#something something featherless biped…

[frankie-the-bad-guy-lupelli]

Oh I am WAY too tired for this. @inventinginventoroftruth why is my cat walking around like people?

[purpleminte]

*aggressively points*

[usernamesaresohardimconflicted]

You watch while Sisyphis is continuously rolling boulders towards the top of a hill. Right before he gets there, The Boulder goes through one of two slits.

One leads to the Grand Hilbert Hotel. With an infinite number of rooms, it seems like they can easily accommodate the boulders, but all of the rooms are full, perhaps we can move some people around?

The other leads to the Ship of Theseus, but all of the pieces have been replaced over time. If a Boulder hits the ship, is it truly destroying the ship of theseus?

If you stop watching, the boulders will go through in a wave pattern instead.

If it hits the box with Schrodinger's Cat, the cat has a fifty percent chance of already being dead, but you won't know unless you look inside the box before the Boulder reaches it. If the boulder reaches it before you check, then there's a fifty percent chance that the cats death is your fault, but you will never know.

If the boulder hits Tantalaus, he is starving and undoubtedly can not fend off a rolling boulder, but he also would be unable to touch it if he tried.

If the boulder heads towards the featherless biped, it might kill a man, but some people argue that featherless bipeds are not necessarily men, so does it count as murder?

Does this still count as a trolly problem?

[biocrafthero]

Things I do not like about Tsukasa's bedroom

None of this is any particular order I just needed to make a post about it

1. This chair and table

Why does he have this. He doesn't need this fancy ass chair and table. Why does the table have a quill and paper on it why the hell does he write under candlelight like he's composing letters to his loved one who's gone off to war.

2. The empty display case

There is ???? Nothing??????? In there??? He needs to put something in there why is it empty

3. His "rug"

It's not even a rug. It's those foam mats that link together that you can find in places like workout studios. Why are there books on the floor too why did he think this was okay

4. The singular skylight

I've seen singular skylights in rooms before but he does not need this considering the massive fuckoff wall of windows????

5. His bed placement

It's not even against a wall. Why is it right next to the windows but not against a wall?? It's just in the middle of the fuckin room????

His bed looks like the grandpa bed from stardew valley but slightly better. The only other character with a bed that looks remotely like this is Kanade btw????

6. His desk and mirror (collective)

I'm less upset about the full body mirror and more about his ten thousand books that could've gone in the display case instead of, apparently, all in the desk and shelf and all over the floor.

That two legged chair is featherless and a biped and I don't even need to finish that joke. Apparently Saki also has a chair like this ?

The worst part is the lamp. Most people show pictures of his bedroom in the daytime so you only see the lamp when he has it pointed at the mirror but it gets worse if you see what the nighttime render looks like

He moves it. To the desk. Every night he moves the lamp to the desk and every morning he moves it to the mirror. What is his problem.

7. The balcony

Where do I even fucking begin with this

What purpose does this serve. Where is his privacy. Why does his bedroom just have a balcony that leads to the rest of the house.

Do you think he jumps over the balcony instead of going down the stairs? Considering how loud this idiot is do you think everyone can hear him if he's practicing a part for a performance?? Is everyone just okay with this??? I feel like I'm going insane??????

Conclusion: what the hell

[cynicalmusings]

im new here but i already wanna jump in on the socrates!reader bandwagon

socrates!reader showing up to anaxas lecture and some point to question him on everything. mans cant get a sentece out of himself because here they are sitting in the front row raising their hand ready to bombard the life out of him with questions.

(queue them giving everyone else in the room a perpetual headache. are they fighting? are they flirting? secret third thing?)

oh, for sure, this has definitely happened before. probably more than once. anaxa is more than happy to engage, but whether the same can be said for the other students, well……

this also 100% reminds me of that ‘man is a featherless biped’ vs *throws a plucked chicken down on the floor and proclaims it to be a man* plato/ diogenes thing which i mentioned briefly before — these two have the same energy of being unbearably pedantic with each other when it comes to argumentation. the benefit is that they actually rule out a lot of impossible/ improbable responses to whatever it is they discuss: whether or not they’ve actually come to a satisfactory conclusion, you can at least walk away knowing with confidence what isn’t the case about a certain matter. it’s a gradual process of narrowing down until they finally land on something which must be true.

so, to be fair, if the students are actually following closely, they will learn a lot. you just have to be really, really focused and not be afraid to ask them what’s going on if you’ve lost track of the argument.

[odysseywritings]

Planet of the Birds

@flashfictionfridayofficial

"And that, class, ends our discussion on the Emu War of Australia. A conflict that radically changed the course of the world. Any questions?"

A little gray wing raised up.

"Is it true that these weird ape things... Humans... Used to be in charge of everything?"

"Indeed. But they needed their guns instead of using their brains. Some even tried to rewrite history and turn it into a minor footnote. Fortunately, those dark ages are gone. Now remember class, tomorrow we will be talking about the chimpanzee war, so study!"

The flock of juvenile emus scattered outside the school with their calls and chirps. Miles away, a normally quiet shoreline held a strange visitor. A featherless biped walking on the sand until spotting something dispiriting. The remains of a giant green statue holding a torch.

"You maniacs! You blew it up! Goddamn you all to hell!"

He then turned and looked at a similar green statue looking like a hairy Roddy McDowell.

"I don't know who that is, but damn you for that, too!"

[vampirejuno]

Today at lunch I was discussing philosophy with my coworker and one of the kids was hanging around listening in on our conversation, which led to the following exchange:

Coworker: [miming holding a microphone to the kid's face] "Excuse me sir, what is your opinion on the idea that man is a featherless biped?"

Kid: "I dunno..... What's a biped?"

Me: "It's something that walks on two legs."

Kid: "Oh..................... So, like a chicken?"

[lizardrosen]

tumblr, i have a very important question for you:

[tiredneutron]

Absolutely we can start a new threat, that last one was getting a bit unmanageable XD Picture at the top is mostly for my benefit…

My biggest accomplishment? That’s… a lot to think about? I dunno it’s either the fact that I finished high school with an actually good grade or the fact that I’ve pretty much finished my uni without failing any units. I think my sense of accomplishment is very education/progress centred so it’s not as easy to think of stuff outside that ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

I mean I know it’s probably cliche but honestly I don’t think I go many days without music. It’s honestly such a constant for me because it helps me focus when I need to work and it also helps me keep my auditory sensitivity in check. On top of that music is one of the easiest ways for me to actually feel my emotions because I’ve a bad habit of both only thinking about them and bottling them up. That’s not to mention the fact that I enjoy playing music a ton, so… yeah it’d have to be that for me

I’d love to see that one moment where Greek philosophers were debating how to categorise man and one suggested “featherless biped” so Diogenes ran in the room holding a plucked chicken saying “BEHOLD! A Man” because I honestly think their reactions would have been Hilarious

What’s your go to fast food place? If you don’t get fast food often then takeaway meals or something like that works too

Have you ever broken any bones? Is there a story behind it? (Again skip if not comfortable with this)

What is an activity in your city/area that you love going to? (Cinema, paintball, escape room, etc)

@musicandbooksaremyhappyplace

[inspofromancientworld]

Diogenes of Sinope

By Unknown author - Römisch-Germanisches Museum, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=6609593

Diogenes of Sinope, also known as Diogenes the Cynic, lived from either 412 or 404 BCE to 323 BCE. His father, Hicesias, was the master of the mint in Sinope and Diogenes worked with him at some level. At some point, the two kicked out of Sinope for defacing money, which is apparently corroborated by the discovery of a large cache of coins that were smashed by a large chisel. Diogenes was stripped of his possessions and his citizenship as well. During this time, Sinope was ravaged by pro-Persian and pro-Greek factions so it's possible that there were political rather than financial motivations, but history doesn't record their reasons. One story that has been passed down through the ages is that the Oracle of Delphi told Diogenes to 'deface the currency'.

By Jean-Léon Gérôme - Walters Art Museum: Home page  Info about artwork, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=323523

Regardless of the reasoning, from Sinope, Diogenes traveled to Athens with the goal to challenge the establishment. He argued that people relied too much on custom rather than thinking deeply about the nature of evil. He had a slave named Manes who left him, causing him to say, 'If Manes can live without Diogenes, why not Diogenes without Manes?' He found masters who could not look after themselves without assistance from servants or slaves contemptible. He was attracted to the teachings of asetic Antisthenes, a student of Socrates, and asked to be taught by him. Antisthenes ignored him and Diogenes kept pestering Antisthenes to the point that Antisthenes beat Diogenes with a staff. Diogenes said, 'Strike, for you will find no wood hard enough to keep me away from you, so long as I think you've something to say.' Antisthenes accepted Diogenes as a student after that. Whether this is true or a fiction developed over time is uncertain, though it is certain that Diogenes exceeded his teacher's asceticism and reputation.

By Jules Bastien-Lepage - Unknown source, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=3095294

Stories of Diogenes' life reflect the logical consistency of his character. He lived in a clay wine jar near the temple of Cybele, he destroyed his only possession, a wooden bowl, after seeing a boy drink water from his hand. He challenged the norms of Athens by eating in the marketplace and went through the city during the day carrying a lamp, stating 'I am looking for a man', possibly implying that conforming to the social mores of the time meant that those around him weren't men. He taught that civilization was counter to happiness. He was reported to have flouted every social norm possible, including urinating on people who insulted him, masturbating in public, defecating in the theatre, and spiting and farting in public.

By Mattia Preti - 3gH_288EhvdkhA at Google Cultural Institute maximum zoom level, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=22491339

Diogenes had special enmity against Plato for being too abstract. He felt that Antisthenes was the true heir to Socrates and that they were to be 'doctors to men's souls and improve them morally'. Plato referred to Diogenes as 'Socrates gone mad'. Diogenes Laërtius, who lived from 180-240 CE and wrote biographies of Greek philosophers, reported that Plato gave a 'tongue-in-cheek' description of man as 'featherless bipeds'. Diogenes brought a plucked chicken to Plato's Academy declaring, 'Here is Plato's man', causing the Academy to add 'with broad flat nails'.

By W. Matthews - http://www.alexanderstomb.com/main/imageslibrary/alexander/index.htm, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=649333

According to one story, which seems to have originated with Menippus of Gadara, a Cynic satirist, Diogenes was kidnapped by pirates while he was on a voyage to Aegina. From there, he was sold as a slave in Crete to a Corinthian by the name of Xeniades. When asked what his occupation was, Diogennes said that 'he knew no trade but that of governing men' and that he desired to be sold to 'a man who needed a master'. Xeniades appreciated Diogenes' attitude and had him tutor his two sons. Most stories about him include him living the rest of his life in Xeniades' home. It is also during his time in Corinth that he is supposed to have met Alexander the Great, to whom he said 'stand out of my sunlight.' Alexander is said to reply 'If I were not Alexander, then I should wish to be Diogenes.' Another story reports that Alexander came upon Diogenes looking at a pile of human bones, and Diogenes reportedly said, 'I am searching for the bones of your father, but cannot distinguish them from those of a slave.'

By John William Waterhouse - File:John_Waterhouse_-Diogenes-_Google_Art_Project.jpg, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=672541

Diogenes' death is hidden behind multiple stories, one of which is that he held his breath until he died, another that he died from eating raw octopus, another from an infected dog bite. Regardless of how it came about, when asked how he wanted to be buried, Diogenes said he just wanted to be thrown outside the city walls so the wild animals could eat his body. Likely aghast at yet another break with propriety, the people asked if he was troubled at all by this. Diogenes replied, 'Not at all, as long as you provide me a stick to chase the creatures away!' Upon being asked how his corpse could wield the stick without awareness, he replied, 'If I lack awareness, then why should I care what happens to me when I am dead?' To his death, Diogenes lived out his philosophy. According to Diogenes Laërtius, Diogenes and Alexander the Great died on the same day, but since we can't confirm that, it may be just another story.

By Diogenes-statue-Sinop.JPG: Tony fderivative work: Singinglemon (talk) - Diogenes-statue-Sinop.JPG, CC BY 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=11169690

Fifty-one items of Diogenes' body of writing survive to today and he, along with Antisthenes and Crates of Thebes, Diogenes' student, are considered to be the fathers of Cynicism, which is a branch of philosophy that holds that 'people are reasoning animals, and the purpose of life and the way to gain happiness is to achieve virtue…by living simply and shamelessly free from social constraints.' To this end, Diogenes lived his philosophy to the end of his life. He didn't fully reject human contact, though, since he went to the marketplace daily, balancing his rejection of social norms and his need for human contact.

[quasar-cheoreom]

A Sign, an Omen, a Glitch

This is something I wrote based on the trailer for Stray Kids' album 'I AM NOT'.

Here's an excerpt:

Once upon a time and world, there existed a dome. And people lived within that dome or rather ape descended featherless bipeds did. They did not know of a life outside the dome or even of a life inside the dome for what they lived was not life. They wore clothes made of glistening white polyester with hoods covering their faces and they never looked up for there was nothing up. Until one day, a boy does. He pulls down his hood and gazes up at the white sky. There was nothing unusual about it, sky had always been white, a harsh glow that made the eyes leak water. But somewhere, in some deep corner of his mind, he remembers a sky that was blue. A strange thought. Blue was a rare colour. He had seen it in flashes- a microchip label, the flash of an eye, deadly radiation. He tried to imagine what it would feel like to see such a colour filling up the entire sky, filling up his vision, suffusing his senses. And a dam broke. Water blue as the sky rushed forth.

Do read and enjoy:)

Once upon a time and world, there existed a dome. And people lived within that dome or rather ape descended featherless bipeds did. They did not know of a life outside the dome or even of a life inside the dome for what they lived was not life. They wore clothes made of glistening white polyester with hoods covering their faces and they never looked up for there was nothing up. Until one day, a boy does. He pulls down his hood and gazes up at the white sky. There was nothing unusual about it, sky had always been white, a harsh glow that made the eyes leak water. But somewhere, in some deep corner of his mind, he remembers a sky that was blue. A strange thought. Blue was a rare colour. He had seen it in flashes- a microchip label, the flash of an eye, deadly radiation. He tried to imagine what it would feel like to see such a colour filling up the entire sky, filling up his vision, suffusing his senses. And a dam broke. Water blue as the sky rushed forth.

********

A boy sits on a cold bench in a room with several others, hoods covering all their faces. The board in front of him is covered in chalk marks. They read formulas and theories- the beauty of which has long been forgotten and not sought after since. The chalk marks represented ideas no more than the stars over a dead world represent hidden creatures in the sky. They are no more vehicles of creation and discovery, but rather fodder to be fed to the next batch of ape descended featherless bipeds. The hooded ones absorb this study of dry chalk on a dusty board. All except one. Since he had risen from sleep, he had been assaulted with images of a sky that was blue stretching over a ground that was green. He was finding it difficult to focus. The images in his head terrify him so he tries to clear his head by repeating to himself, "I am 1-MH. I am a learner. My job is to absorb information." "I am 1-MH. I am a learner. My job is to absorb information." "I am 1-MH. I am a learner. My job is to absorb information. " To do what? Why?

And a fog opaque as chalk dust clears up. He stands up then. Everyone in the room stills almost imperceptibly. This is out of the ordinary. The boy walks to the front of the class, grabbing a chalk on his way and writes something on the blackboard, his hand moving furiously. Then he leaves. There on the blackboard in jagged letters stand out the words- I AM NOT.

********

Another stands in a dark room full of screens. Reflected on the myriad of screens in front of him are smiling faces. The faces all look like him and on some other day he might have tried convincing himself that they were him too. The pictures capture his body from various angles-close ups and full body shots alike litter the walls. Litter? No, they grace the walls. After all, why shouldn't they? He was the ideal citizen. An example. The very model of a young man everyone looks up to.

He had been han- picked for this. Every aspect of his features considered, every merit of his life taken into account. He had worked hard all his life, toiled away without a care because that's what you are supposed to do. He was sure he had inspired many and made someone very proud, who he wasn't quite sure yet, but there had to be someone who was proud of him. And so it didn't matter that he chugged pills to get even a wink of sleep at night or that heavy bags hung from his eyes or that he can't bear to look at himself in the mirror. But here he can look at himself all he wants. The perfect face. Perfect Body. Perfect life full of extremely productive time, or rather perfect twenty years.

He was the model. He was, wasn't he? Or was he just a model?

The screen glitches.

His face glitches on the screen, breaking and cracking. And in some distant corner of his mind, he remembers when reflections on bodies of water used to do that. When there were ripples in water and your appearance distorted even as you looked at it.

Bodies of water? What would that look like?

You were free in the water. Not bound by any form. Each passing molecule reflecting a bit of you back to yourself, knowing a bit of you for a fleeting moment as they passed by beneath, taking a bit of you to the horizon.

The screen cracks with a sharp sound sending glass shards flying everywhere. A shard nicks him in the face and as the smooth porcelain of his face breaks, blood red as ripe cherries flows freely as bodies of water once did.

*******

In a cold laboratory, a boy lies on a steel table. Headset over his eyes, a simulation playing in his mind, wires connecting every part of his body to machines that record his every reaction. His body is a labyrinth of chrome plates, exposed wiring and bleeding flesh. He is an experiment. An experiment aimed at combining automated features into the bipedal race. The boy currently experiences nightmares through the VR headset. His reactions are being closely monitored and studied for the sake of building more efficient bodies. If his trial is successful, he would become the first cyborg, heralding a new leap in technology.

As it goes, it probably won't. This boy is the first lab rat in a slew of more, his fate betrothed to doom.

In his mind, the boy runs through dark tunnels barely keeping out of reach of the giant. He runs, panting, falling, crawling. In the real world, the boy flails on the cold table, sweat shining on parts of his body that are still him.

He takes a turn around a corner and runs blindly. His foot makes contact with a piece of fallen rock and sends him sprawling. The giant makes a turn as well, the putrid smell of his body filling the space. The boy gets on all fours and feels the area around him, there's fallen rocks everywhere. He crawls forward, hands shaking, his foot burning in pain. The giant's footsteps behind him cause the ground to shake, the rocks to clatter. He moves ahead, gravel digging into his hands and knees and feels the way but all he encounters is a a boulder and another boulder and another all of them slanting upward. The way ahead is caved in.

A sob chokes his throat and he looks back. In the darkness, he cant see anything but vague shadows but the smell is stronger now. His sobs are eaten by the sound of the giant's footsteps. Small rocks roll down from the collapsed mound behind him, and desperately he starts climbing up the mound of fallen rocks. One last attempt on his part. Hands clutching at boulders, feet kicking rocks loose and sending them sliding down behind him, he climbs. Shoulders screaming in pain, he clutches a rock to heave himself up but the rock comes loose and sends him sliding downwards. Throwing out his hands to grasp at anything, he finds another rock to hold on. Palms bloody and gasping, he looks up and sees a strange sight.

A beam of light with dust motes flying in it.

A strange light. Yellowish. A fire?

He pulls himself up towards the light. It peeks out from an opening made by the rock he pulled out. Orange light, he tries to look through but it's blinding to his eyes accustomed to the dark of the tunnels. He holds a hand out and feels warmth on his skin.

Could this somehow be the way to the furnace? He had used to work there at the waste incinerating facility, the temperature got so high it could melt the skin off your face. He starts removing the rocks around the opening. If a quick death is all the mercy he is offered, he'll gladly take it.

As he pries away the rocks from the opening ignoring his stinging hands, more and more light enters the dark tunnel, and he hears a hissing sound behind him. Like sizzling flesh. The loud roar of the giant echoes in pain. Hopeful now, he starts removing the rocks even faster. The light shines on his grimy face but it's too bright and he can't see a thing. When the roar has subsided to a groan and finally given way to silence, he opens his eyes to look down at a puddle of goo on the floor, fast disappearing in the light. Something halfway between a laugh and a sob escapes him. His chest hurts. He turns around to look at the light.

Eyes squinting, sweat and tears shining on his face he looks outside and is greeted by an orange vista. Warmth suffuses his skin. He sees what he can only describe as the sky except it's orange and not white. Not orange like the cleaning garments they wore but warm. Mellow. If he could taste it, it would taste of honey, which is a strange thought considering he has never tasted honey or even knew what it was.

There's also a big round light in the sky that burns silently.

Sun… its name echoes in his mind. He expects it to make a noise-a buzz in the way light fixtures tend to. He expects himself to be terrified of such a big burning force in the sky but, strangely enough, he is not.

His soul hums the song of home.

He tries pulling himself up and out of through the opening. On the operating table, the boy pulls away the wires from his body. He pulls and he climbs. Loose dirt falls on him getting in his eyes and the wires keep snaring him and getting entangled, but he pulls himself free and pulls himself up.

His hands remove the headset from his eyes, and his eyes fly open, but what they see is not the stark white room and the machinery littering the place but a meadow full of daisies stretching out beneath an evening sky and Sun.

********

Another stands in a cave for the first time in his life. It's his first time outside the dome with a team of colonisers. They had walked through blasted lands under a gray sky to reach here. Their job was to stake out more land in order to expand the dome to account for the increasing population. Currently, they were checking out a cave. His companions stood outside at the mouth of the cave while he was still inside fascinated by his own shadow thrown into sharp relief against the rocks by the light coming from outside. He looks back at his companions. From here, their bodies are nothing but silhouettes. They look like little playthings. He turns back to look at the cave wall and his shadow on it. Is that what he looks like to the walls? The way his companions look like to him? Like a mere impression of a being, two dimensions spelling out his entire existence.

But then a shadow flits by on the wall. He turns back to see its actual form but it has disappeared from his field of view by then. All he sees is the bright light from outside and the silhouettes of his companions. Shadow in front of him and shadows behind him. The world nothing but a blend of pitch dark and sterile white.

But then he sees it again, not as a shadow but in flesh, something flying by outside the mouth of the cave. He catches the wide spread wings and the sharp searching eye.

A bird, his mind says. But what is that? He looks at it gliding in the sky right there. It utters a sharp cry. He wonders why the rest of his companions are not reacting. They stand still, still looking at the shadows on the wall. What do they think of the shadow of the bird flitting by-shadows just do that sometimes? Glide by?

He looks at their silhouettes and feels their palpable stillness. In their silent shadowy selves is a message hidden plain as day. They are tense, waiting for him to react. And what happens if he does, when he shouts out at them to turn around and look at the bird?

He doesn't want to find out. The moment of revelation can wait. Now is not the time. This is a test. For what? He isn't sure himself.

He quietly turns back and stares at the cave wall and its two dimensional shadows. His companions aren't much different either way. But what he sees now are not the dim shadows on a wall but the clouds through which he soars, wings spread and crying for joy.

*******

On the roof of a tall building, stands a boy. There, hundreds of feet above the ground he looks down at the lights below. They are so distant that many smudge into one, expanding out far and wide before stopping abruptly at the edge of the dome.

He stares at the lights. The lights wink back. Like stars that he had never seen.

He feels a breeze tickle him but there is no wind in the air. The air stands still, heavy as lead. But there it is again-a whisper, an idea, the merest suggestion. It wraps around his hands swirling up his arms, encircling his torso, enwrapping him, lifting him up. And it whispers things to him, things he had never dared to dream of, things he didn't know he could dream of. It called for him to give in and fly. He turns back from the edge and looks himself straight in the face for a mirror stands there and contained in its four frames is him. No lights blink in the mirror, only the white of the dome and his figure in the center. Like the pupil of an eye. Like a breach. An opening.

He lifts his hand, the figure in the mirror lifts its hand, he sweeps a foot in front of him, the figure does the same. The breeze glides about, guiding his movements. The sweep of arms, the tapping of feet, the movement of body and soul, and there he is at long last, dancing on a rooftop. The first dance in an eon. Soon enough, the movements come easy and he had no idea that simple movement could generate so much joy. It feels sacred, a ritual performed in secret, a rite of movement for him and the stars. One moment he is a lion sauntering in its territory, the other a leaf blowing in the wind, the very next a koi swimming against the current. The movements grow expansive for the mirror frame. A hand breaking out, a foot skirting the edges of the frame and when his movements grow big enough, the mirror finally shatters. Cracks racing across its length, it gives away and on that night a dragon is born.

********

A boy stands in a room packed with easels, a holographic projection floating in the air above him. He paints with colours that look like mud but even mud couldn't have the ingenuity to be so bland. This was the trA programme, any successful society required trA to thrive. You needed someone to muck about with paint every once in a while or scrawl about their tortured souls in Po-Etrie, that's what it was called, wasn't it?

He had always had a very sensitive mind, he perceived things differently from his peers and that's why people had come knocking on his door as a child. They had recognised his gift and had thus put him in a special institution that would slowly but surely leach that out of him. He stands now painting a soupy yellow background, his posture rigid as a pole. The holograph rotates slowly in mid-air. The posture of the figure, the anatomy, one must get everything exactly as it was put in front of them, otherwise what was the point. What incompetent couldn't even copy things exactly as they were. What tra-tist could that man be called.

trA was very important for a society. It made you look at things and see exactly what everybody else was seeing otherwise how would people like him cope. They would go through all their years never seeing what others saw, they'd be effectively blind. Hence the programme, to make them see and copy out things in front of them exactly as they were-no embellishments, no flaws. One looked at a pose, one copied it out. One did not think why the figure would be in such a position in the first place.

He was here to be corrected. So why wasn't he? What was wrong with him? Today he had woken up with stories in his mind, that hadn't happened since he was a child. He was scared to tell that to the instructors, for he did not want them to nullify all his progress. He worried he was being too obvious in front of them when he wanted to mix the colours to see what would happen.

Now, he looks at his half finished painting and peeks discreetly at those of others painting beside him. they all look busy with their work. The one in front of him has finished half of it, the one beside him, a quarter of his way through. They both paint the same thing, they paint the same way but in all their half-finished glory the paintings look vastly different. Originals. He shakes his head, scolding himself for thinking weird thoughts again and looks at his own painting, with the background painted and an empty patch in the middle for the figure.

It looks much better this way, what if he just left it like this? The calling is too great. He remembers back when he was younger and still learning to paint, how whenever he made a mistake he would go to throw it away and there in the bin would be other discarded paintings and he would stay there a bit longer looking at what mistakes others had made and the beautiful stories they spun. He had gotten caught and to save skin had made a tale of how he was ashamed of others who couldn't even copy everything out and was actually criticising the mistakes. Others hadn't talked to him much since then and he swore to himself to never go astray again.

But now he feels that temptation again. He feels that if he just let go again and tripped and fell, there'd be something there to catch him. He would fall like a river over a cliff and after a terrifying descent would meet others like him, he should go for the rest of him was waiting. So he picks up the brush and albeit he did nothing more than a simple line sweeping through the entire length of the painting, it was a rejection and it made a world of difference.

********

Another sits in a bus after a long day of work, bone weary, muscles twitching, and on the verge of nodding off. It was night-time and the bus was empty. He sits there with his head resting against the window pane, the long day behind him but another looming up ahead.And that's when he sees it.

A boy sits on a bench at the bus stop nearby. There would be nothing peculiar about it except that the other boy was looking straight at him. And smiling. And that he bore his own face. The boy startles, now fully awake and touches his own face as if to make sure it's still there. While the boy in the bus debates his sanity, the other boy gets up, still looking at him and then starts walking away as if he had not a care in the world. He looks so happy, happier on this lonely night that he himself has been in all his years. Radiant.

Curious, he gets off the bus and follows the other boy down the lonely street. The boy waits for him up ahead and shows him a different world behind all the lights. Work and sleep forgotten, he roams with himself and sees the world within the dome. All the little uncertainties and blemishes that the shining white could not cover-a destroyed painting burning within a bin, long shadows cast by the lights, wires stained with blood, pieces of mirror, a busted television, loose chalk. Time slows to a crawl and then stops entirely while he sees the world for the first time, the pretty and the ugly both. He talks with himself and laughs with himself and at long last finally bids farewell for he has a job to do.

He walks back to the bus-stop and sits there waiting. A bus pulls up and a tired boy looks out the window, eyes heavy with sleep. He smiles at the boy in the bus welcoming him to follow and join the  exploration alongside him as he skips along the street. ********

In the crowd where one boy first remembered the colour of the sky and pulled down his hood to look up, several others follow. They look up and then at each other. Understanding blooms and fills the space between them. They are here now. Together. The glitches in the matrix, the resounding omen, heralds of a new age.

********

P.S.- I have written this as based on the interpretation by youtube channel skzvintage2.

Here's the video:

Big thanks to them and their big brain.

P.P.S.- I will also be writing out the District 9 mv so keep an eye out for that ;)

P.P.P.S- Do like and reblog and tell me about the parts you liked best, I'd love read your comments. I hope you have a nice day/ sleep and thank you for reading<3

[auricbound]

@ikarosxflight is being a little shit:

❝ what makes you think you can possibly take me, short stuff? ❞

It's a taunt filled with intention because if there's anything that excited the immortal being, it was a challenge. It was all fun and games, right? And like any good player, sometimes pushing the right buttons is necessary.

---☉---

short stuff. SHORT STUFF ? oh, come on, he’s tried ! it's not his fault he's stuck at this stupid, stupid height that is ABSOLUTELY not befitting for a man his age - everyone else is just a freak. that includes his brother, that includes stupid ling too - freaks, all of them. definitely not just him being on the lower end of males. definitely not him having some kind of deficiency that made things harder. DEFINITELY not him having had a giant metal limb weighing him down for the 6 major developmental years of his teens. definitely not. absolutely not. stupid angels. stupid shrimpy not really beanpole also not really angels. who's he talking to, huh ? he wants to play around ? he should be able to put him in his place. after all, he has a much GRANDER set of wings just waiting inside of that little stone resting inside his heart - he may be SHORT, but at least his wings actually SUIT HIM for flight. he is electing to conveniently ignore hali's warnings to not kill BOTH of their dignities, because he's alway's been really bad at listening to them anyways.

" oh, plen'y'a things fer fuckin' sure. y' don' even pass fer a featherless biped an' yer goin' for ME ? y' barely e'en pass as th' image of 'n angel, y'know that ? damn things 're way too tiny. you ain't got any business callin' ME short when yers 're that small."

hali is nagging him. lightly smacking him on the head, even. but he just keeps running his mouth, putting his little stupid hand on his hip, flicking his hair up a little bit as the arms of infinity sprout from his back and weave themselves together into the "wings of god" his lovely - and seemingly very embarrassed - seraphim twin has GRANTED HIM. this cannot go wrong. absolutely not. he definitely isn't saying something that could be easily misheard as something else if someone neglected an "s" or an "are" and let their mind wander, surely. and even if he were, there's no way he can say anything worse than that, surely ?

" y' don' got shit on me. my set's way bigger. "

and there's hali, smashing his face into his hands. all while goldie is seemingly clueless.

[catatonic-chaos-climax]

Do you identify as a featherless biped ?

I see no feathers, but I'm currently not bipedal. more something like a seastar that had found a really comfy spot and doesn't want move.

although soon enough, the forces within my body will demand I stand up again. Bipedalism is a transient state, and perhaps the same is true for featherlessness?

[haravatat-slime]

You mentioned "emotions as matter" earlier, does that tie into music universalis or even the divine possession of creating music? Or is that something else?

I did in fact say something about "emotions as matter," but now I think it would be more accurate to say "emotions as energy that can in turn affect matter." Even in Teyvat, emotions aren't something that can be physically held. (Unless you have a vessel for them. Like. I don't know. A little. Glass thingy.)

I don't have any strong evidence for this yet, but since 1) all elemental energy flows through Irminsul and can therefore be influenced by music, 2) the soul is influenced by music and 3) the soul can take the shape of elemental energy, it seems to me that those things that reside within the soul (feelings!) can also be manipulated via music and energy.

And - this is the thing I've really wanted to talk about regarding emotions - I don't believe this is exclusive to the current Seven elements of Teyvat.

We've known for a very long time that Forbidden Knowledge is influenced by the emotional state of the creature in contact with it. When we first fight Dvalin all the way back in the Prologue, the Tainted Blood that we remove from him is a combination of

The foul blood he once ingested, the lies whispered from the Abyss, and the anguish of abandonment (emphasis mine)

In the Chasm, enemies that come into contact with Dark Mud (a liquid form of Forbidden Knowledge) become more aggressive.

Xiao, and by extension the other yaksha, have absorbed so much Forbidden Knowledge in the form of "karma" that it pains them physically and emotionally, and is capable of causing psychosis in non-Vision-bearers who stay too close to them. (In fact, the "Remedium Tertorium" Zhongli gives us in his voice-line to give to Xiao is, in traditional Chinese medicine, an antidepressant.)

In Inazuma, the Crystal Marrow (visually very similar to Dvalin's Tainted Blood) exists as a solidified combination of Forbidden Knowledge and Orobashi's "will" (Tatarigami). When the overproduction of Crystal Marrow caused Tatarasuna to melt down, a human heart was required to absorb the Forbidden Knowledge - wielded by someone without one, so that he could exit unscathed.

This same someone who encourages us to "embrace our anger" while standing in a Delusion factory filled with Forbidden Knowledge.

Then, if we cut to Sumeru, our good friend Zandik has done a little extra footwork by discovering that Eleazar (a manifestation of Forbidden Knowledge in humans) is correlated with high levels of "elemental energy" within the body.

So if elemental energy and Forbidden Knowledge are both associated with emotions, it would make sense that their levels would be proportional to one another - the higher one's emotional sensitivity, the higher their sensitivity to Forbidden Knowledge, and vice versa.

We know through Nahida's Story Quest that Forbidden Knowledge exists because Nibelung (King of All Dragons) obtained it from outside of Teyvat's borders. We also know that he would not have gone searching for it if not for the rage he felt at having his homeland colonized by featherless bipeds, What we don't know is what form the Forbidden Knowledge had when he first obtained it - or, if its true form is in fact "knowledge," what that knowledge is of.

So maybe I take back what I originally said. Maybe if the mere concept of knowledge can have a goopy, weirdly colored liquid form that is visible to the naked eye, emotions can too.

[hatesaltrat]

Wait, lemme look something up real quick, BRB …..

Plato set out to define “human being” and announced the answer: “featherless biped.” When Diogenes of Sinope heard the news he came to Plato’s school, known as the Academy, with a plucked chicken, saying, “Here’s the Platonic human!”

Ok yea that’s funny.

jemallon #WildIsLife #RareLittleBugger #Pangolin

[taxonomicon-idiot-edition]

Starting Easy: Thoughts towards a Taxonomy of Elves

In another blog I let drop ages ago, I kicked off by looking at some theory and the taxonomy of dragons. [That one, as an aside, was deliberately written with a slightly smug authorial voice and in-universe fictional framing specifically to annoy a certain class of Reddit Guy, which is why I'm dropping the framing device here. At some point I'll port its content over.] Turns out draconic taxonomy is insanely complicated, so lets start with something much simpler and easier, with I'm definitely sure no surprises: the taxonomy of elves.

Our first starting point needs to be to define an Elf in a way that is mostly correct for most Elves. To my mind, that's something that like:

An elf is a featherless biped with two arms and a head that,

Is long-lived,

Maintains regular bodily processes (that is, it is enmeshed in thermodynamic exchange with its ecosystem),

Is usually, but not always, within a range of slightly shorter to slightly taller than the average human comparator,

Is gracile [that is, of relatively slender build taken as an average body plan tendency],

Where magic or similar phenomena exist, is usually naturally inclined towards its use.

This type definition of the Elf is obviously strongly weighted to the post-Tolkien ideal, but that's okay. We're doing Multiple Taxonomy here, so we can offer each Elf we encounter three or even more taxa. The initial scheme I'm going with is as follows:

Descriptive Taxon - habitat, ecological niche, and general appearance. DTs need not follow a full linnaean or quasi-linnean hierarchy.

Phylogenic Taxon - actual shared descent taxa scheme. This one gets tricky in how its executed - my general thought is that unless something is indicated otherwise, all very similar species from across universes belong to a sort of shared meta-phylogeny, even if they're from wildly different worlds. A horse is a horse, of course, of course...

Mythotaxons - old names and taxa that are 'phased out' for the newer ones, letting me play with older mythologies and in-universe taxonomy as a site of contest and context.

Since we have all three, we can define the Common European Elf - our type species for Elves more generally - using these Tolkien-inspired lines, because Tolkien in turn derived them from his hybridization of Christian Angel with Old English Elf. Elves that deviate in one way or another present the fun challenge: Are they a seperate species? Subspecies? Do they belong to an entirely different Genus - even a different Family?

MYTHOTAXA PALEOALFARIDAE

Since Elf in its original sense can be a bunch of stuff that isn't an Elf in our above Descriptive Criteria, those Elves can belong to the shared Mythotaxonic family of Paleoalfaridae - Dwarves are also members Paleoalfaridae because of their shared mythological origins with Elves, while the paleoalfaridae belong in due course to a broader of mirorder, the Chthonifae.

Our hypothetical mythotaxa will look something like this:

Any Elf that fits the mythotaxa goes in the Paleoalfara genus - Tolkien's elves can slot in right beside the Common European Elf, as can, arguably, the Eldar of Warhammer and so on. The goal of the Mythotaxa is not exclusive - it is another place where we can say 'well, that's an elf that derives from the common language of elves' while the phylogenic taxons may place what are still clearly elves in completely different trees due to their evolutionary history and the descriptive taxon is wholly unconcerned with constructing hierarchical systems of taxa. Using all three lets us have the best of both worlds - the flexibility of non-hierarchical taxonomy, the fun of absurdly detailed charts of phylogeny, and an alternative that sees an elf, says 'that's an elf!', and categorizes Elves based on their distinct attributes within the mythotaxic Genus. Next time: The phylogenic and descriptive taxa of Paleoalfara alfar and some thoughts on other kinds of Elf.

[p.s. send me critters you want taxonomized!]