Quote from: StumpydaveWell I don't get the high falutin' importance given to what, for me and mine, is just sitting around saying either what has happened / is happening or saying what we do in response.  Often there is dice rolling.  If everything goes well we have a laugh and maybe get an anecdote we can share with ourselves and those friends who also game.

Why all the vitriol and lines being drawn?

Got it.

No wonder you're confused -- if everyone's having fun, talking about playstyle is pointless.

The only reason playstyle discussions come up is when you're talking about gaming in the abstract (game design or theory), or if there's a problem that might be caused by conflicting goals.

If you're

• Having fun with the games and groups you're playing with
• Not interested in designing games
• Not interested in Internet wankery

There's no compelling reason to talk about playstyle at all.

For people designing games talking about playstyle is worthwhile because they might need to understand / reference play goals beyond their immediate group (especially if the intent is to design a game with a broad market)

For people having problems, play-style discussions can be a (very, very) small part of the solution (note: some people think they're a HUGE part of the solutions. I think this is wrong. I have a simple proof if anyone's interested)

On the other hand, I'm certain you're interested in Internet Wankery. There's no other explanation for having an account at TheRPGSite.

So I'm baffled -- given the laser-like perfection of playstyle threads for meeting your (and my) needs, what could possibly be confusing you?

Cheers,
-E.

Quote from: -E.If you're

• Having fun with the games and groups you're playing with
• Not interested in designing games
• Not interested in Internet wankery

There's no compelling reason to talk about playstyle at all.

Isn't there?  Though I very much enjoy the play-style in which I spend most of my gaming, I also like to hear about stuff that other people enjoy.  Firstly, it's just fun to hear about people having fun.  Secondly, sometimes it gets to sounding so interesting that I'll take a spin at playing a game the way they play it, because it sounds like it might be fun too.  That way I can have more than just one style of play, the same way a person can have more than one hobby generally.

If you enjoy playing chess does that mean there's no point hearing about what other people enjoy in rock-climbing? :confused:

Quote from: PseudoephedrineChomsky is certainly highly critical of Foucault, and claims that he is unintelligible at times, but he doesn't claim that he "believes in nothing". In "Justice and Power", Chomsky and Foucault's extended debate is filled with mutual recognition of the work the other is doing, albeit they do disagree with one another. I don't know where you got this idea that Chomsky believes that Foucault believes in nothing, but it's simply wrong.

Hmm, I remembered the quote slightly off, Chomsky actually said that Foucault was "completely ammoral".  And I mean fuck, we're talking about Noam fucking Chomsky here, so for that guy to be stunned by Foucault is quite a feat.

Quote from: From The December 1993 Edition of "First Things""By the time of his meeting with Foucault, Chomsky had settled easily into his role of resident extremist; so he was appropriately stunned at being far outflanked on the left. Later he commented, "I’d never met anyone so totally amoral." The utopian anarchist with the furrowed brow had been treated to a dose of Foucault’s considered views: no human nature, no social models, no justice, no law, no responsible human subjects. "One makes war to win, not because it’s just," Foucault explained. And if the winners exercise bloody violence on the losers, "I can’t see what objection one could make to that.""

The context of the quote was after Chomsky's first face-to-face meeting with Foucault, in the early 70s.

RPGPundit

Which is it, amoral or immoral? You say one and the quote says another.

Quote from: jrientsThe main problem with discussing conflicting play styles (espeicially in the abstract) is that behind every simple statement "I like punching orcs" or "I like story games that explore narrative premises" is the unexpressed follow-up "because its the best way to play".

That's a fairly pessimistic outlook. I do think that it's true of Settembrini and his ilk -- mainly because they're not shy about saying that their preferred styles of play are the only way and the best way. Take my own love of emulating myth, though -- I don't do it because it's the only way to play or the best way to play. I do it because it's what I like. Period.

Most gamers are well aware that other people like different play styles and, unlike Settemebrini, don't go out of their way to actively level ad-hominem attacks against them for a failure of being able to explain their position logically. Look at the recent progression fo his threrads. . .

He starts with a thread that specifically calls players who don't do things as he does weak. When many point out that thsi is a rather unfiar charcterization, he starts another thread asking for explanations of other play styles in which he summarily dismisses all explanations as crazy. He the starts this thread in which he openly decalres that people who don't play as he does are morally bankrupt.

It might just be me, but I don't view any of that as particularly productive discussion -- rather, they seem like blatant trolls.

But you see, it's all the fault of The Forge. they started it. :rolleyes:

Quote from: James McMurrayBut you see, it's all the fault of The Forge. they started it. :rolleyes:

"He who fights with monsters, should take care, lest he thereby become a monster. And when you gaze too long into an abyss, the abyss gazes also into you"

Quote from: AkrasiaI find it rather strange that you would enlist Habermas in support of your overall position, given his broadly Kantian framework, and the fact that he does make a distinction (in his various discussions of the 'ideal speech situation' and its role in justifying norms in the 'post-metaphysical age') between 'moral questions' (which must satisfy the test of universalizability) and 'ethical/existential/aesthetic' questions (which need not be universalizable).   Moreover, Habermas is quite explicit in seeing his work as a continuation of what he calls the 'Enlightenment project'.

Sure, one can't read Habermas uncritically. I think he's mistaken about his work being a continuation of the Enlightenment project, based on his essays in Postmetaphysical Thinking (specifically the one focusing on Hegel - my books are packed up at the moment so I can't check the title), where he spends a great deal of time showing precisely how the philosophical projects of the Enlightenment and the 19th century have irrevocably changed and can never be recovered.

As well, the implication in the Structural Transformation of the Public Sphere's discussion of the transition from rational debate to consumption is that we are now different in character, politically, morally and epistemologically from the Enlightenment. Deliberative democracy and the theory of communicative action can be read not only as attempts to return to that period, but also as a way to go forward out of our own.

I think that based on those kinds of consideration, he is mistaken in his later statements that he is continuing the Enlightenment.

As for Habermas being a self-confessed "Kantian Pragmatist", it's true he is. However, his Kantian distinction between aesthetic and moral judgements seems rather permeable in his actual work. For example, in the Structural Transformation of the Public Sphere, aesthetic judgements (specifically art and literary criticism) are key to the origin of public rational debate, and play a political-moral role in the shift from power relations to validity relations. This seems to undercut the distinction made between the two.

However, I don't think these two problems are particularly key to his philosophy. One can give up Habermas as "the last Modernist" and his off-handed distinction between aesthetic and moral judgements without really doing much damage to his philosophical work.

QuotePerhaps, but the same could definitely be said about Foucault and the neo-Wittgensteinians!

Sure, but so what? You've got to lay out at least one specific problem and explain why it is fundamental to the position and how it undermines their criticisms of Kant, just as I did with Kant's aesthetic-moral divide, not just assert things wildly, as if there was some philosophy out there that wasn't problematic in some way.

QuoteThe fact of the matter is that Kantian moral theory (despite being considered 'problematic' by people with a fondness for postmodern cant)

I love you too, but don't be an ignoramus. "Postmodern cant" is a ridiculously pejorative term that refers to nothing in particular. It's a sign of sloppy thinking that fails to either engage with the various (ever-changing) thinkers lumped together as using it, or to adequately distinguish between entirely different theoretical approaches.

Quoteremains one of the two dominant approaches in contemporary ethics (the other being, of course, consequentialism).  Just look at the recent and current work of Christine Korsgaard, T.M. Scanlon, John Rawls, Barbara Herman, Onora O'Neill, Habermas, Steve Darwall (my former PhD advisor, I should note), etc., to see the health of Kantian moral theory in recent decades.

Once again, I don't recall making the claim you're attacking. I said that Kantian ethics was problematic and laid out a specific problem with it. I didn't claim that virtue ethics was the dominant ethical theory of our day.

I'm not sure how we got from a mad Prussian with dice telling us we were all fuckwits, to "Kantian ethics" and "postmodern cant." I suspect this is a conversation Akrasia is carrying over from that absurd Off-Topic subforum "atheism" thread.

Quote from: James McMurrayWhich is it, amoral or immoral? You say one and the quote says another.

Amoral.  The "immoral" was a typo on my part.

RPGpundit

Quote from: JimBobOzI'm not sure how we got from a mad Prussian with dice telling us we were all fuckwits, to "Kantian ethics" and "postmodern cant."

We started talking about morals and morality. Somebody mentioned that a school of philosophy was dead/had been derided. Akrasia said it wasn't. The discussion moved from its continued existance to a discussion on its merits and the merits of its champions.

Quote from: JimBobOzI suspect this is a conversation Akrasia is carrying over from that absurd Off-Topic subforum "atheism" thread.

It's not. It is about philosophy, but not all discussions about philosophy by philosophers are the exact same one. (Which you'd actually know, if you read them. Though, I don't suppose I can blame you because....)

Look everyone, this philosophy discussion is super interesting. Like, really. But can it be taken somewhere else, pretty please? I'd totally read it if you, say, posted it in the off topic section.

Quote from: Thanatos02[...]not all discussions about philosophy by philosophers are the exact same one. (Which you'd actually know, if you read them. Though, I don't suppose I can blame you because....)

You'd be surprised at how much philosophy I've read; lack of quoting it does not prove lack of having read it. As for how similar the monologues and dialogues of different philosophers are, I'm reminded of what Tolstoy said about families: "Happy families are all alike; every unhappy family is unhappy in its own way." So yes, different philosophers do sound quite different, but they all seem quite miserable.

Quote from: Pseudoephedrine... However, his Kantian distinction between aesthetic and moral judgements seems rather permeable in his actual work.

Simply because a distinction is 'permeable' doesn't mean that it isn't a legitimate one.

Quote from: Pseudoephedrine...  You've got to lay out at least one specific problem and explain why it is fundamental to the position and how it undermines their criticisms of Kant, just as I did with Kant's aesthetic-moral divide ...

Ummm, where exactly did you explain this devastating criticism of Kant?  All you did was mention a bunch of people who objected to the general distinction between aesthetics and morality, note that this divide emerged at a certain point in history, and remark that both aesthetics and morality were part of 'value theory' (nobody is going to dispute any of that).  

Quote from: Pseudoephedrine...  I love you too, but don't be an ignoramus. "Postmodern cant" is a ridiculously pejorative term that refers to nothing in particular. It's a sign of sloppy thinking that fails to either engage with the various (ever-changing) thinkers lumped together as using it, or to adequately distinguish between entirely different theoretical approaches...

It's not a sign of 'sloppy thinking'.  Rather, it's simply a quip that was not meant to be taken overly seriously (but that nonetheless roughly reflects my overall evaluation of most thinkers labelled as 'post-modern').

Quote from: JimBobOz... I suspect this is a conversation Akrasia is carrying over from that absurd Off-Topic subforum "atheism" thread.

:confused:

It's got nothing to do with that thread, man.

Rather, Pseudoephedrine objected to the distinction that I had made earlier in this thread between something being a 'moral matter' (which involves claims that concern obligations to which all persons are subject) and an 'aesthetic matter' (which involves judgements of taste and decisions about what activities to participate in that can vary somewhat among persons, even if they are not strictly speaking 'subjective').  My claim was that RPGs belong in the latter category, and thus Sett's talk of 'morality' in connection with RPG preferences was thus somewhat misplaced.

Anyhow, Pseudoephedrine felt the need to invoke the authority of Foucault and some neo-Wittgensteinians in order to back up his objection (which was never really explained, btw).  I replied to what he said, and ... well ... here we are.
:shrug:

Quote from: James McMurrayBut you see, it's all the fault of The Forge. they started it. :rolleyes:

The amount of times folks have dipped into that well, I'm amazed it hasn't dried up already

Regards,
David R