Quote:
Originally Posted by Rocket Man
I picked this one because it's actually an example given in canon and seems to match my experience in play.
"My name is Isabel." No, no it's not. Your name is Sophira, Angel of Judgment. Isabel is the name of the Role you assume in order to act on Earth, but it's not your name, anymore than Kenneth Branagh's name is "Hamlet, Prince of Denmark."
"People call me Isabel." Yes. That is true. They know you under your Role name and use that to refer to you.
"You can call me Isabel." Yes. That is true. They are physically capable of doing so, regardless of whether that is your true name or not.
Subtle distinctions, indeed.
So yes, a Seraph understands verbal subtlety. It has to. Otherwise, it couldn't navigate the minefield of language at all.
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Yeah, but (as is so often the case) the canonical example makes no sense. A name is just a set of phonemes or symbols that people use to designate something. (In a performance of Hamlet, "Prince Hamlet" doesnt designate the actor who plays Hamlet, it designates Prince Hamlet.) Maybe there's a metaphysically important connection between certain things and the phonemes and symbols that are recalled by the, say, Seraph of Destiny attunement, but since native English speakers don't generally have any familiarity with such things, it can't be the thing which the set of symbols/phonemes "name" designates.