On Sun, 15 Oct 2023 09:33:21 -0400, Cian Witheryn wrote:

>Thanks David, for that excellent response because it articulates what I was
>finding uncomfortable and couldn't expand on past "who wrote this, a
>Protestant who never challenged the fundamental biases that color the
>definitions they use?"

Actually, I'm Jewish - but I'm part of the wider society, which is,
fundamentally, Christian.

Part of the problem is that when we see new things, we attempt to fit it
into categories that we already know from experience; it takes major
radical departures from the familiar to cause people to come up with new
categories. But even when developing those new categories, they're going to
be defined - generally negatively - in terms of the extant categories:
"This potrzebie is not a frammistam (it differs in this critical way) nor
is it a widget (it differs in that critical way), it's therefore just a
potrzebie." And when you find a wadget that differs from both a frammistam
and a widget in the same way as a potrzebie, the initial inclination is
going to be to classify the wadget as a type of potrzebie, until you come
up with yet another critical difference from the extant classes.

>                       Which adds nothing to the discussion, other than
>"yeah a christian probably wrote this". It's not a religious profile, it's
>not even proper sociological data, it's taking what is many people's
>bedrock of their reality and distilling it through bureaucratic questioning
>into bubbles on a multiple choice exam that asks "which one is the least
>different from your faith".

Which type of distillation is ultimately what any of the U*Ps in Traveller
are. None of them actually define a *; they just provide a summary of
certain characteristics for the referee to use as a launchpad for his own
*building. And under Rule Zero, the referee can even say "Nah, I like yadda
better; I'm going to Make It So for my campaign.".

>                            It's also an amazing worldbuilding tool if you
>work from "here's what the bureaucrats think it is", and I love it.
>Even if it was written by Christians who never fundamentally challenged how
>their religion has shaped their thinking about religion.

You've made a somewhat valid criticism of the presentation. Can you suggest
some improvements to address them? When I post things like this, I _do_
want the feedback with an eye toward making it do the job better, and
correcting what I might have overlooked.

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