of +Thought try to understand the whys and hows of Seekerdom. They consider the Path of +Thought to lead to all other Paths. One can, they believe, logically derive the theoretical existence of and benefits of the other Paths by analyzing the different capabilities and failures of human thought and behavior. Yet they will generally not claim to presuppose the wisdom of these Paths. As they will readily tell anyone: one can’t know what one doesn’t yet know. Yet the Path of +Thought does lead easily to the other Paths. Many Seekers on all the Paths started on the Path of +Thought and understand its usefulness and power. Those on other Paths may see those on the Path of +Thought as dangerously arrogant with their assertion that they understand the hows and whys of other Paths. Many +Thought Seekers also take flak for insisting that other Seekers do not have supernatural powers. Many on the Path of +Thought come from a Western tradition (Western philosophy, math, science, academia) while many on the other Paths come from non-Western traditions, traditions that have been persecuted or denigrated in favor of Western traditions. This traditional animosity can cause problems between +Thought and other Seekers. Some have doubted that +Thought is a real Path. Perhaps the strongest affinity is between +Thought and -Feeling. Trying to develop one’s ability to accurately model the universe through thought often leads to trying to eliminate prejudice of thought by
+Thought
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emotions, and vice versa.
Traditions
The greatest contributors to the Path of +Thought are the traditions of Western Philosophy, Mathematics and Science, each of which have contributed many of the models that +Thought Seekers use to try to understand the universe.
Other traditions that contribute to +Thought are African American Culture (with its focus on self-taught scholarship, philosophy and ability to argue), Computer Science (with its emphasis on efficient decision making), Monotheism (from those sects that put a high value on scholarship, philosophy and reason, such as the Jesuit order of Catholicism, Jewish rabbis, Kabbalah), and Psychology, especially cognitive science (where the mind is seen as a toolbox of problem-solving techniques).
Challenges
The challenges that can help Seekers along the Path of +Thought advance are those that demand that Seekers absorb and utilize new concepts or new ways of thinking. Most challenges take the form of puzzles and games, as simple as a verbal riddle or as complicated as a custom built computer game or a mechanical device that only unlocks when wheels are rotated in a certain way.
Recognizing
+Thought Seekers are more likely than any other Seekers to use technology, such as smartphones, iPads, slide rules, etc.
They tend to like books and usually have at least one physical book (or digital device capable of reading e-books) on their person.
The Path of +Thought gives slightly fewer opportunities for exercise, compared to the other Paths, so +Thought Seekers are not always as athletic looking as other Seekers.
Have the annoying tendency to interject with “Actually, it’s not that simple,” followed by a long explanation.
Can often be seen distracted in thought, looking like they are daydreaming, counting off something on their fingers or scribbling incomprehensible notes or figures on scraps of paper.
Rarely act spontaneously or quickly, they usually take a moment to think before every action or response.
Usually speak with a large vocabulary, including many terms that are seldom heard outside of certain mathematical, philosophical or academic specialties.
View of Normals
Normal people only develop their cognitive skills to the level necessary to get by in modern society. A good analogy would be physical strength: the average person builds his or her muscle to the point necessary to carry out day-to-day activities, but no more. The relationship between +Thought Seekers and normals is like that between Olympic weightlifters and normals: just a matter of the work put into it.
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“The effort to understand the universe is one of the very few things that lifts human life a little above the level of farce and gives it some of the grace of tragedy.”
-Steven Weinberg
“Today, then, since I have opportunely freed my mind from all cares [and am happily disturbed by no passions], and since I am in the secure possession of leisure in a peaceable retirement, I will at length apply myself earnestly and freely to the general
overthrow of all my former opinions.”
Path Plusses
Primary: +2 per level of +Thought to any AV roll that involves using thought or reason to solve problems or arrive at new knowledge. Examples: AVs for using INL based
skills, for deducing facts based on small clues, for inferring the presence of unseen elements in a system by noting its effects on visible elements, for modeling complex systems.
Aided: +1 per level of +Thought to any AV that can be aided by the application of reason, planing or strategy. Examples: AVs to
determine the falsehood of delusions, hallucinations or deceptions, rolls to do things that use non-INL attributes but where a smart approach can help (like using knowledge of leverage and physiology to figure out how best to lift a heavy rock).
Combat: Add +1 per level of +Thought to combat rolls only when the PC has examined the fighter’s capabilities or the environment the fight will take place in long enough to formulate a strategy.
Path Abilities
Deduction: This is the Sherlock Holmes-like ability to take one small, seemingly irrelevant piece of information and deduce some important fact from it. For example, to deduce from the scuff marks and stains on someone’s shoes that they work as a short-order-cook, or deduce from examining parasitic infections of trees that someone has been poaching deer in a forest. A PC with knowledge of Psychology can even make psychological deductions based on behaviors (e.g. “he strangles schoolgirls, so he must hate his mother.”) The difficulty is based on the amount of time the PC
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has been studying the subject matter and collecting clues. In general, the PC should tell the GM what it is he or she wants to determine and the GM will say what led to that determination. Note that a failure means that the PC has come to an incorrect conclusion but thinks that logic supports that conclusion.
Easy (1): Determine someone’s
occupation by rifling through his or her house for an hour.
Moderate (3): Determine someone’s
occupation by rifling through his or her car for five minutes.
Hard (5): Determine someone’s
occupation by looking at him or her for a few seconds.
Legendary (7): Determine someone’s
occupation by examining their handwriting.
Improv: By making monumental leaps of deduction, the PC can work from common knowledge to knowledge possessed only by specialists. For example, a PC with no medical training can cut open a person and, using knowledge of the basic principles of evolution and facts remembered from grade school biology, determine what the function of each organ must be well enough to perform successful heart surgery.
Easy (1): Temporary 1 level in an
INL based skill
Moderate (3): Temporary 2 levels in
an INL based skill
Hard (5): Temporary 3 levels in an
INL based skill
Legendary (7): Temporary 4 levels
in an INL based skill
Profile Thought Strengths: By watching someone solve problems or listening to someone talk, the PC can determine what mental strengths a person has going for him or her. This is more than just sensing intelligence vs. stupidity or knowledge vs. ignorance, but sensing what kind of intelligence or knowledge a person has. A person may have ‘book smarts’ and be good at abstract intellectual problem solving, or a person may have ‘people smarts’ and be good with people, or have good spatial abilities, or good musical sense, or good imagination, etc. The difficulty is based on how much contact the PC has had with the person.
Easy (1): Sense the strengths of
someone the PC has known for a few hours.
Moderate (3): Sense the strengths
of someone the PC has talked to for 5 minutes.
Hard (5): Sense the strengths of
someone by observing them for 5 minutes or rifling through their belongings.
Legendary (7): Sense the strengths
of someone upon first seeing them.
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“Any philosophy that can be put in a nutshell belongs there.”
Principles
Most of what people believe about themselves is false. Beliefs about self are a self-fulfilling prophecy. If you think you have athletic ability you’ll play sports a lot and become skilled. If you think you’re ugly you won’t flirt with people and won’t find anyone that finds you attractive. People’s beliefs about themselves become a layer of prejudice that affects everything they do. It is also broadcast to others: people catch on, even if only at a subconscious level, to what a person thinks about themselves and treat the person accordingly.
What’s more, ideas about self limit one’s ability to adapt, to learn and to understand the universe. A person who considers themselves ‘liberal’ will reject any idea they consider ‘conservative’ out of hand, even if it is an idea they might have agreed with otherwise. A person who considers themselves Christian will reject a teaching of Buddha even if it is a teaching which coincides well with Christ’s teachings. People feel discomfort when they act in a way they think is at odds with their self- identity. Psychologists call this ‘cognitive dissonance.’ It is a powerful force, one which leads people to change their behavior or to invent and believe phony stories about why they did what they did.
Self-identity is a crutch, one that makes every decision easier (it is easier to do “the kind of things I normally do” than to have to make a decision on its own merits each time). Self is the one thing people think they can always depend on. No matter how external circumstances change, people think they can trust that their own capabilities, desires, opinions and allegiances won’t change without warning. A potential change of identity rocks the very base of one’s reality. Thus, ideas about self become self-imposed shackles. Self-identification causes prejudices. People assume that those who belong to the same category as themselves have the
same thoughts and operate from the same motives, while they assume that ‘others’ are fundamentally different. These assumptions are quite often false.
Self-identity is built on ideas of difference from others. If you think you are strong, then you must feel that others are weak. If you think you are moral, you must feel others are immoral. Thus, identity is a source of most prejudice. Identifying one- self as belonging to one gender, religion, nation, tribe or race almost always leads to negative beliefs about, or hatred of, other genders, religions, nations, tribes or races. -Self Seekers thus see identity as the root of most violence and warfare.
In the end, identity is just a simplistic story that is incapable of matching the true complexity and power of a human being. When -Self Seekers learn to see identity as a story, they see people ‘telling’ this story with everything they do: with how they talk, what clothes they wear, what job they take, who they hang out with, etc. Yet while most people think they are telling people about their strengths (a punk with a skull tattoo tells people “I’m tough”; a businessman with a tailored suit tells people “I’m rich and sophisticated”), to a -Self Seeker they’re only saying how they have limited themselves, what roads of exploration they have closed themselves off from. In other words, they broadcast their own weaknesses.
Those on the Path of -Self prefer to eschew ideas of self altogether. They can avoid the limitations of self by not having any beliefs about self. The ideal is to believe nothing about self that isn’t believed about all of humanity (e.g. “like all humans, I need to eat”) and even then they try to be extremely skeptical about the supposed limitations of the human creature.
-Self Seekers try to suppress their sense of self when observing the world around them. They find that more energy can be put towards understanding things as they really are once one stops worrying
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about self. They also find that being a passive observer helps them to blend in, go unnoticed.
Yet it is not so easy to escape ideas of self. It is a long, hard, often painful process. It involves giving up everything one has associated oneself with: one’s home, job, possessions, family, even one’s name. Those on the Path of -Self, long after they think they had given up every possible attachment to self, find something else, often something new, to give up.