Shachalai,

I am not making any excuses for the scribe, since I scribed the reply
and posted it as a first draft. It didnt seem something worthy of
lengthy proofing until it was perfect, so thats certainly on me. Before
I continue I will point out, at the request of a guild elder, that I do
NOT speak for the Sciomancers in whole, only in part, insofar as I am a
Sciomancer myself.

************
A play on words that descends into incoherence.
************
It is a good jab at me to be sure, but if we wish to engage in a more
academic debate we should refrain from the fallacy of equivocation. Both
you and I know that a "weak proof" in this sense does not mean "weak" in
the common usage of the term. I shall try to once again address your
rebuttal, this time with your positions marked with a "*" and my replies
marked with a single "-".

* If Spirit ceases to exist in sufficient quantities to support life, we
are left with a situation in which there are no further plants; no
further animals. This carries obvious economic implications, but the
most relevant to our circumstances is that we rely upon living things
for our curatives.
-You are too young to remember but I have seen the same afflictions
cured with four different curatives. The first iteration of reanimation,
the second iteration of reanimation, herbalism, and the system that we
currently use. It is known that other cures exist, and the first
iteration of reanimation utilized minerals more than living things. This
is addressed in the point made in what I termed the "weak argument".
Shadow is a threat to YOU. It may be a threat to the CYCLE. To the
rhythm or whatever you wish to term it, but many of us are not concerned
with either you or the cycle so the fact that the channeling of shadow
threatens these things is not particularly relevant. If the plants die
we will change and adapt as we always have. We are not burdened by
tradition. But even this is not a certainty. Shadow is capable of
mimicing spirit and other elements so it is not entirely clear why the
world couldnt continue to function even if spirit was entirely
eliminated. That is, if youre right about shadow being a mimic.

*While it is nevertheless true that the undead can replenish themselves
from the Earth itself, and that Shadow, even given its 'greedy'
properties, will not eradicate existing Earth at any temporal point
within practical reckoning, these circumstances nevertheless remain
apocalyptic ones.
-Apocalyptic for you. Not apocalyptic for us.

*A Shadow world would be a finite world, robbed of new life and new
individuals
-A world without new life perhaps, but not necessarily one without new
creation. The consanguine and undead and their constructs prove that new
existences, even new intelligent existences, can be created without
relying upon spirit. Finite is also a bit of a loaded term. We cant even
say that this world is non-finite so it seems a silly thing to argue
about. But we do know new things and even new minds can be created
through shadow.

*Is every action performed by a God necessarily of that God's realm,
/solely/ on account of that affiliation? You consider me presumptuous
for declaring that a conclusion following from basic extrapolation of
observed phenomena is unsound.
-While the exact nature of the Grand Artifice is hidden to us I think it
is almost a certainty that Severn utilized the element that he is mostly
tied to, shadow, to accomplish this at least in part. This is absolutely
a wide scale application of shadow that had effects that were not
apocalyptic. Perhaps a follower of Severn can provide clarity there.

*Shadow is greedy. (paraphrasing).
-Agreed though the wording is not how I would state it. However if
shadow can mimic and replace other elements than this ultimately is not
the problem you say it is.

*Theory of dynamic equilibrium.
-You've taken conjecturing and in a rather literal sense made it an art
form by turning it into a book. If you send me a copy I will be pleased
to read it.

************
Your conclusions
************

*Shadow is a threat to plants, animals, and all living creatures.
-To be determined by future research. Shadow is poorly understood and
given that many would view undeath as a preferably state saying that
shadow is a threat this broadly is something yet to be determined. If
nothing else the universality of the conclusion can be rejected.

*Shadow is capable of compounding itself even in small quantities.
-Non controversial. Accepted

*Sciomancers channel Shadow into this plane in order to perform many of
their spells.
-Non controversial. Accepted.

*They [Sciomancers] do so [create shadow] in quantities far exceeding
any other force tethered to Shadow.
-A lofty assertion but one I am hesitant to call true. Do you have a
mechanism for quantifying and measuring shadow and how much is being
produced via channeling versus other mechanisms? If you do not, this is
conjecture. If you do please send me the device, mechanism, or outline
of techniques you are using for your analysis. Rejected as
unsubstantiated.

*If the plane is imbalanced such that the living cease to exist, there
ceases to be input into the existing stock of Consanguine and Undead.
-That might happen, it might not. The truth is that we dont know. There
has not yet been a world where the shift was in favor of shadow so we
cannot rightly say WHAT will happen. Rejected as unsubstantiated.

************
My conclusions
************

You have presented unsupported conjecture as if it were well accepted
fact within the structure of a weak and uncogent argument. I personally
liked your reply. I give it relatively good marks despite being an
ideologically driven piece.

What you have correctly perceived is this: it will take less of us to
shift the balance than it will for you to maintain it, and you are right
to fear your apocalypse.

Sciomancer Verillia, Itzatl Sorceress






Penned by my hand on Tisday, the 22nd of Arios, in the year 468 MA.