is not necessarily the end of the story.  I personally DO know individuals who don't believe in any gods because they don't believe there is any reliable evidence for such, but who DO find evidence of various supernatural phenomena compelling.  It is not a zero sum game at all--in the real world, individual atheists can and sometimes DO believe in ghosts while rejecting belief in god(s).  And in the context of Dragon Age, spirits and demons and the use of magic are ever-present, observable phenomena that aren't called into question for pretty much the same reason that gravity isn't called into question in the real world: within dragon age, spirits and demons have been experienced and observed by enough people that the documented evidence is incontrovertible.  The same is NOT true of the Maker, which is why it is not in the least bit illogical to believe in the one but reject the other.

Finally, don't forget that people are individuals.  It is not necessary for there to be a movement, a clearly delineated philosophy of atheism, for individual persons to simply not believe in any god or gods.  I assure you, throughout all of human history, there HAVE been people who met the definition of atheism insofar as it means not believing in any gods, full stop, even if they didn't subscribe to a conscious philosophy of atheism, or find a boatload of likeminded people with whom to relate.  To exist, atheism doesn't require anything more than a lack of--or loss of--belief in a deity, and that itself doesn't require a person to be exposed to a school of thought.  It can be as simple as not finding religious evidence compelling or interesting, or trauma that kills ones belief.  Or something else. 

Modifié par Silfren, 20 novembre 2012 - 05:53 .

[xsdob]

Reading this thread is fun.

[Solmanian]

In both DA games thus far, every time you encountered a religious figure you had allways had the following options (at the very least):

1. agree with them, and do the "praise andraste" dance.

2. tell them you respect their religion, but you're a pagan and happy to be one.

3. tell them to take their "holier than though" horse they rode in and f*** off.

I don't see bioware trying to shove religion down your throat (legion=jesus, not withstanding), especialy a fictional religion.

So, yeah. you can be an etheist (99% sure).

Just because you don't believe in the divine, doesn't mean you don't care about people killing eachoder in his name. Quite the opposite.

[Kaiser Arian XVII]

Natural vs Supernatural
What if ... nature is just a program?
So does Supernatural achieves some kind of reality with this scenario, and Natural loses its sacred materialist place?

[Truffle]

If you played the human noble storyline in DAO you could tell the priest that you didn't believe in the Maker.

But seriously people it's a game.

[Solmanian]

Varus Praetor wrote...

Atheism in a fantasy game including magic, demons, spirits, and spirituality based healing makes about as much sense as Scientology does in the real world, which is to say, none.

I say thee NAY!
If anything quite the opposite. One theory says that andraste wasn't a saintly "bride of the maker" chosen one; but simply a powerfull mage, not much better than the tevinter magisters. the fact that the tevinter magisters are villefied in the chant is supporting of that theory, since she would view them as her main competition.

If everyone could raise the dead, summon firestorms to decimate their enemies, and conjure things out of thin air, contemporary religions would've been drastically different.

[brushyourteeth]

Solmanian wrote...

I don't see bioware trying to shove religion down your throat (legion=jesus, not withstanding), especialy a fictional religion.

Legion= Jesus, really? I don't hang around the ME forums much, but just what the whaat?
I didn't get that at all. And the reference in the Bible he's named after is about a bunch of demons sharing one body.

(sorry to be off-topic, but mind=blown)

[Xilizhra]

brushyourteeth wrote...

Solmanian wrote...

I don't see bioware trying to shove religion down your throat (legion=jesus, not withstanding), especialy a fictional religion.

Legion= Jesus, really? I don't hang around the ME forums much, but just what the whaat?
I didn't get that at all. And the reference in the Bible he's named after is about a bunch of demons sharing one body.

(sorry to be off-topic, but mind=blown)

Well... Legion dies to save the geth, is shown effectively crucified at one point... there are definitely parallels.

[Lotion Soronarr]

Plaintiff wrote...

Lotion Soronnar wrote...

I don't get this line of reasoning.

People claim to want proof of the supernatural.
Yet then they claim anything they can see and work with (ghost, spirits) is not supernatural (since it exists).

By that logic, the second you can "prove" supernatural it ceases to be supernatural. How then can one demand proof?

Seriously?

The "supernatural" is just a concept, defined as "any manifestation or event that is attributed to some force beyond scientific understanding or the laws of nature". If something is proven to exist, it ceases to be supernatural, but it doesn't cease to exist.

If science can observe and explain ghosts, just as an example, then they become a natural phenomenon, rather than a supernatural one, but the people who believed in and claimed to see those ghosts would still be completely validated.

Yes seriously.
People want proof of the existence of a supreeme God, but if they ever had such proof, they wouldn't regard him as God anymore.