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Old 08-02-2010, 10:49 AM   #1
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Default Do characters have a soul ?

They say trees and rocks have a soul
so i been wondering if character in games and animations have a soul
i mean think about it:
they feel, they love and they hate
yes some actor is doing the voice, someone else gives life to the character
hair, eyes, the way he/she moves etc .

so i ask the next question
do you think/believe characters have a soul ?
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Old 08-02-2010, 10:59 PM   #2
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I say no, because characters are artificial creations (in distinction from stones, plants etc.).
It is our soul at most that could give the impression that they are real... maybe... somehow...
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Old 08-03-2010, 12:53 AM   #3
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This, of course, makes the assumption that we have a soul... I think it would be rather important here to define what you actually mean by a soul. Is it a sould in a religious way or more like personality, or what?
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Old 08-03-2010, 04:15 AM   #4
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Yes, everything I said (and I guess it is the same for oron?) was under the condition that there exists something like a soul at all. I neither want to assert nor deny its existence, I only referred to a general understanding of what is called "soul" and its possible connection to artifical characters.... to avoid a (never-ending) philosophical discussion.

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Old 08-03-2010, 05:40 AM   #5
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sorry guys i should of realized my question will cause an endless philosophical discussion.
it wasn't my intention at all
all i wanted to know if it's possible that artificial creations have a soul
and not in a religious way more like the personality of the characters
lol i'm afraid to add anything else
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Old 08-03-2010, 10:34 PM   #6
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a well written character in any medium can have an artificial personality that's convincing enough to provoke emotions in the reader/watcher/player/etc, although some people are better at the 'willing suspension of disbelief' than others and get immersed in the story and characters easier, but some people are stubbornly resistant and cannot identify with fiction no matter how well written
so ultimately, no but they come pretty damn close
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Old 08-17-2010, 01:45 AM   #7
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Of course,thats why we hear soulless characters.
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Old 12-25-2010, 01:33 AM   #8
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Artificial characters themselves don't have souls. I stick with the 19th century view that you need free will to have a soul. But writers, artists and voice-lenders behind them have, and you have. So what comes out is the result of everyone's interpretation.
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Old 01-21-2011, 06:01 AM   #9
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What's a "soul"?
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Old 01-23-2011, 05:05 AM   #10
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Omikiron Nomad Soul would say so

re the wider question, no proof exists yet anyone or anything has a "soul" but the Japanese believe in the "kami" or spirit of both natural forms and human ones. The Buddhists believe we have a corrporal entity that moves from lifetime to lifetime and i am sure everyone knows the other variations.

Good question actually one of the most original querries i have seen in a long time.
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Old 01-24-2011, 05:13 PM   #11
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As a de-facto atheist I don't believe in the soul. So without dragging this out, I say no.
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Old 01-26-2011, 08:05 PM   #12
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A lot of cyberpunk stuff deals with this kind of question. Blade Runner (movie and book) for one.
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Old 01-27-2011, 07:40 AM   #13
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What is a soul? Okay. But if characters in video games have souls? What.
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Old 01-27-2011, 02:52 PM   #14
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Sure they do! I mean I often have whole conversations with the game charcters...they go on and tell me about their feelings and sometimes I do too and they give me advice and I give them advice too...Sometimes they even get mad at me and they refuse to obey my orders.
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Old 02-18-2011, 05:01 AM   #15
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What a question ? No if there is a soul characters wouldnt have one since they are no living individual
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Old 02-20-2011, 11:41 AM   #16
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Maybe the question should be: 'do characters have a consciousness' like in 'are they aware of what they're doing?'

I don't know this, but in the Baldur's Gate games, if you left your characters awaiting for too long, they would start commenting on this, they would say things like: 'hey, i don't wanna wait here any longer- or can we get on with already' or 'there is no purpose just standing around all day'.

This, to me, suggest a bit of awareness, but the point is still that this awareness has been scripted into the game by the game devs.

To compare this even further a bit, does Data (a character from star trek) have a soul? Or is he just a very intelligent machine with a very clever Artificial Intelligent (AI) programming?

A wellwritten character in any game would certainly feel to the player like a real -ahem- live character. Bethesda, Obsidian, Bioware and other devs. have been trying to make these for ages now. And I do believe they're slowly getting there, being able to make characters somewhat act and talk like real people, with their own motives and reasons for what they're doing in the course of the game.
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Old 02-21-2011, 08:43 PM   #17
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Stonez View Post
As a de-facto atheist I don't believe in the soul. So without dragging this out, I say no.
Well, you can be an atheist and a dualist at the same time.

That being said, what an odd question to ask.
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Old 02-22-2011, 10:38 PM   #18
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If the story requires it.
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Old 02-23-2011, 04:14 AM   #19
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I do not believe in a religious soul but if we think about soul as in essence of personality or ability to touch people around you emotionally or intellectually then a character definitely can have a soul. There are plenty of artificial people who move thousands of lives across the globe and to me that's close enough. And I'm not saying there isn't a soul when a character just moves one or two people, for them they surely have a soul. But I can understand that people really have different definitions to soul and some people might even be offended by this idea.
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