Gromnir

By misleading you mean "they don't show what you want". The statistics themselves simply are what they are and you were happy enough to use them when you thought they showed what you wanted, that they don't actually show what you want is unfortunate, for you, but that's all. There are very good reasons for using stats and maps with properly defined regions; it's far more rigorous and objective than appeal to emotion and what any person wishes was true. If you run around arbitrarily defining demographic areas based on particular agenda you can 'prove' just about anything you want, right down to the Armenian family down the road having an ethnic majority in their area, so 32 Jones Street shall now be known as the Republic of Armenia Really Minor heretofore. Easy, I wouldn't have a partition. by “misleading” we mean that your green (arabs… not palestinians as there has never been a palestiain state… ever. ) v. white (jew) maps is obfuscating or ignoring many obvious facts. the pre 1947 maps show jewish property ownership accurately, but anything not owned by jews shows up as green. now, considering that by all accounts near 50% o’ all land in the british mandate were uninhabitable, the suggestion that all the green area were owned by arabs is ludicrous. who the hell pays for uninhabitable lands? the previous owner o’ such undeveloped and largely useless lands is the State: british, ottomans, romans, assyrians, babylonians, etc. also, a considerable amount o’ land in the british mandate were owned by non-arabs. there were brits, french and even turks who still owned land and business in the mandate. so, your map is misleading ‘cause it is missing at least one additional color to represent State owned land and/or land owned by non-arabs and non-jews. grey? grey is a nice neutral color, yes? more than ½ of the pre 1947 green v. white maps would be grey if we is looking for accurate property ownership at the time. as for not having partitions, that were considered by the UN. both jews and arabs had been promised the opportunity for self-determination within the area o’ the british mandate. 1/3 of the population in the british mandate were jewish by 1946. the UN did not have complete faith in either the arabs or the jews insofar as protecting the other group’s civil liberties. so, how does you protect jews in the mandate from arabs? how does you protect arabs from jews in the mandate? yeah, the UN and british coulda’ both pulled out and let the chips fall as they may… which is actually what functionally happened anyway. the brits left and every arab nation bordering the mandate invaded with the intention of reducing the jewish population o’ palestine to 0. no partition results in what we got today, ‘cause the partition were never actual implemented. so… congrats and well-played? the un folks back in 1946 had an impossible task to accomplish in 3 months: come up with a plan that would result in long-term peace and prosperity in the lands o’ the british mandate. economically, the jewish presence appeared to be a boon to the local economy—arabs and jews alike benefited from jewish improvements to infrastructure and manufacturing. unfortunately, there were great hostility between the jews and arabs and the fact that the brits had failed to live up to promises made to both ethnic groups resulted in increased tensions. there were more than 200,000 jewish refugees confined to camps in Europe and nobody in Europe wanted them. at the same time, between late 1800s and mid 1940s, over seven million jews had been murdered—allowing a similar bloodbath to occur in the middle east were not considered a particularly moral option. partition were considered the best option, but even the UN folks and the brits (who played the role o’ pontius pilate in this little drama) were dubious that any plan would succeed. palestine did not belong to the arabs in 1946. it hadn’t belonged to the arabs for a Long time. similarly, the jewish claims o’ right to the lands near jerusalem were equal remote and tenuous. lots o’ promises were made to two groups o’ people living in the same geographic area and those two ethnic groups hated each other… and still do. the current problems is kinda predictable. hamas has not had any kinda majority support o' the arabs in gaza or the west bank and their influence with young arabs has decreased steadily. hamas needed something to galvanize support. at the same time, israel is trigger-happy. is some historical justification for their anxiety and suspicion, but that not change the fact that the israeli attempts to make peace seem more like pro-forma actions meant to appease supporters in the west. yeah, hamas were rather stupid to be looking for a fight, but they were doing so for political survival. at the same time, israel were looking for an excuse to bloody hamas and other organizations in gaza. no surprises. HA! Good Fun! ps http://www.cnn.com/2014/06/23/world/africa/sudan-woman-freed/ jews and christians alike doesn't fare particularly well in muslim arab states. leaving jews to the tender mercies o' the arab majority doesn't strike you as perhaps a bit myopic?

no doubt. if the government always lies to you, then you predictably become dubious 'bout anything and everything the government claims. however, knowing the root cause doesn't change the fact that those folks who has been lied to so frequent now grab a hold o' even the wackiest conspiracy theories to explain events. HA! Good Fun!

in hindsight, practical and rational reasons is rarely the actual reasons for these seeming random human tragedies. sure, stuff like 9/11 were planned out long in advance, but do not ignore the possibility that a chain o' causality that relies 'pon human error and stupidity is what were the cause o' this plane crash. am not saying there weren't reason driving the eventual decision to shoot down the plane. however, am thinking that it is very likely that numerous decision makers... failed. bad information, technical errors, poor judgment and a confluence o' improbable events likely all combined to result in this tragedy. then again, maybe the downing of the plane were part o' some kinda sinister and coldblooded plan. is gonna be some time before we know for certain. 'course it may not matter what actual cause or reasons is as many eastern europeans will prefer conspiracies to explain anyway. nearly 50% o' russians don't believe that the meteor that did so much damage in their country last year were actually a meteor. http://www.csmonitor.com/World/Europe/2013/0222/Was-Chelyabinsk-meteor-actually-a-meteor-Many-Russians-don-t-think-so.-video is freaking wacky. no matter what actual evidence suggests, many will disbelieve any official version o' events 'cause the official version is necessarily a lie and cannot be true. just listen to some o' our resident board conspiracy theorists as they routinely bend over backwards to ignore or distinguish more plausible explanations. HA! Good Fun!

You know I'm not big on conspiracies but if you direct a civilian aircraft through a zone where you've lost multiple planes including at high altitude and where you know rebels shoot at anything that flies above (it's not like they can tell) you're either very negligent... or you're manufacturing an incident. The fact that the Ukrainian rebels shot down the plane from such a high altitude is very rare, so there haven't been other examples Also the Russians do have the flight recorder, why when I pointed this out did why you say " I don't know what I'm talking about" This thread always brings out the worst justifications and excuses from people in there support for Russia or the Ukrainian rebels. You guys need to learn just to accept certain things and not look for some conspiracy theories. IMO the plane was shot down by the Ukrainian rebels thinking it was a transport plane helping the Ukrainians http://thenextweb.com/apple/2012/09/11/american-airlines-first-get-faa-approval-use-ipads-all-phases-flight-saving-1-2m/ the cost o' having to avoid airspace where any global conflict is occurring would be extreme. is perhaps cynical, but until the potential cost in human lives became real, most airlines were gonna take the admitted extreme small risk o' flying over the contentious airspace wherein this tragedy finally and predictably unfolded. how many commercial passenger airliners has flown that same or similar route for many months? how many has been shot down? how much money would some carriers have lost if they voluntarily had avoided all the dangerous seeming travel routes, particularly if other carriers were utilizing the more direct (cheaper) route and were able to offer relative discounted fares by doing so? somebody were eventually gonna lose the lottery, but it were good business to take that risk... as cold-blooded as that sounds. HA! Good Fun!

with thankful decreasing frequency, Gromnir does real work that takes up all o' our time. last big case we had were reason we were gone from boards for 'bout 20 months. am seriously considering retirement so we can devote our self full-time to a life o' sloth and indolence. HA! Good Fun!

"Like with Korean Boeing it's likely an error with the autopilot so the plane deviated from its planned course and ended up where it didn't belong." thankfully, that kinda thing is near impossible nowadays. significant changes occurred after that tragedy so as to prevent future occurrences. the ****pit autopilot interface were altered to avoid confusion, and the US made gps available for civilian use. no doubt after this tragedy, similar advances/changes will be made... although we suspect weapons technology will always be subject to human error. all it takes is a misinformed general, trigger-happy pilot or yutz in an anti-aircraft platform to make the wrong split-second decision that will cost hundreds or even thousands of lives. as tech becomes more readily available and lethal at ever increasing ranges, it will be difficult to keep mistakes from happening. am recalling that when rebels overthrew qaddafi there were numerous reports on just how much the rebels used and relied 'pon social media and burner cellphones to communicate. the notion o' the cia using social media to communicate and coordinate with rebels struck us as initially ludicrous, but perfect reasonable 'pon reflection. is a new world-- wouldn't complete discount social media sources and cellphone communications. that being said, we sure as hell don't believe all the nonsense floating around at the moment. is almost not even worth reading news reports at this time as many "facts" will be revealed as incorrect when looking back a few months from now. also, when you got eastern europeans, you will have wacky conspiracy theories. http://www.boston.com/news/world/europe/2014/07/17/the-weirdest-conspiracy-theories-surrounding-the-malaysia-airlines-flight/Vga8tXxgp0g9z4t4OtctYL/story.html the putin presidential flight path is particular amusing to us as it has so much inertia but is based on a single unnamed source that even rt admits were contradicted. that conspiracy theory also requires the ukranians to have known o' the s'posed flight path. nevertheless, the best conspiracies only work 'cause o' absence o' evidence. is like an insane mad libs template where anyone and everyone can fill in the blanks howsoever they wish. HA! Good Fun!

You sir, are a true patriotic american. we don't want for bad stuff to happen to her. well, perhaps a severe case o' laryngitis so she can't sing would be an ill we would wish 'pon her. also, we would hope that somebody would teach her how to use a bow. her form is complete wrong. how tough is it to get her to keep her elbow up, pull back to mouth or chin, and hold longbows at a 45 degree angle? am joking o' course. wanting realism in combat is kinda silly. ... am kinda serious 'bout the laryngitis though. HA! Good Fun!

so? all o' your wikilinks is very nice and yet still extreme misleading. what is with you people and statistics and maps? break down based on ethnicity were exactly what the partitioning were meant to achieve. the jewish communities already had jewish schools and medical facilities and infrastructure that they developed by themselves. arabs wanted their own such facilities. the communities were already broken according to ethnicity, and ethnicity were far less arbitrary than were the lines drawn on maps without any consideration o' the deep political and practical divisions existing between the arab and jewish populations. the partitioning were done specifically in recognition o' ethnicity, duh. how on earth is you gonna come up with a jewish partition that isn't based on ethnicity? did that make sense in your head? and again, there were no palestinians pre balfour. the notion o' palestinians as a distinct group o' arabs arose contemporaneous with the british mandate and balfour. palestinians were having as much legitimacy as jews insofar as promises made by the brits. lord knows the ottoman empire didn't make any such promises to jew or arab. "And the WW1 british and the UN were idiots. "Deportation and forced re-location has never, EVER solved a problem in history." we read unscop report. the folks don't sound like idiots, and there were never forced relocation and deportations, save for the jewish settlers who were in excess o' the extreme limited and arab (not palestinian) protective white paper standards. as noted earlier, the arabs left the proposed partition areas and then attacked. that being said, the UN folks did have a clear misunderstanding 'bout the degree to which the arabs in 1947 were resistant to the notion o' an independent jewish homeland anywhere in the middle east and the degree to which jews didn't trust the arabs. the true tragedy being that as unscop observed, "The Peel Commission, in referring to the matter, had noted in its report that "there was a time when Arab statesmen were willing to consider giving Palestine to the Jews, provided that the rest of Arab Asia was free. That condition was not fulfilled then, but it is on the eve of fulfillment now." the brits weren't dumb, but they had decades to learn that the arabs and jews were not gonna be able to exist together. the UN had 3 months to come up with a plan, and we suspect that they very much underestimated the hate that had developed between arabs and jews under the british mandate. the UN folks were smart. maybe that were the problem. smart people could look and see that every would benefit from their plan. rational and reasonable were meaningful to smart folks, but not to the folks in the british mandate. "Never said it was the only standard, BUT body count IS more objective that any other standard you can provide. Especially in the context that most of those bodies belong to civilians." *eye roll* is terrible that you believe what you is saying. HA! Good Fun!

"I think the US is a very good example of a nation which is not based on any ethnicity. Nations everywhere should be based on similar principles." aside, cause we don't wanna complete derail, but ros is again being monumental obtuse. did you bother to look up lakota and oglala? probably not. should all nations be based on US principles regarding ethnicity? is debatable, but if you believe that then you got a serious problem. http://www.nps.gov/nagpra/documents/RESERV.PDF each o' those colored portions on the map is representing a domestic dependent nation, an ethnocracy if you will, existing within the united states. HA! Good Fun!

reading skills here is baffling. " the jews were given control o' the portions o' the british mandate where they already had a majority population. they also got places like the negev freaking desert and other virtual wastelands." we didn't say that the jews had a majority in the negev. we said that the jews were given areas where they had a majority and were also given wasteland. http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/48/Palestine_Index_to_Villages_and_Settlements%2C_showing_Jewish-owned_Land_31_March_1945.jpg you and your busted map reading. look at the big section o' southern israel. how many towns is there in 1945? why so few? 'cause it were a wasteland... and that shows only northern most part o' the negev. a very substantial portion o' their 56% were the negev freaking desert, and at the time, there were nothing there worth having. imagine how the jews felt when the first see partition and realize that the single largest portion o' their partition were wasteland. oh, and not-red on the map doesn't mean it were owned by arab palestinans. there were brit and turk and french ownership o' land in the mandate as well. and there were also a sizeable quantity o' what would best be described as State-owned land. example http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/govbeat/files/2013/10/Pasted_Image_10_15_13_2_12_PM-2.jpg and that don't include individual state owned land neither. and who the hell cares what the zionist terrorists were claiming? your own quoted material o' balfour is: "His Majesty's government view with favour the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people, and will use their best endeavours to facilitate the achievement of this object, it being clearly understood that nothing shall be done which may prejudice the civil and religious rights of existing non-Jewish communities in Palestine, or the rights and political status enjoyed by Jews in any other country." the fact that some terrorist groups wanted all o' palestine is important why? how does that represent the intentions o' the brits, or the UN? or even the jewish majority... not that they matter in this instance. why should we care what admitted terroists groups wanted when figuring out what brits or UN promised? as for zor input, there is absolute nothing about granting arabs an autonomous state within the british mandate that conflicts with offering the same to the jews... which is what the UN partition were clear looking to accomplish. " Especially Poland had pre-war the largest Jewish population by percentage, so that larger region historically has had the largest Jewish connection in Europe (again, relatively speaking. And I'm not necessarily talking about Ostpreussen in itself, but the larger surrounding region)." and over 90% o' that population were slaughtered. and stalin, given his historic love for the jewish people, would have ever have agreed to an independent jewish nation smack-dab in the center o' the eastern bloc? you are a lunatic if you is trying to peddle that product. ... why? before we bother with further dismantling your increasingly bizarre argument, give us a why? why did the UN attempt to partition the british mandate as they did. you see the partitioning as manifest unfair, but explain to us their partitioning and their rationale. HA! Good Fun!

is nothing like a misleading map to brighten your day. point out negev desert on the map ros provided. lots o' that green crap is area that were complete unoccupied and were functional "owned" by the British government and nobody else. show us a map o' utah in late 1800's. go ahead, we can wait. now imagine that the US government is gonna complete pull out o' utah and divide land between mostly mormon settlers and the indigenous peoples. any place on the map not having a settler recorded deed will be showing green as is rightful belonging to the indigenous peoples. divide up map that way and how much o' utah shows green as "owned" by indigenous peoples? statistics is also misleading. the jews were given control o' the portions o' the british mandate where they already had a majority population. they also got places like the negev freaking desert and other virtual wastelands. 56% nonsense complete ignores what were there. Americans is perhaps more able to grasp that not all % o' land is alike. using utah, you want area around salt lake city, or the mojave desert if you is looking to add additional settlers in 1900? am not knowing if ros is doing this purposeful or not, but is comical. "So the British promised to "give" Palestine to the Jews at a time when Jews were only 10% of the population." he can't even read his own quoted material. the brits did not promise to give palestine to the jews when they were only 10% o' the population. the brits agreed to create a jewish homeland in palestine... you know, back when all those jews were being chased out of eastern europe. it were never evisioned or suggested that the jewish folks would get all o' the british mandate. heck, one plan were to settle the jewish folks in uganda... serious. *eye-roll* yeah, am genuine sorry that the jackarse UN folks ignored the bedouins living in the desert. am also not forgetting that the zionist terrorists in the british mandate pre-1948 were killing palestinians and brits. jews were sometimes on the receiving side o' those bloody conflicts, but the zionists in the british mandate were well and fully steeped in blood. there is no nice guys in this, but don't get suckered in by the bs that ros and others is trying to spin. HA! Good Fun! ps eastern prussia as a homeland for the jewish peoples? did we not just mention those pre ww2 pogroms and post ww2 jew huntings? and no doubt the ussr with it security council veto woulda' gone for that idea. *snort* come up with a worse idea... we dare you. pps is another funny about the map ros provides. near bottom o' 1947 map it says that the un partition were never implemented. next map shown in 1967. immediate after the brit mandate ended, the palestinians, egypt, jordan, syria, lebanon and others immediate attacked the jewish settlements with announced purpose o' wiping them out entirely. 1967 is six day war. you can read up on that if you wish. the maps is most amusing for what they don't tell you.

we like the circles as an option, particularly if combat is having any noteworthy complexity. the bg enhanced editions allowed you to specify a particular color for each party member's circle, which we were thinking were a fantastic idea. particularly at higher resolutions, isometric combats can be confusing. you potential got a half-dozen party members, some o' whom is gonna have similar gear, fighting against an even larger number o' enemies in darkened caves and tunnels. many such battles is gonna be close-ranged affairs and is gonna be frenetic, even with pause. colored circles let Gromnir know, at a glance, the location and identity o' each party member. is a much better system o' identification than is b00b v. no b00b armour as has been suggesting elsewhere. in a game where combat is kinda simple, no such circles is needed, but being able to toggle-on or toggle-off varied color circles is a good thing in our book. we don't necessarily want such circles to be ubiquitous, but is a good option. HA! Good Fun!

oversimplification, but we ain't a true expert, so perhaps others will clarify better. what is israel on a map today were, after ww2, part o' what were called the british mandate. the british mandate has origin going back to fall of ottoman empire... gets confusing. at the time the UN carved up the british mandate in 1947-48, creating jewish and palestinian territories, there were many jews living in the mandate. in fact, in many areas, the jewish folks were a majority. one reason there were so many jews in the mandate (don't call it palestine or it makes you believe it were run by and for palestinans) is 'cause as of late 19th century and before, there were concerted efforts throughout europe to get rid o' jews from many european countries. most o' the pogroms were in eastern europe, but jews were taking it pretty hard everywhere, with particular escalation from late 1800s... is not as if hitler picked jews randomn. ok now, here is one o' those dirty little not-so secrets o' european history that doesn't get much coverage in the history books. when jews in concentration camps were fed and eventual released by allied soldiers, some historians suggest near 1/3 as many jews were killed by local populaces as were killed by the nazis during all o' ww2. and the earlier pogroms had killed between 100 and 200 thousand jews as well. in another bit o' historic irony, 'cause so many jews were fleeing europe before and during and after ww2, the british set up concentration camps in cyprus to reduce the flow o' refugees to the british mandate. and yeah, they were technical concentration camps, and the conditions were pretty horrendous, but "concentration camp" necessarily conjures up nazi death camps, and that ain't what the cyprus camps were. nobody wanted the jews in europe. seriously, nobody. the jews were still being killed in europe even after world war 2. so the UN takes a look at a map o' the british mandate and recognizes that the jews there is already a majority in many areas and there is a lot o' useless desert area to dump new refugees into. also, the british had already promised to create a jewish homeland in the mandate territory back in 1917. at the time it were no doubt seeming like a great idea to let the jewish majority in the british mandate run things for themselves. nobody need be displaced and there were additional space, albeit inhospitable, for new jewish refugees. wins for everybody. *groan* HA! Good Fun! ps we purposeful did not mention holocaust victims, but keep in mind you is talking 'bout millions o' jews killed during the holocaust. to give perspective, total casualties we has seen for isarelis and palestinians (leaving other arabs out o' the mix for the moment) from 1948 to today might be a tragic but tiny number for many jews. 50,000 total casualties is probable high side for israeli-palestinian conflict, but even if you feel like bloat helps make some kinda point, add 20 thousand. assume 70k total and you got death totals for single death camps over a course o' a handful o' months. perspective can be a terrible thing.

how very enlightened. our notion o' a single romance thread were adopted by the mods. creation o' this thread shows impressive judgement. but as to romance, we hate the biowarian companion sexification mini-game. romance in a crpg and the companion mini-game is not the same thing, but as long as they is treated the same, we will necessarily be against romance. HA! Good Fun!

the post ww1 british and the UN in 1947 disagreed with you. the jewish folks had as much historical right to the land in what is now Israel as did folks now known as palestinians, which is to say, not much right at all. sure, the jewish refugees were a third o’ the population o’ the british mandate and many o’ them were moved from their homes when that mandate ended, but we can just ignore them as is inconvenient for you to do so. nobody in Europe were stepping forward to give jewish refugees (you seemed to put stock in refugee status earlier, but not now? Interesting) following the late 19th century pogroms, ww1 and ww2 a place to live. so, what were your solution then and now? if the right thing to do is give the poor and unfortunate palestians back lands that they were only holding at the sufferance o’ the ottomans and brits anyway, then am s’posing you thinks the displaced jews should be given back their lands and properties in Europe? *chuckle* no? do you even comprehend where your reasoning takes you in the present context? and again, were the British mandate. ain’t talking about Texans in America is we? nevertheless, the government does take land from folks all the time here in the US. those people gotta be compensated, but government can take and does. too bad for the palastinians, that they weren’t british, eh? and no, we don’t agree that an ethnocracy is necessarily detestable. Gromnir is Oglala you small-minded little yutz. we is technical a citizen o’ an ethnocracy as the Oglala is a domestic-dependent nation that survives within the boarders o’ the United States. as much as the Oglala and Lakota would like to have their ancestral lands back, even they/we ain’t so ignorant as to believe that the Americans who occupy those lands should be dispossessed at this point. and btw, as the lands in the Dakotas were subject o’ a treaty ‘tween the US and the Lakota people, there is far greater legal merit for Lakota claims as ‘posed to palestinains living in British mandate. regardless, no, we don’t find an ethnocracy necessarily detestable, particularly when that ethnicity has suffered historic abuses at the hands o’ other ethnic groups that approach genocide. HA! Good Fun! ps is also worth noting that most historical palestinan refugees is the result o' warfare. is not as if arabs living in the UN planned jewish portions o' israel were sudden denied citizenship rights and had their lands taken from them. the jewish territories were all having either a jewish majority or were so underpopulated as to make such distinctions pointless. negev desert? *snort* war starts and arabs flee. and when did war start? less than a day after end of british mandate.

Yes, Palestinaian cruelty is why so far the number of dead and injured on both sides is so euqal. Oh, wait, no it's not. what a novel concept. we congratulate you, sir. moral superiority as measured by an absolute and objective standard: body count. we will look forward to reading your thesis when you publish. is your system simple or complex? what we mean is, is one corpse equal to any other corpse? women is gonna be problematic. could potential open a can o' worms if you figure relative misogyny into some kinda function for determining values o' women dead. maybe just ignore that, yes? do you distinguish combatant victims from civilian? perhaps children count more? less? a sizable number o' palestinian dead has been the result o' palestinian infighting. on which side o' the scales o' justice does their bodies get thrown? regardless, is fascinating. it had never occurred to Gromnir that we could simple total up the bodies o' dead from the belligerents in a conflict to determine who gets moral high ground. what terrible irony-- the only way to win battle o' Justice is to be making sure your people suffer more casualties. nevertheless, we applaud your verve. HA! Good Fun!

Nope, not everyone. Just the less-annoying ones. well, we found shale and the dog to be least annoying in da:o. didn't say the dog were well-written, but it were less annoying. am gonna assume, to keep this all pg-rated, that the dog were not counting as bisexual for the immediate query. give us a second to try and recall the da2 companions. this will require some effort as they were largely forgettable or horrible. ... varric and aveline were our favorite companions, but am needing to consider if they were 'least annoying. anders were most annoying. nevertheless, am thinking that there is departures from previous games that will no doubt causes howls o' anguish from the mini-game sexification fans. your starting race is gonna result in some romances being unavailable. is our recollection that in da:o no romance option were having race limitations. da2 had no race choice for hawke, so yeah, this counts as a fascist and reactionary move by bioware in the eyes o' the Freedom and Love For All crowd. similarly, while da:o had gender preferences, it is possible that da2 marked an enlightened evolution. am honestly not knowing, but were all romanceable characters in da2 available to hawke regardless o' his gender? if so, then using something so anachronistic and inegalitarian as gender preferences in da:i would be, by comparison, criminal and ungodly... or at least unkanadian. HA! Good Fun!

You seem to be arguing from the standpoint that souls have a very real and pervasive connection to the 'self' or the individual. Souls are undoubtedly real in the POE world, but it does not fall out ipso facto that souls have a necessary connection to personal-identity. If most/all souls have no recollection of the afterlife even after reincarnation or Awakening, then we can make a Lockean argument: 1. Take a body with a brain containing a certain psychology, certain memories, and a certain set of proclivities. 2. Transfer that brain to a new host, suppose the contents carry over. 3. If the contents carry over, I think it is common sense to say that the person also carries over. Ergo, personal identity resides in the psychology, memories, proclivities, etc. and not in the specific body (or brain). Now replace body with soul. Transfer the psychology, memories, proclivities, etc. from one soul into another (empty soul, if possible). The person resides in the soul which corresponds to their psychology, etc. IF souls are shells which house certain traits, they're really no different from bodies or brains or minds or whatever real world analogy you want to make. I'm made up of a bunch of energy in reality, but when my mind perishes I have no reason to think I'm going to persist in the things that make me manifest corporeality, even if my energy will permeate through the world. Similarly, I'm made of star-matter, but /I/ am not a star, nor do I have any recollection of being those atoms in some far off entity. It's the content of the soul that matters, and if the afterlife or reincarnation damage that content, the soul being eternal is no different than the energy composing our bodies being eternal (unlikely as that may be). Now, there are lots of interesting questions that naturally arise: if souls only lose their memory upon reincarnation, are they in some sense the same person? I think we may more easily argue that they are the same soul, but in doing so we make a distinction between soul and person (such as the distinction we have between body and mind). But, these questions lay outside of my scope. I don't know if it has been said definitively what souls themselves experience after death, but in the latest update we learned that souls can become vengeful simulacra of their former selves when they die via natural disaster, so it would seem that death in the natural sense, at the very least, has the potential to strip parts of people away or turn them into specters of who they once were. That is to say, souls don't seem immutably 'you' any more than bodies do. Anyway, my point is: The question of value, soul versus body, isn't as cut and dry as I think you are making it out to be. Just because souls are "proven" to be real does not mean that (at least to the educated or introspective) souls are or ought to be valued more than bodies or what have you. and that is why we specifically noted, multiple times, that our position is different if obsidian is showing reasons for the people o' poe to be relative dismissive o' souls. clearly there is information we is not privy to that is making animancers more huggable in the poe world. however, please observe that the developers used a very specific word: soul. obsidian has used souls in past games, and the nature o' soul were familiar to us in the context o' real world major religions and concepts of the soul. if the soul in poe were something functional very different from our collective concept o' the soul, then use o' a word that is so emotionally charged strikes us as odd. still, it is possible that in spite o' use o' "soul" by obsidian, poe soul could be very different from our expectations based on real world or previous obsidian games. "The devs have specifically stated that many, many people have a "BURN IT WITH FIRE" mentality when it comes to animancy. You suggest the people of the world don't have enough suspicion and/or fear/contempt for animancy, based on what?" you want us to repeat everything we has said up to this point again? fail. say something new. HA! Good Fun!

you made a mistake. man-up and admit it. the reason americans and Gromnir don't much care 'bout the florida kid is not 'cause we has convicted him o' a crime without due process o' law. the idiot put himself in a situation where something bad were obscenely likely to occur. the guy shows up at a riot where peopled with their heads wrapped in keffiyeh is using slings to launch fist-sized stones at israeli police, and mr. genius decided that he will peaceably join the demonstration with a keffiyeh obscuring his features whilst carrying a sling. given such circumstances is anybody surprised by what happened to the future rhodes scholar? no? that makes the kid an idiot. that makes it perfectly reasonable for Gromnir and other americans to shake our heads sadly, pray for his speedy recovery, and hope he has learned from his Brobdingnagian display o' poor judgement. and guess what? is NOT a court o' law, so each and every reader and viewer is the equivalent o' the finder o' fact when judging for themselves if the kid's story is believable. bring up innocent until proven guilty is the dumbest thing you has said in awhile, and that is saying a great deal. our best friend cheats on his wife with Two women at the same time. guess what, Gromnir is not bound by any kinda social covenant that requires us to prove Beyond A Reasonable Doubt that he were cheating and that his actions were stoopid before we is able to punch him in the short ribs, call him an idiot, and then buy him a beer as he considers his upcoming divorce. public opinion gets an even reduced standard than friendship, yes? our judgement o' the kid's stupidity does not deny him liberty or right to travel across state lines or any other such American values. heck, can you imagine how difficult it would be to fire bad employees if we had to resort to such nonsesne? no kidding, this were monumental dumb o' you. as an aside, in case it were missed, we noted we thinks the israeli police acted excessive. is not as if the mind-boggling stoopidity o' the teen from florida lessens the what we see as an excess o' police force. nevertheless, the kid is not deserving o' sympathy... unless he actual is mentally deficient. is he? given the circumstances it seems likely. oh, and in the leaked video you can clear see his keffiyeh, and that video were released by sympathetic palistineans to show the evils o' the israeli police. so, wrong again as there clear is evidence. am not certain what you think is relevance o' the kid being charged or not charged. do you has access to the charging documents? do you know what pressures the US state department brought or did not bring? neither does Gromnir. we don't know and neither does you. don't care really. as to your cnn and bbc response... HA! okie dokie. "The three Israeli teenagers were too stupid to live, hitch hiking on the West Bank and getting into a vehicle with a stranger, knowing that a lot of palestinians on the WB hate them!" seems a bit different to us, but am suspecting there is some folks that would agree. the assumption that violence would result from walking along a highway at night strikes us as a bit more remote than the possibility o' there being violence at a riot, but hey, we is kinda funny that way. (*snort*) but perhaps you is correct and that is why we didn't hear much 'bout the murder o' three israelis until after the palestinians rioted. perhaps it were just chalked up as three israelis being in the wrong place at the wrong time in a part o' the world where this kinda crap happens all the time. regardless, whether you think it is possible to argue that the 3 israelis were acting foolish, it is clear to us, and to many Americans that showing up to a riot dressed in your keffiyeh and carrying a sling is asking for trouble. ... and sorry, but the notion that you could see florida's kids actions as anything other than foolish in the circumstances is just too much for us to believe. yeah, am getting you has chosen political sides in this nonsense, but fighting this point is just mind-boggling. just for fun, ask Gradma Z for her pov. everybody can play at home. http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_jE2qRqEt7yU/TKhfIl3dClI/AAAAAAAAAEA/ElmM7uby6nw/s1600/peaceful+demostrator+oct+1.jpg show linked picture above. tell Grandma Z that you is planning on heading out to a riot where folks will be outfitted like the guy above. you plan to be similarly costumed, but you won't carry a slingshot. the high point o' the demonstration will be when your fellow protesters, not you o' course, will hurl rocks at police. now, how does grandma zor react? HA! am not expecting zor to be honest, but no doubt other folks here can imagine the horror on granny's face as you explain you is gonna peacefully join a riot. some o' us got insane grandmothers, but am suspecting that most is gonna be shocked, appalled and worried by your absolutely moronic display o' poor judgement. if your personal compass for foolishness is busted, perhaps you can ask grandma. HA! Good Fun!

fishy? yes. am glad you noticed. diane sawyer clearly doesn't know how to accessorize. look at those earnings. orange? with her coloring? ghastly. HA! Good Fun!

"A permanent just settlement of the refugees in their homeland is an essential ingredient of any genuine settlement in the Middle East." roll back calender to 1947 and such statements could be taken to be advocating the formation o' a jewish state in the middle east. heck, can go back to balfour in 1917 and it rings just as true. 'course the English realized they couldn't appease everybody, so they just kinda gave up, the UN had some crazy cartography skills when they initial drew up new boarders, but at the end o' the british mandate, egypt, jordan, iraq, syria, lebannon, the palestinian irregular army and saudis and pakistanis and seeming folks from entire middle-east and beyond, attacked the new jewish settlements. ... not even a single day lapsed before the arab and islamic world came rushing in to destroy new state o' israel. as for the historical nonsense as to who took whose land first? who cares? romans (italians?), turks , philistines, assyrians, babylonians, jews and arabs has all planted their freaking metaphorical flags on that contentious little bit o' dirt and sand. it were the brits who were running the madhouse most recent before the UN did their king solomon act (*snicker*) and they had been doing so since after the first world war. the turks had been in charge since the 1500s? am pretty sure that the ottoman empire did not consider itself palestinian. palestine? palestinians? ha! nonsense. so-called palestinians and jews were both living in the british mandate and killing each other and the brits for decades. were an absolute Charle Fox situation. as noted above, we ain't a huge supporter o' israel, but the whole bs about how israel came in and disposed the existing state o' palestine and created thousands o' refugees or somesuch similar insanity is absolute bunk. the last time the palestinians had full control o' territory in what is now is israel, they and the rest o' the arab world attacked with the goal o' exterminating the new jewish state. during the british mandate, the zionists didn't believe england were moving fast enough on its promises to create a jewish state. the zionists resorted to some rather brutal acts o' terrorism, presumably to speed things up a bit. there ain't no dew-eyed innocents in this conflict. go back far enough and everybody has screwed everybody many times over. so what? bah. "So as well as an amateur earthquake expert who doesn't know the difference between Mercalli and magnitude moment, you're a lawyer who doesn't know presumption of innocence? (Un)Fortunately it's actually irrelevant, quite apart from said presumption of innocence which tellingly you give to the settlers but not the youth, the US kid not only strenuously denies any involvement but is yet to be charged with any crime and that despite supposedly, per the Israeli propaganda, throwing molotovs and being armed with knives. OTOH, some of the Jewish Nationalists haou ve confessed, and even re-enacted beating the kid and setting him on fire while still alive." wow going serious necro on us with earthquakes. is that the only time you felt like you made a point o' some kind? sadness and condolences. "per the Israeli propaganda" that is funny. is propoganda when cnn reports or bbc? okie dokie. regardless, as to other points, am not talking 'bout a criminal law standard are we? public opinion has never been held to the same standard, nor should it. presumption o' innocence in Amercian criminal law exists with full recognition that it "is better that twelve guilty men should go free rather than that one innocent man should suffer." o j simpson were found not guilty. thinks every (or even most Americans) believed that oj were innocent is a complete different issue. criminal guilt needs must be proved beyond a reasonable doubt for the State to deprive a person o' their liberty, but that has never been the standard necessary to hold persons accountable to public opinion. o j didn't go to jail, but he sure as hell weren't doing hertz commercials after the trial, and no court could force advertisers and sports networks to embrace oj. duh. stick to plate tectonics or whatever, 'cause you is so far outta your depths here it is laughable. also, we never actual said that we were certain that the kid did throw rocks, did we? we said he is too stupid to live. put yourself in a position such as he did, and you is asking for trouble. he got trouble. if we were his lawyer, we would do our utmost for our client. we has advocated for folks we loathe. gang members and religious cultists and french people. *shudder* personal opinion o' clients does not reduce our diligence. if we were on a jury in which dumb kid were facing criminal charges for attacking police, we could do so objectively. fact that we think he is an idiot who put himself in a bad situation does not mean we can't be an objective finder o' fact where standard is beyond a reasonable doubt. find criminal liability for attacks on police is a far different thing than deciding as a person, and seeming as the American public as a whole, that the florida kid were dumb and not deserving o' much sympathy. thank goodness we ain't forced to give zor a beyond reasonable doubt standard before we decide he is too stupid to live based on his inane posts. what a truly nightmarish world that would be. HA! Good Fun! ps being an a-hole or an idiot is Not crimes. being an a-hole or an idiot will result in lack o' sympathy, but it won't get you convicted o' crimes in the US. thank goodness. is likewise no criminal standard o' arseholeishness (we invented a word) or idiocy. count yourself lucky.

am gonna ignore the one-sided description o' current events for the nonce. one reason why we ain't getting much reaction here in the US regarding the florida kid (am not thinking irony means what you think it does) is 'cause the kid were part o' a group o' protesters that were hurling rocks at the police with slings. 3 Israelis got murdered in the middle east and there were zero coverage here until a palestinian kid is similarly murdered, possibly in retaliation. you know for certain that jewish nationalists responded? you know more than anybody at this point it seems. riots ensued. israeli government condemned the killing o' the palestinian boy, but nobody trusts anybody. regardless, this innocent florida boy (no doubt an honor student... initial reports concocted a story about him visiting his deathbed grandmother, but that were changed) with his head wrapped in a keffiyeh that complete covered his features and carrying a sling gets beat up by israeli police who were suffering more than psychological injuries from hurled rocks. btw, am not talking about bart simpson cartoon slingshots neither, am talking the the kinda slings that can hurl fist sized rocks in excess o' 60 mph at folks a goodly distance away. did the israeli police act with excessive force? yea. nevertheless, is tough to wok up much sympathy for the sling-carrying kid (he assured his father that he didn't throw any rocks... honest) who disguised his features and joined a crowd that were attacking police. is not as if we is particularly pro-israeli, but we could care less 'bout a an american kid who purposefully travels to a veritable war zone and then joins an angry rock hurling mob and (gasp) finds himself hurt in the process. this ain't an example o' Israeli evil or even palestinian extremism. is freaking darwinism. kid is too stupid to live in our book... and am only being a smidgen hyperbolic. http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_jE2qRqEt7yU/TKhfIl3dClI/AAAAAAAAAEA/ElmM7uby6nw/s1600/peaceful+demostrator+oct+1.jpg HA! Good Fun! edit: we added a picture o' the traditional outfit o' the peaceful protesters that were suffering israeli mistreatment. is not a picture o' the florida kid specific.

I was merely clarifying your last sentence stating repeatedly that Souls and their manipulation were real in Poe, not asking to discuss the nature of reality. This seems obvious. sure seems that way. "what is real" is a quote btw. souls and gods is different in the real world than they is in poe. Gromnir is gonna accept that fact and move forward 'cause we sure as hell ain't gonna engage in a metaphysical debate. doing so is nothing more than a functional distraction. *shrug* regardless, given the setup o' animancers in poe, we see your reaction as wholly implausible. you, like lephys, is looking from perspective o' a world o' science wherein the science itself ain't good or bad. animancy, however, is not at all like chemistry or even medicine. your own examples o' real world practitioners o' suspect arts necessarily needed to do so secretly because it were feared that such arts endangered the souls o' themselves and those around them. in poe world you got real magic, so open use o' magic is not gonna get same adverse reaction. unfortunate for you, souls is also real. animancers binding souls to objects and corpses is real. animancers traveling about and offering faustian deals to unsuspecting rich and noble fools is also real. the uneducated fear that animancers will bring about Apocalypse. the educated, the folks who know o' undead creation and animancers playing at mephistophiles and offering immortality while stealing souls has less reason to be suspicious? to the educated and informed, the cost o' misplaced faith in a chemist is what, a toxic cloud and a chemical fire? misplaced faith in animancer, on the other hand, is far more serious. secretive government organizations and shady cabals making use o' animancers? sure. individuals who dare fate and spit in the eye o' god (or gods or whatever) for possibility o' immortality or maybe even for a misguided dream o' a greater good? yeah, obsidian has actual done such more than once. ps:t, motb, and fo:nv is all having examples o' such hubris. animancers who has widespread acceptance 'cause o' their good works? that would be perfect reasonable if poe world didn't have animancers creating genuine rather than imagined horrors and if potential cost o' misplaced faith were not your very real soul. but again, is going in circles. HA! Good Fun!

I think that when people assume that a corporate entity has an "attitude", they'll end up in the wrong simply because a corporation is not alive even though it behaves as a living thing. The great Leviathan and as one, made of people who are ultimately who decide and influence said attitude. Without being privy to the internal culture inside BW all we can do is speculate. If I had to point something out it would be the thematic differences in their works, BW has become more about the romances/companion based narrative driven games and Obs keep doing unique RPGs and being awesome at it. Bioware have a kind of "hive mind" where everyone in the company act the same, acting like a d**k...really, they will become like a d**k from time to time....that is their attitude, and their working attitude...It not just on their staff, but also their loyal fans, but the fans are drones, they are like a clone of the staff and their job is attacking anyone who critic Bioware...After the one who critic got heated, the mods come and issue a ban, all blame goes to the one who critic They are like that, the staff and the fans, they love to bait the discussion into something else, get into religious and racist stuff, or even sexual stuff, then the one who got banned are the one who originally critic them in the posts...i got hit by that tactic many times, they who direct into religion stuff, then i who got banned... So it's okay when they say "Qunari are Muslim terrorist and their religion is Islam" but when i said "No, Muslims are not terrorist, Qunari is not Islam", mod come block the topic, banned me and say "religious topic, end of line!" That is their attitude ... you do realize that you is making your bio issues sound kinda personal? Gromnir has now experienced one of those "ah" moments. some o' your complaints and notions were striking us as rather flimsy or ridiculous, but in context o' a personal rather than intellectual grudge, it is now making sense. cost as something near $800 to be taking a mediation and alternative dispute resolution course some number o' years ago. the course counted towards our mcle and we were then able to be claiming that we were a bona-fide mediator... am pretty sure we got the certificate in our desk at home. maybe. the thing is, the guys teaching the course were stressing that whatever people claimed their issues were, it weren't. "it is never just about the car." we were not fully embracing such a notion, but there were some validity. am sorry bio hurt your feelings. HA! Good Fun!

*sigh* in a world with souls that is real and incontrovertible, animancers may bind those souls to inanimate objects as well as to the corpses o' the dead. not only is animancers able to do such, they has. you are sooooo not helping by analogizing to such stuff as real world guns. no matter what new and more ridiculous example you come up with, we is still left with your previous admission: "I'm not hurting my own cause. There are horrible things in the REAL world. Why does it matter whether they're affiliated with souls or not?" again, go play motb or ps:t. read 'bout martyrs. souls is making qualitative different. make those souls real and it is so far from analogous we have difficulty expressing just how bizarre your perspective is seeming. there is no real world analogue to an animancer binding your soul to your corpse. the reasonable fear o' anaimancers should be extreme regardless o' whether they can can relieve your gout symptoms or not. obsidian developers in their info drop about undead tells us that animancers, pretending to sell immortality to nobles, has in fact cursed them by binding their souls to their corpse. is positively faustian. is not a solitary event neither. HA! Good Fun!