Lets talk Spiritualism, Religion, and Ethics.

[Nighzmarquls]

And again I would like to note. The materialists don't have any tangible malus to psionics once discovered. They don't outlaw them or deny their existence. Unless you the player does anyway.

It goes the other way. The spiritualists don't accept that none organics can be conscious. Where this idea the materialists are opposed to the evidence came from is beyond me. They simply don't discover it without an example.

Having mind powers makes your population more likely to have magical thinking? Look at how much having the internet encourages flat earthers.

 

[Shermanator]

And why couldn't someone with a materialist worldview, as materialism is defined by Stellaris, care about nature? I'd argue that in real life people with similar views to Stellaris meterialsm tend to have environmentalist views.

Also you can play as a spiritualist megacorp that cares nothing for the environment, and exploits it for profit.

 

[Wildwiredweasel]

Here's my question: Would anybody be opposed to spiritualists being able to use AI and robots with no penalties?
Are people okay with materialists being able to use psionics without penalty?
If there's no malice toward either of those situations, then why is there a divide at all? It feels arbitrary. But it's actually not.

All the ideas expressed here explaining the viewpoint of spiritualism doesn't preclude the idea that a mind or a soul can be artificially created. You can sit here and argue about why it should or should not be, but sticking to what we believe are the possible belief systems that can be expressed by all possible alien minds is ridiculous.

That said, there is a problem with the materialist mindset regarding AI being the same as organic intelligence, and that problem is that AI can not use psionics. If their consciousness was of the same nature, then obviously they could- but since they're incapable, it lends credence to the idea they're not actually minds. That's an in-world, testable, binary argument. And it's one I wish wasn't there.

I don't understand the need to treat being a robot as a bonus rather than a different nature of body. If you had produce all of your pops through resources, if your food product was either irrelevant or just used for bio-products (bio-diesel fuelled eco-friendly hippy-robots, anyone?), if your pops were susceptible to other things that other races were not (for example, what if machine races had huge penalties to overcome to live on an ocean world because of all the salt water? Anyone seen what that does to a computer chip?)

In short, because being mechanical is in itself treated as a bonus, allowing it access to psionicism results in imbalanced play, and due to the game elements, it's iffy to allow materialists and especially machine races access to the psionics because that could be wildly imbalanced- thus why it isn't arbitrary, but why it also doesn't make it feel satisfying.

It's game balance causing the world to have to fit this idea that a lot of people just really don't care for, and promote a world that a lot of people don't care for over the other way.

 

[Ciderglove]

Here's my question: Would anybody be opposed to spiritualists being able to use AI and robots with no penalties?
Are people okay with materialists being able to use psionics without penalty?
If there's no malice toward either of those situations, then why is there a divide at all? It feels arbitrary. But it's actually not.

All the ideas expressed here explaining the viewpoint of spiritualism doesn't preclude the idea that a mind or a soul can be artificially created. You can sit here and argue about why it should or should not be, but sticking to what we believe are the possible belief systems that can be expressed by all possible alien minds is ridiculous.

That said, there is a problem with the materialist mindset regarding AI being the same as organic intelligence, and that problem is that AI can not use psionics. If their consciousness was of the same nature, then obviously they could- but since they're incapable, it lends credence to the idea they're not actually minds. That's an in-world, testable, binary argument. And it's one I wish wasn't there.

I don't understand the need to treat being a robot as a bonus rather than a different nature of body. If you had produce all of your pops through resources, if your food product was either irrelevant or just used for bio-products (bio-diesel fuelled eco-friendly hippy-robots, anyone?), if your pops were susceptible to other things that other races were not (for example, what if machine races had huge penalties to overcome to live on an ocean world because of all the salt water? Anyone seen what that does to a computer chip?)

In short, because being mechanical is in itself treated as a bonus, allowing it access to psionicism results in imbalanced play, and due to the game elements, it's iffy to allow materialists and especially machine races access to the psionics because that could be wildly imbalanced- thus why it isn't arbitrary, but why it also doesn't make it feel satisfying.

It's game balance causing the world to have to fit this idea that a lot of people just really don't care for, and promote a world that a lot of people don't care for over the other way.

Materialists *do* have a penalty for adopting Psionics: it creates a large amount of Spiritualist ethics attraction, meaning that all their robots suddenly start causing a lot of unhappiness and influence loss.

 

[TheAtreides84]

Honestly, I would simply add two civics, something like
"Creation of consciousness" - Spiritualist ethics (not fanatic), starts with Robotics workers, can give full rights to Synths with no penalty.
"Department of parapsychology" - Materialist ethics (not fanatic), starts with Psionic theory, does not cause ethics attraction.

Seems a good way to preserve the uniqueness while still giving people two new playstyles if they pay for them with a civics slot.

 

[Ciderglove]

"Department of parapsychology" - Materialist ethics (not fanatic), starts with Psionic theory.

STARTS with Psionic Theory? That’s ridiculous.

 

[TheAtreides84]

STARTS with Psionic Theory? That’s ridiculous.

Why? Last time I played you could get that fairly quickly as a Spiritualist civ. Did they change it?

 

[Novacat]

Psionic theory is a tier 3 tech, which usually means you will not be able to start rolling it until late early game/early mid game. By comparison, Gene tailoring is also a Tier 3 technology.

Here's my question: Would anybody be opposed to spiritualists being able to use AI and robots with no penalties?
Are people okay with materialists being able to use psionics without penalty?
If there's no malice toward either of those situations, then why is there a divide at all? It feels arbitrary. But it's actually not.

Spiritualists are currently hard-limited into granting AI rights, so they do have a limitation there.

Materialists meanwhile have no penalty to using psionics, but pretty much unless they are super lucky, they will not acquire psionic theory at all because of the limitations materialists have on acquiring psionic theory.

 

[BlackUmbrellas]

That said, there is a problem with the materialist mindset regarding AI being the same as organic intelligence, and that problem is that AI can not use psionics. If their consciousness was of the same nature, then obviously they could- but since they're incapable, it lends credence to the idea they're not actually minds. That's an in-world, testable, binary argument. And it's one I wish wasn't there.

Synthetic minds lacking the same hardware biological ones have for tapping into the Shroud in no way implies they're any less sapient.

 

[TheAtreides84]

Psionic theory is a tier 3 tech, which usually means you will not be able to start rolling it until late early game/early mid game. By comparison, Gene tailoring is also a Tier 3 technology.

Well, it's still a civic slot, one you can't change anymore for the rest of the game. So you get the tech early, but you give up some other passive bonus.

 

[Novacat]

Well, it's still a civic slot, one you can't change anymore for the rest of the game. So you get the tech early, but you give up some other passive bonus.

It is a civic slot that lets you get a technology that normally that ethic would not have access to at all. So, that is really strong. Especially since psionics is the main draw of Spiritualism in the first place.

 

[TheAtreides84]

It is a civic slot that lets you get a technology that normally that ethic would not have access to at all. So, that is really strong. Especially since psionics is the main draw of Spiritualism in the first place.

Yeah, maybe. Then just up the chance.

 

[Adolf - Finite War]

In short, because being mechanical is in itself treated as a bonus, allowing it access to psionicism results in imbalanced play, and due to the game elements, it's iffy to allow materialists and especially machine races access to the psionics because that could be wildly imbalanced- thus why it isn't arbitrary, but why it also doesn't make it feel satisfying.

It's game balance causing the world to have to fit this idea that a lot of people just really don't care for, and promote a world that a lot of people don't care for over the other way.

It can be balanced out with having to pick more ascension perks to improve your species thus having access to fewer perks to improve your empire (they also should be improved to make the decision harder). Also production cost - building psionic synths takes longer and could require special ressources like Zro.

If we make antimater, living metal, nanites and Zro produceable (though much more difficult) then using megastructure like projects on certain gas giants using nanites to create synthetic Zro could be a thing. Or synths who are not totally opposed to organics could encounter and use rare species in space or on dune like planets that they can herd/farm for Zro to cover their psi-pop unit upkeep.


About the civic slot not being changeable - have any of you ever crowned a psi-god-emperor? That's the biggest irony about the civic that would let materialists much more reliably create one. The suggestion about spiritualists that actually love the idea of playing god with machines as a civic is good but the proposal for a materialst pendant isn't. I remember a earlier proposal where latent psionics was suggested as a pop trait though imo it should be weaker then the first tier of the ascension path and there still should be an option that doesn't depend on the founder pops traits to more easily explore such ideas.

 

[Wildwiredweasel]

Materialists *do* have a penalty for adopting Psionics: it creates a large amount of Spiritualist ethics attraction, meaning that all their robots suddenly start causing a lot of unhappiness and influence loss.

There appears to be some miscommunication. I do not mean that there are currently no penalties. I'm asking if people are okay with the technology you can access not being dependent on your people's ethos. That is, if the technology you could access did not depend on your people's ethos, would you be okay with that. I am not making the statement that it currently does not.

Synthetic minds lacking the same hardware biological ones have for tapping into the Shroud in no way implies they're any less sapient.

By the same rationale, accessing a different plane of existence shouldn't prove that spiritualism is a valid mindset, yet in your empire, psionic ascension increases spiritualistic viewpoints. You can't appeal to rationality in one place and not in another, and you certainly can't expect the populations to be completely rational in their beliefs.

It can be balanced out with having to pick more ascension perks to improve your species thus having access to fewer perks to improve your empire (they also should be improved to make the decision harder). Also production cost - building psionic synths takes longer and could require special ressources like Zro.

If we make antimater, living metal, nanites and Zro produceable (though much more difficult) then using megastructure like projects on certain gas giants using nanites to create synthetic Zro could be a thing. Or synths who are not totally opposed to organics could encounter and use rare species in space or on dune like planets that they can herd/farm for Zro to cover their psi-pop unit upkeep.


About the civic slot not being changeable - have any of you ever crowned a psi-god-emperor? That's the biggest irony about the civic that would let materialists much more reliably create one. The suggestion about spiritualists that actually love the idea of playing god with machines as a civic is good but the proposal for a materialst pendant isn't. I remember a earlier proposal where latent psionics was suggested as a pop trait though imo it should be weaker then the first tier of the ascension path and there still should be an option that doesn't depend on the founder pops traits to more easily explore such ideas.

Honestly, as long as they quit trying to prescribe imagination and focus more on making things mechanically balanced, it should work. It's all the arbitrary limitations cutting both ways that raise all the questions about what it is that spiritualism or materialism are supposed to represent.