White Wolf's World of Darkness

[TheLastOne]

If you have access to a Euthanatos archmage, that sentence is two letters too long.

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Sure, the Good Death is very much an aspect of the Euthanatos. Though for all that they are focused on killing, the Euthanatos tend to kill less then every other fraction in the Ascension War. All the factions raise and train assassins in one flavor or another. The Euthanatos feel guilt over it, though.

Whether that makes it better or worse is an interesting debate.

 

[BiopunkOtrera]

At this point, why not just use the Seers of the Throne?

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Because they're not nearly as interesting. For one thing, they don't have much in the way of an interesting aesthetic, and for another thing they're basically just evil. If you want to fight just evil then use the Nephandi.

Like, you're totally misrepresenting what you're being told here. The Technocracy wants universal ascension. It's just it's idea of universal ascension also requires a stasis locked, predictable universe. There's nothing necessarily dystopian about that. Like, does the fact that you probably don't really have free will actually affect you in any way? I mean, I, in reality right now, believe that the idea of actually free will in any kind of real sense is pretty unlikely. The universe isn't predictable (because of chaos theory) but whether or not I have free will will not determine whether I'm happy or not.

Is it bad and evil right on its face to be a Lensman Aresian, who can visualize the full state of the universe to almost its end through pure rationality and clear thinking? Because frankly, that sounds a lot like ascension to me.

The idea the Technocracy is a vanguard party trying for universal ascension, and that they're trying to create a universe of perfect predictability aren't in any way opposed.

See, you say that, but human history is largely about people learning to control their surroundings for fun, profit, and (very occasionally) the good of others.

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Yeah, but it's when those surroundings become people you have more of a problem.

 

[linkhyrule5]

... I mean, I think "The Technocracy turns us into the Culture" is a pretty Good End. It's not the Best End, the Golden Ending, but I don't know that I'm even capable of conceiving of such a thing, especially without a whole lot of sociology to understand where the limits are.

Also, your argument is directly contradictory to your last one, which is that "literally nobody wants the ending the Technocracy do." Or was that @TheLastOne?

 

[TheLastOne]

... I mean, I think "The Technocracy turns us into the Culture" is a pretty Good End. It's not the Best End, the Golden Ending, but I don't know that I'm even capable of conceiving of such a thing, especially without a whole lot of sociology to understand where the limits are.

Also, your argument is directly contradictory to your last one, which is that "literally nobody wants the ending the Technocracy do." Or was that @TheLastOne?

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Eh, both of us. Though you're simplifying here - the end-state with the Technocrats is much more the Polity, with the Technocracy playing the role of the A.I.s, then it is the Culture. Minds have entirely to much respect for you and your individuality to be the Technocracy. If there isn't uncomfortable paternalism in there, it doesn't follow from them.

 

[BiopunkOtrera]

... I mean, I think "The Technocracy turns us into the Culture" is a pretty Good End. It's not the Best End, the Golden Ending, but I don't know that I'm even capable of conceiving of such a thing, especially without a whole lot of sociology to understand where the limits are.

Also, your argument is directly contradictory to your last one, which is that "literally nobody wants the ending the Technocracy do." Or was that @TheLastOne?

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It's a good ending, but I don't think even the culture lines up against like, "we all become magical gods."

 

[linkhyrule5]

... That's basically what the Technocracy is trying to do, though...? "Turn magic into something anyone can use, until there's no difference between Sphere magic and linear sorcery."

When anyone can sit in their home and order their closet to turn into a TARDIS, complete with Dyson sphere and swimming pool, the difference between that and "magic god" is pretty academic...

 

[Chehrazad]

I've noticed that when you claim that the Technocracy wants a predictable clockwork universe, you don't actually prove that they want that; like come on and find me some citations please?

It's a good ending, but I don't think even the culture lines up against like, "we all become magical gods."

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Please provide a citation that this is actually possible, or even works like that. I'm tired of qupting Guide to the Technocracy to no effect, so I'd like for someone else to quote books to no effect now.

 

[BiopunkOtrera]

I've noticed that when you claim that the Technocracy wants a predictable clockwork universe, you don't actually prove that they want that; like come on and find me some citations please?

Please provide a citation that this is actually possible, or even works like that. I'm tired of qupting Guide to the Technocracy to no effect, so I'd like for someone else to quote books to no effect now.

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I'm not actually sure where it comes from right now It might actually be first edition, however actually, it does persist in later editions because that's what the Technocracy paradigm demands.

The reason quantum/chaos theories are etheric is because they break the Technocracy paradigm as is, which is basically classical physics.

 

[Chehrazad]

I'm not actually sure where it comes from right now It might actually be first edition, however actually, it does persist in later editions because that's what the Technocracy paradigm demands.

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Obviously, since you can't provide a citation at the exact moment I provide it, this must mean that you are objectively wrong and debating in bad faith; therefore I have objectively won the debate.

The reason quantum/chaos theories are etheric is because they break the Technocracy paradigm as is, which is basically classical physics.

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I don't really know about that actually? Like quantum theory was introduced by the Etherites according to their blurb in the core and their own Tradition book, but quantum theory was introduced in the 19th century (with the discovery of cathode rays, the black-body radiation problem and the suggestion that energy states could be discrete), which suggests to me that the modern Technocratic Union (especially now that Control is dead ) would mostly consider it a part of their paradigm; I am frankly unsure whether you can actually consider that the Union's endgame anymore, even if it was their endgame originally.

 

[BiopunkOtrera]

Obviously, since you can't provide a citation at the exact moment I provide it, this must mean that you are objectively wrong and debating in bad faith; therefore I have objectively won the debate.

I don't really know about that actually? Like quantum theory was introduced by the Etherites according to their blurb in the core and their own Tradition book, but quantum theory was introduced in the 19th century (with the discovery of cathode rays, the black-body radiation problem and the suggestion that energy states could be discrete), which suggests to me that the modern Technocratic Union (especially now that Control is dead ) would mostly consider it a part of their paradigm; I am frankly unsure whether you can actually consider that the Union's endgame anymore, even if it was their endgame originally.

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Quantum and Chaos Theory actually render a lot of the best stuff the Technocracy can do vulgar, so I doubt it. Both limit predictability and precision, and make perfect knowledge (and thus perfect reason) impossible.

For instance, without Chaos Theory, a Itx statistician can sit down, look at a slate of data and then tell you what the weather is going to do next year, or what the market will do, or who in a given population is a traitor. After it. . . they can still do all that, it's just that it'll be vulgar now.

Personally, I think it's much more i the technocacy's paradigm isn't an exact fit with the modern understanding of science. It means the traditions aren't just shouting into the void, and makes them in general kind of more interesting.

 

[EarthScorpion]

Quantum and Chaos Theory actually render a lot of the best stuff the Technocracy can do vulgar, so I doubt it. Both limit predictability and precision, and make perfect knowledge (and thus perfect reason) impossible.

For instance, without Chaos Theory, a Itx statistician can sit down, look at a slate of data and then tell you what the weather is going to do next year, or what the market will do, or who in a given population is a traitor. After it. . . they can still do all that, it's just that it'll be vulgar now.

Personally, I think it's much more i the technocacy's paradigm isn't an exact fit with the modern understanding of science. It means the traditions aren't just shouting into the void, and makes them in general kind of more interesting.

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No, you just like asserting that.

By contrast, I'd argue that Chaos Theory is how the Technocratic paradigm justifies in-paradigm the fact that Time magic isn't precise. Choiristers justify Prime spells failing with "your faith wasn't strong enough"; Dreamspeakers justify Life spells to heal someone failing with "the disease spirits were too strong"; Technocrats justify the fact that Time magic is imprecise and fails with "chaos theory means that that small deviations in chaotic systems can produce large changes in the end model". Solid paradigms can explain their own failings. Paradigms which can't self-justify when they fail are more vulnerable to mutation and changing - so the universalist paradigm that the Technocracy promotes has to be very good at explaining why sometimes your magic goes wrong.

And the bits of the gameline which ascribe "quantum physics" to the same Etherites who denied Relativity are, bluntly, ignorant. It's the same understanding of quantum mechanic that spiritualists use to claim whatever quackery they're currently claiming, because it was written by people who thought that quantum was just magic. For fuck's sake, the same Einstein who the Etherites reject for relativity also produced:

Article:

"According to the assumption to be contemplated here, when a light ray is spreading from a point, the energy is not distributed continuously over ever-increasing spaces, but consists of a finite number of 'energy quanta' that are localized in points in space, move without dividing, and can be absorbed or generated only as a whole."

which is often considered to be one of the most revolutionary sentences written by a physicist of the twentieth century. Then more foundations are laid by Louis de Broglie, the man who lead the French Academy of Sciences and also laid the foundations for CERN, literally the most Technocratic science programme (with the possible exception of the Manhattan Project) ever. And then you've got Schrodinger, who spent much of his later life working on a Unified Field Theory with Einstein.

To ascribe quantum mechanics to the Etherites when the Etherites are literally named after their rejection of relativity, you have to assert that the Technocracy is lying to everyone and they gave the credit for QM to other parties. And by that point, you're conceding defeat on the ill-informed nature of the writers when you have to literally conjure up a conspiracy theory to justify a badly written bit of background.

 

[BiopunkOtrera]

No, you just like asserting that.

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LOL. This from a guy who makes a big post like this and makes no argument what so ever? You didn't actually present any argument as to why Chaos Theory or Quantum Theory would be technocratic as opposed to mess them up.

Let's be real here. The technology not being modern science, unless one is just looking to go to bat for them, a far more interesting way to visuallize the ascension war, with the Traditions making breaks into the consensus and scoring ideological victories with the masses. It's the same reason why the internet and smart phones should be the invention of the virtual adept. Because it means that stuff is happening rather than just the technocracy explaining some thing in it's paradigm.

To ascribe quantum mechanics to the Etherites when the Etherites are literally named after their rejection of relativity, you have to assert that the Technocracy is lying to everyone and they gave the credit for QM to other parties. And by that point, you're conceding defeat on the ill-informed nature of the writers when you have to literally conjure up a conspiracy theory to justify a badly written bit of background.

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I'd just give the etherites relativity too to be honest. It fits their world view far better than the technocracy,

 

[ChineseDrone]

I'd just give the etherites relativity too to be honest. It fits their world view far better than the technocracy,

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...what?

The fact that the Etherites reject relativity is, like, literally why they are Etherites.

It'd be like deciding that making the Technocracy also religious fundamentalism and anarcho-primitivism just because

 

[Chehrazad]

What, @FBH would you actually let the Union have under this model? Please, inform me; this intriques me and I want to understand your position.

 

[EarthScorpion]

...what?

The fact that the Etherites reject relativity is, like, literally why they are Etherites.

It'd be like deciding that making the Technocracy also religious fundamentalism and anarcho-primitivism just because

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It's not just that! He's also rejecting the idea that the Technocracy is Big Science and Organised Science, while the Etherites are Mad Science and Discredited Science.

 

[TheLastOne]

No, you just like asserting that.

By contrast, I'd argue that Chaos Theory is how the Technocratic paradigm justifies in-paradigm the fact that Time magic isn't precise. Choiristers justify Prime spells failing with "your faith wasn't strong enough"; Dreamspeakers justify Life spells to heal someone failing with "the disease spirits were too strong"; Technocrats justify the fact that Time magic is imprecise and fails with "chaos theory means that that small deviations in chaotic systems can produce large changes in the end model". Solid paradigms can explain their own failings. Paradigms which can't self-justify when they fail are more vulnerable to mutation and changing - so the universalist paradigm that the Technocracy promotes has to be very good at explaining why sometimes your magic goes wrong.

And the bits of the gameline which ascribe "quantum physics" to the same Etherites who denied Relativity are, bluntly, ignorant. It's the same understanding of quantum mechanic that spiritualists use to claim whatever quackery they're currently claiming, because it was written by people who thought that quantum was just magic. For fuck's sake, the same Einstein who the Etherites reject for relativity also produced:

Article:

"According to the assumption to be contemplated here, when a light ray is spreading from a point, the energy is not distributed continuously over ever-increasing spaces, but consists of a finite number of 'energy quanta' that are localized in points in space, move without dividing, and can be absorbed or generated only as a whole."

which is often considered to be one of the most revolutionary sentences written by a physicist of the twentieth century. Then more foundations are laid by Louis de Broglie, the man who lead the French Academy of Sciences and also laid the foundations for CERN, literally the most Technocratic science programme (with the possible exception of the Manhattan Project) ever. And then you've got Schrodinger, who spent much of his later life working on a Unified Field Theory with Einstein.

To ascribe quantum mechanics to the Etherites when the Etherites are literally named after their rejection of relativity, you have to assert that the Technocracy is lying to everyone and they gave the credit for QM to other parties. And by that point, you're conceding defeat on the ill-informed nature of the writers when you have to literally conjure up a conspiracy theory to justify a badly written bit of background.

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I know you loath the Etherites, but their leaving had nothing to do with Einstein or Relativity, and conflating them is deeply misleading to people trying to understand the Mage timeline of events. They left in 1904 when Control voted the Ether of out existence. They left abruptly after that, which created problems as they were expected to provide the replacement framework now that Ether had been removed.

Einstein didn't publish his theory of Relativity until 1905. Ether had already been discredited by that point. It was only partly about ether anyways. The divide was over what could be shared with the masses, vs. reserved for the Union. The Electrodyne Engineers left because they felt Control was betraying the ideal of invention and exploration in favor of reliable security.

Relativity is a side-show and a distraction.

 

[Chehrazad]

I don't know, but even ignoring the fact that @EarthScorpion is my friend; I feel more inclined to trust the actual physicist with matters of physics to be quite honest.

 

[linkhyrule5]

No, he has a point. Michelson-Morley was the experiment that pretty much nailed down ether as not existing, and that was a solid year before Einstein formalized relativity - they're separate events. We knew that something was up for a while before that, because the Maxwell equations that get you the speed of light leaves no dependence on your reference frame, but not precisely what, and until M-M we assumed that Maxwell was wrong and not Newtonian velocity vector addition.

That being said, it's still weird to say that Einstein was backed by the Etherites, given that he was the one that produced a viable alternative to the ether and got the scientific community behind him - thus shifting Consensus in the oMage world. The Etherites would've much preferred to have somehow discredited M-M, and intuition/the Consensus would've been on their side - Lorentzian velocity addition is weird as hell to a common sense that grew up in a context where 60 mph was "blazing fast." They had every reason to believe it was possible and every reason to try, so Einstein doesn't fit.

 

[MJ12 Commando]

So @FBH after the Technocracy told everyone alchemy and astrology were bad, I suppose in your world the Hermetics just removed those from their paradigm. And don't forget, after they disproved the existence of spirits, the Dreamspeakers suddenly stopped being able to do all magic, ever.

Or is it that the Technocracy, because you want them to be chumps, is the only organization which ends up taking body blows to its core paradigm? Because the scientific consensus is the Technocratic consensus. Given that the Technocracy recruits almost exclusively from science and technology, and most of its people are steeped into what the scientific paradigm is of the day, you declaring that the Etherites 'snuck in' chaos theory or quantum mechanics into the consensus is like saying 'the Technocracy made it so that the Dreamspeakers stopped existing by declaring spirits twaddle one day.'

This is stupid because paradigms should be involate to external influence. They're by definition what the organization in question believes. If you can force someone to change their paradigm, you have basically all but won. You confuse paradigm with consensus, which is not fully scientific.

Your 'solution' is to make the Technocracy the Seers of the Throne. Again. By deciding that their paradigm isn't so heavily tied to modern science and scientific theory, that they can just declare that the currently accepted rules of the community are the sleepers getting it wrong because of lies, that they can just reject shit like chaos theory and quantum mechanics out of hand. This keeps coming up. You want the Technocracy to be the Seers of the Throne, and despite all your protestations every time you make a concrete suggestion it's "let's make the Technocracy the Seers of the Throne."

But apparently if Mage doesn't involve "oh hey we edited the Technocratic paradigm and they just rolled over and accepted it because lol Traditions rule Technos drool" the only reason for someone to reject something as dumb as that shit is because they're going to bat for the Technocracy. Not because it's a dumb suggestion. Not because it makes the Technocracy chumps. Not because it betrays a fundamental understanding of the difference between paradigm and consensus. Not because it's the equivalent of suggesting that after the Technocracy said there was no such thing as spirits, the Dreamspeakers went 'ok i guess we're all dumb' and disappeared in a puff of logic.

Apparently the guys who wrote Sons of Ether Revised were also only going to bat for the Technocracy I guess.

 

[Godwinson]

Apparently the guys who wrote Sons of Ether Revised were also only going to bat for the Technocracy I guess.

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Yeah, but that's Revised Edition. Only First Edition Mage is the real Mage. </sarcasm>

 

[MJ12 Commando]

Like, as a reminder, oMage authors were loath to retcon shit. They just quietly deprecated things they didn't like or said it was a stereotype that was misleading, e.g. the soulless Technocrat stereotype or the idea that Euthanatos were serial killer psychos. They made up a huge metaplot reason as to why they deemphasized the role of the old masters and Control and why paradox and the dice system had been shifted to Revised. They would jump through massive hoops to avoid saying 'welp things were always like this.'

One of the few things in Mage that was ever explicitly retconned is the inane twaddle that the Etherites snuck quantum mechanics into the Technocratic scientific paradigm.

That should tell you how important it was considered by the Mage writers to remove that shit from the game.

 

[The Laurent]

So @FBH after the Technocracy told everyone alchemy and astrology were bad, I suppose in your world the Hermetics just removed those from their paradigm. And don't forget, after they disproved the existence of spirits, the Dreamspeakers suddenly stopped being able to do all magic, ever.

Or is it that the Technocracy, because you want them to be chumps, is the only organization which ends up taking body blows to its core paradigm? Because the scientific consensus is the Technocratic consensus. Given that the Technocracy recruits almost exclusively from science and technology, and most of its people are steeped into what the scientific paradigm is of the day, you declaring that the Etherites 'snuck in' chaos theory or quantum mechanics into the consensus is like saying 'the Technocracy made it so that the Dreamspeakers stopped existing by declaring spirits twaddle one day.'

This is stupid because paradigms should be involate to external influence. They're by definition what the organization in question believes. If you can force someone to change their paradigm, you have basically all but won. You confuse paradigm with consensus, which is not fully scientific.

Your 'solution' is to make the Technocracy the Seers of the Throne. Again. By deciding that their paradigm isn't so heavily tied to modern science and scientific theory, that they can just declare that the currently accepted rules of the community are the sleepers getting it wrong because of lies, that they can just reject shit like chaos theory and quantum mechanics out of hand. This keeps coming up. You want the Technocracy to be the Seers of the Throne, and despite all your protestations every time you make a concrete suggestion it's "let's make the Technocracy the Seers of the Throne."

But apparently if Mage doesn't involve "oh hey we edited the Technocratic paradigm and they just rolled over and accepted it because lol Traditions rule Technos drool" the only reason for someone to reject something as dumb as that shit is because they're going to bat for the Technocracy. Not because it's a dumb suggestion. Not because it makes the Technocracy chumps. Not because it betrays a fundamental understanding of the difference between paradigm and consensus. Not because it's the equivalent of suggesting that after the Technocracy said there was no such thing as spirits, the Dreamspeakers went 'ok i guess we're all dumb' and disappeared in a puff of logic.

Apparently the guys who wrote Sons of Ether Revised were also only going to bat for the Technocracy I guess.

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Still, shouldn't the Traditions be able to influence the Consensus? If neither the VA and the SoE have actually made any strides in the Consensus, then what's the point? And considering how varied many of the Technocratic beliefs are (or at least, they clearly have 'scientific' disagreements) over time this should create, you know, friction? As people raised in a Consensus influenced by "X" check X out[1] and, since they're not working off the Purple Paradigm, find that, "While this or that claim is overstated, there is some truth in yada yada, etc, etc" unless there's mind-editors literally standing behind them at all times making sure that they damn their lying eyes.

[1] When it's "Technocracy Adjacent" like some of the Traditions are, that is. Obviously, a Technocrat who says, "Hey, I think spirits are real and prayer cures AIDs" is sorta doomed.

 

[MJ12 Commando]

Still, shouldn't the Traditions be able to influence the Consensus? If neither the VA and the SoE have actually made any strides in the Consensus, then what's the point? And considering how varied many of the Technocratic beliefs are (or at least, they clearly have 'scientific' disagreements) over time this should create, you know, friction? As people raised in a Consensus influenced by "X" check X out and, since they're not working off the Purple Paradigm, find that, "While this or that claim is overstated, there is some truth in yada yada, etc, etc."

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Sure, the trick is that the scientific paradigm is not the consensus. The things scientists believe about how the world works are similar, but not quite identical, to the overall consensus, which is significantly friendlier to mystical magi than the scientific paradigm is. And sure, the Technocracy has to explain anomalies which occur, because the consensus.

The thing is, the explanations are their own paradigm's. The Technocracy declaring spirits don't exist isn't just adopted wholesale by the Dreamspeakers. The Dreamspeakers go 'spirits are just hidden, because the Gauntlet blah blah blah persecution blah blah blah fuck you Technocrats.' Similarly, the Sons of Ether and Choristers might go 'well you can't predict everything, because free will is core to the souls of man!' and then the Technocracy might say 'well actually, it's not free will, but because the universe is probabilistic rather than deterministic' ha ha take that you motherfuckers. As you get closer and closer into the heady fields of theoretical science, you get farther and farther away from the consensus and closer and closer to the technocracy's paradigm. And quantum theory is pretty much at that point where it makes far more sense as an explanation in-paradigm for why certain things happen than as a foreign cancer introduced into the Technocratic paradigm that they hate and secretly want to get rid of.

You can force a paradigm to explain why a certain thing occurs. "If the universe is at its core run by knowable rules," someone might ask, "why does predicting based off of them keep failing" and the Technocrats go and invent chaos theory while the Ecstatics say it's because of human rationality preventing us from seeing the truth in the mists of time and the Hermetics say 'well it actually is predictable, as long as you do it right, stop fucking doing it wrong.'

That's a pretty common refrain for the Hermetics. "Actually X thing always happens reliably if you do it right, stop fucking it up you fuckup."

 

[The Laurent]

Sure, the trick is that the scientific paradigm is not the consensus. The things scientists believe about how the world works are similar, but not quite identical, to the overall consensus, which is significantly friendlier to mystical magi than the scientific paradigm is. And sure, the Technocracy has to explain anomalies which occur, because the consensus.

The thing is, the explanations are their own paradigm's. The Technocracy declaring spirits don't exist isn't just adopted wholesale by the Dreamspeakers. The Dreamspeakers go 'spirits are just hidden, because the Gauntlet blah blah blah persecution blah blah blah fuck you Technocrats.' Similarly, the Sons of Ether and Choristers might go 'well you can't predict everything, because free will is core to the souls of man!' and then the Technocracy might say 'well actually, it's not free will, but because the universe is probabilistic rather than deterministic' ha ha take that you motherfuckers. As you get closer and closer into the heady fields of theoretical science, you get farther and farther away from the consensus and closer and closer to the technocracy's paradigm. And quantum theory is pretty much at that point where it makes far more sense as an explanation in-paradigm for why certain things happen than as a foreign cancer introduced into the Technocratic paradigm that they hate and secretly want to get rid of.

You can force a paradigm to explain why a certain thing occurs. "If the universe is at its core run by knowable rules," someone might ask, "why does predicting based off of them keep failing" and the Technocrats go and invent chaos theory while the Ecstatics say it's because of human rationality preventing us from seeing the truth in the mists of time and the Hermetics say 'well it actually is predictable, as long as you do it right, stop fucking doing it wrong.'

That's a pretty common refrain for the Hermetics. "Actually X thing always happens reliably if you do it right, stop fucking it up you fuckup."

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Thing is, if you're forcing a paradigm to explain something, you're forcing it to change in a small way. Do you think that the Technocracy Paradigm of the 1800s would see Chaos Theory as legitimate? Or, pick a date and a belief that went into fashion and then went out of fashion. Don't you have Technocrats in your Quest playing around with psychic stuff, and then dropping it? (Representing the CIA experiments and etc) or so on and so forth?

If you force facts that lead to a paradigm changing, you're changing a paradigm, even if it's not exactly some 'foreign cancer victory' or whatever.

 

[Cosar]

Thing is, if you're forcing a paradigm to explain something, you're forcing it to change in a small way. Do you think that the Technocracy Paradigm of the 1800s would see Chaos Theory as legitimate? Or, pick a date and a belief that went into fashion and then went out of fashion. Don't you have Technocrats in your Quest playing around with psychic stuff, and then dropping it? (Representing the CIA experiments and etc) or so on and so forth?

If you force facts that lead to a paradigm changing, you're changing a paradigm, even if it's not exactly some 'foreign cancer victory' or whatever.

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I think the difference is between forcing someone to react to you as opposed to deciding how they react to you. The latter is what MJ12 seems to be objecting to, not the idea that various groups have to react to each other, if I'm reading the arguments correctly.