Alicornutopia

Max, why should the bar know why she is a bar? Do you know why you're a human and not an elf like Sarion? You could have been born a pokemon, but you weren't. Why?

Max can at least give causal explanations. "I am a human because my parents were humans and that is how genetics works; here's a summary of the last few billion years of evolution leading up to that."

The bar just knows "someone made me a bar for some reason."

but he could just as easily have been an elf if his parents had been elves. yes there are a few years of billions of years behind Max's species but if he were an elf that would presumably also be true. It just seems on the level of "why was I born one gender when I could just as easily have been born another. Because genetics is one answer, and it's not a bad answer, but a different sperm could just as easily have swam faster and then I would be different.

If Max's author were an elf, Max would likely also be an elf being taken aback by the sudden appearance of humans. But even allowing for Max doesn't know that he is a fictional character, and Max not being religious (which is like being a fictional character in the sense that all fictional characters have an author whose desires dictate their lives to greater or lesser degrees depending on how central they are to the plot), it really does feel like complaining "why are a table and not a chair?" Why is his favourite coffee shop Brenda's when that property could just as easily have been owned by Al instead and then his favourite would have been Al's, but Brenda's is familiar so he doesn't question it or find it suspicious that it is Brenda's and not Al's.

My table is also a "somebody made a table for some reason, probably because they are a table-maker, if my maker had been a lamp i could have been a lamp instead, but then i would not have been bought by a person who wanted to buy a table"

Why wasn't I born a cat I could be napping in the sunshine all day and chasing dust motes?

A bit late for this, but everybody in the Incandescent group: ask the dragon about history! You can learn your enemy’s likely motivations, and maybe be more credible about saying Phix isn’t like that.

"You have a lot of really convenient magic items. But - okay. You'll hold the door, I'll go find Ozma and ask to get advice from the White Pearl, and we go from there?"

...huh. So now I wonder what Glass would see when looking at Oz. And oh look there's a thread where I can ask!

Hey, Glass? Could you take a look at Oz and tell me what you see?

Effulgence and that sandbox don't share a continuity, and we haven't worldbuilt Effulgence Oz enough for me to give Glass a detailed accounting of what she would find there.

Hm. Can I at least ask what she'd see if she looked at the sandbox's Oz? Or does that also not work?

I parse that statement as a more detailed rendering of "I don't know", which explains why that knowledge is unavailable. It's not quite saying that the answer is unknowable, but remember that Glass reads authorial intent, not anything 'objective'. Therefore, since Alicorn has not done the worldbuilding necessary to build up a foundation from which Glass can draw on, the answer to the question is currently indeterminate, and will remain so until and unless that work gets done.

(correct me if I'm wrong, of course)

You're right.

Ah, gotcha. Sorry, nvm then.