u/Mister_Ape_1

Humans from the Pokémon Universe are necessarily Pokémon themselves. Every life form is a Pokémon pretty much, and all references to real life animals were erased with the gen 3 soft reboot.

This means humans are a kind of Pokémon and this was confirmed in gen 4.

But does this mean they are biologically closest to primatelike Pokémon, especially to humanlike Pokémon like the Ralts or the Machop line ?

No. They are not.

Humans are descendants of Mew, a Pokémon who likely evolved naturally from an abiogenesis event like real living creatures, but they are from a lineage that separated before all the others.

Why ? Because all Pokémon, excluding some major Legendaries who are the "gods" of the verse and were created by Arceus, reproduce by eggs. Some Pokémon, such as the minor Legendaries, evolved to be very long lived but lost the ability to reproduce altogether, and are now present in extremely low numbers, hence the Legendary status. But 95% of Pokémon lay eggs, and the other 5% do not reproduce, except for Mew itself.

Humans, on the other hand, give birth to living offspring, just like Mew itself.

They are the only group that never became oviparous.

Hence they need to have separated before the other direct descendant lineage of Mew and common ancestor of all other Pokémon evolved oviparous behavior.

Humans are also the only group that lost all moves, but many Pokémon have like 2 or 3 moves in the whole movepool already.

Mew is basically an embryo, a complex organism with comparatively few cells. Except it is over 1 feet tall, making its cells quite huge.

This means it stands in for creatures that emerged about 600 mya. By 520 mya, Anomalocharis and Trilobites were around, and so were the Anorith and Kabuto lines. This means humans separated from Mew between 520 and 600 mya.

Pokémon such as Primape, Slaking, Oranguru and even more Gardevoir, Gothitelle and Conkeldurr evolved CONVERGENTLY to humans, but they are not human at all.

So a lineage of Mews that never became oviparous had to evolve into a ratlike animal by about 225 - 280 mya, then by 80 mya into the first primatelike forms, into actual monkeys by 40 mya, into apes by 25 mya, into hominins by 7 mya and into mankind by 2 mya, and finally into the current iteration of humans by 300 kya. Meanwhile, they became Normal types and lost all their moves, and the Ability Syncronize was replaced by nothing, or pheraps by Adaptabilty.

I calculated that humans have 50 BST points across the board. The same as Snorunt, even though Snorunt is just a random Pokémon. As shown in a recent Pokémon movie, they can actually gain back the ability to learn moves sometimes. Normally they do not have any and our physical attacks are not moves since Pokémon moves are powered by elemental energy and we do not have that.

Most humans are level 1 to 2 or 3, with some very powerful humans such as Ash or Jessie and James being level 5, even if with some occasional PIS feats.

We can determine they are not actually stronger than that because even initial starter Pokémon are portrayed as strong enough to protect humans from threats.

It also seems humans can not train and reach level 100, except for 1 non canon, extremely ridicolous case in the Pokémon Manga, where a human was 1HKOing fully evolved Pokémon in their 40s, tanking their attacks with no significant damage, and was also fighting on par with Level 70 Regigigas and Deoxys, showing the power of a low BST Level 100. Pheraps they can go up to level 10 if they train to go past level 5.

So most humans would get stomped by Showdown Little Cup Pokémon.

What is the most ancient common ancestor of all tetrapod that is not also ancestral to fishes and other marine animals ?

And if it is Tiktaalik or something close to it, what was the still marine creature it evolves from ?

Yesterday I found out there is a Tier for Pokémon who can still evolve but also evolved already once. They are banned from LC regardless of power, but excluding some such as Kadabra, Haunter or middle stages originally conceived as fully evolved Pokémon such as Rhydon and Electabuzz, they are far too weak even for lower Tiers such as NU and end up in PU or something.

So the majority of middle stages, which amounts to hundreds of Pokémon, is too weak for the main Tiers and too strong for LC. This can definitely be a good metagame on its own. But apparently there are literally ZERO NFE events.

Because of this, if NFE can not be popularized by itself, I think LC, from ADV onwards, could "grow up" a little bit by including those middle stages who were originally conceived as Base Pokémon with also an evolution, including

Pikachu (No Light Ball)

Jigglypuff

Clefairy

Marill

But these are only 4 Pokémon afterall.

I think as a principle all middle stages who are at 350 BST and below should be analyzed separately and should be admitted if found to not be OP. Such middle stages may have a hard time in NFE because 350 is like a threeshold for middle stages, just like 450 for fully evolved Pokémon.

Specifically, I am thinking about these

Skiploom

Kirlia

Vibrava

All of them struggle in any possible iteration of NFE, and except for Vibrava, their Base form is useless in LC.

Hoppip and Ralts could literally be removed, and their middle stage would not be suspiciously powerful for a Base stage. The same goes for Trapinch because Vibrava is very weak, but Trapinch is an useful Pokémon that provides for a different role than Vibrava and it may even be better overall. I do not think either Skiploom, Kirlia or Vibrava would centralize, even in ADV LC, the metagame. Would they even be good at all ?

For now however let us look at those who were designed as Base Pokémon and then received a pre evolution.

Marill in ADV LC is actually less powerful than Azurill because it loses Normal STAB and its Base Stat Atk is still 20, but overall it is faster, much bulkier and has a stronger Surf. What do you think about it ? Could it become a worthy part of ADV LC ? Azurill has technically the best offensive capabilities with Huge Power Double Edge since unlike Cubone it can also have a CB. Yet it is so slow and frail it does not work.

Not only, from gen 4 onwards Clefairy could work like Clefable in OU in ways Cleffa could definitely not.

Since these are only 7 Pokémon at the end, and other, not so weak middle stages should likely be used in the NFE Tier if only it was a bit more popular, I will make individual cases for Clefairy, Marill, Skiploom, Kirlia and Vibrava to enter ADV LC. They are like high school kids who are such underachievers they should go back to junior high. Pikachu and Jigglypuff are not even interesting because they would have no practical use with Pikachu being outclassed by Elekid and Jigglypuff being just extremely weak.

This month ADV LC is freely playable.

While in gen 4 a ton of Pokémon that were originally designed as weaker than average fully evolved creatures received evolutions, the overall power of Base stage Pokémon with at least 1 evolution was still pretty low in gen 3. There were exceptions, Chansey, a Pokémon that would have been unkillable in ADV LC but later received a pre evo, Schyter, because Scizor is actually a regional form ante litteram, leaving Schyter with incredibly high stats for the standards of LC, and Porygon (and Onix, it was created as a fully evolved Pokémon, but it is just horribly bad).

Porygon for a long time was the staple of ADV LC. This artificial Pokémon was created as an already functioning digital creature, and later it was upgraded further, and more than once at that. Of course in its basic state it would still overpower some babies. And that is why it was banned.

After the Porygon ban Diglett, now free from its main counter, became the major offensive threat. Not as poweful as Doduo, but much faster and with Arena Trap. It was able to trap and kill a ton of Pokémon, and its speed tie with Elekid was extremely tedious.

They decided to ban it. I would not have banned it, but they banned Latios, Garchomp and Salamence from DPP OU, with especially Salamence being pretty manageable as I learned playing Platinum OU, and in Gen 5 OU the Kamis literally have only 1 avaible form each. Was it really needed to ban both human form Landorus and Thundurus and beast form Tornadus ?! Banning Diglett was still OK, more or less, with such standards.

But now apparently Abra has been banned too. It is slower than Diglett, and any physical attack destroys it. The fact that Diglett counters it does not mean without Diglett it is overpowered. It is faster and more powerful than Gasthly, but seriously, Quick Attack from CB Doduo can likely threaten it very heavily. And its only STAB has 90 BP. It can not knock out a Wailmer in 1 hit or something without a Calm Mind boost.

Sometimes I feel like instead of banning only what is strictly necessary to be banned they just let stay what is strictly needed to keep the game enjoyable. As if the burden of proof was on the Pokémon and everyone is guilty until proven the contrary. I hate when a Pokémon you like is also strong but you can not use it.

Can we at least welcome Abra back (And maybe re-evaluate the banned Kami forms in Gen 5 OU ?) ?

The so called vegetative and animal parts of the soul feel like old concepts we never updated for a while.

First, I easily understand there is a difference between the spirit, the immortal part of the soul, and the "vital force". One sets Homo sapiens apart and survives after death, the other is found in all living beings and dies with the body.

But why two of them ? Plants and animals stem from the same primordial forms of life. It makes no sense to separate the two vitalistic principles, even if if I understand correctly animals have also a vegetative part. This distinction feels like something that has nothing to do with being a Catholic and was just a basic pre scientific idea.

Now the very concept of a "vital force" does not fare so well either in science, but at least this is something found in all major other religions. For example Prana in Hinduism and specific types of Qi in Taoism. But is the vegetative/animal part of the soul any different than such concepts ?

I believe the idea as a whole should either be...

1. Scrapped because it has no scientific basis and it is not necessary for the belief in the actually spiritual, immortal soul.
2. The vegetative and animal part should be merged into one vital forcelike thing and used to dialogue more easily with Hinduism, Taoism and other Eastern religions by equating it with Prana and other kinds of life force concepts.

There are people who believe the universal Qi is the Holy Spirit which is frankly insane and totally off the mark from both points of view, since Qi is a mere immanent principle and is ultimately not separated from reality as a whole. There are also people who claim they can use their individual Qi to accomplish superhuman feats. Obviously if they had a better understanding of such things they would realize how fallacious their views are. Equating individual Qi with this old Scholastic concept would clean up such bizzarre ideas and give us a better understanding on how to deal with eastern religions.

The basic definition of Qi is a vague, ineffable principle that interpenetrates reality as a whole. It is the pattern reality works through. It is, if I am correct, what in Huayan Buddhism is known as Li. In Huayan Buddhism it is not an eternal, uncaused substance like the Brahman, as it is as dependent on reality as reality is dependent on it. In modern western world it is often equated with energy in its physical, scientific, universal sense.

But Qi is often used also as a word for the "vital energy" of each living beings. This concept is quite different than what I mentioned above. It is similiar to Prana, but is also somehow close to several concepts from western philosophy and religions. In the West it was popularized only by the New Age movement first and by Dragonball then. Definitely quite far from accurate, trusthworthy sources. It is often used in a very syncretic and confusing way too here.

How in Taoism Qi as the universal principle is differentiated from "vital energy" of living beings ?

And is "vital energy" present in Chinese Buddhism too ? If so, what term is used for it in Huayan Buddhism ?

We find in the Bible a few people never died at all, specifically Enoch, Elijah and Mary. And out of them, Enoch is likely not even a historical character.

But what happened to them ?

Judaism believes Enoch and Elijah were turned into Metatron, the supreme Archangel, reckoned to be even above Michael, and Sandalphon, another high ranking Archangel. Those two have a very important role in post diaspora Judaism.

But is this possible ? I say NO. Angels are not like powered up human spirits with no body. The substance they are made of is immaterial, just like our spirit, but is utterly and totally distinct. Just as the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit too are "spirit" but are also totally distinct from both. There is no point of contact. A human can not become an Angel and viceversa.

However, it is clear Enoch, Elijah and Mary are no longer living in a mere 3D, flesh and bones body. There is no place for that in Heavens. I see Heavens as a state the human spirit, the immortal part of the soul, gets into after death, not as some kind of higher dimensional plane where you can have a body like in Dragonball.

And yet a resurrected body can dwell in Heavens somehow. Jesus appeared after his Resurrection with a glorified body without physical limits, too.

I believe the bodies of Enoch, Elijah and Mary were transformed into Resurrection bodies.

The Book of Enoch, a non Canon 2nd Temple Judaism book, was written by people who could have easily mistaken a human Resurrection body created before Incarnation for an Angel.

Ok, the Book of Enoch is not reliable. It features Angels turning into men and generating other men who happened to be 450 feet tall, and the same Angels are even said to have created this way every kind of hybrid with all creatures on land. If a man turns into an Angel in a book with also giants and kaijus, maybe it is just a tale. But unlike giants and kaijus, the Enoch turning into Metatron story might be based on Enoch actually turning into something superhuman, as I explained.

What are the metaphysical views of the Kalachakra Tantra on the essence of reality as a whole and on the relationship between the Dharmakaya and the phenomenal world and the individual beings ?

Is the Dharmakaya an eternal principle that truly exists, uncaused and eternal, and is it the ground of being, with the phenomenal world being its manifest, empty side ? Is the phenomenal world in a mutual relationship with it, or is the Dharmakaya ontologically superior ?

Are the individual beings emanations of the Dharmakaya who need to go back to it ?

Is there something beyond what is perceived by the minds of the individual beings ?

I heard the Jonang school has quite unique views contrasting pretty much with all the rest of Buddhism.

Apparently it sees the Dharmakaya just like Vedanta sees the Brahman, and the Tathagatagarbha like Vedanta sees the Atman.

Is it true the Jonang school sees the Dharmakaya as an eternal substance that is also the ground of being ? Is it a kind of Panentheism ? And does it teach the Buddha-nature is our individual share of such absolute principle, like the Atman compared to the Brahman in Vedanta ?

If all of this is true, then is the Tathagatagarbha what reincarnates and what is inherently united with the Absolute, and needs to realize such union to achieve Buddhahood ?

As I learned, Buddhism 99% of the times has very different ideas than that.

I know quite well why even in the most lay friendly and life affirming versions of Mahayana Buddhism there is, in the actual official teaching, no eternal substance or soul.

But sometimes the Tathagatagarbha can feel like a soul if you are a newbie of Buddhism reading some Sutras.

Furthermore, in pop culture versions of Buddhism, such as the Dragonball Universe, loosely based on syncretic Buddhodaoism, sometimes the soul exists. In Dragonball, souls go to the realm of Yama/King Enma, and from there they get reincarnated.

So did any small sect of Buddhism ever develop an eternalist heresy about the soul concept ?

I know quite well why even in the most lay friendly and life affirming versions of Mahayana Buddhism there is, in the actual official teaching, no eternal substance or soul.

But sometimes the Tathagatagarbha can feel like a soul if you are a newbie of Buddhism reading some Sutras.

Furthermore, in pop culture versions of Buddhism, such as the Dragonball Universe, loosely based on syncretic Buddhodaoism, sometimes the soul exists. In Dragonball, souls go to the realm of Yama/King Enma, and from there they get reincarnated.

So did any small sect of Buddhism ever develop an eternalist heresy about the soul concept ?

There is around the idea that Qi is "energy", but this definition by itself does not mean much.

So let us look at the definition of energy we found in quantum physics...

"Energy is the same in the quantum world and in the conventional world. To understand energy we need to start with the term “work”, which is a force applied over a distance i.e. the work performed on an object is the force times the distance this object has been displaced by that force. We can now define energy of an object as its ability to perform work on other objects thus we measure energy the same way we measure work: force × distance. We should discuss some examples of energy.

When an iron ball is held uphill it can do work while sliding downhill. This work equals its weight (force) times its height above ground (distance). While still held uphill, the ball has potential energy.

If we let the ball fall freely it will gain speed. This speed would allow it perform work while slowing down while dragging something or by collision. That speed energy is called kinetic energy.

Then there is energy stored in the matter itself. If the matter was converted to radiation, for example by a nuclear blast, the energy released would equal the mass used times the speed of light squared - the famous Einstein formula. This is the energy stored in mass.

In quantum mechanics it is common to write equations that add up all the energies, kinetic+potential+mass. If there is no nuclear reaction then it i only kinetic + potential energy. Since energy is a conserved quantity, equation are sometimes written as “total energy before an event” = “total energy after”. There is a major difference though in quantum mechanics. Since matter behaves like a wave, the energy equation becomes a wave equation (Schrodinger) and under certain conditions matter can have only discrete levels of energy. We then say that under those conditions energy is quantized. There no equivalent quantized energy in classical physics - there can be discrete modes of oscillations but their energy can be adjusted at will by supplying external energy.

-Eli Pasternak, Quora-

Do you think this definition is an accurate representation of Qi ?

Qi from Taoism is seen in pop culture as some mystical thing that is everywhere in the Universe and can be gathered and controlled to accomplish superhuman feats.

In reality it is basically energy in the quantum physical sense. It is the principle through which the phenomenal world is actualized and it interpenetrates it just as much as it is interpenetrated by the phenomenal world itself.

Is there anything like that in the Kabbahla ?

Unlike basic monotheistic beliefs, Kabbalah recognizes reincarnation of a human soul after death.

Does it also have something like the law of Karma from Dharmic religions ?

Who Melchizedek is ?

I see 4 possibilities.

1. The preincarnate Logos/Son, but this is a not likely because God as Yahweh is said often to be the preincarnate Logos. Melchizedek is not also Yahweh.

2. The Angel of the Lord, the one mentioned not by name in the Bible and known as Metatron in post Temple destruction Judaism. The problem is nowhere it is said Melchizedek is an Angel, and even the Angel of the Lord is sometimes said to be the preincarnate Logos, even though this is very unlikely because the Logos is NOT an Angel.

3. A man who had an immortal body because God made him so, and that would have to be Enoch because at that point he was the only man not said to have died ever. Ironically Enochian mysticism says Enoch was also Metatron and I guess it also says the God Abraham and Moses met was just Metatron. The issue would be he was said to have no genealogy.

4. The personification of a function, the function of pre Christ priesthood. The issue with this view is Judaism never had beings who are the living embodiment of a concept.

What do you think ?

I have found a character who almost literally is the image of what a Precure villain should be and the archetypical opposite of what a Precure would.

By backstory, he was born as a human, he gathered magic powers through Kabbahlistic cultivation until he became one of the most powerful beings in his Universe, he spent 400 years destroying other magic cultivators and forming an army of magically endowed humans who ended up under his influence, and he even trained himself his own chieftains. He tried to conquer the Earth of his own Universe, he ended the lives of countless people but he was stopped by a team of heroes of light and order.

By personality, he is beyond misogynistic, he literally treats most women like objects. He follows no rules except for the one of the will to power. He is as selfish as it is possible to be. He is not even immoral, he is a-moral as he is outside the very boundaries of morality.

By character design, he definitely looks like he could belong to the evil team of some Precure series, which often have been drawn with a way different style than the roundish, cutesy protagonists.

I am talking about Dark Schneider from "Bastard!!".

Base Dark Schneider

Angel Dark Schneider

Could a team of ALL Precures ever created defeat him ?

Round 1 : Base Dark Schneider

Round 2 : Angel Dark Schneider

Round 3 : All Precure evil Bosses are revived and come to help Precures. However, Dark Schneider has a chance to try to convince each of them to switch side.

Rules : Everyone is in character, win by KO, incapacitation or death, Precures have their fairy companions and Dark Schneider can choose to target them if he wants, each Precure will be in her most powerful form and none of them could go back to their base, regardless of damage and loss of stamina.

Who wins ?

P.S. In his own Universe Dark Schneider is not even properly evil. He is Chaotic Neutral. But by the standards of Precure he is Chaotic Evil and more evil than most bosses they ever faced. This shows how important are perspective and context.

For example from the point of view of reality I am a True Neutral with a Chaotic tendency, but from the point of view of the Precure Universe I would be Chaotic Neutral with an Evil tendency. Yet in Universes such as Bastard!! and Berserk I would be True Neutral with a Good tendency because of how morally gray at best, deranged at worst most people are.

Monotheistic religions usually depict reality with one only physical Universe. On the other hand Dharmic religions created the concept of the Multiverse, a larger view of reality characterized by infinite parallel versions of the physical Universe.

Was a Multiversal view of reality ever a thing in the more mystical sects of the Jewish tradition ? I believe it can work because the Universe is currently expanding, and thus it is finite, but the power of God is infinite, so infinite versions of the Universe could have been created even though God then chose one in particular.

Monotheistic religions usually depict reality with one only physical Universe. On the other hand Dharmic religions created the concept of the Multiverse, a larger view of reality characterized by infinite parallel versions of the physical Universe.

Was a Multiversal view of reality ever a thing in the more mystical sects of the Jewish tradition ? I believe it can work because the Universe is currently expanding, and thus it is finite, but the power of God is infinite, so infinite versions of the Universe could have been created even though God then chose one in particular.

Is there in Judaic mythology, be it from 1st Temple, 2nd Temple, Midrash, Talmud, Merkabah mysticism, Kabbalah or anything else, any work mentioning a race of sapient monkey-men or ape-men endowed with supernatural powers, such as, for example, the Vanaras from Hindu mythology ?

The Vanara monkey-men (and a bear-man who happened to be there with them)

I know monkeys/apes do not have much of a place in any Middle Eastern culture, but I do not know enough to be sure.

Cosmic Buddhas, Bodhisattvas and Pure Lands are often said to be both literal and metaphors, with "real" meaning real in the sense of emptiness obviously.

Yet some schools seem to skew a bit toward one or the other.

For example, I feel like Pure Land verges more toward Cosmic Buddhas etc. being real and inhabiting actual hyperdimensional realms, while also being the embodiment of the qualities of Enlightenment, while Tiantai with its emphasis on the oneness between conventional reality and emptiness and the 10 realms containing eachothers would have some issue envisioning a real Pure Land and a Cosmic Buddha.

So, which schools verge more toward a metaphorical interpretation, which toward a more literal one ? Which absolutely need both ?