#longpost anyone? any pornbots want a longpost?
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for me the interesting inhuman thing about ghouls is (rather than their physical characteristics) that they are in some way created and not born. i see people talking about them being ritualistically summoned and im 100% on board with that. and i think that raises a whole bunch of interesting topics including the following:
how, physically, is a ghoul created?
generally what ive seen is some sort of summoning ritual (this makes sense and fits the theme) in which a ghoul emerges fully formed from a portal. this is interesting because it implies the ghoul was already alive somewhere else, and is just being brought to this plane of existence or planet or whatever. i think its a pretty common concept in other demon lore/media (doom comes to mind, because it always comes to mind) and i feel like its really what "summoning" technically means.
i personally think a more compelling method of creation is like in hellraiser¹ where frank basically grows out of blood/life energy and is literally physically created right there. i feel like its more parallel to birth and also just more fun and yucky. notably, this doesnt contradict the idea that a ghoul already exists before being summoned (frank was being resurrected, not created for the first time). but a method like this could also believably be creating something new.
2. where and what are ghouls before they are summoned?
if they are summoned through a portal which is just a magical doorway than i guess they are in hell and just hanging out. what is their life like there? do they have guitars there?
i think ghouls could perhaps be incorporeal before they are summoned, if their bodies are physically created as part of summoning. i like the idea of a ghoul being sort of "made to order" based on what the summoner needs (e.g. type of musician). i also really like the idea that ghouls have no prior experience with anything. this is probably one of the most compelling ghoul concepts to me. am i projecting in some way? yes, absolutely.
3. how do ghouls know what they know?
this ties in with the previous question. if they lived somewhere else before they came here, they could just practice their instruments there and come here knowing how to play them. i think thats logically possible but the idea of electric guitars in hell is kind of silly to me.
the idea im most attracted to is that, if they are created, they come with the knowledge they need to be in the band. obviously as humans who start out as babies we gain knowledge through experience but imagine someone with amnesia². depending on what parts of their memory are affected, they could have semantic ("what") knowledge without episodic (personal) memories.
4. are ghouls alive? are they alive in the same way as a human?
one straightforward answer to this question is that they are demons, and a demon is a type of creature like a human or other animal. personally, the word "ghoul" (more generally) means something undead just by definition. so my knee-jerk reaction is to say yes of course ghouls are undead. but i dont think it makes sense for them to be zombies. if we consider the backstage photos³ to be canon we can assume they eat and sleep and everything (as opposed to, for example, being banished after every show and summoned again at the next one).
then again, what really makes something undead? it sort of ambiguously means alive but not alive, or more specifically dead but corporeal and animate. but i think that second definition is a little too restrictive because its a hard line to draw. you have to consider also what it means for something to be alive, which is debatable as well.
anyway, i think of ghouls as being mechanically alive (beating heart and everything) but their "souls" are not alive, which would fundamentally be undead. i also think being something that was never a baby is an undead concept also. so overall i think they are undead but in a way thats indistinguishable from normal life (yes, projecting⁴ again).
if you havent seen it, enjoy
i found these explanations of declarative (semantic, episodic) and non-declarative memory in the context of amnesia helpful
e.g. on slide 4 of this post
i have some personal death experience (according to me only)
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