[sindohte]

Here's my pondering of the day - all out wars, smaller battles and skirmishes took place during all of the various ages of recorded Tolkienverse history. You can start with the fighting the Valar waged against Melkor and keep on going to the War of the Ring. So here are my questions -

1. Given the long lifespan that an Elf would possess, what would be the impact of witnessing and fighting in multiple major wars over the ages?

2. Would Elves have a different view as to the reasons why to wage war vs. that of mortal men?

3. Would being an Elf allow them to have more of a big picture perspective in general or would mortals be able to grasp the big picture to the same extent in terms of why certain actions during a war might have negative consequences centuries later?

For example, Elrond was able to see the long term consequences of Isildur's refusal to destroy the Ring during the Last Alliance. Would things have been different if Elrond had been a mortal? Would he have looked at the short-term gain of having a ring of power vs. knowing that Sauron would rise to power again at some point because the ring had not been destroyed?

[SilverMoonLady]

Now there is food for thought....
It is a rare individual (among us mortals anyway) that can see the big picture with any clarity, though it has happened, and most of us do catch a glimpse every now and again. Now, an elf that has lived so very long, and *knows* much more first hand of the sources and causes of a present conflict due to participation in earlier portions of it, that individual might well, in a mood of calm contemplation, be able to take the long view, and *see* the effect of certain actions upon the course of history. I believe Elrond is certainly one who could, to a degree, do just that. But despite their longlived experience and accumulated wisdom, elves are still *limited* beings, affected by more than intellect. After the Last Alliance (if I remember accurately) Elrond never again picked up a sword... It was simply that disastrously awful on many levels that he chose to put that aside. Thranduil retreated to Mirkwood and became very isolated from the other elven communities. (I may be wrong about any of the facts here, working off of my poor memory) But in any case, they cannot not be affected and changed by the conflicts around them.
My two pence/cents/knuts!

[BittenBuggy]

*Flounces out of this thread*

Can nothing be simple with you Sindie?

[sindohte]

Uhhh, no

(Likely my shortest answer ever)

[sindohte]

[DragonEyes]

Thank you for the questions....
well me and my inferior intellect have been trying to solve those for a long time and I have come up with a couple of things:

1. only a part of wisdom comes from age and living...and usually forsight is a gift some are born with and it intensifies with age...
a foolish person is always foolish....so age won't do anything there
2. Elves have a calmer nature as opposed to our continuously fiery one...that gives them an advantage but doesn't necessarly mean they have more wisdom
3. Elves such as Elrond are not oridnary elves...they are elves with gifts so yes they would kick any human's ass when it comes to being wiser
4. As for how they look at war I think part of their feelings regarding war either turn into a state of :" it's not my business anymore" or " I don't care...." because I think at some point a person starts to get used to certain things to a certain degree I'm not saying they become desentized I'm just saying it's like when ur nervous system gets used to a certain level of pain...

That is all I've come up with so far...I usually find humans complicated ...well I find elves more complicated

*scrams before she gets caught in the tomato shower*

[Elvenesse]

[BittenBuggy]

*Hands itch* Oh! Must. Not. Respond.

My first age elfies...

[sindohte]

Go on and respond BB. You KNOW that you want to wow us with your First Age knowledge. And you KNOW that you want to talk about your beloved Fingolfin and Fingon

[SilverMoonLady]

*blush* just good at rehashing and bs-ing about things I know little about... at least a little of psych and anthro did filter through the alcohol in my bloodstream while at school though...

But it is a very tough question, even when thinking of it in terms of a fictional place and fictional beings. War is horrible, though occasionally necessary, due to our less reasonable and enlightened impulses. It scars the 'winners' as much as the 'losers', and in the end solves no problems... We are lucky not to live long enough to see the end of the damage we do when we behave in such ways. And I am now wrenching myself from this before it becomes an embarrassingly tearful and impassioned dissertation.

[sindohte]

Come on BB and SilverMoonLady!!! You know that both of you want to grace us with a dissertation. Give us more please? Pretty, pretty please????

But based on SilverMoonLady's comment about humans not living long enough to see the damage of their actions - totally agree with that point. And that is why Elves spend their lives tinged with regret. They don't get to have the luxury of a finite number of years. The life of a human is bound by two bonds - birth and death. The life of an Elf begins with a birth, but then there is that extremely long lifespan before the ending of the world finally occurs and they have their final release.

Okay folks, time to start disserting (how do you like that new word I made up?)

[SilverMoonLady]

Ahhh... well. I think I'd have to organize this on paper before I could ever make a rational point of it, you know But, oh, the evils of war and its scars, the sheer folly of the world we live in, even now, in the supposed age of reason... It's a wonder the Powers that be haven't just hit the reset button...
But then, taking the long view can be paralyzing. Ever tried to make a decision based on an outcome beyond the immediate? It's nearly impossible. Too many ifs. I suppose the question (to relate it back to our topic) is whether that same endless maze of possibility would create that kind of paralysis in a being as old as a mature Elf (particularly one past his first Age or two). Because it is one thing to look at a certain course of events and try to follow it to its ultimate end and quite another to act to change it. Say one thing and not another, assign a task to one and not another... The ramifications are... well, overwhelming:)

[DragonEyes]

OUch.....I did say continuosly....that means elves do have that....but not all the time...as opposed to us...

*excuses herself out of the discussion *

[SilverMoonLady]

DragonEyes, you certainly did say "continuously", a key word, though it is true that if one looks at the actions of earlier elves, they were somewhat... rash. It does seem that they took a far more passive role in the Third Age, but I too think that this was more the effect of experience than temperament.

[BittenBuggy]

I'm just going to make a small point. Well - I'm going to try

Elves age with Arda - with age comes life-experiance (aka wisdom) - Elves were simply older in the Third Age.

Now I feel better.