paladingineer

[paladingineer]

"Reel Around the Sky" and "Reel Around the Sun". I've had dromaeosaurs and ancient life on the brain something FIERCE lately. Coloration and patterning partially inspired by local hawks and the Carolina Wren.

[paladingineer]

It wimdy

[paladingineer]

housewives were not banging out spirk fanfiction in the 60s for you to be AI generating your fic

[paladingineer]

wanted to draw some dilophosaurs again, so i made some butterfly inspired dilos... :]

you can get these dilos on my toyhou.se (or send me a dm if you're interested)

[paladingineer]

[paladingineer]

You inspired me to go through the list. Here are some highlights I noted:

"Harry Potter wand" is a specific item on the list

"Playstation" and "Xbox" are listed separately from "Full-size video game console"

"Sand" and "Rocks" are on the list

"Saber" is listed separately from "Sword"

"Foam toy sword" is prohibited from carry-on and also listed separately from "Toy guns and weapons"

"Waffle iron," "Printer," "Microwave," "Television," "Solar Panels," and "Sewing Machine" are on the list.

"Light Saber" is on the list with the following description: "Sadly, the technology doesn't currently exist to create a real lightsaber. However, you can pack a toy lightsaber in your carry-on or checked bag. May the force be with you."

"Magic 8 Ball" is on the list with the following description: "For Carry-on bags: We asked the Magic 8 Ball  and it told us…Outlook not so good! For Checked bags: We asked the Magic 8 Ball and it told us…It is certain!"

"Wedding Dress" is listed separately from "Belts, clothes, and shoes"

a TSA officer will visually inspect your lobster

[paladingineer]

There's a running joke in certain paleontological circles about "nobody knows what a bird is" for exactly this reason.

And really, it's a pretty good analog. Both have simple answers that are woefully insufficient for the nuances of reality but work well enough for a sixth grade intro science class. "A bird is an animal that has feathers." "A woman is a human with XX chromosomes."

Both of those definitions begin to break down when you expand them beyond the simplified world of middle school science classes.

Is a Velociraptor a bird? It has feathers. What about a baby T. rex? How are we defining feathers; do the quills on a Triceratops's tail count as feathers? Are pterosaur pycnofibers feathers or not?

The concept of bird as a simple category breaks down when expanded to include prehistoric creatures. Sure, we can get around this by just saying "fine, anything in the clade Avialae is a bird" - but that's a completely arbitrary dividing line. There's nothing that inherently makes Avialae more bird-y than, say, Maniraptora. The dividing line is an arbitrary social construct.

Likewise, the simple definition of woman breaks down when you introduce intersex people, trans people, etc.

The difference is, we can't solve the bird question by asking a Velociraptor whether it considers itself a bird and taking its word for it. You can ask a person whether they consider themselves a woman and just accept their answer.

gender essentialism is soooo funny bc it's like "this is what women are like" and you're like "I've met women and many of them, if not the majority, have not been like that" and it's like "well women SHOULD be like that" and you're like "why should women be like that" and its like "because that's what women are like"

[paladingineer]

We make intricate runes out of special crystals and precious metals and then push lightning through them to create an environment in which someone with the right esoteric knowledge performing the right incantations can make their will manifest.

Computers are just a hard magic system. I dont know how I hadnt realized this before but look. Ancient wizards are just 60yo win 7 or linux users with uncomfortable knowledge of the inner workings of c compilers. Phones and laptops are artifacts made to give non magic users(sane people) usage of tech with lower barriers to entry. I can keep listing examples

[paladingineer]

I discovered the secret of what Emmrich’s silly little waistcoat pockets are really for

[paladingineer]

I love how many of us immediately went to the same place

[paladingineer]

they're the same picture

[paladingineer]

Theseus: Listen here you son of a bitch-

Zagreus: Hey! Don’t talk about my mother that way!

Theseus: I meant your father.

Zagreus: Fair enough. Carry on.

[paladingineer]

Only on the darkest arctic nights can you encounter this Primordial Pokémon. It manifests as aurora and ice, gently towering over the pole's frigid denizens... ✨❄️🧊 (There are 12 kinds of Pokémon in this #art! Can you find 'em all? Some are well hidden... Have fun, open your mind, & don't give away answers! 💕) Image on Bluesky~

[paladingineer]

REBLOG THIS TO GIVE THE PERSON YOU REBLOGGED THIS FROM A GOLD STAR BECAUSE THEY’VE BEEN STELLAR TODAY AND THEY DESERVE IT ⭐️

[paladingineer]

Nyctosaurus, a same-sex couple, lingering on top of a floating corpse. Very romantic.

[paladingineer]

You intrigued me with this, so I did a little research and found a couple cases where the spirals are, in fact, used.

The main usage generally suspends the spiral inside a tube, and is called a condenser. There are several variants, some where the coolant goes in the spiral and the main liquid flows through the outer tube, and some where the tube contains the coolant and the main liquid goes through the spiral.

The other usage is something called a coil trap. I can't find much information about what this is for, but based on the name I would assume a slime should probably not try to go through one.

You know those spiral-coiling glass tubes you often see in depictions of chemical apparatus? Those look like they could be so fun to flow through.

Unfortunately, despite having been created through weird alchemical processes myself and having therefore spent some time around alchemical equipment, I've never seen one of those coiled tubes in real life. Plenty of flasks and beakers and retorts, but they're generally connected by straight glass tubes, or tubes with just one or two right-angle bends. I fear the media may have lied to us once again.

[paladingineer]

I like looking at translated dinosaur names cause they’re all just

“Horn on face”

“Tyrant of death devourer of worlds”

“Weird feet”

“Argentina”