What are some realistic and ethical concerns in regards to necromancy

[Sanctuary]

Question.
Are there any?

Example.
Is it wrong to make a dead comrades in to skeletons soldiers?

Would that not mean you have stopped an individual from entering whatever afterlife there is and enslaved them to do your bidding?

Is that morally reprehensible?

On the other hand, Is turning your enemies in to eternal skeleton "slaves", ok?

What about random "ghosts" that are neither friend nor foe?

Can necromancy ever be anything other than a combination of mind controlling and slavery?

Should dead people have rights in a fantasy world where souls / afterlife are known to exist because of necromancers?

Or should necromancy simply be considered generally immoral and be done with it?

*Necromancy, legally distinct from mediums, spiritualist, and shamans.

 

[SailusGebel]

Spoiler: Can't think of any.

 

[J_Chemist]

A dead body is still a dead body.

Don't fuck the dead body.

 

[RepresentingEnvy]

I like to see undead applications where they are used as workers. Also, it depends on if the soul clings to the body for morality.

 

[Don_Quacko]

Question.
Are there any?

Example.
Is it wrong to make a dead comrades in to skeletons soldiers?

Would that not mean you have stopped an individual from entering whatever afterlife there is and enslaved them to do your bidding?

Is that morally reprehensible?

On the other hand, Is turning your enemies in to eternal skeleton "slaves", ok?

What about random "ghosts" that are neither friend nor foe?

Can necromancy ever be anything other than a combination of mind controlling and slavery?

Should dead people have rights in a fantasy world where souls / afterlife are known to exist because of necromancers?

Or should necromancy simply be considered generally immoral and be done with it?

*Necromancy, legally distinct from mediums, spiritualist, and shamans.

1)Some people might not want to live again and be dead forever so that they can rest in peace.
2)If they are in some sort of after life like heaven, hell or something else then it might pose an issue with whatever entity/entities (gods, demons, angels and etc) who look after that afterlife.

 

[Deleted member 58005]

Consent, bro! Don't touch the dead without their permission

 

[NotaNuffian]

Question.
Are there any?

Example.
Is it wrong to make a dead comrades in to skeletons soldiers?

Would that not mean you have stopped an individual from entering whatever afterlife there is and enslaved them to do your bidding?

Is that morally reprehensible?

On the other hand, Is turning your enemies in to eternal skeleton "slaves", ok?

What about random "ghosts" that are neither friend nor foe?

Can necromancy ever be anything other than a combination of mind controlling and slavery?

Should dead people have rights in a fantasy world where souls / afterlife are known to exist because of necromancers?

Or should necromancy simply be considered generally immoral and be done with it?

*Necromancy, legally distinct from mediums, spiritualist, and shamans.

The principle is to "respect the dead".

As in don't defile the corpse.

Don't do unto others what you don't want done unto you.

Cannibalism is a-okay ONLY in extreme cases. Unless you are in an extreme case where you need a dead body reanimated, then it is fine.

Such as the case in chinese myth where taoists would have jiangshi (dead bodies) jumping to their destination as it is cheaper in delivery fee.

Any other moments? No.

Also, uncanny valley might be a problem, seeing how those that are dead still disturbed and moving.

 

[Daitengu]

The real question is: Does the necromancy summon back the soul and stick it back in the corpse, or is it more akin to making a golem, but from a corpse?

Will the undead miasma give rise to natural undead?

 

[Goodmann]

If necromancy exists ANYWHERE secrecy becomes... very difficult. Kill someone 'in the know', then bring them back & interrogate them -- especially if the dead cannot lie. Even the threat is strong. CSI would love necromancers too.

 

[KoyukiMegumi]

Necromancy is the sinners' magic. They raise the dead and make them do their bidding. This means they desecrate the dead for their fitting needs. They don't care who that person was in the past, just that they can be fodder for their needs. They use the souls of the dead to power themselves and that makes them immoral and essentially evil in the eyes of others.

Their magic also doesn't invoke the living because they want to. No, they enslave them to their needs.

That said, necromancy is awesome in a theoretical way!

 

[Daitengu]

What does necromancy mean for government? Would progress even be possible with kings and emperors ruling forever in unlife? Would they want to just wipe out the population so they can use them as eternal slaves?

Does necromancy corrupt the mind/soul of the raised?

 

[SailusGebel]

Serious answer, depends on the setting. It's not ethic or moral that stops us, but religious beliefs.

 

[Hopper]

We've got ourselves some good answers. Now, to the example of it.

Half-Life 2

Ever imagine how a soul attached to a dead body would react after death?

Stalker. Mentally and physically severed, through brutal surgery.

Look at this subject. How fine is he?

This is even worse...

The examples have answered the first, third, and fourth questions.

For the fifth one, the example has answered that too, by being a neutral antagonist. Why? They attack only when you're too close to them.

The second question is a yes. We'll get to that later.

The sixth question, no.

The seventh question, no

The eighth question, yes.


What is the explanation behind those?


Necromancy isn't about reviving people. If so, then the holy power will be considered Necromancy, since some of them are able to bring back someone from the afterlife.

So, let's get to the point.

If the two sides are balanced, then it's either a contract or someone's turning into one of the Necromancer's family members. If it's one-sided to the revived person, then that's a Shaman's doing.

Necromancy is about dominance and slavery. It wouldn't be called Necromancy if the revived has rights, isn't it?

 

[K5Rakitan]

That depends on your magic system and if you need to actually need to return the soul to the body or if you're just using the corpses like marionettes or something in-between where you have different souls entering the corpses, like aliens wearing a skin suit.

 

[2wordsperminute]

Necromancy spells could always bring someone's consciousness back in your world, and if you want evil necromancers you could have there be a variation that suppresses the soul's free will.

 

[Goodmann]

There's a story idea there: Souls cannot be (forcibly) incarnated into zombies or skellies,so they need some form of magic Operating System. Necromancer doesn't like either Brainzz!™ or GolemOS™ to run his meat puppets, so he decides to create his own OS ... but it's buggy!
And the 'commercial' versions have their own flaws, & can be 'hacked'
Heh - the Unblue Screen of Undeath: It falls down (or skeleton disassembles) accompanied by an obnoxious 'fail message'
The few souls that do accept Undeath are ... deeply weird. Including necromancer's buddy Bonzer.

 

[QuercusMalus]

Question.
Are there any?

Example.
Is it wrong to make a dead comrades in to skeletons soldiers?

Would that not mean you have stopped an individual from entering whatever afterlife there is and enslaved them to do your bidding?

Is that morally reprehensible?

On the other hand, Is turning your enemies in to eternal skeleton "slaves", ok?

What about random "ghosts" that are neither friend nor foe?

Can necromancy ever be anything other than a combination of mind controlling and slavery?

Should dead people have rights in a fantasy world where souls / afterlife are known to exist because of necromancers?

Or should necromancy simply be considered generally immoral and be done with it?

*Necromancy, legally distinct from mediums, spiritualist, and shamans.

Even if the body is animated, it's still dead and decaying. So assuming the average adult is anywhere from 100 lbs to 250 lb+ of dead, decaying, festering, rancid meat. I have anosmia and I still wouldn't want to be around that.... plus all the flies and maggots? Say what you will about Warhammer but the depiction of Nurgle and his demons are pretty much what I would expect.

Assuming they don't come back exactly as they were before, it would also be weird as fuck to have to deal with someone I knew well before death after they were brought back. Very jarring, uncanny valley like. I wouldn't want to be around them.

Even if they were mostly there it would be like them having ahlzeimers or dementia of varying severity.

The Witch and The Beast addresses the ethics a little bit- essentially those who become zombies, their souls are permanently removed from the system, they don't get an afterlife, don't get reborn, once the zombies are destroyed they're gone. Permanently. So using someone as a zombie without their permission is definitely frowned upon.

If they are ghosts- what are ghost's? Are they the spirit or souls? Does using them damage them? Does it stop them from resurrection, afterlife?

If skeletons, how do they get out of the flesh? Watching the bones rip themselves out of a dead companion or enemy is high octane nightmare fuel, and I would definitely not be willing to spend time with, associate with someone who had no problem doing that.

 

[owotrucked]

Assuming you cannot waltz in the afterlife to check the brazillion number of souls:

There's no ethical issue if you gaslight the reanimated souls that they're not the original identities, but just a copy with infused memories. Then you confuse them with identity paradox like Theseus' ship where two copies of the same entity can coexist

In addition, if a necromancer really has the power to pull a soul back from afterlife to reanimate a corpse, isn't it the greatest resurrection miracle? Thus necromancer would be just OP healing priests.

In conclusion, you can never prove that necromancy is unethical as long as it's veiled by the metaphysical debate of identity and the only way to "prove" metaphysic theories is violence and your fists

 

[Goodmann]

As far as soul=software is concerned: Rather than yoinking a soul from it's afterlife, it might be much easier to copy/paste from a living source. Ethics need not apply. Yes it probably won't be a good fit to the meat puppet, even if you match genders. If you can find a mind that won't go insane, you'd want to copy it several times...

 

[TheEldritchGod]

Question.
Are there any?

Yes.

Is it wrong to make a dead comrades in to skeletons soldiers?

Depends.

Would that not mean you have stopped an individual from entering whatever afterlife there is and enslaved them to do your bidding?

Maybe. Define the Mechanics.

Is that morally reprehensible?

Define the mechanics.

On the other hand, Is turning your enemies in to eternal skeleton "slaves", ok?

Define the mechanics.

What about random "ghosts" that are neither friend nor foe?

How did they become ghosts? DEFINE THE MECHANICS.

Can necromancy ever be anything other than a combination of mind controlling and slavery?

Sure. The mechanics of my necromancy isn't.

Should dead people have rights in a fantasy world where souls / afterlife are known to exist because of necromancers?

I'm not sure the LIVING should have rights.

Or should necromancy simply be considered generally immoral and be done with it?

If you want.

*Necromancy, legally distinct from mediums, spiritualist, and shamans.

HOW? WHY? DEFINE THE MECHANICS.