Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

Bad by definition? Not if you are Ancient Greek or Asian.

Then they are not demons. They are Asian stuff that were translated into demons because their concept was somehow close. And I do not recall any mention of demons in Greek mythology.

It's where "demon" comes from

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daemon_(classical_mythology)

The word Demon comes from Greek myth, but the Daemons were typically benevolent spirits. At worst morally neutral. Demon as we use it today in English, is sinister spirits specifically out to get us. It's a wholly Christian concept.

There are a lot of things in Japanese lore that could be translated as 'demon' but many of them are morally neutral, benevolent, and malevolent, so really when something from Japan gets translated as 'demon' you kind of have to wait and see what happens. This is the reason lots of fan subs and dubs typically keep the Japanese term (Oni, Yokai, etc) to avoid this culture confusion.

 LordofHats wrote:
The word Demon comes from Greek myth, but the Daemons were typically benevolent spirits. At worst morally neutral. Demon as we use it today in English, is sinister spirits specifically out to get us. It's a wholly Christian concept.

^

This. I suspect the change from good to evil was part of some attempt to make the pagans look bad.
Like giving satan goat legs as a reference to Pan.

 CthuluIsSpy wrote:

 LordofHats wrote:
The word Demon comes from Greek myth, but the Daemons were typically benevolent spirits. At worst morally neutral. Demon as we use it today in English, is sinister spirits specifically out to get us. It's a wholly Christian concept.

^

This. I suspect the change from good to evil was part of some attempt to make the pagans look bad.
Like giving satan goat legs as a reference to Pan.

No.

Again, the effects of translation. Remember the OT and NT were first brought to the gentiles in Greek. When translating the Hebrew words 'shedim', 'mazziḳim', and 'ruḥin' (this one literally means evil spirits) the translators ended up translating them as 'daemon' as it was the most direct word in Greek for the concept. Ancient Hebrew demons were also more morally varied than they are in our culture (some even worked for God), but the NT with a little help from the Muslims revamped the entire concept of a 'demon' into a purely evil spirit by the 13th century, which is now the dominant perception in Western culture.

^ And this is why context matters And why yes, people do in fact change how they think based on what they read/see.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 CthuluIsSpy wrote:

Like giving satan goat legs as a reference to Pan.

That's just another myth from the 'Christians are evil and always have been' parade.

The Shedim, which I mentioned above, were Hebrew spirits often portrayed malevolently and where also goat men, so the concept already existed in the roots of Christianity before it moved out of Israel. Christians themselves largely ignored this concept for a long time because they themselves didn't have much reference for the idea of a satyr being evil.

That you can thank the Muslims for, as they also had in their culturally background the idea of a Shedim, an evil goat man, and when Christians and Muslims began directly mixing during the Crusading era, this was one of the ideas that got transferred over into Western Europe. Add in that during this same time, Europe was kind shoving a stick up its own butt about sex and the Satyrs were notorious poon hounds and hedonists, and you get to the point where goat men in general just start being look down on as evil.

Which is also kind of sensible cause off the seven deadly sins, Satyrs embraced at least 5 them XD

LOrd of hats I really enjoyed the above post , I learned stuff. (posting after 13 and a half hours work really strains the vocabulary muscles)

Also just thought I'd add your posts are generally good value and enjoyed by myself (excepting multiquote arguments)

 CthuluIsSpy wrote:
It's where "demon" comes from

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daemon_(classical_mythology)

That is daemons, not demons . They are not really all that popular in mythology, though, are they? There is no example listed, and I cannot think of any mythological story involving a daemon.
The difference between daemon and demon is usually put forward when speaking of computer daemons (program always running in the background). Beastie looks like a traditional demon, but is actually a daemon. I guess this was decided and put forward when some Christian went all crazy about satanic developers or something.

 LordofHats wrote:
Which is also kind of sensible cause off the seven deadly sins, Satyrs embraced at least 5 them XD

Anger, gluttony, lust, and which others?

I'd say Anger, Gluttony, Lust, Sloth, and Pride

It is true they were not renown as great builders or craftsmen, so I guess sloth make sense. And yeah, you got to be proud to the point of stupidity to think you can rape Hercules' wife and get away with it .

 Hybrid Son Of Oxayotl wrote:

 CthuluIsSpy wrote:
It's where "demon" comes from

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daemon_(classical_mythology)

That is daemons, not demons . They are not really all that popular in mythology, though, are they? There is no example listed, and I cannot think of any mythological story involving a daemon.
The difference between daemon and demon is usually put forward when speaking of computer daemons (program always running in the background). Beastie looks like a traditional demon, but is actually a daemon. I guess this was decided and put forward when some Christian went all crazy about satanic developers or something.

 LordofHats wrote:
Which is also kind of sensible cause off the seven deadly sins, Satyrs embraced at least 5 them XD

Anger, gluttony, lust, and which others?

Sexism, bigotry , profligacy and multiquote arguments I believe.

Glad you sigged my quote ;')
I

Hey, Pan was no slouch. He heard 'Three Virgin Goddesses' and he didn't think "wow that's sacred" he thought "that sounds like a damned challenge!"


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Bullockist wrote:
(excepting multiquote arguments)

Ahhhh, but those are the ones I laugh at the most

 Bullockist wrote:
Glad you sigged my quote ;')

Badge of honor .

Going to post this here:
Humble Weekly Bundle “Leading ladies”

That “Ms. Splosion Man”. WTF? The Ms Male Character is a thing, Anita Sarkeesian spoke about it, but “Ms. Splosion Man” rather than “Splosion Woman”? Really?

Do not be fooled by Long live the Queen's artwork. This is basically a Games of Throne simulator . If you thought been a princess was an easy role for naive young girls, think again: it is about leading a country while taking care of the rivalries and schemes of the nobility, while defending your borders and your interests from foreign nations, without loosing support from the people.

Too bad only 3 of those works on Linux, and I already bought one of them :(.

 Hybrid Son Of Oxayotl wrote:
Going to post this here:
Humble Weekly Bundle “Leading ladies”

That “Ms. Splosion Man”. WTF? The Ms Male Character is a thing, Anita Sarkeesian spoke about it, but “Ms. Splosion Man” rather than “Splosion Woman”? Really?

Do not be fooled by Long live the Queen's artwork. This is basically a Games of Throne simulator . If you thought been a princess was an easy role for naive young girls, think again: it is about leading a country while taking care of the rivalries and schemes of the nobility, while defending your borders and your interests from foreign nations, without loosing support from the people.

Too bad only 3 of those works on Linux, and I already bought one of them :(.

Ms Splosion man is meant to be like a reference or parody of ms packman. Then again how do you tell a parody from just doing the thing?

Valdis Story: Abyssal City looks neat, but I have no money :(

Edit: and WoW dose the cat lady looks crazy.

I'm having trouble figuring out why this bundle is called "Leading Ladies". Is it because some of the characters are female, or because some of the developers are?
Either way, it sounds like a weird, misleading title.

The Yawhg looks intriguing, though... And Long Live the Queen is indeed fun if you like that kind of game (decide X things per day, see what the results are).

I thought every player character was female. But apparently it is not the case in Valdis Story. And maybe not in Yawhg, I have no idea.

Hybrid Son Of Oxayotl wrote:But apparently it is not the case in Valdis Story.

Better yet, guess what gender the default character is.

Oh, and ofc the guy is the warrior, and the gal is the rogue.

The website speaks of 4 characters, two male and two female.
And it does not mention this warrior and rogue thing. Are you sure you are not mixing this game with another?

 Hybrid Son Of Oxayotl wrote:
The website speaks of 4 characters, two male and two female.
And it does not mention this warrior and rogue thing. Are you sure you are not mixing this game with another?

Well the main guy is like a rougeish guy and the main girl is like a monk? So close I guess. (http://valdisstory.wikia.com/wiki/Wyatt) (http://valdisstory.wikia.com/wiki/Reina) (http://valdisstory.wikia.com/wiki/Vladyn) (http://valdisstory.wikia.com/wiki/Gilda)

My Commander Shepard was female as was my Orc Dragonborn from Skyrim.

 MWHistorian wrote:
My Commander Shepard was female as was my Orc Dragonborn from Skyrim.

Almost every one I talk to has had a female commander Shepard. It's like nine times out of ten, but the offical numbers are the complete inverse. It's like 18% femshep 82% maleshep. I wonder what is the reason for this disconnect.

How did they collect the nubmers? If it was online, then I should mention that my xbox isn't connected to the internet.

Not saying that would explain what happened in every case, but might have resulted in me not being part of the statistic.

 daedalus wrote:
How did they collect the nubmers? If it was online, then I should mention that my xbox isn't connected to the internet.

Not saying that would explain what happened in every case, but might have resulted in me not being part of the statistic.

They never tell us how, but I would assume it has to be from people connecting online. (Though they could do like a form thing?) Drawing data only from people who have their Xbox online could skew the results. Though asking random people that you know is about as skewed as you can get too.

Assuming that their sample wasn't like, 100 people, how they got the data is probably not too important. It's likely from a poll or from data collected from people connecting online and checking what the data on their saves. The thing that probably gets overlooked is that the data never seemed to discriminate between people with more than 1 save. I'd be willing to bet nearly everyone who played ME, played it at least once as FemShep (even if they never finished the game), even if their other 50 saves were all ManShep.

 LordofHats wrote:
Assuming that their sample wasn't like, 100 people, how they got the data is probably not too important. It's likely from a poll or from data collected from people connecting online and checking what the data on their saves. The thing that probably gets overlooked is that the data never seemed to discriminate between people with more than 1 save. I'd be willing to bet nearly everyone who played ME, played it at least once as FemShep (even if they never finished the game), even if their other 50 saves were all ManShep.

How they get the data is very important to ho accurate it is. Like if you went to a hospital to collect data on how many people are injured, you would get data skewed towards injured because you had a bias selection. If you only get data from players who play online, then your introducing a bias. Though you don't know if it is a big bias or if it affects anything.

Fact is that "what about people not online" is kind of a pointless question. Tens of millions of people play Mass Effect and in this day and age, most of them are probably online via XBox Live, PSN, or PC (there's no offline option on PC, not really). As long as the sample is large enough, it can be considered an accurate representation of the player base. There's no real reason to assume offline players would at all expose any bias in this respect.

 LordofHats wrote:
Fact is that "what about people not online" is kind of a pointless question. Tens of millions of people play Mass Effect and in this day and age, most of them are probably online via XBox Live, PSN, or PC (there's no offline option on PC, not really). As long as the sample is large enough, it can be considered an accurate representation of the player base. There's no real reason to assume offline players would at all expose any bias in this respect.

It's not about size it's about what the sample is of and if there is a difference between players who hook their game up to the internet and players who don't.

I agree with Hatlord.

The main issue I see is that the first option given is male, and so a lot of people just stuck with default, rather than making a conscious choice, so that biased the statistics a little bit.

Hybrid Son Of Oxayotl wrote:Are you sure you are not mixing this game with another?

Yup. Look at the website I linked.
I dunno if the focus ("assume the role of Wyatt") is a leftover from an earlier design stage where there was supposed to be just one character, but it's still on the page and the game's ads. *shrug*
And the guy has a greatsword, which I guess makes him a warrior. I had assumed the girl to be a rogue, but I admittedly based that just on her clothes and lack of a big weapon. A monk is at least something different for a change.

No idea about the two bonus characters, though - neither that game's website nor the wikis say much about them.

nomotog wrote:It's not about size it's about what the sample is of and if there is a difference between players who hook their game up to the internet and players who don't.

I have a hard time believing that people who play a game offline would have notably different preferences regarding their choice of character than the ones who play online. I consider it an independent topic.

A more interesting question, however, would be how the numbers would look like if the male Shepard would not have been the default player character from ME1 onward - both in terms of advertisement, as well as in the character selection screen.