What atheism looks like in pathfinder world?


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Silver Crusade

The Sideromancer wrote:
Saldiven wrote:

If you stick to the strict definition of "atheism," I'd have a hard time accepting anyone could actually be an atheist in Golarion. Atheism means that a person doesn't believe in the existence of a god or gods.

Now, an antitheist would be very possible. Antitheism is more complicated and nuanced, but in general they opposed religions in general. Some might believe that a god or gods exist, but that they are not worthy of worship. Others merely oppose organized churches of a god or gods.

Something that's been pointed out in a previous thread, magic is not necessarily divine. A cleric can heal you, but so can a bard. We know the bard doesn't need a god to do so, why should the cleric?

Bard uses arcane song magic.

Cleric uses divine magic.

Creative Director, Starfinder Team

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The thing I love about this thread is that the arguments are exactly the same sort of ones that people living in Golarion would be having. This is basically one giant roleplaying session. :)

Shadow Lodge

I certainly have no idea what you mean, Mr. Sutter. :)


TriOmegaZero wrote:
Saldiven wrote:
If you stick to the strict definition of "atheism," I'd have a hard time accepting anyone could actually be an atheist in Golarion. Atheism means that a person doesn't believe in the existence of a god or gods.
You could deny that the 'gods' are actually deities and just powerful outsiders, but that is semantics for the most part.

Mostly "what is and isn't atheism" is semantics for the most part anyway. People are rarely defined by what they don't much think about/care for and those that are so defined aren't generally that interesting, so I wouldn't recommend playing characters like that.


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Jessica Price wrote:
In terms of PFRPG alignment, there's a difference between the Sarenite Church tolerating slavery versus supporting it. And Sedeq is an outlier in Qadiran culture, not representative of it.

(So I just want to preface this with a minor apology, because I'm aware most of the decisions about Golarion and Qadira were made awhile ago, and I know that the reason to defend it is because the Ottoman Empire, Persian Empire, Arabian Caliphate, etc were so cool! And you guys want to explore the Golarion expy of it so that players can go experience all that awesome stuff. But this bit is a sticking point for me.)

I can't really accept the idea that Sedeq is an outlier in Qadiran culture, its a cornerstone. An unsavory cornerstone, a cornerstone maybe they don't like. But its the center of the slave trade, and slavery is not an outlier in Qadira. Maybe they don't want to think about the place where the people they've bought for their harems and mines had their will broken, but Sedeq is central to one of their cultural practices. At the start of the Grand Campaign, Qadira attacked and enslaved the city of Zimar. If they make war with Taldor again, I very much doubt they will be more lenient this time around, and the slaves they take have to be sent somewhere.

Actually, this is the reason I get angrier about the Qadiran slave trade than I do about it in Cheliax or Okeno. Because I am aware Qadira is not unique in having slaves, but it does seem unique in that it isn't denounced for it, or opposed in it. Not even by the powers I thought would be most against it.

Cheliax has slaves and treats them brutally, but Cheliax is evil and described as a fading empire run by Devils. Cheliax is an antagonist.

The Okeno slavers terrorize the Inner Sea, trying to keep the slave pens of Sedeq and Katapesh full, but again, they're evil. In most cases you're working against them.

There are slaves in the Shackles, but those are bloodthirsty Pirates. Slaves or serfs in Taldor, but Taldor is treated as a pathetic relic that's just going to die or be enslaved by Qadira. Hobgoblin slavers, they're evil. Katapesh has slavers, but at the very least they're morally bankrupt traders that buy and sell anything.

When it comes to Qadira though, their Empire is blessed by the Goddess of Healing and Redemption. A big fuss is constantly made about how culturally advanced they are, how wealthy they are. The great size of the Padishah Empire, all the many wonders of it. And it feels like they're the only ones 'getting away with it', so to speak.

Sedeq is NOT an outlier of Qadiran culture. It is everything wrong with it. And the reason I get an itchier trigger finger about the Qadiran slave trade is the feeling that no one else is going to do anything about it. The one force in Qadira that you might figure SHOULD be opposing it, instead ignores it. So when I think about slavery in Cheliax, I can at least think "I hope some Paladins of Iomedae help those people!" or with Okeno I can think "Thank goodness the Gray Corsairs are opposing those fiends!"

When I read about Sedeq though, and how the Church of Sarenrae isn't going to do anything to help them, my thoughts are just "No one else is going to help them, so I'm going to take this sword and start killing until the work is done."

To swing back around to the topic of Atheists in Golarion, that Paladin of Sarenrae idea I had became an idea for a fallen Paladin, or a Cleric of Gorum, because I just hate Sedeq that much. I never got to play that, we've never been near enough to Qadira for me to go nuts, but its my first idea for anything near there. I know its not 'real' atheism, but a strong reason for people turning against the Gods is just seeing what they or their Church allow. I was honestly VERY much into Sarenrae, she was the perfect Goddess for a Paladin character that I just LOVED playing. But the idea that a city like Sedeq would go unopposed by her Church, that felt like a betrayal of what I thought she was supposed to support. And that led to just leaving the idea of following her or her teachings, because SOMEONE had to stand against the slave trade in Qadira. Not an in-character progression, but I do think that is a fair idea of how an 'atheistic' character could come about in Golarion.


I think a lot of it is differing views on the different types of slavery between someone from the past and a more 20th century view. Back then, slavery was seen as a mercy to prisoners of war. It wasn't really limited to a certain ethnic group. It was prisoners of war and debtors that were stuck there. And depending on the country, many were treated well or poorly. Some had legal protections while others did not.

Mind you, I'm not excusing slavery. It's a deplorable institution that destroys the culture and subjugates the humanity of man. But it is important to remember this perspective.

Of course, even back then, you had abolitionists and free thinkers that blasted the practice as inhumane. And I think that would be perfect for a cleric of Sarenrae that feels deeply that the church has strayed too far from the path of good and redemption. And since words haven't helped, the cleric feels it is time for action. They may still be merciful to plantation owners and nobles with slaves. But ultimately, the cleric goes out and fights for abolitionist legislature by day, and frees slaves from their owners by night.

Maybe she gets a vision from Sarenrae to do this. Many ask why Sarenrae wouldn't just change things herself, and really, she is using your cleric and other like minded individuals to enact change. I say roll with it. It's a great story and a great adventure that I'd like to run one day.

Grand Lodge

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Possibly an excellent story for an AP.

Project Manager

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Xerres wrote:
I can't really accept the idea that Sedeq is an outlier in Qadiran culture, its a cornerstone. An unsavory cornerstone, a cornerstone maybe they don't like. But its the center of the slave trade, and slavery is not an outlier in Qadira.

No, it's not a cornerstone. It operates extralegally. Qadira's an exception in Kelesh given how warlike it is, and Sedeq's an exception even in Qadira.

Quote:
Maybe they don't want to think about the place where the people they've bought for their harems

Harems are relatively uncommon in Kelesh, especially given that descent is matrilineal, and are generally the domain of the imperial family. And those function more like harems in Imperial China, where consorts and concubines are chosen as much for political alliances as they are for sexual attraction--i.e. not slaves.

Look, I get that the Qadira Player Companion spent most of the Katheer section talking about slavery, as if that's all there was to the culture there, and that it was all, "ooh, concubines! female slaves! woot! harems! genie harems! genie concubines! eunuchs!"

It had two jobs, which were "make this interesting" and "don't make these people into bloodthirsty Arab harem pants slaver Arabian Nights stereotypes." The first one's subjective. It failed at the second, which is very unfortunate, given that the way the Keleshites were originally set up were as a matrilineal society with an empire based on pre-Islamic Persia that spread their reach economically rather than militarily. Moreover, it didn't seem to process what matrilineality would actually change about how such a culture would look compared to real-world cultures, let alone how different it would look from Western Orientalist fantasies. And let's not even get IN to how absurd eunuch harem guards are in a matrilineal society. (And to be fair to the PC, even the description of Qadira in the Inner Sea World Guide was already starting to go that direction.)

Then, on top of that, you have a lot of other material, like PFS scenarios, written by people who either built on what the PC did, despite that not really jiving with the original description of the Keleshites, or who just assumed Qadira=Arabian Nights and went from there.

One of the main reasons for doing a Qadira campaign setting was to redirect that.

As far as Zimar, you've gotten the side of the story based on Taldor being assumed as a major homeland for PCs (heck, "Common" is Taldane), and Qadira set up largely as an antagonist to Taldor, rather than as a functioning country and culture in its own right. Qadira's been Othered pretty hard for most of the pages we've published about it, some of which is probably inevitable given how decentered it is (both in the sense of its position in the stories that we tell, and in the sense of literally being at the margins of the map that shows the focus of our campaign setting). Which is understandable, but also something that needed to be addressed as we continue to expand that focus.

Project Manager

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James Sutter wrote:
The thing I love about this thread is that the arguments are exactly the same sort of ones that people living in Golarion would be having. This is basically one giant roleplaying session. :)

I am not roleplaying, thanks.

Silver Crusade

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Jessica Price wrote:
James Sutter wrote:
The thing I love about this thread is that the arguments are exactly the same sort of ones that people living in Golarion would be having. This is basically one giant roleplaying session. :)
I am not roleplaying, thanks.

Please don't kill Sutter.

At least until Starfinder is out.


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"Atheism" empowers mortals.
The less mortals rely on the divine, the more they have to come up with solutions to replace the divine. And each solution stacks to create stronger mortal world.

I guess that is what I got from this, if that was the question.


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HWalsh wrote:
Gods are not nice people when wronged. Iomedae permanently cripples people for mocking her, to use one book example.

To be fair and accurate, if Iomedae is inflicting that level of punishment... it's to a PC who's gone out of their way to ask for it. She's far more tolerant than any given member of the Classic Greek pantheon.

It's like pissing off Sasquatch, at some point you have to remember that it's Sasquatch... and you're not.

Sovereign Court

Jessica Price wrote:
Balancer wrote:
Read the post and damn that's a cop out, nice people don't build empires. Sure, in real life where nice people don't get literally Divine power to accomplish their goalw and the ability to smite evil. It strikes me as another example of fantasy authors falling back on real life without thinking through the ramifications.
My comment that "nice people don't build empires," wasn't a "cop-out" or a justification for Qadiran slavery: it was a description of the conceptual difficulty of figuring out how an empire with a NG state deity functions.

Actually - there were multiple empires which were expanded hugely in what amounted to self-defense, though most of them later continued to expand beyond that. (Rome actually did a lot of that right after the 2nd Punic war - where they attacked & conquered nations in response to them having helped out Hannibal against them. Not that Rome was in any way a 'good' aligned nation - probably closer to LN at the time than anything else.)


In my opinion, you'd need very easy communication to stop any large state from being Lawfully aligned from the tight logistics required to run something spread across a continent. Regular messengers, roadbuilding, and all that.


TriOmegaZero wrote:
Saldiven wrote:
If you stick to the strict definition of "atheism," I'd have a hard time accepting anyone could actually be an atheist in Golarion. Atheism means that a person doesn't believe in the existence of a god or gods.
You could deny that the 'gods' are actually deities and just powerful outsiders, but that is semantics for the most part.

Which would be one of the definitions of anti-theism. The person in question knows that the being exist, but does not recognize their divinity and/or their worthiness to be worshiped.

An atheist literally believes that being doesn't exist.


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I kind of prefer the apatheist. They don't know much about the gods nor really care about them :)


Well, the first thing you need to do is establish an understanding of the terms. "Atheism" is a term often thrown about without fully understanding exactly what it means. Atheism is Theism with the 'a-' prefix attached. This prefix, a variant of 'an-' from Greek, means "without" or "not", as in "asymmetry" (without symmetry) or "achromatic" (without color). Atheism means "without theism"; so to understand that, we need to know what Theism means. Theism comes from the joining form "the-" (variant of "theo-" as in "theocracy"), which means "god" and the suffix "-ism" which is used to form action nouns out of verbs.

Theism, n.
1) the belief in one God as the creator and ruler of the universe, without rejection of revelation (distinguished from deism).

2) belief in the existence of a god or gods (opposed to atheism).

So, before going on, we need to understand exactly which definition of Theism we're talking about here. If we're going with the first, then the very nature of multiple deities is an issue of contention. A Theist might believe that there is one supreme God and the rest are pretenders. Alternatively, a Deist might believe that there is one supreme God, but he has not revealed himself and all the deities that have made themselves known are pretenders. But if we're talking about the second definition, merely the belief in the existence of one or more gods, then Atheism simply means "without the belief in the existence of one or more gods". It's attitude-neutral because it only states a lack of belief of the affirmative. That could include a disclaimer of knowledge capacity (agnostic atheist) or it could be an active opposition to the belief (anti-theism). There are also the matters of Gnostic (believes that spiritual knowledge is not limited to empirical evidence/experience) and Agnostic (believes that people can only have knowledge based on empirical evidence/experience and if anything exists beyond our capacity for such, it is unknowable).

So now, we can accurately discuss our options:
Gnostic Theist (1): Believes that one of the "gods" in particular is a True God who created and maintains existence and any others who claim divine authority are lower-order entities and/or pretenders. Also believes the existence of God can be confirmed simply by "knowing" and bypassing empiricism.

Agnostic Theist (1): Believes that one of the "gods" in particular is a True God who created and maintains existence and any others who claim divine authority are lower-order entities and/or pretenders. Also believes they have received some kind of empirically supported revelation of such an entity's true divine authority.

Gnostic Theist (2): Believes in the power and divine authority of all the Gods and that their divinity is directly "knowable" without empirical support.

Agnostic Theist (2): Believes in the power and divine authority of all the Gods because they have revealed and demonstrated their power in a direct manner.

Gnostic Deist: Believes that there is one ultimate creator God who created and maintains existence, but rejection of revelation of such an entity. All of the "gods" are not gods at all, but just very powerful entities. Knowledge of the "True God" is directly "knowable" and bypasses empirical support.

Atheist Deist: Believes that there probably is one ultimate creator God who created and maintains existence, but rejection of revelation of such an entity. All of the "gods" are not gods at all, but just very powerful entities. Suspicion of a "True God" yet unrevealed is based on logic and analysis that is either waiting on empirical support or an understanding that such evidence is likely impossible for people.

Gnostic Atheist: Believes that spiritual knowledge is directly "knowable" and, with such knowledge, has confirmed that no "gods" actually exist. All entities claiming divinity are merely very powerful Outsiders.

Agnostic Atheist: Believes that knowledge must be empirical in nature and that "divinity" either has not or cannot be empirically demonstrated, thus the divinity of the "gods" has not been (and possibly cannot be) confirmed.

Anti-theist: Believes that "divinity" cannot exist if it is not subject to empirical study and that it should be considered not to exist until such observations are made.

There is also one other term to keep in mind:
Henotheism: Worship of a particular god without disbelieving the existence of others.

This is largely what the various "devout" classes (Clerics and Inquisitors, mainly) follow, having a focused worship of a single deity without disbelieving others (though often disavowing those in opposing stance).

Personally speaking, I'm a bit of a gnostic deist as well as an animist/spiritualist in my philosophy. That is, I believe that a creator God exists and, while he hasn't empirically revealed himself, people are capable of varying levels of direct spiritual knowledge to which the burden of empiricism does not apply and I believe in non-physical matters of souls and spirits as being just as real a component of the universe as the physical aspects of observable matter and energy. I have to believe that, in Pathfinder's cosmology, I'd likely end up in Nirvana (NG) on principal alone (without direct "divine" guidance).

Grand Lodge

Pathfinder Adventure, Adventure Path, Pathfinder Accessories, Rulebook, Starfinder Adventure Path Subscriber
Saldiven wrote:
An atheist literally believes that being doesn't exist.

And if the being that is questioning him does not qualify as whatever definition of god is being considered, the atheist is correct. No god exists in that case.

Sovereign Court

The Sideromancer wrote:
In my opinion, you'd need very easy communication to stop any large state from being Lawfully aligned from the tight logistics required to run something spread across a continent. Regular messengers, roadbuilding, and all that.

It depends how the empire was built. If it was Rome style where they civilized as they conquered - yes. But I don't think that the Mongul empire was likely Lawful. Or at least the Monguls themselves almost definitely weren't - they basically just conquered already civilized groups and took over their roads and much of their bureaucracies/systems etc.


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Jessica Price wrote:
Xerres wrote:
I can't really accept the idea that Sedeq is an outlier in Qadiran culture, its a cornerstone. An unsavory cornerstone, a cornerstone maybe they don't like. But its the center of the slave trade, and slavery is not an outlier in Qadira.

No, it's not a cornerstone. It operates extralegally. Qadira's an exception in Kelesh given how warlike it is, and Sedeq's an exception even in Qadira.

Quote:
Maybe they don't want to think about the place where the people they've bought for their harems

Harems are relatively uncommon in Kelesh, especially given that descent is matrilineal, and are generally the domain of the imperial family. And those function more like harems in Imperial China, where consorts and concubines are chosen as much for political alliances as they are for sexual attraction--i.e. not slaves.

Look, I get that the Qadira Player Companion spent most of the Katheer section talking about slavery, as if that's all there was to the culture there, and that it was all, "ooh, concubines! female slaves! woot! harems! genie harems! genie concubines! eunuchs!"

Well, I'm not too hung up on the idea of harems. I'm not trying to demonize or otherize the Kelesh. I'm assuming their slavery is the same as it is everywhere else on Golarion: absolutely horrible. I'm mistaken about the harem thing, sort of. Given how widespread slavery is through the Kelesh territory, I do not believe for a SECOND that the implications of a harem are at all uncommon. Just like I assume Cheliax, Okeno, the Shackles, Taldor, whatever all engage in the same practice. Because if you take a human as property and they are attractive, that is what happens.

But harems existing wasn't the point. SLAVES existing, being very common in Kelesh, that was the point. If the slave trade is a part of the Qadiran culture, than so is Sedeq. The idea of Sedeq, of it being a place where a person is broken and sold, that cannot be separated from the idea of slavery. That is why I say it can't be considered an outlier.

Do the people of Qadira keep slaves? Do they break their will to resist so that they will do what they are told? Then Sedeq is not an outlier. It is not UNIQUE to Qadira, there must be places much like it, possibly even more terrible in Cheliax or Okeno or anywhere else slaves are kept. But if the people of Qadira willingly take and keep slaves, then Sedeq represents an idea that is very much a part of their culture.

Quote:

It had two jobs, which were "make this interesting" and "don't make these people into bloodthirsty Arab harem pants slaver Arabian Nights stereotypes." The first one's subjective. It failed at the second, which is very unfortunate, given that the way the Keleshites were originally set up were as a matrilineal society with an empire based on pre-Islamic Persia that spread their reach economically rather than militarily. Moreover, it didn't seem to process what matrilineality would actually change about how such a culture would look compared to real-world cultures, let alone how different it would look from Western Orientalist fantasies. And let's not even get IN to how absurd eunuch harem guards are in a matrilineal society. (And to be fair to the PC, even the description of Qadira in the Inner Sea World Guide was already starting to go that direction.)

Then, on top of that, you have a lot of other material, like PFS scenarios, written by people who either built on what the PC did, despite that not really jiving with the original description of the Keleshites, or who just assumed Qadira=Arabian Nights and went from there.

One of the main reasons for doing a Qadira campaign setting was to redirect that.

I do not assume the Kelesh are a worse or more warlike people than anyone else. The establishing image for Rahadoum in the Inner Sea World guide has people being led in stocks and chains. Cheliax is noted for its horrible subjugation of Halflings and is very active in the slave trade, but again its an evil nation led by devils. Taldor is a faded remnant that's treated like a senile grandparent by the actual powers in the Inner Sea. Nidal exists.

The other nations that have slavery as a big thing treat it as a major flaw of that culture. Something terrible. Sedeq is an example of that for Qadira. They run a massive slave trade, and that's really horrible.

Why am I more angry about Qadira's slave trade than Cheliax's? Its not because they're Kelesh, its because there's less being done to stop it. Even with the massive Church of Sarenrae, they don't want to openly oppose the slave trade. And that makes me angrier than something like Cheliax, which is an Evil nation whose practices are something to oppose. If the Church of Sarenrae or just some upright citizens of Qadira were trying to stop it, I wouldn't be nearly so eager to go there and start killing.

Quote:
As far as Zimar, you've gotten the side of the story based on Taldor being assumed as a major homeland for PCs (heck, "Common" is Taldane), and Qadira set up largely as an antagonist to Taldor, rather than as a functioning country and culture in its own right. Qadira's been Othered pretty hard for most of the pages we've published about it, some of which is probably inevitable given how decentered it is (both in the sense of its position in the stories that we tell, and in the sense of literally being at the margins of the map that shows the focus of our campaign setting). Which is understandable, but also something that needed to be addressed as we continue to expand that focus.

What I get about Taldor is that its a pathetic shadow of a once powerful Empire that is destined to be defeated because they just suck SO MUCH that they can't do anything to defend themselves. In comparison to Taldor, Qadira is set up as this amazing nation that dwarfs the accomplishments of Taldor even as a satrapy of the greater Padishah Empire. I do not use Taldor as a homeland, because there's nothing to be proud of there, nothing to base a character idea on.

But for me, what Others the Kelesh is that their Empire is constantly built up as this fantastically wealthy, unimaginably powerful entity that completely dwarfs anything of Avistan. They're amazing merchants, incredible warriors, they're blessed by the supposedly nicest Goddess in the Golarion pantheon next to Shelyn. The only real flaw about the Kelesh I can think of is the slave trade. And even then, apparently I shouldn't hold it against them.

So take the slave trade out of the equation, what then are the major flaws of Qadira and the Padishah Empire. Because Cheliax, Taldor, Androran, etc are rife with problems and people trying to stop them from their horrible stuff. Warmongering is the only other flaw I can think of for Qadira, but Taldor isn't going to stop them, Taldor can't even save itself. I wouldn't be nearly so itchy to fight Qadiran slavers if I thought other people were already opposing them. I thought it would be the Church of Sarenrae, but they can't be bothered. So because there's nothing in Qadira trying to put an end to Sedeq or the slave trade, all I can think about when I go there is running around screaming "One batch, two batch, penny and dime! SOMEONE'S GONNA GET STABBED TODAY!"

Its not because I hate the Kelesh. Its not because I think they're all monsters. Its not because I think their culture is nothing but slavers. Its because there are people in Sedeq that need someone to help them, and no one will.

Project Manager

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Xerres wrote:
Jessica Price wrote:
Xerres wrote:
I can't really accept the idea that Sedeq is an outlier in Qadiran culture, its a cornerstone. An unsavory cornerstone, a cornerstone maybe they don't like. But its the center of the slave trade, and slavery is not an outlier in Qadira.

No, it's not a cornerstone. It operates extralegally. Qadira's an exception in Kelesh given how warlike it is, and Sedeq's an exception even in Qadira.

Quote:
Maybe they don't want to think about the place where the people they've bought for their harems

Harems are relatively uncommon in Kelesh, especially given that descent is matrilineal, and are generally the domain of the imperial family. And those function more like harems in Imperial China, where consorts and concubines are chosen as much for political alliances as they are for sexual attraction--i.e. not slaves.

Look, I get that the Qadira Player Companion spent most of the Katheer section talking about slavery, as if that's all there was to the culture there, and that it was all, "ooh, concubines! female slaves! woot! harems! genie harems! genie concubines! eunuchs!"

Well, I'm not too hung up on the idea of harems. I'm not trying to demonize or otherize the Kelesh. I'm assuming their slavery is the same as it is everywhere else on Golarion: absolutely horrible. I'm mistaken about the harem thing, sort of. Given how widespread slavery is through the Kelesh territory, I do not believe for a SECOND that the implications of a harem are at all uncommon. Just like I assume Cheliax, Okeno, the Shackles, Taldor, whatever all engage in the same practice. Because if you take a human as property and they are attractive, that is what happens.

But harems existing wasn't the point. SLAVES existing, being very common in Kelesh, that was the point. If the slave trade is a part of the Qadiran culture, than so is Sedeq. The idea of Sedeq, of it being a place where a person is broken and sold, that cannot be separated from the idea of slavery. That is...

We haven't said anything about how common slaves are in the rest of Kelesh.


Pathfinder Adventure Path, Rulebook, Starfinder Adventure Path, Starfinder Roleplaying Game Subscriber
TriOmegaZero wrote:
Saldiven wrote:
If you stick to the strict definition of "atheism," I'd have a hard time accepting anyone could actually be an atheist in Golarion. Atheism means that a person doesn't believe in the existence of a god or gods.
You could deny that the 'gods' are actually deities and just powerful outsiders, but that is semantics for the most part.

If I accept the premise that the difference between 'gods' and 'just powerful outsiders' is semantics, I think that at that point they cease to be 'gods' by my reckoning. At that point I wonder what the difference is between a 'god' granting divine magic and a devil making a pact with a sorcerer or witch to grant arcane magic.

Grand Lodge

Pathfinder Adventure, Adventure Path, Pathfinder Accessories, Rulebook, Starfinder Adventure Path Subscriber

Obviously the character in question would not agree that it is just semantics.


TriOmegaZero wrote:
Obviously the character in question would not agree that it is just semantics.

Apocryphally Ludwig Wittgenstein once threatened Karl Popper with a fireplace poker because Popper refused to accede to Wittgenstein's thesis that there are no actual philosophical problems, simply semantic puzzles to be worked out.

So there's no reason you can't have a character who takes their semantics REALLY SERIOUSLY.


Yeah people can get crazy man. Working in the kitchen, I've seen people get violent over trivial things. Like two people getting into a fist fight over the proper temperature to cook key lime pie at.


Jessica Price wrote:
We haven't said anything about how common slaves are in the rest of Kelesh.

Fair enough. I thought I read that most of the slaves in Sedeq were actually to be sent further into the Padishah Empire, but since I can't find that I guess I just made it up.

Project Manager

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Xerres wrote:
Jessica Price wrote:
We haven't said anything about how common slaves are in the rest of Kelesh.
Fair enough. I thought I read that most of the slaves in Sedeq were actually to be sent further into the Padishah Empire, but since I can't find that I guess I just made it up.

We've said precious little about the rest of Kelesh, which is surprising, given that it's mentioned in the Campaign Setting and Gazeteer, and one would think that having a massive empire lurking just off the edge of the map would be a fairly significant element in Inner Sea politics, but no dice.

I did a thorough PDF search last year before starting work on Qadira, and discovered that other than A) it's big, B) it's rich, C) it's got an emperor, D) it's Sarenite, E) it's got the Pit of Gormuz in it, and F) it's over there in Southern Casmaron somewhere, we've barely said anything concrete about it.

Dark Archive

To be fair, the campaign info does mostly deal with the inner seas region. So it's not that surprising.

Designer

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Removed a series of personal attacks. Please try your best to avoid personal attacks and to keep this community a welcoming place for all sorts of people to post, whether they're first time posters, Paizo staffers, or anyone in between. It's OK to object to someone's logical ideas or tone, especially in a thread like this with a contentious philosophical topic, but when you do, please try to find another way to express your disagreement without attacking the other person personally.


Kazaan wrote:

Well, the first thing you need to do is establish an understanding of the terms. "Atheism" is a term often thrown about without fully understanding exactly what it means. Atheism is Theism with the 'a-' prefix attached. This prefix, a variant of 'an-' from Greek, means "without" or "not", as in "asymmetry" (without symmetry) or "achromatic" (without color). Atheism means "without theism"; so to understand that, we need to know what Theism means. Theism comes from the joining form "the-" (variant of "theo-" as in "theocracy"), which means "god" and the suffix "-ism" which is used to form action nouns out of verbs.

{. . .}

Other words that need to be added are Dystheism (distrust of deities, even if such are proven to exist at the power level that they claim) and Misotheism (distrust of deities, even if such are proven to exist at the power level that they claim). I used to use the term Antitheism for the latter, butthat term has already been taken for something else.

* * * * * * * *

The discussion on Sarenrae's contradictions is very interesting, and I'd like to follow it. Fortunately, this subject already has its own thread, which merely needs a Raise Dead! I'd like to see Jessica Price and all the others in on it here in on it there. I'll start things off there with a thought about The Paradox of Sarenrae -- with a Rahadoum tie-in -- that I originally posted in the ask James Jacobs thread (although unfortunately he didn't seem to care for it much), with some more recent thoughts added afterwards.


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Pathfinder Maps, Pathfinder Accessories Subscriber; Pathfinder Roleplaying Game Charter Superscriber; Starfinder Charter Superscriber

Regarding the Cult of the Dawnflower: who knows, maybe they're not even getting their divine powers from Sarenrae at all. Maybe she has disowned them, and before they've noticed, some other, more sinister power, has stepped in.


Zaister wrote:
Regarding the Cult of the Dawnflower: who knows, maybe they're not even getting their divine powers from Sarenrae at all. Maybe she has disowned them, and before they've noticed, some other, more sinister power, has stepped in.

No.. they ARE gaining their powers from Sarenrae. She may be the good goddess of redemption, but it's canon that she's run off her own rails every now and then in the past. She hasn't cut the Dawnflowers off because she is overcompensating for her rush to judgement in the Pit of Gormuz, which resulted in her slaughtering a town full of innocent people.

Gods have a different perspective from mortals, which frequently means that they have major blind spots as well.

Liberty's Edge

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Drahliana Moonrunner wrote:
No.. they ARE gaining their powers from Sarenrae. She may be the good goddess of redemption, but it's canon that she's run off her own rails every now and then in the past. She hasn't cut the Dawnflowers off because she is overcompensating for her rush to judgement in the Pit of Gormuz,

This part is accurate, more or less. She's trying to give them the opportunity to see the error of their ways on their own.

Drahliana Moonrunner wrote:
which resulted in her slaughtering a town full of innocent people.

This part isn't. Their death was something Sarenrae certainly regretted, but they'd just gone berserk en masse and ripped her Herald limb from limb...calling them innocent seems a bit of a stretch.


Umbral Reaver wrote:
Murder the gods and topple their thrones.

Play MythEnder!


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Charon's Little Helper wrote:
Not that Rome was in any way a 'good' aligned nation - probably closer to LN at the time than anything else.)

LE.

"How many languages even HAVE a word for 'killed every tenth person'?!" - Larry Gonick.

Sovereign Court

Arbane the Terrible wrote:
Charon's Little Helper wrote:
Not that Rome was in any way a 'good' aligned nation - probably closer to LN at the time than anything else.)

LE.

"How many languages even HAVE a word for 'killed every tenth person'?!" - Larry Gonick.

By today's standards - I totally agree. I suppose that I was grading them on a curve relative to other ancient nations. (Relative to the Assyrians they look positively righteous.)


Arbane the Terrible wrote:
Charon's Little Helper wrote:
Not that Rome was in any way a 'good' aligned nation - probably closer to LN at the time than anything else.)

LE.

"How many languages even HAVE a word for 'killed every tenth person'?!" - Larry Gonick.

Well, I know one word in the English language that describes that, though it is more like "killed every fifth person". I'll spare the forum the mayhem mentioning that particular word would ignite, though if you are really curious and not easily offended you can PM me to find out.

I agree that Rome was definitely pushing the LE end of the alignment, if we are to judge it based on Pathfinder alignment.


Klorox wrote:
there are no gods, clerics are just deluded wizards in disguise

No, the GODS are just deluded wizards in disguise!


Arbane the Terrible wrote:
Charon's Little Helper wrote:
Not that Rome was in any way a 'good' aligned nation - probably closer to LN at the time than anything else.)

LE.

"How many languages even HAVE a word for 'killed every tenth person'?!" - Larry Gonick.

Keep in mind the context. It's not that there was such a thing as a happy happy flower power nation at the time.

It's like Vlad Teppes, he was legendary in his brutality and cruelty, but he was also just one of many brutal and cruel rulers of the time.


How to reasonably atheist on golarion

1) Maltheist. Yes. The gods exist. They are enormous pains in the rear and we're better off without them. If you think thats an unreasonable position, consider that most people have a problem with at least 1/3rd of the pantheon.

2) Its magic: The wizard goes ickity ackity ook and shoots a fireball from his fingers. The cleric goes "by the power of Iomedae!" and magic stuff happens. To most people there's not much of a difference. Even to the learned there's very little a cleric can do thats exclusive to clerics.

3) You don't impress me much. meh. You're a god. So what?

4) Yes you exist, but that's nothing special.

There are a lot of extra dimensional beings. Angels, demons, archdevils. Whats the difference between those and gods? Nothing all that observable.


I prefer the idea of an atheist who simply refuses to believe, despite any evidence to the contrary, that the Golarian gods exist. Who would he irritate the most? Calistria?


Create Mr. Pitt wrote:
I prefer the idea of an atheist who simply refuses to believe, despite any evidence to the contrary, that the Golarian gods exist. Who would he irritate the most? Calistria?

A person like that on Golarion is pretty much in the same boat of crazy as people posting YouTube videos arguing that the Earth is flat.


Why do we get so many of these threads?


BigNorseWolf wrote:

How to reasonably atheist on golarion

1) Maltheist. Yes. The gods exist. They are enormous pains in the rear and we're better off without them. If you think thats an unreasonable position, consider that most people have a problem with at least 1/3rd of the pantheon.

2) Its magic: The wizard goes ickity ackity ook and shoots a fireball from his fingers. The cleric goes "by the power of Iomedae!" and magic stuff happens. To most people there's not much of a difference. Even to the learned there's very little a cleric can do thats exclusive to clerics.

3) You don't impress me much. meh. You're a god. So what?

What are those other options called? Is #3 an "apatheist"? Is #2 an "equatheist"? ;P


Kobold Cleaver wrote:
Why do we get so many of these threads?

Because there is no god.


BigNorseWolf wrote:
There are a lot of extra dimensional beings. Angels, demons, archdevils. Whats the difference between those and gods? Nothing all that observable.

Hell, at tier 3 Mythic, a mortal can take Divine Source and grant spells and domains to divine casters. All the Gods are are high-tier mythic outsiders.

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