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Discussion
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I know this question might be a bit confusing as there’s no universal definition of “necromancy”. It generally means animating corpses, summoning ghosts, possessing people with spirits, etc. I’m sure the answer would be different for different acts of necromancy.
I’m just curious, as when necromancy appears in fiction, it’s usually performed by the villains, but I’m wondering if there’s anything inherently evil about these actions. Obviously it can be done for malevolent purposes, and can be used to cause suffering, but in general, would you consider it evil?
I’m sorry if this isn’t the right place for philosophical discussions, it just feels like a witchy topic.
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Question: If necromancy was possible, would it be inherently unethical?
updated 9 months, 1 week ago
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Reply
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Reduce, reuse, reanimate, require consent?
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It depends on what’s being done like you said. Generally I say it’s unethical to disturb the dead, whether that be animals or humans. Let those who have passed on rest.
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I think it depends on the intent, and whether you have power over your reanimated corpse. If you raise them to hurt someone, or force your risen dead to do anything they don’t want to do (including continuing to be undead), that’s bad. I think if you raise the dead for a short period of time just to give them a chance to say goodbye, figure out what happened, or do a few things off their bucket list that they didn’t tick off, and let them leave again on their terms, that’s cool. Likewise, if you reanimate the corpse of a murder victim to have them testify in court about what happened and get justice, that’s a noble use. I wish we could do that actually.
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I think it would depend on a lot of factors, primarily ones about the soul or lack thereof involved and the agency or lack thereof of the raised individual. If the soul of the person must necessarily be involved and cannot refuse, then it would be unethical, but I think people would probably be weird about it because that stance would likely be too close to the idea that having children is inherently unethical because children don’t ask to be born (something I think is debatable).
If there is no soul or the soul has the right to refuse, then we move on to agency. Is the raised individual given free will? Would they have the capacity for free will? Enslavement is obviously unethical, but if the raised individual has the mentality of, say, a dog, would it not be ethical then to have a pet undead and to treat them with the same respect and care one would treat a dog with? Maybe.
And if they have literally no agency nor the capacity for it, would that make them extensions of the necromancer? Perhaps. But then we get into the morality and ethics of dead bodies and who has the right to do what with them. In the real world, one can draw the parallel of using corpses in art. If someone consented before their passing, is that consent still valid even centuries later? How can one verify the authenticity of the consent if one never met the person before their passing? Presumably through some form of ghost-summoning in the case of necromancy which would be interesting and certainly would cover the consent angle.
Legalities may be a problem (I am still unsure if my mom’s plan of “cremate me and mix my ashes with paint for friends and family to paint with” is actually 100% legal, she’s been aquamated as it was both cheaper and more environmentally-friendly, I went with the spirit of her wish rather than the letter of it, haven’t felt ready to do anything with the “ashes” yet) but one could presumably call a ghost to the stand in court in a world where ghosts are provably real and can be summoned, thus it would be hard to prosecute those who actually gained consent. I could see it becoming a very contentious issue and having lots of back-and-forth.
Possession is another interesting one as it brings up the question of consent. How can one consent to being possessed? How can a possessing spirit consent to possessing someone else if under the guidance of a necromancer? I think there would certainly be ways but it wouldn’t be terribly common for that specific aspect.
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Some RPGs I’ve played group physical healing spells under the broad category of “necromancy”. If such were the case, I couldn’t imagine necromancy being deemed inherently unethical.
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Totally unethical, if you can’t even get rest when you’ve died when can you?
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I’ve read a few books over my many years where someone raised the dead, and I can’t agree with it except under very limited circumstances. Part of it is because you would have to call back the soul, which would probably be very cruel.
I could see it if it were in a very limited time after death, or to catch a murderer. It would also be different if the person chose to visit a medium or other intermediary.
Zombie armies are horrifying for a few reasons. If you’ve called the soul back to the body, you’ve now locked the soul into a rotting flesh prison and taken over control of that prison. If the body is reanimated without the soul, the humanity is gone and it can be ordered to do anything, no matter how terrible, without remorse. We want to believe that when our bodies are laid to rest that they will stay that way; obviously, they will not.
Using someone else’s body parts without consent is wrong.
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Most ancient cultures practiced necromancy in one form or another. And it is never shown as unethical or evil.
Only the Israelites prohibited it, which has influenced modern views on the practice.
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I find it unethical in that it operates in the absence of consent.
About 20 years ago I came to the conclusion that procreation is unethical. Reproduction happens entirely without consent – not the act itself, but ***the being that is being created cannot consent.***
Forcing a being into existence, a being that may not have ever wanted to exist in the first place, is evil. I didn’t ask to be born, nobody reached into the Void and asked for my permission, if I wanted to know loss and sorrow and suffering, to be doomed to crave and destined to die. It was an entirely selfish act on the part of my progenitors.
That’s not to say I don’t enjoy the experience *now*, that’s not to say I’m in any particular hurry to return back home to the Void, I’m in a good place and this is all for the sake of argument – nobody asked me if I wanted to be born, and I would be equally offended and enraged if somebody, after I finally escaped and went back to non-being, reached in and forcefully plucked me out again. I would just as forcefully pluck their eyeballs from their skull!
