*Spoilers* Anyone feel joining Emet would have been better

[redheadturk]

I'm well familiar with the passage, having cited it to you on previous occasions. What's the relevance here? The Convocation were short-sighted in assuming that Zodiark was a permanent solution, sure. But the Convocation were convening over the plan to sacrifice non-Amaurotian souls to free their friends. That has nothing to do with addressing the Final Days at all.

I can see why you would consider Venat's faction and all of Amaurot as being morally repugnant under that criteria, but I'm surprised that you aren't so willing to condemn Azem, the Scions, and the rest of humanity as well for acting similarly in their own interests. Venat's faction was acting in defense of the lives and souls of the non-Amaurotians on the star who weren't given the opportunity to consent, in much the same way that Azem and the Scions did in defense of the sundered peoples of Etheirys. I think that if you want to condemn one on that principle, you should be consistent across the board and just condemn them all. Having power to effect change is morally repugnant by those standards.

Legitimate self defense changes the moral calculus. Azem did nothing wrong because what they did harmed none. I do not consider Venat's actions to be self defense, as the Ancients who were acting out of their grief and trauma were not harming anyone. Emet was trying to kill the Scions, and us, that was legitamate self defense.

[KariTheFox]

Which had nothing to do with my original argument about my moral objections to Venat's actions.

If you think about it, it has everything to do with it. If your concern is the consent of the people involved, then whether or not the targets of the third sacrifice were ensouled beings who could object to being sacrificed becomes very important. Which is why you are being asked if you think Amaurot society would be bitterly divided over the moral consideration of non-sapeint life.

The "Venat's actions are morally unjustifiable" argument has to rest on a central pillar of the third sacrifice being of non-sapient life. It is the difference between Venat being a raging enviromentalist extremist and her attempting to prevent her own people from committing genocide.

But before and after the sundering we are never shown any indiction Venat is overly concerned with the welfare of non-sapient animals over sapient life.

We are however, shown the ascians committing genocide several times, and planning to commit more. I do not think it is hard to figure out which interpretation was intended by the writers.

[Lauront]

I'm well familiar with the passage, having cited it to you on previous occasions. What's the relevance here? The Convocation were short-sighted in assuming that Zodiark was a permanent solution, sure. But the Convocation were convening over the plan to sacrifice non-Amaurotian souls to free their friends. That has nothing to do with addressing the Final Days at all.

If you're familiar with it, then how are you missing the part where both Hythlodaeus and Venat mention stewardship of the star what's at stake? Here you said:

Meteion's report isn't relevant to the Convocation's proposal, however. It doesn't matter if they viewed Zodiark as a temporary solution or a permanent one. They planned on bartering for the souls of their friends with the souls of non-Amaurotian life. This really had nothing to do with protecting the star.

It is something you claimed was not relevant when discussing the third stage of sacrifices, and yet both someone close to the Convocation (Hyth*) and Venat mention it. As far as they were concerned in the SHB scenes, the Final Days were forestalled. It is only with EW that we learn that they were not, and this is concerning knowledge solely privy to her. And of course that stage of sacrifice in and of itself is not directly relevant to Meteion's report - the motivation behind it is, i.e. doing what they believed was best for the star, again, as per Venat and Hyth. Why is it relevant? Because given this motivation, which Hades himself reaffirms at the end of KH, if their plan would in fact harm the star (but also themselves) and they were given some good evidence of this that they could at the very least probe further, there is a possibility that they'd reconsider it.

*Well shade of him but that just equates to Emet's will anyhow so even better in a sense to convey what the Convocation was thinking...

Your entire argument hinges on "What if Venat told everyone what she knew? How would the Ancients have adjusted their views had they known?" You know what we call that? Conjecture. Because we'll never know.

You are saying I misunderstood or that it is conjecture when you are quite literally doing the exact...same...thing. You are clinging to a "What if" scenario where one does not exist.

I'm not talking about the theme, I'm talking about the actual story. As in, what the writers have put in the game. Whether you like it or not is a matter of opinion, and that's fine. But this is what it is. Being free to interpret it the way you like is also fine, but we have a word for that. Do you know what it is? Headcanon.

So, once again. You are doing the exact same thing.

It's fine to disagree and I love these debates about the story. But not when you are accusing people of doing something that you yourself are doing. Almost to the letter.

Well yes, I am saying that calling their plan idiotic when your understanding of it is not consistent with either what EW or SHB shows is a misunderstanding. To go back to it:

To counter the idiotic plan to sacrifice half their population to bring forth a god, then sacrifice more to bring them back, and then do yet another sacrifice to...restore the world? A world that was still hurtling headfirst into the Final Days. Remember the last species in the Dead Ends? That was where the Ancients were headed.

Venat's plan was far from perfect but it was absolutely the lesser of two evils.

Here is the stages we know of from SHB:

Stage 1: Bring forth Zodiark to halt the crisis and reinforce the celestial currents.
Stage 2: Use him to restore the star's proper functioning since it had been so badly depleted.
Stage 3: The debate over whether to sacrifice the unspecified new life to restore their own people within Zodiark, in an exchange of life to resume their role as stewards of the star while presumably also keeping him at full power (why? in case another seemingly random event hit them would be a good guess...)

We can assume stages 1 and 2 must've taken place, or else the world pretty much would be non-existent given the devastation it suffered. Her plan hinges on it for the star both to exist and last long enough to devise a way to defeat Meteion. Now since you are referencing sacrificing more to bring their people back, I can only presume you're referring to stage 3, because the EW cutscene gives the impression that it is themselves they'd sacrifice to restore the lives they once had before the star was struck with crisis (reinforced by the state of the sky in that scene, with monstrosities still amok - this is consistent with stage 2 IMO and I take Veloran's point that they may have used this scene to entirely sidestep the issue of stage 3 and have the Sundering take place during stage 2...) The way you framed it was stage 1->3->2, which to be frank, would seem stupid, because it omits the stage whereby they revitalise the star; again, if we are referencing this stage, the SHB sources become relevant, because that's where it comes up. Their impression, not knowing about Endsinger, was that stages 1 and 2 had curtailed the crisis. They did not know of the Plenty. Stages 1 and 2 as I said are required to even have a star at that point. Thus do I struggle to see how, when you properly sequence the events, and qualify the knowledge that they had, to label the plan idiotic. Hopeless? Perhaps, but we're also coming at this plan with more knowledge than they were given.

If we're in agreement that the scenario in the Dead Ends was a possible outcome of their civilisation were they to follow through with the same pursuit of perfection, never having been given a proper accounting of what happened, but that this was not an inevitability if they were to be provided this info, there is no argument from me, and we're in agreement that it's open to interpretation...

[Cleretic]

Legitimate self defense changes the moral calculus. Azem did nothing wrong because what they did harmed none. I do not consider Venat's actions to be self defense, as the Ancients who were acting out of their grief and trauma were not harming anyone. Emet was trying to kill the Scions, and us, that was legitamate self defense.

Stopping the third sacrifice was a form of defense for those who could not defend themselves. Is that invalid? Is 'empathy' an inapplicable reason to stand for things?

[KariTheFox]

At the risk of being facetious, would you murder a dolphin to save a loved one in an unrelated situation?

Maybe, but I don't think I could be considered a morally just person if I did so. Given the scientific consensus on dolphin personhood.

Although given the scales likely involved if the sacrifice was of non-sapient life, a better question to ask might be "Would you burn the entire Amazon Rainforest to the ground to save a loved one?" and... "do you think someone trying to stop you from doing that would be acting immorally?"

[Slatersev]

Maybe, but I don't think I could be considered a morally just person if I did so. Given the scientific consensus on dolphin personhood.

Although given the scales likely involved if the sacrifice was of non-sapient life, a better question to ask might be "Would you burn the entire Amazon Rainforest to the ground to save a loved one?" and... "do you think someone trying to stop you from doing that would be acting immorally?"

Considering the scale involved, if it was just plants animals and fauna, or really the life Zodiark brought back into the world with the second sacrifice, wouldn't that make the Third one redundant?

"Thanks for healing the ecosystem of the planet big Z, now please trash it immediately, it will put us right back to Square 1"

Which doesn't feel like a sound idea whatsoever.

Like its crazy just how bad the Ancients plan looks if the third was all about non sapient life. Sure it makes them more sympathetic in that moment but at the cost of making all there actions before and after idiotic.

Why heal the ecosystem first if you were just going to trash it again immediately?

Why does Emet never bring it up as the worlds easiest trump card ever? Seriously, Emet just saying 'Venat did it to protect chickens and some pretty flowers" immediately undercuts every argument against him.

There simply isn't any argument for a Non-Sapient sacrifice that doesn't make the Ascians look like morons for never mentioning it. I don't understand how you could be a fan of them and want it to be that way. You want to retroactively turn Emet into the biggest idiot ever? Why?

And as someone who likes both the Convocation and Venat equally, I can't imagine looking at there conflict and thinking what it needs is something that so thoroughly undercuts both sides like that.

[thegreatonemal]

The part that is brought into question by facilities like Ktisis Hyperboreia allowing them to temporarily suppress their powers and thus potentially interact more readily with dynamis. The part that is brought into question by Elidibus drawing on the power of prayer in SoS to empower himself as a primal. The part that is brought into question that the ancients could either devise aether-thinned familiars or even sunder a subset of their own to prepare to track down and hunt Meteion and forgo the third stage of sacrifices. But a few possibilities they could’ve conceived of in the 12k+ years Zodiark bought them. Nothing is impossible, so they can figure it out.

Suppressing power would not help anything. It has to do with the amount of aether they are composed of limiting how much of it you can use for your spells does nothing.
Elidbus is a primal feeding off aether and prayer for salvation not dynamis, just normal prayer, he would be just as useless as zodirak would be in a fight agaisnt someone weild massive amounts of dynamis.
They had already made their decision to sacrifice more lives. They weren't interested in finding the source or any such thing they just wanted to go back to the way they were.

[Lurina]

Maybe, but I don't think I could be considered a morally just person if I did so. Given the scientific consensus on dolphin personhood.

Although given the scales likely involved if the sacrifice was of non-sapient life, a better question to ask might be "Would you burn the entire Amazon Rainforest to the ground to save a loved one?" and... "do you think someone trying to stop you from doing that would be acting immorally?"

My point in making the post wasn't that the Ancient's sacrifices were morally good or acceptable, but rather that they were morally banal in a manner that's a far cry from Lyth's assessment of them as a culture anyone should understand as twisted. It is extremely normal for humans to prioritize human life at the expense of all other forms, sapient (dolphins, great apes, elephants, some birds) or otherwise. While they might be correct that not many people would directly slit the throat of a dolphin, my guess is that most would press an abstracted dolphin-killing button to cure their child of cancer.

That you bring up the Amazon is interesting because, well, we are 'burning it down', and not even to save lives, but just because it's useful in keeping the wheels of our industrial complex turning and preserving our current lifestyles. All over the world, real-world mankind is essentially doing the most extreme interpretation of what the Ancient's planned - killing the entire biosphere, intelligent and unintelligent life alike - for a much more flippant reason.

I think we can probably agree this is not a good thing, but with that said, would you be comfortable with having our whole civilization destroyed to put a stop to it? In the real world, how much effort and sacrifice do you, personally, put into trying to put a stop to it?

I think people are very hasty to judge the Ancients as an entire people for an action that is ultimately pretty unexceptional, wrong or otherwise.

[Lurina]

Which I guess brings us to this (since I ran out of characters, lol):

The "Venat's actions are morally unjustifiable" argument has to rest on a central pillar of the third sacrifice being of non-sapient life. It is the difference between Venat being a raging enviromentalist extremist and her attempting to prevent her own people from committing genocide.

A lot of people's arguments here seem to frame the situation as binary. Either the Ancients weren't doing a sufficiently bad thing and so Venat wasn't justified, or that they were and she was.

I think you're missing what actually predicates redheadturk's opinion, which is the idea that both can be wrong at the same time. Even if the Ancients were about to overrule the agency of a bunch of innocent beings, that doesn't per-se make an action to prevent this morally justifiable if it also involves the same evil, which it implicitly does - obviously not every Ancient on the planet would have had a say in the conflict at all. What about the children? What about the ones living far away in the New World, who are referenced in Amaurot? Or hell, even for the ones who did want to do the sacrifice, is it acceptable match violence with violence at such a scale?

To bring it back to the real world, very few people would find destroying modern society an acceptable answer to its inherent evils. Overturning an established order, even for the better, often has a cost in suffering even greater than the problem it hopes to resolve. You can't boil it down to just saying, 'it's doing something wrong, so it must be stopped'.

[KariTheFox]

This is probably beyond the scope of this discussion and straying into real life politics, but I do want large aspects of our modern society to change for the sake perserving the enviroment.

But I don't think the ancients should be condemned or called twisted. Thier society certainly had flaws, but - the third sacrifice is when it goes too far. Though I don't think being sundered and being sacrificed are equivalent. After one you are dead, after the other there's just more of you and you don't have godlike superpowers anymore.