[MENTION=55456]Anselyn[/MENTION], the word "science" was used by Steiner for his work, which he called "Spiritual Science," which was science in the sense that he advocated an empirical approach to spirituality, one not based upon belief or faith but experience (that said, most Anthroposophists treat Steiner's words as gospel and Anthroposophy as a religion). It wasn't science in the narrow sense that it is commonly (and perhaps erroneously) used, that is dealing only with the physical world. By the way, I'm not saying that Steiner is correct in terms of specifics, but that I agree that science need not be limited to physical, sensible realities, that there is a "science of inner domains" that manifests in different cultural contexts, from Tibetan tantra to Hermetic alchemy to Steiner's Anthroposophy.
[MENTION=6688049]DnDPhilmont[/MENTION], thanks for the Tolkien link - interesting stuff there. The similarities support my view that there is a common wellspring of mythology, which most fantasy taps into to various degrees. The reason Tolkien's work is so popular, powerful and evocative is not as much because he brought a new genre, or sub-genre, into being (that would explain his initial popularity, not his sustained popularity), nor is it because he was a particularly skilled writer (some are rather critical of his style which is, at the least, a tad anachronistic and sounds a bit dated), but because he tapped into deep archetypal forms that live within all of us, and thus resonate on a "soul" level.
If we're to use Coleridge's taxonomy of Imagination, I would say that the primary Imagination is a spiritual capacity that few tap into, while the secondary imagination is what could be called "true art" - that echoes and manifests the vision of the primary Imagination. But most art, most fantasy, is merely the regurgitated re-combinations of what Coleridge calls fancy which, he says, deals only with "fixities and definitives" rather than living, archetypal forms. Tolkien's work is so vital, imo, because he had a deep experience of primary Imagination, which was expressed through his secondary Imagination of Middle-earth.
We see glimmers of this in RPGs, but just glimmers. Most RPG ideas are the products of fancy and referential to other works within "The Tradition" (of RPGs). Yet even then you'll find deeply interesting ideas and concepts that have a certain kind of archetypal resonance (which is one of the reasons I'm a collector of settings).
