Was Napoleon Evil? Results from the Alignment Survey

Our survey says...Lawful Neutral

The results are out from the Alignment Survey! Thank you to everyone who took part.

As we'll see below, it was a fascinating range of results, from the archetypes on which there was almost universal agreement (The Joker, Robin Hood), through those whom everyone agreed as (for example) Good, but not what type of Good (Aragorn), to those which wildly split opinion (Captain Nemo, Winston Churchill and - of course - Israel).

There were the results which perplexed me (I was curious as to who had put Superman as Chaotic Good; it turns out they'd also put Robin Hood, Gandalf and Harry Potter as Chaotic Good, thought they were Chaotic Good and that most people in the UK were Chaotic Good, which is at least consistent) and those which made me learn something (such as the contrarian theory that Mother Theresa is actually evil).

I'll be presenting all the results below, sometimes with a little commentary, often drawing on conversations I've had with those who completed it. And after that, we'll look at all the results to see which were assessed with most and least consistency and - the bonus feature, as we did on the Who's Rich? survey - which are the most famous.

But before we plunge into the results, whether you are lawful or chaotic you can you can make sure you receive an update every time I post by entering your email address into the subscription form below. You can also help by sharing what I write (I rely on word of mouth for my audience).

Christmas Quiz XVIII is now available. Answers will be available on Epiphany, with honour and glory to the highest scoring team.

Robin Hood, as a Chaotic Good archetype, was indeed generally thought to be Chaotic Good.

Everyone agreed both Gandalf and Aragorn were Good, but opinions were divided as to what type of Good. Interestingly, though more people saw Gandalf as Neutral Good and Aragorn and Lawful Good, this wasn't fully consistent - there were some who bucked the trend and saw Gandalf as more Lawful than Aragorn.

Also, interestingly, 3 people gave an answer for Gandalf who didn't for Aragorn - I assume these have read The Hobbit but not the Lord of the Rings.

With Harry Potter, it starts to get interesting - our first answer with five different answers, ranging from Lawful Good to Chaotic Neutral (no True Neutral, interestingly).

Back to archetypes, both Superman and The Joker had a clear majority for their classic archetypal answer - with the Joker being the most consistently identified in the survey, with 96% saying he was Chaotic Evil. Intriguingly, though 70% thought Superman was Lawful Good, the remaining 30% splitting across the other five non-evil possibilities.

Our first real-world figure, Donald Trump, is almost universally seen as Chaotic - with Chaotic Neutral narrowly beating out Chaotic Evil. A small number go for Neutral (either True Neutral or Neutral Evil) and an even smaller number for Chaotic Good. But I'm sure he would be pleased to know that, like or loathe him, every single respondent knew who he was.

In sad contrast, almost half of respondents did not know Anne of Green Gables well enough to attempt to classify her - though those who did universally thought she was Good.

I had included Mother Teresa¹ as a stereotypical 'Good' individual, so I was quite surprised to see a non-trivial minority of respondents classing her as Evil. It turns out their is a well-established contrarian theory that she was actually Evil (see 'criticism' on Wikipedia). You live and learn! In consequence, her answers, though clearly a majority go for Good, spread across six categories, and from Lawful to Chaotic, and from Good to Evil. 

Another great divider, though this one more expected - Odysseus. I was quite pleased to see that a plurality had gone for my own choice - True Neutral. 

Putin was almost universally thought to be Evil, though a lone respondent plumped for Chaotic Neutral.

Han Solo saw a division between Chaotic Neutral and Chaotic Good. I think there's a good case to be made that he begins A New Hope as the first, but ends the film as the latter.

Churchill was one of the most dividing individuals, with seven different alignments selected, and no clear front runner amongst them. Just over half thought he was Good (evenly split between the three Good alignments) but the largest single category, at nearly 30%, was Lawful Neutral. A small number thought he was True Neutral, and an even smaller Evil (either Lawful or Chaotic). Interestingly, Lawful was the least popular Good alignment, but by far the most popular Neutral Alignment - most people clearly think Churchill was either Lawful or Good, but not usually both. 

Fortunately everyone though Hitler was evil. 

The loveable bear from Darkest Peru was generally thought to be Good, and either Neutral or Chaotic. I must confess to finding it hard to understand the people who think he's Lawful (I guess he's very polite?).

Another interesting character, Treebeard, had been selected as a True Neutral archetype - but while this was a plurality, it was not a majority. The contrast with the other True Neutral plurality, Odysseus, shows that this is one of the tricksiest alignments to define. 

Captain Nemo greatly divided opinion. I confess to struggling with this one: I plumped for Chaotic Good when answering the survey, but on reflection think Chaotic Neutral (the plurality) is probably right. 

Voldemort, like Hitler, was universally seen as evil, though interestingly with much less consensus on what type of evil. 

Just William, not unexpectedly, was thought by the majority to be Chaotic Neutral. 

Fagin, in both incarnations, divided opinion, but he shifted from majority Evil (Book Fagin) to majority Neutral (Musical Fagin). This also saw a shift to the Chaotic, with Neutral Evil being the plurality for Book Fagin and Chaotic Neutral. A non-trivial number of people even saw Musical Fagin as actively Good. 

Though he accrued seven different alignments (as many as Churchil), unlike Churchill, there was a clear consensus that Cornelius Fudge was Lawful Neutral - though one person I spoke to suggested that this was actually Ineffective Neutral. 

Willy Wonka was a clear Chaotic Neutral. 

Another seven-alignment individual, Paul Atreides was generally seen as being in the top left quadrant (Lawful Good / Lawful Neutral / Neutral Good / True Neutral), but a small number saw him as Chaotic Neutral or even as Evil². 

And our last individual, Napoleon. Just over half thought he was Lawful, with these splitting about 3:2 between Lawful Neutral and Lawful Evil. One person even thought he was Lawful Good (I checked to see if they were French, but remarkably not). There were also takers for Chaotic Neutral and True Neutral, and even for Neutral. For me, I think he is clearly Lawful - restoring law to France after the Terror and creating the Napoleonic Code - and while I went for Lawful Neutral, I can see the perspective that trying to conquer Europe puts one in the Evil category, even if one otherwise rules well. 

Everyone loves Japan)

This was a primarily British audience, so I guess it shouldn't be surprising that there was a plurality for Lawful Good. Over 80% put Britain in the top left quadrant, though a few fringe voices went for Evil or Chaotic Neutral options. 

I expected more respondents to think Japan was Lawful than thought Britain was. I hadn't expected more to think it was Good - but they did, by a significant margin. The grass is always greener. 

Nazi Germany was universally thought to be Evil. There was an interesting phenomenon with some people classifying Nazi Germany as Lawful Evil, but Hitler himself as Neutral or Chaotic Evil. The Soviet Union was also (reassuringly) universally thought to be Evil, but less Lawful.

The Roman Empire was felt by a clear majority to be Lawful Neutral - I think it is a fairly archetypal nation of this alignment. A few people who did not think Britain was Lawful Good did think the Roman Empire was, which intrigued me. 

Israel, unsurprisingly, saw the most divided opinion of any question in this survey, being classed as in all eight alignments (everything except Chaotic Evil) and a good split between all of these. I was slightly surprised to see the strong showing for Lawful Neutral (I myself had put Chaotic Good), but that was still less than 30%.

There was far more consensus that Hamas was Chaotic Evil.

China saw a big split between Lawful Neutral and Lawful Evil, with decent minorities also going for the Neutral equivalents.

The Samaritans were, unsurprisingly, generally thought to be Good.

And Somalia, as expected, to be Chaotic Neutral.

No-one thinks they are an NPC

The largest single choice for a typical person in Britain was True Neutral - and yet only one person said they themselves were True Neutral! Truly, no-one is an NPC in their own life. In total, fewer than half of people thought that they were the same alignment as a typical person in Britain. Of course, sometimes this can be justified (as one person said to me, 'I think the typical person in Britain is True Neutral; but I am a lawyer, so I am Lawful Neutral') - but notably, only half of people think the typical person in Britain is Good, while three quarters of people think they themselves are³. The diversity of views on both though was interesting.

And finally...

I'd asked some questions about nationality and religion, but they didn't show anything interesting, so we'll skip past that.

I wanted a number to show how consistent the answers were for each individual or country. Ideally this would take into account not only the number of different alignments suggested, but how clumped they were - there is a world of difference between Superman and Captain Nemo, for example, despite both having six alignments. And it should also have 100% for one where everyone picks the same alignment, down to 0% if the answers are split evenly between all 9.

The formula I went for was equal to 1.5x((a²+b²+...+i²)^1/2 - 1/3), where a, b, c...i represent the fraction of respondents that selected each alignment. This gives the core of the score; subtracting 1/3 and multiplying by 1.5 then scale the answer such that an even split is 0 (it would otherwise be 1/3) and a unanimous response is 1.

We can see that the Joker is the most consistently identified, with a score of 97%; Hamas, Just William, Nazi Germany and Robin Hood come in at around 60%; there is a large clustering between 40 - 60% (these are typically entities which are split between 2-3 main alignments), going down to entities that split opinion, such as Napoleon, Captain Nemo, Churchill, Paul Atreides and, most divisively, Israel, which at 13% is almost as widely split as one can get.

And finally, which entities are best and least known? There were six figures who were well enough known that 100% of respondents could guess their alignment: Robin Hood, Harry Potter, Adolf Hitler, Nazi Germany, Vladimir Putin and Donald Trump. Superman, Churchill and the Soviet Union come close behind. In all, almost 2/3 of entities saw over 80% of people respond; after this, the answers start falling off rapidly, with Odysseus and Treebear just under 80%, Somalia, Musical Fagin and the Roman Empire near 60%, and poor Captain Nemo at only 38%.

The figure refers to the proportion of respondents who answered that question.

If you enjoyed this survey, the next major event will be next year's Prediction Contest, in which people try to forecast the likelihood of various UK and world events occurring in 2024. This will occur in mid-January, shortly after I post the results of last year's contest on 1 January (and of course the Christmas Quiz answers on Epiphany. Last year over 60 people entered the Prediction Contest; this year, it would be great to get over 100, so stay tuned!

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