#philosophically i am the most vacillating agnostic but i am going to light candles in a couple of hours bc that action means something to m

[utilitycaster]

The thing about both Ioun and Selena is like. I get it. I really do. So much of our scientific knowledge - medical especially - comes from knowledge we gained in blood, and a lot of it was the blood of people who did not volunteer nor consent (nor were given opportunity to consent). What protections we have now are all recent, in many cases insufficient, and themselves subject to debate. Knowledge we lack and the safety and wellbeing of many people in the future often rest on the safety of a few people in the present; knowledge we have and the safety and wellbeing of many people in the present often comes from sources we should have never had access to.

You do want to have that information. You do not ever want to have to get it, and there's no good way to decide who should have access to it, but someone has to. There is absolutely no good answer at any stage of the process, and a goddess of knowledge and an archmage desperately trying to save her life's work both have to make a decision knowing none will be a good one.