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pencilofawesomeness · 1 year ago

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The JJK x TWST crossover that started living rent free in my head >:'D

Random Doodle Edition

Ahem, so, uhh, turns out the characters of Jujutsu Kaisen fit pretty well as Night Raven College students, temperament-wise, and that was all the excuse I needed. Yes the ages get funky but whatever. Happy high school AU except they still get cool powers and Trauma(tm). Just less than JJK canon so I count it as a win.

I also may or may not have written an entire oneshot (here on AO3) for some freshmen Satoru & Suguru bonding, featuring me still bullying Satoru over his funky eyes.

Image Text (and me rambling more) underneath the cut

Gojo Satoru (of the Jupiter Clan)

Ignihyde Housewarden Year: Junior Species: Sky Dragon (Fae) Club: Movie Analysis Club Unique Magic: Six Eyes—pretty much just like canon Six Eyes. They can see far and wide and out of normal sight, and they can see magic in a highly detailed manner. They are also powered by magic that just, never stops ever, so he can decrease or increase the power/range at will to a degree, but technically, cutting off magic from them altogether will blind him. Also he has an inherited magic that he by no means asked for, which is, sad drumroll, Gate of the Underworld. (There are no shrouds in this AU, just me finding ways to forever make Satoru instrumental to the well-being of the world to his own detriment. I have waaaaay more thoughts about the "Jupiter Clan of dragons" and what that actually entails, but they are still jumbled and shifting, so. Maybe later.)

Geto Suguru (of the Draconia Clan)

Diasomnia Housewarden Year: Junior Species: Night Dragon (Fae) Club: Equestrian Club Unique Magic: Magic-eater—can consume and nullify any spell and gain its base magic. With minimum side effects. Mostly. :)

Satoru and Suguru are their usual brand of special-grade menaces, being the only two adolescent dragon fae in the world, buttttt they still inevitably become besties. With Shoko too, of course, who has no fear and will mess with them as they see fit.

Suguru is essentially Malleus in this AU, though in Suguru-fashion, he's way more stubborn when it comes to trying to catch up. (Translating him being new to sorcery to being new to technology was surprisingly low-hanging fruit.) Meanwhile I borrowed the Jupiter name/legacy because it was fitting and made the Gojo Clan into a long-lived dynasty of antisocial dragons who fist-fight and deal with Phantoms and recently accidentally became a tech empire, which is pretty close to the Sorcerer Family vibe a la TWST, if I say so myself.

There's definitely a lot of backstory I have in mind for the two of them. Neither of them beat teen parenthood (they are currently Malleus-aged, so 178 years old, but that's still teenagehood for a dragon/fae) and acquired children through various means, much to the consternation of their elders/court. I might develop/write more solid ideas later, but Suguru has a reverse characterization moment when he finds two starved/beaten human children (the twins) and begins his journey of losing all intrinsic racism via love, and Satoru still somehow gets his shit wrecked by Toji (probably a heist gone violent or something) and then finds out he had abandoned children: human Tsumiki and half-fae Megumi.

Nobara Orientation Comic:

Nobara: Obviously, I'm going to get ~Pomefiore~ because I'm elegant and graceful. (And a badass queen, of course)

Mirror: The nature of your soul is... Savanaclaw

Nobara, getting dragged away from the Mirror by Maki: HEY WAIT A MINUTE! STOP MESSING WITH ME YOU DIRTY SMUGED HUNK OF JUNK AND I'LL SHOW YOU WHAT I THINK OF—

(Nobara gets her reverse-Epel moment, but she adapts quickly. Especially because she still comes to have mad respect for Maki.)

Ieri Shoko

Ignihyde Vice-Housewarden Year: Junior Species: Merfolk (Nurse Shark) Club: Science Club Unique Magic: Reverse—rewinds a target to its previous state within twenty four hours. The longer within the range, the harder/more magic it will take, especially for larger targets, so realistically her range is less. (For example, if someone cracked a piece of glass 24 hours ago, Shoko could restore it, but a day-old wound on a living being would be much harder.)

Making Shoko a mermaid was a joke to myself at first but then I liked it and it spiraled and now Nurse Shark Shoko is unironically one of my favorite things that I have drawn. The joke was right there too, but it's mostly fun to me because nurse sharks are docile and apathetic creatures, for the large part (they are still sharks lol), and I think match her temperament well.

Also when Satoru pestered the previous housewarden enough times to accidentally gain the title for himself, he made Shoko his vice (mostly because he trusted her) to make sure he never had to do the paperwork and the boring parts. She makes him do it anyway. To the dorm, she is less of a vice and more of a "dragon wrangler," which is still extremely appreciated.

Zen'in Maki

Savanaclaw Housewarden Year: Sophomore Species: Human Club: Track & Field Unique Magic: N/A—Maki doesn't actually have magic of her own, but she is unnaturally resistant to most magic. She can, however, use magic/cast spells through a magic-capable familiar.

She befriended a phoenix when she was younger, having survived an encounter with a wild youth. (idk what I want the details to be but I think it would be cool if she had some related burns to it, with the idea that these creatures are rare and volatile and hard for normal humans to handle without high magic resistance.) His name is Torch because I don't think Maki would put that much thought into a name, so long as its not completely stupid sounding. I almost named the phoenix Jogo but I refrained for my own sanity.

Inumaki Toge

Savanaclaw Year: Sophomore Species: Human Club: Board Game Club Unique Magic: Reality Speak—pretty much just how Cursed Speech works but with a world-friendly name. Also it can apply to inanimate objects as well. The power and scope of the command is proportional to the magic required.

Toge gets an overall nicer time in this AU because he doesn't have cursed speech 24/7 and therefore can speak normally. Though the idea of him being able to affect people/bend reality with his words does freak people out. I imagine he had a rough childhood nonetheless, because why not, leading him to be less verbal than he would have been otherwise.

Okkotsu Yuuta

Diasomnia Year: Sophomore Species: Human Club: Board Game Club Unique Magic: Wraith Pact-maker—he can enhance/bolster a ghost's magic/presence through making a link with himself. It has to be mutual, and it can last for any duration of time, although actively using the link does require magic. The ghost in question gains magic and grounding from Yuuta, and Yuuta can use the ghost's magic, including their UM, if applicable. He can have multiple links, but the first and main recipient of this magic is his childhood friend Rika.

Between her longlasting connection with Yuuta and her brutal death, she is a more wraith-like and powerful ghost. Her unique magic was to copy other people's UMs, which Yuuta can use through her in short bursts.

I didn't have space nor solid ideas for unique magics for the Hasaba twins and the Fushiguros, so I didn't do full bios for them. Later, perhaps. All of the girls are sophomores and Megumi is a freshman. Tsumiki and Nanako are sharing their social brain cell and trading stories of stupid things their dragon dads/older brothers/untitled guardians have done, while Megumi is helping budding-gamer Mimiko learn Pokemon strats. I love the idea of them all being friends, maybe after minimal difficulty in the girls' first year, likely on account of the twins being a little Sebek-shaped, in terms of wanting to be The Best Guards for Suguru, etc etc.

I technically have way more ideas for other characters and other dorms, but, I will end this here, for now. I am trying to reign myself in lmao.

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bobbinrobins · 11 months ago

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hi ! First of all I love your bird's nest fic, we really need more borrower x Batman crossover fics 💖💖💖. Second, unrelared to the fic what do you think would happen if during Jason's attack on Titan Tower Tim shrunk down cause he forgot to take the medicine to stay human size or do to an accident. Jason finds him and he fits into his palm, what do you think je would do ?

Thank you very much! <3 I'm really glad people are enjoying this extremely self-indulgent AU (and I am here for the borrower + Batman agenda)!

So this is an interesting scenario that I have a lot of thoughts on. I'm rolling with the idea that Tim is a borrower who, through some kind of tech, is able to appear human-sized, and Jason managed to disable technology due to some kind of comic books magic/sci-fi logic. (This snowballed quite a bit than I intended so I'm putting it under a "read more" lol. Also warning for sappiness because I'm incapable of writing any kind of angst or hurt without a heaping pile of fluff to finish it off.)

Assuming that Jason had no idea about Tim's identity, I think, first and foremost, he'd be extremely befuddled? Logic might dictate that he's using size-changing technology to become small and escape, but that can't be the case, because Jason just disabled all of the technology around them, as evidenced by the lights having gone dark around them. So that could only mean that the opposite is true: Tim was using tech to be bigger than he actually is, which means he's naturally as small as he is now, and Jason just...struggles to wrap his mind around that for a moment.

And then, I think something clicks - maybe Jason found out about borrowers at some point, or maybe his mom told him stories of tiny people who live in the walls and floorboards and survive by "borrowing" scraps from humans. Maybe he used to leave out bits and pieces overnight, taken from his own plate, and wake up to see them gone. And I think it that moment, the full weight of what he's doing really clicks.

Because when Jason set out to the Tower, he knew, to some extent, he was going to be hurting a teenager. But to him, it was also the best way to get through Bruce's thick skull that he's back, that he's angry he wasn't memorialized like the other fallen Titans, that Bruce put another kid in that costume despite the fact that the last one died alone and unavenged. There's a whole host of reasons Jason decides to do what he does.

But I think, seeing Tim now much more defenseless than before, the full weight of his actions catches up with him. He can't bring himself to go forwards with this anymore - he's still angry, possibly even more so now at Bruce for putting someone with such a glaring vulnerability into danger every night, but no matter how much he tries to warp his anger-fueled logic he can't find it in him to hurt him.

So, instead, he decides to abandon ship and get out of there as fast as he can. He's not really ready to have a heart-to-heart with Tim, especially not when up until a few minutes ago he'd been planning on fighting him.

Tim, however, does not like that. Red Hood's appearance raised more questions than it answered (we'll also say this happened before Jason did his dramatic reveal, so Tim still has no idea who he is). He's somewhat encouraged by the fact that he apparently gave up un beating Tim up, so he makes the very unwise snap decision to stow with Hood, somehow (for the sake of things, maybe he brought an easily-accessible bag with him lol), without Hood knowing.

So Red Hood returns to a safehouse to regroup and switch gears. He takes off his helmet and peels off his domino and then hears a very tiny gasp and sees a very tiny figure crawling out of his bag. He's frustrated, at first, but Tim ropes Jason into a conversation, and Jason reluctantly allows this. He's got some questions for Tim, too, after all, and Tim answers honestly. When he hears about how Batman had been acting after Tim's death, and how Tim had really never intended to replace him, Jason finds himself beginning to understand, just a little bit more. He's still upset and angry, about a lot of things, but he's finding it harder and harder to be angry at Tim.

Tim encourages Jason to go home, but Jason staunchly refuses. He's not ready for that yet. Tim points out that he at least needs to take Tim back to the Manor for the night because that's where he lives and he's kind of stranded in Jason's safehouse now. Jason counters by letting Tim use one of his burners to call the Manor and get someone to pick him up, which would give Jason ample time to get out of there. Tim reluctantly agrees.

So Jason makes to leave, after having Tim call Alfred, but he can't find it in himself to really leave, so he lurks as discreetly as he can across the street, just so he can confirm that Tim gets picked up safely. And he does - Alfred pulls up, Jason feels an immense wave of Emotions seeing him, but stubbornly remains in hiding until Alfred pulls away.

So that should be the end of things, except it's not. Tim goes home and blabs to the entire Batfamily that Jason is alive and the Red Hood and that he'd actually been pretty nice to Tim, all things considered. And Bruce, Alfred, Babs, and Dick, encouraged by Tim, decide that they absolutely will not rest until they reconcile with Jason.

Jason should've known that Tim finding out his identity would have led to being stalked relentlessly by several vigilantes and a butler, but it doesn't make it any less annoying. (But he finds that he's minding it less and less when Nightwing swoops in to incapacitate the goon who had been about to get a lucky shot on him, when a plate of homemade cookies is left at the doorstep of one of his favorite safehouses, when Oracle manages to weasel her way onto his private comm line to tell him a dumb joke, when he catches a glimpse of a hulking shadow watching him as he's patching himself up after a long night, when Robin - now back at human-size - drops by to crash in one of his safehouses after a grueling patrol. And little by little, he makes his way home.)

#ask #jason todd #tim drake #there needs to be a borrower batfamily tag...#borrower batfam #i will be using this one for now #thank you for the ask!! :)

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gear-project · 1 year ago

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when do you think Asuka met Happy Chaos? at what point in asuka's life would he have met hc. just really confused on the timeline. was it college or what

Since you ask, I'll do what I can to make a summary:

Prior to 2014, Asuka had been a survivor of the disaster of 1999 that was the Dawn of Revival, alongside Frederick Bulsara and Aria Hale... the three of them were students in University (prior to the fall of Civilization as we knew it), though Asuka's teacher was the one everyone called "The Original" (a.k.a. The Original Sage).

While we DO know Asuka R. Kreutz after some time of his name being revealed, we do NOT know his teacher's real name, so for now we can only refer to him as "The Original" (sometimes known as "The Original Man" in comparison to "That Man" which was Asuka's historical nickname).

Scientific research prior to 2014 delved heavily in to the study of Magic and understanding it, since it was an as-yet untapped energy resource that the world was clamoring to understand.

At the time, the Backyard was mostly considered a heavily contested "Theory": only Asuka's teacher knew the truth since he was the one who first discovered it.

Most who followed The Original would later become his Disciples and members of the massive organization later known as the Sanctus Populi. One of those members was also Asuka's Scientific Rival who later went by the name Chronus (we do not know his past connections with Asuka in full detail).

It was after the Universal Will waged war with humans and undid most technology in society (in 1999) that "The Original" decided to entrust two Mass-Information Seeds to his student, Asuka: The Scales of Juno and the Flame of Corruption.

It is speculated that at this time, the Original Sage was in actual conflict with the Universal Will that he had created and was in battle with it within the Backyard itself.

Meanwhile, Asuka began researching the true nature of the Seeds that his teacher gave him, and by 2014, he created the first set of encoded Gear Cells (with Aria's and Frederick's help of course), and set about to establish guidelines for their use as a new medical technology (their main purpose to serve as a means to protect the Seeds from fulfilling their original functions of generating the World's Absolution: an overlap of the natural world and the Backyard).

As of 2016, however, rogue elements of the United States Military (C.I.A. remnants) sought to take Asuka's Gear Cell Research by force, and Asuka was given no choice but to use Frederick as a scapegoat. He was also trying to protect Aria having forced her in to cryostasis at this time as well.

After the tragic events of 2016, all progress on Gear Cell research was classified, frozen, and halted, and supposedly many researchers involved also went missing (Asuka and Frederick not being the only ones involved).

Much time would pass up to the year 2040, and the U.S. Military would re-open the files on Gear Cell Research with the intent to weaponize the technology.

It is not clear if "The Original" was aware of Asuka's activities at this time, but it is implied that he would be tracking Asuka's movements sometime later.

A fully functional Gear would not exist until the year 2060, and Asuka's attempts to protect Aria eventually fed in to the development of Command Type Gear 01: Justice which came in to existence around the year 2073.

It is in the year 2074 that the Universal Will planted a virus inside Justice' body and forced Asuka to fire the Gamma Ray on Japanese soil in order to eliminate several Anti-Matter Gear Mutations that would have destabilized the world's physical information (i.e. generate Information Flares).

As of this time, we are, again, unclear on how involved "The Original" was in observing the events of Japan's destruction... however it appears as though he was responsible for the destruction and subjugation of Baiken's village prior to these events.

At the time, it seems as though "The Original" had been borrowing several of Asuka's aliases, either through work history, or some other means, and so many activities (and atrocities) he performed during the Crusades can be attributed to Happy Chaos by that time.

In other words, Asuka's Teacher had been transformed by the Universal Will and had been swallowed by it around the same time that the Crusades had started.

However, there is more to this: Humanity had witnessed the tragedy of Japan's destruction firsthand, as well as the revolt of the Gears and this caused a mass-panic around the world that influenced the Backyard itself.

The Backyard could not handle this anomalous mental feedback, and so it sealed most of the errors it obtained within I-No, cutting off part of itself from the world (this in turn sent Axl Low in to the Future as well).

It is speculated that Happy Chaos is partly responsible for what happened to create I-No, but we do not know the full extent of his involvement with her existence... only that he blames himself and sought atonement for what he did to her (though he never openly states this).

Asuka would not be aware of his teacher's activities for quite some time after this, though he would eventually meet I-No in the year 2183 of the first Alternate Timeline.

At that time, Asuka was imprisoned by the Gears, though Justice had been killed in the year 2180 of that timeline (mirroring events that would later occur in the corrected timeline).

I-No corrected the Timeline in the year 2173, changing major events (though again, it is unclear if anything involving Happy Chaos was changed).

Time passed, and Asuka learned of Blackard Company and its Command Gear Project named Solaria.

As of the year 2180, Asuka now had I-No and Raven serving under him, and he had given Jack-O'Valentine a physical body (though she hid her face due to her immature development still in early stages).

Jack-O'Valentine was of course the "backup half" of Justice that Asuka managed to recover from her Memory Core prior to her death and retrieval by the Conclave (the Conclave were serving under Ariels/The Universal Will although they were unaware of this at that time).

It is presumed that Happy Chaos was "sealed" inside Ariels' body at this time, but he was still able to "leave" at various intervals to do as he wished (though we do not know what all he was involved with at this time). It is worth noting that Happy Chaos had been pursuing Nagoriyuki as early as the year 2127, though we do not know how involved Nagoriyuki was with the Crusades events himself.

Happy Chaos later suggested that he had been inside Ariels' prison for 100 years, so most likely he had been "sealed" (at least to her knowledge) as early as 2074 when the Crusades began.

In the year 2192, Axl Low's Time Slipping had reached a "plateau" and he was unable to Time Travel in that year. This was also the year Sol Badguy's Dragon Install fully encroached, turning Sol in to an Anti-Matter Gear (leading to Frederick's quiet demise).

Axl Low made "contact" with a fragment of "The Original Sage's" consciousness (which Happy Chaos retained memories of) and obtained a message to be passed on to Asuka regarding the Conclave.

After obtaining the message from "The Original", Axl Low was caught in a trap within Bedman's Nightmare Theater, forcing I-No to rescue him.

At this time, I-No had created an "Integrated Point" within she had the power to manipulate various stages of the Timeline, though her mission at this time was to monitor the various Valentine creations that the Universal Will was generating based on Asuka's designs.

I-No had (on several occasions) successfully "assassinated" Ramlethal Valentine in various future Timelines beyond the Integrated Point (under Asuka's orders).

However rescuing Axl Low after he "fell in to her net" was a sign that events were beginning to change. I-No confirmed this by having one last fight with the current Timeline's Ramlethal, only to learn that Ramlethal had obtained a sense of self-preservation, which confirmed I-No's suspicions that the Timeline had changed.

Raven, meanwhile was working alongside Asuka to keep an eye on Sol Badguy, though neither of them were fully aware that Happy Chaos was observing them all.

Jack-O' felt misgivings regarding her role to fuse with Justice, due to her developing sense of identity, and so she escaped I-No's custody temporarily.

By this time, Sol had become more aware of Asuka's movements (as was Anji Mito, who still considered himself a friend of Asuka's at this time).

Raven requested Sol's assistance in retrieving Jack-O', but prior to their first meeting, Jack-O' revealed the truth as she saw it to I-No, greatly distressing her.

Jack-O' felt it necessary to prepare I-No, as a contingency plan in case the merge with Justice was a failure, though Raven corrected her, as he felt that I-No didn't deserve to be crudely treated.

I-No partially took her frustrations out on Sol and Axl, but at this time she became keenly aware of where Happy Chaos was being kept, though she kept this knowledge to herself (even despite Raven's attempt at trying to maintain friendship with her).

Asuka, meanwhile, had been tracking the Conclave's movements with the Cradle along with Sol, but ended up becoming Bedman's prisoner... he would be unable to move until Chronus later freed him with the understanding that he would finally reveal the truth to Sol.

Happy Chaos was... as of this time, "physically imprisoned" but still somehow able to observe Raven's and Jack-O's conversations, and he became "inspired" to craft a new identity for himself.

Happy Chaos would not reveal himself to Asuka until the events of the White House, and by that time his only purpose was to serve I-No's goals as well as his own. By that time, he had become Asuka's enemy.

It is speculated that after fulfilling his purpose for I-No, Happy Chaos hid himself inside her Paradox World temporarily so as to go in hiding from authorities.

He did have a final discussion with I-No prior to her "demise", though he seemed to have his eyes set on Nagoriyuki and what remained of Bedman, though even that is uncertain.

It's worth noting, however, that the Original Sage was the "author" of the Tome of Origin, that Asuka swore to protect. And while Happy Chaos "got his use" out of the tome, it's unclear if he will ever decide to use it again.

It seems that Asuka did not have access to the Tome until after the Crusades, as he had asked Raven to retrieve it at one point, as it had been in an undisclosed location prior to Strive's events.

Asuka has since moved his person to a secure base on the Moon, though he created a copy of himself for research purposes as a figurative "extra set of hands".

Asuka still seems bound and determined to undo the past tragic history his teacher created, though we do not know how far he'll manage.

#Asuka R. Kreutz #The Original Sage #The Original Man #Happy Chaos #Mr. Black Halo #GG Expanded Timeline #I=No #Raven #That Man

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smolcinnamonchipmunk · 3 months ago

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borrower Au

Your newest post and the picture of borrower syn sleeping on Malleus gave me an idea. Since apparently nobody but Grimm, Ace, Deuce and prof. Crewel has seen them in their natural size. So after they Bond with Malleus so much that their O.K with being their vurnerable true self in his presence that they even sleep on him. What if during one such event, syn again fell asleep on him(eighter the same spot or on his head near the horns). Syn reminded mal before of a housewarden meeting that will be held later that day. Malleus didn't want to wake them up, they needed the rest (and totaly not because he enjoys the closness and trust this shows), so he decided to go to the meeting with them(he'll use magic to endure they stay asleep). And that how every housewarden saw syn in his natural state. They didn't motive him immidietly, but once they did a lot couldn't stop themselfs from staring. They all already knew syn was a borrower, but none of them saw them in their natural state before. Some had their instincts acting up or were (m̶e̶s̶m̶e̶r̶i̶s̶e̶d̶) intrigued by such a tiny being.

After that they would probably be more interested in syn

Okay, so I wanted to actually write something for this and I've restarted writing at least twice. Once because I thought that the Housewardens wore their ceremonial robes for meetings (for some fucking reason) so I was going to have Syn asleep in his hood, but the Housewardens just use their school uniform. The next was because I was trying to figure out whether Lilia or Silver do a sort of double-tap on reminding Malleus about the meeting once Syn is passed out, but I couldn't make a decision before I remembered that Crowley heads the Housewarden meetings, which adds another factor to have into consideration. However, right now I don't really feel like starting over again, so instead we're just going to word vomit and see what happens

I'm going to start with prefacing this whole scenario by bringing everyone up to speed on Malleus's dorm uniform vignette. In this vignette, it starts with a Housewarden meeting that Malleus misses because Lilia couldn't find him and the other Housewardens have given up trying to figure out how to get the Fae to attend given his ineptitude with technology along with Lilia losing physical invitations/reminders to attend. Instead, Malleus spent a total of at least three hours in various locations because he didn't know where the meeting was going to be held. He even tried asking a random student who ran away in fear

It's 'shown' (I know that Twisted Wonderland doesn't necessarily 'show' anything, but shut up) that Malleus has broken multiple phones because they're 'fragile' and easily destroyed unintentionally, both with and without magic, and he struggles to even figure out how to look at notifications. He ends up accidentally crushing Lilia's phone in his hand after seeing a picture of the other Housewardens right before a post-Housewarden meeting party that he wasn't invited to because he wasn't there. After some words between Lilia and Malleus because of the newly broken phone, Malleus blames fearful humans while Lilia says he hasn't put forth enough of his own effort to try and attend (which, I mean, waiting three hours at different locations does feel like trying, but he didn't even try the Mirror Chamber)

Malleus admits to himself that he internally thinks it's impossible for fae and humans to understand each other and that he wasn't trying to earnestly get to know the other Housewardens or attend. In an attempt to put forth more of an effort he places a teleportation spell on the Mirror Chamber to link to Diasomnia, thinking that if he doesn't know the location or time of the meeting he'll be gracious in making the meeting spot his own abode and ensure he's available at all times for the meeting. Unfortunately, despite the convenience, the fact that he came to his own solution without consulting anyone else doesn't sit right with the other Housewardens who compare it to summoning objects. Malleus doesn't understand why the others are upset with a lack of autonomy (something we obviously see manifest in the extreme with Book 7) and is berated by Crowley with the end of the vignette being him recounting the incident to Lilia and saying that he'll continue to try and put effort into understanding humans

(Christ, why do I do this to myself?)

Alright, we've got the prompt, we've got the backstory/setup and pertinent information, now to actually GET to answering haha From the top, Syn wouldn't be going around advertising that they were a Borrower despite rumors, so Malleus would find out when one of the doses wear off and leave them at their natural size outside of Ramshackle while talking with him. Some people might go 'Wouldn't he connect the dots between the rumors and the new student?', but this motherfucker is so dense that it takes multiple Housewardens blatantly being furious with him for him to even ASK 'Are you angry with me?'. There'd be surprise and definitely some concern, especially when Syn is freaking out, but they're not freaking out about HIM exactly, they just really fucking hate being small and are still getting used to their normal again. There'd also be a lot of trial and error between the two on how to exactly go about picking Syn up considering Malleus would probably try to just pluck them off the ground in his straightforward mindset and they'd have to remind him very quickly that THEY'RE VERY FRAGILE. Grim gets to be woken up by an ominous figure by the bed telling him to get his prefect off the sidewalk (with an impromptu lesson on How to Hold a Syn for Dummies)

Anyways, the whole bit that I was going to see about writing was Syn coming to remind Malleus of the Housewarden meeting since they were stopping by Diasomnia for Silver to try and convince Sebek to let them borrow notes since the newest attempt to make height enhancement had the side effect of lethargy (Crewel would try to make a new batch by morning to try and not affect their schoolwork) and they spent the day more exhausted than usual. Malleus would invite them into his room to wait for Silver and rest on his couch while he maintains his chisel tools to return the favor of them letting him know about the Housewarden meeting. Yada, yada, yada, bada bing, bada boom, the height enhancement wears off, Syn shrinks to their natural size and Malleus offers a hand to climb into so they can perch on his shoulder. They'd unintentionally drift off and when they jolt back awake (because I've been having some of THE worst falling sensations while falling asleep lately, I almost flung two of my cats off me) and apologize, Malleus would essentially say it's fine and start humming with the weakest magic he could muster to help them sleep

Silver/Lilia would show up to either look for Syn with the asked for notes which would unintentionally remind Malleus of the meeting or to remind him of the meeting personally in that respective order. If either made a comment, Malleus would assure them that he'd return them to Ramshackle and Grim safe and sound

The Housewarden meeting would probably already be in session by the time Malleus arrived so there'd likely be a couple snarky comments about him finally showing up to a Housewarden meeting and being greeted by Crowley before anyone notices Syn asleep on his shoulder. They might feel something is off and even see the small thing on him, but Leona would be the first to actually realise that the thing was actually Syn as Crowley continues the meeting. Which would only be interrupted again when Leona asks "Hey, lizard. Is that the rodent on your shoulder?" and draw everyone's attention to them (thankfully they're passed out so they can't be overwhelmed and embarrassed)

Crowley and Riddle would probably struggle to keep everyone on track with whatever the meeting was about.

#cinnanswers #syn #g/t #99 problems #borrower au

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mitigatedchaos · 1 year ago

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Maybe I'm stupid, but I don't really know what you mean by reproductive alignment

On Earth, there are all kinds of animals, that have all sorts of mentalities or behaviors.

There's a lot of argument over whether evolution influences the behavior of humans within our species, but it clearly influences behavior between species. Praying Mantis would be one example, an insect where (infamously) the female eats the male after sex.

A species is always losing members to entropy, and having to replace them with new members. So a species isn't a static thing; rather, when a species remains in some particular way for a long time, this is the result of a balance of forces or influences that keep them from evolving out of that particular range.

When a man and a woman have to come together, have kids, and raise those kids to adulthood, this puts a limit on just how far humanity can drift away from their baseline on some axes, because each generation is a "reset."

For example, and this is entirely hypothetical, if there were a gene that contributed to a high propensity to have a mental illness that involves hating children, even if it arose through a natural mutation, it would tend to be wiped out pretty quickly each generation, because the people with that gene would generally try to avoid having or interacting with children as much as possible.

In general, the majority of humans need to be heterosexual, they need to want sex, they need to like and value children so they can put in the effort to raise them, and so on. There are likely some pretty profound influences beyond this which are rooted in it, like our nature as a social species.

Suppose we have artificial wombs and other sophisticated genetic manipulation technology, so it becomes possible for two gay men to have a child created for them based on their genetics. If there's one or more genes for homosexuality (or high propensity for it), then it's possible to imagine a gay male separatist polity that's able to replenish their own population, where the whole population have been selected heavily for being gay.

This is a relatively close divergence. I wouldn't say I agree entirely with the character Clint Manstock's view that "Communism is not even gay," but it's easy to imagine greater divergences. A society could try to do away with sexual desire almost entirely, for example.

AI alignment is about the tricky problem of ensuring an AI holds/conforms to some particular moral values, and retaining those moral values across multiple rounds of 'upgrades'. Reproductive alignment thus borrows from this idea and proposes that there could be an intergenerational divergence of values once environmental conditions move outside the previous human range.

We might call reproductive alignment a "bioconservative" or "cishumanist" concept.

#anons #asks #politics #gendpol #mitigated future #reproductive alignment

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19thperson · 1 year ago

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19th Steam Next Fest Impressions - Day 5

Day 0/Day 1/Day 2/Day 3/Day 4

Hollowbody

youtube

Silent Hill 2 but sci-fi. Not to beconfused with the other Silent Hill 2 but sci-fi.

It's a flying car future and your flying car crashes you into a long abandoned town covered with a Mystery Grey Substance and a lot of dead people, some of them not all the way dead.

The game then tells you to go into a decrepit apartment complex. Just like Silent Hill 2.

The game has both tank controls and contextual direction control. I have unfortunately betrayed the church of tank controls. It felt more intuitive, and the game didn't consistently use hyperspecific camera angles enough to bother.

Has a legitimately creepy atmosphere, and the combat controls run the line between intentionally awkward without being infuriating. Which makes one last decision baffling.

If there's enemies nearby, you can't enter doors or use key items. So it feels like the game's structure is encouraging combat that its mechanics are discouraging.

Hoping that this is either a specific quirk to that one encounter/demo, or I was just somehow missing the prompt.

Arranger

youtube

Puzzle adventure game. The protagonist, Jemma, instead of moving normally, moves the entire row/column of tiles, and whatever else is on it, with her. She can also wrap around the edges of a path. Easier to explain in images than words...

the puzzles that come from this are pretty good so far. Arrange a sword to push into a monster's face, or placing weights on buttons and then trying to find a way to move that doesn't dislodge the button weight you just placed. Trying to maneuver around the few objects that can't be moved by you. And the trailer suggests they have a lot more to add to these building blocks.

I really like the presentation, especially the trick of having comic panels floating in the background to show details/movement that can't be shown with the sprite art.

I Was Lost

youtube

It's almost unfair that I played this right after the incredibly well done Arranger.

A simple maze game where you can re-arrange certain parts of the maze, with the gimmick being that the levels form poetry.

Alone as a puzzle it's... fine. Had a couple head scratchers.

Problem is that the poem it forms is specific to the demo. Whose meaning is "this is just a demonstration of something." So the poetry is the means for this game to generate pathos and they've already undercut it.

Hopefully the final game will have something to actually say, and do something interesting with the game mechanic. Because the demo doesn't.

Anyways, wishlist Arranger. And play Void Stranger.

Nekokami - The Human Restoration Project

A Dorfromantik-like, where you play as far future space cats, using their advanced technology and the borrowed power of nature spirits to try and resurrect their long extinct servants: Humanity.

Dorfromantik was fun but also kinda lost its novelty after a while. And a lot of successors look like they fall in the same pitfall. This game does some stuff to offset that.

The plot is mostly fluff and has some awkward "this was definitely translated" wording, but it's still nice to feel like something is progressing. Each level also has different win conditions, like having multiple fully leveled up flower fields.

I also like the kami-storm system. Midway through a level, a powerful kami will appear and change the rules somehow. The family kami will drop her kittens off for you to babysit and the little fuckers will laze around making certain edges unusable. the rain kami causes water tiles to appear more often as well as setting up little "rain bombs" that'll fill areas with water unless defused by placing a tile over. Stuff like that.

Lastly, it introduces two conflicting scoring systems: population and kami approval. Anything that ups the human population will displace nature and leave less room for kami, and you need to balance those at the same time.

Its interesting. Not mind-blowing but interesting.

#19th's steam next fest impressions #Youtube

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nerbs-the-word · 1 year ago

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Thinking about tiny culture

I feel like a lot of people don't think about the cultural aspect of their tiny species, assuming they have something of a society. So here we go into another "Nerb overthinks the worldbuilding of a niche internet subgenre" post. The backbone of human culture for most of our history has been religion. Even very small groups of hunter gatherers in prehistory have been seen to worship some kind of god. Even if this isn't worship in the way we see (With pantheons of gods like in Greek or Egyptian myth, or monotheistic religions such as Christianity), they could absolutely extract divine meaning from the world around them. Especially in the typical "borrower-styled" world, where the tiny species is culturally and technologically separated from the dominant species, there is so much they still don't understand. One of the main reasons humanity developed religion was to explain things we don't understand, and if a society lives within human society without any of its knowledge, there is a lot to understand. Not just forces of nature (Celestial bodies, weather, animal behavior, disease), but human innovations or things humanity has 'tamed'; electricity, magnetism, chemistry; even things like a faucet or microwave would be like alien technology to a society operating on pre-industrial ideas of the world; so religion helps cope with that. But of course, there is one force that prevails the typical tiny culture, regardless of writer or world; the host. Typically humans, they are the species they rely on for basic survival in a 'borrower' situation. A human operating a light switch could be seen as full-blown magic to somebody with no concept of electricity and the inner workings of a light bulb. So in tiny societies, humans may be seen as gods or otherwise celestial beings; the bringers of food and of warmth. If this changes the dynamic of the typical tiny rule of 'don't be seen' is up to the writer, but I think the two ideas can very easily be woven together into a sort of silent, unseen reverence. But even without considering that, they very well could just have religions similar to our own historical analogues. Gods they pray to attempt to find comfort in troubling times, to appeal to for relief from disaster, to thank for the good times, and to appeal to in times of loss. I dunno, I may go more into this kind of stuff because I like hypothetical worldbuilding and all this jazz, so take this treat and I will abscond for a while longer to ponder in the Nerb Cave

#g/t #giant/tiny #nerb rambles

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xtruss · 11 months ago

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A Scientist Says Humans Will Reach The Singularity Within 21 Years! The Countdown Is On.

— By Darren Orf | August 08, 2024

Photo By John Lund, Getty Images

Futurists have long debated the arrival of the singularity, when human and artificial intelligence will merge, a concept borrowed from the world of quantum physics.

American computer scientist and futurist Ray Kurzweil has long argued that the singularity would likely occur around the middle of the 21st century, and with the rise of AI, his predictions are gaining more credence.

In his new book, The Singularity is Nearer, Kurzweil doubles down on those predictions and details how humanity’s intelligence will increase a millionfold via nanobots (among other things).

You don’t exactly become a world-renowned futurist by making safe predictions. And while some of these past predictions haven’t exactly come to pass (Back to the Future Part II, specifically), these ideas help expand our thoughts on what exactly the future might look like.

And no one makes futuristic predictions quite like Ray Kurzweil.

An American computer scientist-turned-futurist, Kurzweil has long believed that humanity is headed toward what’s known as “the singularity,” when man and machine merge. In 1999, Kurzweil theorized that artificial general intelligence would be achieved once humanity could achieve a technology capable of a trillion calculations per second, which he pegged to occur 2029. Experts at the time scoffed at the idea, figuring it’d be at least a century or more, but with Kurzweil’s timeline only a few years off—and talk of AGI spreading—that decades-old prediction is beginning to loom large.

Now in his new book published last month, The Singularity is Nearer (a play on his 2005 book of the same name minus an “er”), Kurzweil doubles down on these ideas in the modern era of artificial intelligence. Not only is he "sticking with [his] five years” prediction, as he recently said in a TED Talk, Kurzweil also believes that humans will achieve a millionfold intelligence by 2045, aided by brain interfaces formed with nanobots non-invasively inserted into our capillaries.

“We’re going to be a combination of our natural intelligence and our cybernetic intelligence,” Kurzweil said in an interview with The Guardian, “and it’s all going to be rolled into one. We are going to expand intelligence a millionfold by 2045, and it is going to deepen our awareness and consciousness.”

While this idea subscribes to a merger more akin to physical intervention to bridge the gap between man and machine, other philosophers and AI experts agree that some form of merger is likely inevitable, and in some ways, is already beginning. In July, Oxford’s Marcus du Sautoy and Nick Bostrom both expounded on the hopeful and harrowing possibilities of our AI future, and for both of them, a kind of synthesis appeared inevitable.

“I think that we are headed toward a hybrid future,” Sautoy told Popular Mechanics. “We still believe that we are the only beings with a high level of consciousness. This is part of the whole Copernican journey that we are not unique. We’re not at the center.”

Of course, this “Brave New World” of a hybrid AI-human existence brings with it a plethora of issues both political and personal. What will humans do for jobs? Could we possibly live forever? Would that change the very idea of what it means to be human?

Kurzweil, like many other futurists, are relatively optimistic on this front. In that same interview with The Guardian, Kurzweil highlights the idea of a Universal Basic Income as a necessity rather than a fringe idea currently supported in more progressive circles, and AI will bring unprecedented advancements in medicine, meaning the very idea of immortality isn’t out of the realm of possibility.

“In the early 2030s we can expect to reach longevity escape velocity where every year of life we lose through aging we get back from scientific progress,” Kurzweil told The Guardian. “And as we move past that, we’ll actually get back more years. It isn’t a solid guarantee of living forever—there are still accidents—but your probability of dying won’t increase year to year.”

Just like “Back to the Future Part II” predicted flying cars, so too could these technology-fueled utopias crumble to dust as these dates inch closer and closer. But 25 years ago, Kurzweil predicted we’d be rapidly approaching a major moment in humanity’s technological history at the tail end of this decade.

Currently, no evidence suggests the contrary.

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amandi-2024mi5016 · 1 year ago

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Component 1: Possible Concepts

I decided to note down possible topics for component 1 as well as what subtopics and points I could explore through this main concept.

Worldbuilding in Avatar the Last Airbender

Discuss the different types of worldbuilding

How to do effective worldbuilding and what to consider (eg: your audience, your overall message, cultural contexts, historical contexts, political contexts)

How to introduce an audience to a fictional world.

Speculative fiction in worldbuilding

what makes a world intriguing and interesting to an audience?

And in contrast, what worldbuilding mistakes kill the audiences' interest in a world?

What does ATLA do right and what does it do wrong?

Compare and contrast to Legend of Korra

some examples I can use: South Scrimshaw, Over the Garden Wall, Spirited Away

More examples: Miyazaki's games

discuss the Theatre of Cruelty - In my opinion had some great principles on how to create effective horror and audience interest through worldbuilding.

Existential Fear and Philosophy in Serial Experiments Lain

Tech and reality are interchangeable

Theme of connection

so far ahead of its time in terms of how it discusses technology

Dealt with the mass hysteria regarding the internet when it came out.

Identity

Idealism

memory and reality - if a tree falls in a forest and there's no one there to perceive it, did it fall at all?

Epistemology

Alan Turing - posited that if an AI/robot can convince us that its human then it is one.

Julien Offray de la Mettrie - compared humans to machines and said that they are really no different. He believed that every part of the human body was replaceable.

Socrates and Plato on essential properties - what are the necessary and sufficient properties of a subject? Plato and Socrates believed everything had essential properties, and that these properties were innate.

Existentialism - Your life has some sort of essence. Something that makes you you. Something that gives human life presupposed meaning.

Jean Paul Satre - believed that life being meaningless was actually freeing and positive. If life was meaningless, then that meant that we were all free to assign whatever purpose we wanted to ourselves. It made Gods of us.

Lain spends a majority of the narrative observing humanity and trying to garner some sort of innate purpose to her own life. In the end she finds none, so she gives her existence its own purpose.

despite its dark portrayal of humanity, Serial Experiments Lain is a hopeful story. Lain ends her arc finding value in humanity and dedicating her life to us.

Visual language, lighting, sound design, and mixing of the show enforces its themes.

Cyberpunk - technology is not meant o be feared in this genre, but is instead depicted as the natural progression of humanity (transhumanism). Depicts technology as a natural necessity, the same way an organ is necessary for the body.

Serial Experiments Lain is not quite cyberpunk but its borrows its themes from it.

Modernism vs Postmodernism - Modernism strives to build towards truth and order, while postmodernism believes that any attempt towards order is doomed to fail. Serial Experiments Lain leans more towards postmodernism.

Sigmund Freud and Carl Jung - psychologists

Compare and contrast - Ghost in the Shell, Neon Genesis Evangelion, Akira[?]

historical context - technological boom

Who's Afraid of Black Women?/ Black Girlhood, Interrupted

Diversity in animation and media

History of diversity in media

Why is there widespread hatred for WOC in main character roles?

Why is there uproar when a character is reimagined as black?

When WOC are depicted, its not in light-hearted stories or coming of age narratives. Often, this is because they aren't seen as relatable.

Use Turning Red as an example - a story that centers the experiences of WOC, and as a result garnered a lot of hate due to to how 'unrelatable' it was to anyone else. In contrast publications described Inside Out 2 as a 'universally understood' film that connects with everyone. Both are coming of age stories about preteen girls, so why does one supposedly speak to a universal human experience while the other doesn't?

Use online reviews and publications' news sites about the castings as research

Hunger Games as an example (Can i include live action examples?) - great example of how white characters need no description of their race while characters of colour do. This technique makes whiteness the standard. It becomes the neutral and the default.

NW by Zadie Smith as research

colorism with WOC - characters who are men of colour are allowed to be darkskin while characters who are WOC are not. Ties into how gender roles and white supremacy interact, and how that manifests in media. What does it mean to be a woman? To be feminine?

girlhood, interrupted: the erasure of black girl's childhood - a study for research. Deals with the adultification of young black girls. Can discuss how this manifests in animated media, especially when it comes to children's television.

Diversity as a tool for profit - how studios will reimagine characters as POC to cater to a demographic with little to no representation whilst also shielding themselves from any deserved criticism.

issue with this topic - there are more examples in live action than in animation for this topic

The history of the Disney Channel Theme

Brand mnemonics

history of Disney Channel

Channel bumpers/program breaks – what creates a channel identity?

Disney channel theme song

In extension can talk about the legacy of an artist

What gets to be called ‘art’? Who gets to be called an 'artist'?

Wes Anderson and Modern Orientalism/Modern Orientalism in Animation

Mainly discusses Isle of Dogs

Orientalism - coined by Edward Said. Orientalism refers to the essentialising ways in which the west interprets and depicts the East, or the 'Orient'.

mysticism

Began with colonisation. depicts the East as culturally backwards and stunted in their development. Eastern men were often emasculated while Eatern women are over-sexualised and were often represented as the antithesis to the delicate, repressed, and pure white woman.

Colonial Imagination - ties in with the concept of the 'savage native'; that it was the duty of western nations to dominate these territories in order 'civilise' the people living there.

Mischaracterises the east as something either to be feared or controlled. The 'Orient' exists in opposition and juxtaposition to the rational and superior West.

Examples of how orientalism manifests in the modern day can be seen whenever the US goes to war. (Vietnam, Afghanistan, Japan)

Anderson seems to view the East as this exotic foreign backdrop to his stories.

He depicts these places with an air of mystery, starkly contrasting with his depictions of the West.

Isle of Dogs is set in Japan but none of the Japanese characters are understandable. On the other hand, all the dogs speak in english. There's no subtitles the entire movie and only some bits of dialogue are translated for the audience.

forces viewers to identify with and relate to the dogs and the one white student over any of the Japanese characters.

Wes Anderson seems to often use the culture and people of the east a decorative background for his white cast to navigate.

mystifies the East

creates this uncomfortably familiar relationship between the western viewer and the racialised Eastern subject.

While Anderson is far from racist, that doesn't absolve his films from having (albeit unintentional) orientalist implications.

The majority of the cast for Isle of Dogs is American and English speaking.

the dogs and american characters feel more fully realised and human than the rest of the Japanese cast.

The 'Japanese' elements in the film are superficial and monolithic. Its Japan, but through the lens of a foreigner.

Anderson seems to have a discomfort with writing anything other than white characters living in the West. This isn't a fault, but when he does try to venture outside his comfort zone, he seems to reduce his environments and characters to backdrops and character devices.

example: Snake Charmer by Jean-Léon Gérôme, c. 1879, Oil on canvas

modern examples: Raya and the Last Dragon, Aladdin.

Orientalism and japan

National stereotyping often leads to the countries internalising these stereotypes as parts of their national identity.

example of national stereotyping: Hetalia, Mobile Fighter G Gundam (apparently)

can talk briefly about The Darjeeling Limited

Research: How Wes Anderson Mishandles Race by Jonah Weiner

Male Fantasies, Male Fantasies: An Exploration of the Fembot Trope in Animation

The evolution of the trope

The fembot is the patriarcal ideal - it is the ultimate male fantasy and a representation of the 'perfect woman'

What this might suggest about the stadards of femininity - the fembot is often white, thin, blonde. On occasion, she will be East Asian and ostensibly naturally subservient - yet a seductress all the same. This speaks to the fetishisation of east asian women.

Hyper-sexism - fembots are literal objects, so they face a heightened verison of sexism. Dehumanised.

example: Chobits - appeals to a male viewer base, the main conflict of the story for the human women is seeking the affection of men, the Persocoms live to serve their masters, while everyone who has a Persocom loves her to some degree its difficult to ignore the obvious power dynamics at play, the entire series revolves around the happiness of the male characters.

example: Good Hunting in Love, Death, and Robots subverts this trope and turns it into a narrative of women (especially East Asian women) taking back their power from white men. The present day narratives of fembots represents freedom.

The need to essentialise women's bodies and labour

What it means to be an othered woman?

Race and enslavement - stories of robots rebelling against their enslavement to humanity is common but these stories are never given to black characters due to how much more realistic it is. instead, white characters often appear in these roles because its more 'relatable' and easier to digest.

essay for research: The Slave Rebellion Genre by Lakitha Tolbert

essay for research: Do Black Lives Matter to Westworld? On TV Fantasies of Racial Violence by Hope Wabuke

fembots as corporate products

Moral Orel

Main theme: Religion/Christianity

Hypocrisy of christianity

institutionalised religion

sexuality and christianity

morality

generational trauma - how Bloberta and Clay recreate the disfunction of their childhood in their own family.

familial abuse

Addiction

Love

How Morel Orel - and Adult Swim - handles sexual assault.

The episode that got the show cancelled - Adult swim felt comfortable when sexual assault was played as a joke but when the show focused how those experiences affected the female characters the show got cancelled.

How do you portray dark, explicit topics?

The use of humour/satire in the show - can tie in spass and Epic Theatre and how this lends well to discussing the show's themes, as well as where it falls short.

The way humour is used to create emotional weight in the more heavy episodes - can tie in the techniques Shakespeare employs in his writings, especially his tragedies.

Clay Puppington

Before Orel - Orel's characterisation

Discuss the ways in which the show reconciles with christianity. It ends with Orel still being Christian. exemplified in Grounded: the episode ends with Orel realising that he is the church, it is Orel recognising that he is the one that has been comforting himself. That the sense of fulfilment he finds in the church can also be found internally. This doesn't stray Orel from God but actually brings him closer to his faith.

Despite the show's critiques of christianity, it still strives to remind us that the core values of christianity are love and kindness. This is especially hinted at through the show's choice of music. The Mountain Goats are a Christian band and many of their songs are used throughout the run of the show.

Nature episodes

The use of repetition in Morel Orel - meant to signify and affirm love. E.g: when Nurse Bendy and Joe stick their tongues out at each other.

American historical context - early 2000s

the tonal shift throughout the seasons.

How the show uses structure to subvert audience expectations. The show structure is established only to be broken later in order to expand on their perviously one dimensional characters.

Anita Sarkeesian vs the world; Gamergate and the representation of women in videogames

The Path game and the Immortality of Fables

Women and Abject Horror

Over The Garden Wall

A retelling of Dante's inferno

Black Turtles as a recurring motif - corrupting, malevolent force. signifies the presence of evil.

FLCL

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rufamaeferrer · 2 years ago

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SARANGHAE, SOUTH KOREA : A LOVE LETTER TO MY FAVORITE DESTINATION

Dear South Korea, I believe that my love started the first time I landed on Jeju Island, and the longer I stay, the more my affection soars. Jeju seems to me to be a fairy tale island; its scenery has not been seen anywhere else in the world. This is why I find myself astonished by the size of this island, or more to the point, the size of this place; there is history written all over the terrain. There are some places where I can feel peace and powerfulness; Jeju has this power that can calm my heart and make me feel humble in front of nature. However, what marvels me every time I think of it is the cherry blossom season that the country offers. The trees, lawns, and slopes turned to pale pink and white, and the flowers appeared like a dream. When I walk in under the large trees on which flowers blossom and which make the petals shower down to the ground like confetti, I am suddenly a witness to the beauty of life and these particular moments. There is calmness in these flowers, in the ebb and flow of life’s cycle, that is comforting and makes me thankful. The feeling of the hot island sun on the body, the smell of the sea wind, and the sound of the island’s pulse, which I sense in my veins—this is the most wonderful feeling, which brings me harmony and reminds me that simple, slow life is worth dreaming about.

Seoul is the next destination, experiencing rapid growth and development, and it seems quite different from the nature of Jeju. But within the city, there is a place that has captured my soul, and it is none other than Starfield Library. This structure is integrated into the COEX Mall, and it seems like it came out of a fairytale of the future. The collection of books rises virtually from the floor to the ceiling with more than thousands of books, vindicating the aesthetics of sophistication and technology. On entry, this general tranquility engulfs me, yet I am filled with joy at the sight of numerous adventures that lie within. Still, the room has been designed to be filled with natural light, and I have chosen to bring books here to read or just contemplate. It is no mere facility to borrow books and read but rather a haven for those who appreciate the pleasures of reading and where civilization blends with literature. Starfield Library shows that in spite of the urban theme, the heart can be still.

Besides being a keen viewer of Kdrama series, one place I considered visiting must be the actual Doldam Hospital situated in Pocheon, Gyeonggi Province, where the drama is actually being shot. Visitors, especially those of the show as I am, come to this relatively inconspicuous yet interesting place to bow to the floor where Dr. Kim Sabu’s knowledge and kindness have left an imprint. The roads leading to the hospital are quite serene with more incline and fresh air that emulates the doctor, much as the atmosphere of an emergency. The countryside of Pocheon is very picturesque, and although it is quite far from the serious medical scenes that the drama presents, the rural setting is quite fitting in portraying the essence of life and the different things that life can present to people. I am at the entrance of the hospital where it has taken place and can only feel warmth, human solidarity, and the power of the story and the place in my life.

And there’s Mong Ted, the sweet café from the popular K-Drama Lovely Runner, located in the lively area of Itaewon, Seoul. However, this place is much more than just a gangway, for it has become an evening symbol of youth’s passion and dreams, as well as the very air one can smell when getting enamored. It is a small and warm café crowded with both various runners and their actual meanings in not-so-metaphorical ways, drinking coffee and munching on croissants. Thus, to explain why Mong Ted is special to me, I can call attention to the peculiar feature of a Korean city being merged with the traditional and home-like atmosphere where time flies. It is a location one can simply take a breather and observe life unfold; each turn has a conversation, a meeting. Whether I am reading at the park, talking to strangers at a coffee shop, or just watching the rain fall outside, Mong Ted is a home to me. In the middle of a place that never sleeps, it is a potent message of why the world does not need to be loud all the time.

Every corner of South Korea seems to have a part of my heart with it. From the budding cherry blossom scenery of Jeju Island to the serene ambience of Starfield Library, from the actual magic of Doldam Hospital in Pocheon to the warm and inviting atmosphere of Mong Ted in Itaewon, you provide me with all that I could ever need in a travel destination. You are paradoxical: a union of the wild and the high-tech, of the Shakespearean and the real, and Hyper Incorporated’s people, eternally ready to fall in love with something. Saranghae South Korea, the more I see you, the more my passion is, and I will always want to be coming to you again and again. Your destiny will always be my most preferred choice, the place I feel is my home.

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sweetpea-sprite · 2 years ago

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magical classism/fantasy politics: the megapost

[ID: a screenshot of cassiopeia casting the manna in ni no kuni: wrath of the white witch. overlaid on top of the image is impact font text which reads “this will affect the / engineering industry i think”. end ID]

good evening everyone. i’m ruby sweetpea-sprite. i’m so fucking normal about ni no kuni’s fake politics. i refuse to be the only one so here i am creating a megapost about every little piece of lore about it so that others can join me. if you’re new here: um. welcome. kublai was a diversity hire. more on that later!

for a summary: non-magical people have been oppressed since nazcaa fell, due to sages being in power and refusing to let them develop their own technology, as they “believe it to be against the gods” (and want to keep their societal power). this, ultimately, culminated into a large reason why lucien became shadar and banned magic. the goal of this post is to compile evidence for these events like some kind of fictional history lesson. it is a long fucking post.

this post will be in sections because it’s a long fucking post. recommended reading before we start, though i will be including quotes so you don’t gotta (though tbh you should read the tales of wonder anyway. for fun): the tenth tale of wonder, the flying machine.

have fun!

part one: the wizard’s companion

this first section is going to be the longest section because there’s so much shit in this fucking book dude. okay. don’t expect all of these sections to be this long the wizard’s companion is just fucked up

if you’ve just come back from reading that tale of wonder. hi! how was it. do you believe me yet

if you did not read the tale of wonder: just so you know, the wizard’s companion is bigoted.

i want to preface this section with this is not horace’s fault i promise. almost certainly, the wizard’s companion has been updated over the ten thousand years since it was written, and nazcaa has various attributes that mean there is no way anyone from there wrote this stuff (more on this later) - even excluding the fact that, you know. we actually have a timeframe for the tenth tale of wonder taking place (as the drawings the man sees are implied to be leonardo da vinci’s flying machine sketches) and it is decidedly not nazcaan times.

whoever the sages were who updated the wizard’s companion, however. well they weren’t great. to summarise: they wanted to keep their place in society and keep it WELL, by suppressing all knowledge of technology ever.

let’s start with the tale of wonder. the tenth tale of wonder, the flying machine, is about a man who goes to ichi no kuni (oliver’s world, for those who don’t know) and discovers sketches of a flying machine done by a painter. he then traces those sketches and brings them back to build the contraption - however, he is stopped by a sage. the entire tale is like this, understand, which is why i recommend reading it, but here are some choice quotes, from pages 300-302 of the companion:

“Using a machine to achieve something that should only be achieved using magic is akin to poisoning this world. “Poison!? Why is it like poison?” “Magic may only be used by those who possess a pure heart and who have undergone the proper training. Wizards borrow some of nature’s power and use it to humans’ benefit. Only those with a pure heart, one uncorrupted by evil, are able to do this. Using machines to triumph over nature is not the behavior of the pure-hearted.” Now, what the sage meant was that anyone could use a machine to manipulate nature--even the untrained and the evil. Machines gave ordinary humans powers that only gods and wizards should have.

“Esteemed Sage, wasn’t magic originally intended to make our lives easier? If machines achieve the same effect, why shouldn’t we use them?” “Because machines can be used by the wrong people, for the wrong reasons,” replied the sage impatiently. But the young wizard was undeterred. “I have been to the other world, and I know how things work there. They have people called ‘scientists’--they are the ones who make the machines--and they work miracles! They are capable of mixing iron with other rare metals to create things called ‘alloys’ which are strong enough to plough even the rockiest of soil. You cannot deny that farmers’ lives are much easier as a result! “Surely you do not believe that all ‘scientists’ seek to improve people’s lives?” the sage snapped back. “Do you not think, perhaps, that some of them wish to use their machines to control people--to bend them to their will?” The young wizard was speechless for a moment, but he soon found his tongue again. “Couldn’t the same be said for magic? Aren’t there some people who seek to use magic to increase their own influence?”

so you can see where i’m coming from.

the comparisons to poison. putting wizards on the same level as gods. stating that only those with a pure heart are able to use magic (blatantly untrue). magic as a sacred thing that cannot be defiled. “Do you not think, perhaps, that some of them wish to use their machines to control people--to bend them to their will?” the sage says, while clearly controlling what non-wizards do with their resources. this tale is directly written on the side of the sage; at the end, when the young man finally builds a cloud sweeper, the final paragraphs say this:

Indeed, he was too captivated by the scenery to spare a thought for the effect his new magical machine would have on the world. Had he known what impact it would have, you can be sure he would not have been quite so elated!

what impact?? there’s no impact i can find. cloud sweepers just exist. they help non-wizards travel. the only impact it could possibly be referencing is perhaps the start of people making more technology, inspired by this guy’s cloud sweepers. which, yeah. i guess the wizard’s companion would be upset about that.

technology, and wizards shunning it, is a large part of the wizard’s companion. this tale is the most egregious example, but there are more areas if you know where to look. we’ll come back to the tale of wonder in a moment, but for now, on the topic of cloud sweepers and how much the sages hate them, take a look at the first means of transportation section - page 129.

Non-wizards have long been forced to rely on vehicles to carry them to their destinations. This section aims to introduce some of the more common modes of transportation currently in use. All wizards are advised to read the information contained herein, for one cannot predict when circumstance--nixing, dismemberment, or wand loss, to name but three--might necessitate the use of such infernal contraptions as those here described.

note the PHRASING. non-wizards are forced to rely on vehicles. dismemberment as one of the circumstances, like you’d have to lose an arm to even consider this. and the most damning - “infernal” contraptions. they fucking hate these things

after that introductory paragraph, it does not get better: it goes on to describe cloud sweepers, in a rather bitter tone:

Wizards, of course, do not require magical assistance to fly through the air. Indeed, in times gone by, wizards would not have countenanced travel by any means other than broom. Alas, the age has changed, and now young wizards insist on using half-magical, half-mechanical contraptions known as “Cloud Sweepers.” Cloud Sweepers require only the merest dash of magic to get them off the ground, meaning that inexperienced magic users--and even non-wizards!--are able to ride them with gay abandon.

and even non-wizards! it says, with shock and horror. dear god... who let the non-wizards travel quickly and safely. this is going against the laws of nature

outside of cloud sweepers, in the second means of transportation section, this continues. with... boats. BOATS. THEY MAKE FUN OF NON-WIZARDS USING BOATS!!! PAGE 147:

Non-wizards rely upon ships to carry them across the world’s oceans. Indeed, many dream of owning their own vessels, imagining the “freedom” this would offer them.

freedom is IN QUOTES. THEY’RE MAKING FUN OF YOU FOR YOUR LITTLE BOAT RIDES!!! in all seriousness, these authors genuinely view non-wizards as inferior. they believe they will never have true freedom; always confined to the vehicles they’re allowed to make, the restrictions on which are defined BY THE SAGES. it’s kind of ridiculous.

obviously, all of this is awful. in the tale of wonder quotes i showed earlier, you can see a sage demanding that a non-wizard get rid of all of his sketches of technology. we can likely assume this was common practice back then, that sages simply had the power to do such a thing - or maybe this man was more dedicated than the rest (he had to be to actually build a da vinci flying machine when da vinci was still alive...) and they decided they had to put an end to it.

however, this kept happening. the tale continues on to say that other people, too, went to ichi no kuni and came back with stories of machines they saw there. how did they go, you might ask me. non-wizards can’t cast gateway.

there was a tunnel between worlds.

THE SAGES SEALED THE TUNNEL BETWEEN WORLDS TO KEEP PEOPLE FROM BRINGING BACK TECHNOLOGY THAT WOULD HELP THEM.

PAGE 302:

The sages realized that something must be done, because technology from the other world was threatening to ruin the balance of their own. They decided to seal the tunnel to the other world, to ensure that the place of magic within society was never threatened again. Now, visiting the other world was not completely forbidden--why, powerful wizards could still cast the spell known as “Gateway” and travel to the other world any time they pleased!

seriously they sealed the tunnel between worlds, knowing that only they would be able to access ichi no kuni. this is a fake world with fake politics and i’m pissed off about this. they wanted non-wizards to have as little power as possible.

this is, unfortunately, not the end of this section. there is one more very large thing about the wizard’s companion and this topic, that i’ve been consciously leaving out:

the sages hate technology. every section on technology is written in a bitter tone... except when they are talking about military, or already existing militarised things.

page 129 (means of transportation part one, cloud sweepers):

To give credit where it is due, certain enterprising engineers have gone so far as to attach guns to the front of their Cloud Sweepers, allowing them to attack enemies while in mid-air--a recognised limitation of the traditional wizard’s broom.

page 130 (rare weapons and armor - yes this is the page right after the one where they insult cloud sweepers):

Such items include pistols that allow one to open locks from a distance, and harps that attack one’s enemies when plucked. Should you be fortunate enough to come across such rare items, do not be afraid to use them on the field of battle. A wizard has nothing to fear from material objects.

page 147 (means of transportation part two, porco grosso):

The latest rumors emanating from the factories of Hamelin surround a battle tank known as the Porco Grosso. This leaked image--depicting the tank’s designers, the Porco twins, standing next to their creation--is the only evidence of its existence. The Porco Grosso is believed to be capable of scaling vertical walls and attacking an entire battalion of enemy troops with a single volley.

page 329 (regions of the world, hamelin):

The citizens of Hamelin are united both by their inquisitive natures and their desire to support and protect their empire. As a result, large-scale magi-scientific military projects are quite normal. Such projects are always kept top-secret, of course, butt rumors suggest that Hamelin’s latest development, the Porco Grosso tank, is several leagues ahead of any weapon in the other nations’ respective arsenals.

A wizard has nothing to fear from material objects. lol. lmao

all of these quotes are entirely neutral or positive about these developments. this edition of the wizard’s companion was published at the very start of shadar’s reign, likely before he began properly enforcing the magic ban. on hamelin’s page, the only technology talked about is that of military value; it’s likely safe to assume any other technology was forbidden.

...more on this later... haha...

part two: the implications

“the implications” of course being various things in game, and how they affect the characters. now that you know the general situation regarding non-wizards, you might ask me. ruby. how in god’s name did this start?

...well, we don’t know for sure. and it could very easily be as simple as “wizards have power and it developed from there”. but i have a theory.

nazcaa, as it happens, was very magi-scientific. we know this because have you ever been attacked by a magimech. i have. it’s fucking terrifying. those bitches were these people’s FAMILIARS!!! nazcaa was around during the age of sages, also known as the sagely stone age, when people were experimenting with stones, discovering the power behind them (maybe i should make a lore post on rocks)! no one was restricted! magi-science was HAPPENING. the wizard king was well known for being equal, to the point of choosing his stone guardians to represent humans, animals, and creatures.

and then, of course, he was assassinated.

and then, of course, his daughter cast the forbidden spell, and doomed nazcaa entirely.

my theory is that nazcaa was somewhat of a trailblazer for this stuff (the MAGIMECHS) and that when it was destroyed, people saw their technology as the thing that cursed them. the wizard’s companion describes nazcaa as a legend; how did the destruction of a kingdom that large not make it into history books? easy: no one knows what happened. but they can guess - and my guess is that they thought their technology went against the laws of nature, and therefore the gods. over thousands of years, this translates into nazcaa being forgotten, but the idea of that still lingering. obviously, this is a theory, and isn’t actually confirmed. but it would make a lot of sense, right?

that’s nazcaa; let’s talk about more modern-day things. for example, khulan and kublai.

even without dotdd confirming it, we can assume xanadu was pretty magical. it was run by a great sage and it fucking floated. it was magical. when kublai was hired, it was a highly magical palace of a highly magical kingdom; he is non-magical, to the point where in dotdd, he uses cloud sweepers, in a clear showing of his divide from wizardry. his position in the xanadu army was... i mean i already said it at the top of this essay: he was a diversity hire.

this is why khulan and kublai’s relationship was such a well-guarded secret. have you ever wondered why in god’s name they were so secretive about it? it’s THIS. are you kidding? the implications of a great sage and a non-wizard sky pirate...

while on the topic of kublai: in dotdd, there’s a little secret cave, called the “sky pirate’s hideout” (different to the one in wotww; kublai’s hideout in dotdd is called dragon’s den) in which you find ghosts of a long lost magic pirate crew from hundreds of years ago. most of it isn’t relevant to this post, but the ghost at the entrance directly scoffs at kublai’s pirate crew for not being able to use magic:

“Using magic to move a huge ship, we were a great pirate crew that controlled the seas around the world!“ [Drippy] “Never saw you lot. Though there is a Pirate King [Kublai] who flies the sky.” “Hmph. The pirates here are small fry compared to the olden days. I guess it’s because they’ve lost their ability to use magic. How pitiful they’ve become.”

it’s a neat little insight into how wizards from before shadar’s reign viewed non-magical people - and a neat little insight into how kublai was likely viewed when hired by the xanaduvian palace.

now that that’s done. here’s the big one:

hamelin.

gascon as well, in a moment. but for now let’s talk about hamelin as a city. now that we know all this, we can pretty easily make some assumptions about hamelin: before shadar’s reign, they were making military weapons and military weapons only (supported by the fact the wizard’s companion still describes hamelin as a “seat of scientific and magical learning”). during shadar’s reign, they may have gone a little too crazy; now that the sages are no longer in power, they’re experiencing an industrial revolution on such a large and fast scale because now they can actually make machines that aren’t. guns or tanks. and they already have the knowledge to do so because they’ve already been making guns and tanks. hamelin is on top of large mining deposits - clear by the mines and quarries everywhere on the pig iron plain - and they’ve already been making the aforementioned guns and tanks, so their tech evolves first.

(xanadu was on an island right next to autumnia; i wouldn’t be surprised if the iron wyvern came out of hamelin.)

they build a roof over the city. we know from dotdd that the primary reason for this is to protect them (likely from shadar, who is right next door), but it may have also been to keep the rain out of their engines. they don’t think about the consequences - they don’t KNOW about the consequences until they have to name a chest disease hamelin heart, a name, again, from dotdd (love that game), because the smog clouds the city.

(according to dotdd, hamelin was the smallest of the cities on autumnia before shadar took over. now it’s the only one standing.)

now. gascon. gascon is the most obvious piece of evidence for this entire thing, considering his lack of magic is a large plotpoint. it seems like even though hamelin as a city has been largely letting go of all of this, in favour of technology, the noble class has other ideas - they want to keep magical superiority alive, so much so that they refuse to have a non-wizard on the throne. even though gascon is good with machines - he gives you a blueprint for a gun he designed! - and would currently be a better fit for the throne than a great sage with no mechanical knowledge, he’s unable to ascend the throne because he can’t do magic. hamelin is a mechanical empire, no one is allowed to use magic ANYWAY, and gascon isn’t allowed to ascend the throne.

genuinely i wish marcassin’s brokenhearted plotline focused more on his ability to run the kingdom; the person who was meant to and was better fit for the job left him on account of the pressure from the sages, after all. he’s doing his best. he really is. but considering he IS a great sage, and most of marcassin’s education likely revolved around that instead of anything his kingdom is known for (seriously. isn’t it crazy that hamelin is the only one of the three kingdoms run by a great sage? that it has a law on it? ...more on this later)... he is not the best for the job is he. yet even if gascon didn’t run, from what we can tell from what swaine says about the situation, marcassin would have become emperor in his place anyway.

this shit runs DEEP.

part three: lucien

this is the big one. why did lucien, as shadar, ban magic? well i hope that now that you’ve read the rest of this post you can infer why, but the answer is easy: he wanted to stop the oppression of non-wizards, by taking away the power the sages wielded. but it’s actually a lot more personal than that. a lot of this section will be going into one of dotdd’s dlc quests, in which this is essentially spelled out for you.

because, according to this dlc quest: lucien did not grow up practicing magic.

in this quest (really series of quests. there’s three of them), you meet three of lucien’s friends from when he was in the army. they’re ghosts, of course, but they’re unable to move on because they feel guilt for not standing with lucien when he turned traitor. they say, very directly:

“A long time ago, Shadar wasn’t even able to use magic.” [Esther] “Seriously? Shadar. The Dark Djinn. One of the most powerful wizards ever, and you’re saying he wasn’t always able to use magic?” [Swaine] “But... If he couldn’t use magic, how was he able to join the battle mages?” “He didn’t want to join the battle mages. He thought that he would be just a normal soldier, given that he was a young man from Halcyon. But, even though he couldn’t use magic, he was made the attendant of a battle mage magimech.” [Oliver] “Magimech?” “He was a soldier whose job was to make synthetic stones. He knew how to hit the enemy hard, but he broke himself in the process of making our weapons. He was a support worker for those who were on the front lines. Lucien was right in the middle of all that, and I think that’s where he became interested in magic.”

so just to be clear. lucien was originally not a soldier in this war. he was an engineer who made weapons (because he wasn’t allowed to make anything else) who then began fighting after he became interested in magic. not only that, he was an apprentice of some kind to a MAGIMECH. are you kidding.

(speaking of. this is very similar to a certain someone in motorville.)

later on in this quest, you find lucien’s diary - kept safe by the magimech he attended - which details his contempt for living in a magic-driven world:

Magic is to blame, if anything... I won’t ever forgive anyone who uses magic spells to harm another person. If there were no magic in this world in the first place... then we wouldn’t have such horrifying wars, either. There is no place for me in this terrifying world. Even if my existence was suddenly extinguished, I don’t think that even my friends would miss me... or notice. But, the innocence of all the people caught up in this world of magic keeps eating away at me. I want to devote myself to protecting innocence. And I want to leave this diary for my friends to read, one day. I will hide it away somewhere no sane person would ever look for it, and I will entrust it to the custody of a guardian. If ever there is a person who reads this diary... I hope that they are a person who holds the same convictions and hopes for the future of the world that I do.

we all know lucien’s motivations for becoming the dark djinn: he wanted to put an end to the wars that seemed to run rampant throughout the world (hell. if you look at some of the dialogue from king tom and cowlipha lowlah, there’s still animosity between the three kingdoms.) so he became the sole target. and i mean. crazy fucking plan but it worked! the world is a lot more peaceful now than in lucien’s age! i don’t condone the murders but he did kind of fucking do it is the thing!

but why did he ban magic specifically? why were there wars in the first place? here’s my second theory of this post: the wars were between sages.

they’re using magic to fight. they’re using armies to attack each other. why ARE military inventions praised so highly by sages, when they have magic that can do much of the same? because their armies can use them. the target in rubicon when lucien betrayed his army was a sage - alicia’s parent. If there were no magic in this world in the first place... then we wouldn’t have such horrifying wars, either.

the sages like the invention of weapons that non-wizards can use so that those non-wizards can fight their wars for them. hamelin’s law that only a great sage can run the kingdom makes a lot more sense when you consider it’s not only for a class boundary, but for control.

the, now rather obvious, reason lucien banned magic was to get rid of the power imbalance; he took down all of the sages who were oppressing non-wizards, he stopped the wars they caused, he forced them to adapt without magic because they couldn’t defeat him. and. again it worked! hamelin is expanding, the al mamoon army uses cloud sweepers now, khulan and kublai are together... things are better! despite the horrors! the world of ni no kuni, as it is in game, is in a very specific position - where shadar has now managed to achieve his aim - tipping the scales so that non-wizards are no longer oppressed. clearly, there’s still some way to go, but it’s a good damn start.

but his job is done; there’s no need for him anymore. the wars are over, the world is almost peaceful again - the last thread tying it to that time is shadar himself. and i mean he did murder and break the hearts of a lot of people also. for the world to be truly peaceful, he needs to be defeated.

and isn’t it poetic that the pure-hearted one, he who will drive out the darkness. is a kid from motor city who likes building cars and didn’t know magic existed until he was thirteen.

Using machines to triumph over nature is not the behavior of the pure-hearted.

imagine how pissed off these sages would be. they come out of hiding after shadar has been defeated like finally! the place of magic within society has been restored! we will now start banning technology again and the pure-hearted one is sitting there like why would you do that :( they’re so cool :(

THEY WOULD BE SO ANGRYYYY it would be so funny. they can’t even fucking say anything. he’s a great sage’s son. he’s from detroit. they’ve been waiting for this powerful wizard to show up to defeat shadar so they can get their world back and he turns out to be a Mechanic. from Another World. full of CARS. AND HE’S THE SECOND COMING OF THE WIZARD KING. IMAGINE.

part four: conclusion

this is where i leave you. with the knowledge that oliver’s existence is driving magical bigots batshit. good for him

thank you for reading this 4500 WORD JESUS CHRIST???? essay. if you have any questions or comments feel free to leave them in my askbox. i fucking love politics that aren’t real in any shape or form and i also love other things about ni no kuni too so you can ask me anything about it.

i hope you get it now.

#ni no kuni #ni no kuni: wrath of the white witch #rambles

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srbachchan · 2 years ago

Text

DAY 5535

Jalsa, Mumbai Apr 12/13, 2023 Wed/Thu 12:30 AM

“No mere human can keep up with the torrent of intriguing, terrifying daily AI news,

AI can probably crack your password — and faster than you think

Cybersecurity firm Home Security Heroes put an AI-powered password-cracking tool called PassGAN to the test against 15m+ passwords.

It cracked 51% of them in under a minute. By month’s end, it had worked out 81% of the list. Uh-oh. Before you reset every password you’ve ever had, remember that usage of PassGAN isn’t widespread — and could also be used to generate crack-proof passwords.

Still, Home Security Heroes recommends stronger passwords with 15+ characters that avoid patterns like “1234.”

***

AI can kinda see what your brain sees?

A team at Osaka University used a deep-learning AI model called Stable Diffusion (SD) to analyse brain scans after people were shown images inside an MRI machine.

The AI was asked to “translate” the subjects’ brain activity into a readable format.

That it did; SD generated faithful reproductions of the original images. Also uh-oh. Per the Osaka team, this isn’t “mind reading” — it merely means AI can reproduce images a person has viewed. Which ain’t nothing, according to every tightly clenched muscle in our bodies.

Practical applications are minimal today, but SD research (and subsequent ethics debates) will continue.

***

Read this in an article .. and found it intriguing enough to be shared with the Ef .. because in time AI shall be able to read your mind too and inform me .. as it would mine and inform you ..

AI = Alternate Intelligence , but first we need to possess ‘intelligence’ for an alternative to exist 😃

( the dearest Ef Miten Lapsia corrected me, this morning Apr 13, 2023 .. said it is ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE, NOT ALTERNATE .. I agree Ef you are right, but my writing was an aside to the real .. it was deliberately done to bring to the fore, the next sentence “ but first we need to possess ‘intelligence’ for an alternative to exist 😃” .. no other .. yes you are right .. and I am wrong .. but my moment was connected to alternate .. hence .. 🙏 )

Building an agenda for the destruction of the ego of existence , has in time failed .. the exist shall exist .. for they were built to do so .. not just they , all of us were built to exist .. how we exist is our prerogative ..

Many though that have no clue how they should , borrow ..

In a borrowing, comes the ethic of return .. when it does happen , there is glory and dignity and respectability ..

But when it does not happen, apart from the unjust, the non ethical drive to destroy shall never succeed ..

Dignity and respect was not laid down on a platter for your devour .. it needed consumption of spirit and delve ..

and as I write the lightening strikes through heavy clouds of immense sound pierce the barriers of limit .. as though a chord had been touched upon .. often it behaves thus ... it is unseasonal rain that shall soon lash the walls and terrace moulded structures of the City, for leakage and piercing waters about the rooms of living .. in time protected by shields of covers .. but that is still a month or so away .. why the predominance of its presence now ..

the God’s they be in annoyance .. they be angry .. as the express went with our forefathers .. in time the science and technology took over to discover and predict and inform ..

THEY ARE STILL IN THE PROCESS OF DOING SO .. 🤣

tolerance has its range of limits and barriers .. when the ‘bandh’ breaks the city floods .. as does the body and mind .. and all else .. the saner elements be possessed by limits .. be in the limits to exist .. exist well ..

Else leave ..

Love and existence .. and sanity to all ❤️

Amitabh Bachchan

an eerie silence persists as the rain doth pass by .. the towelling that plugs the drips from above prevails .. the morning shall exhibit the damage done .. the night shall be in the anticipate of the mornings’ nature ..

unseasonal rain .. predicts unseasonal predictions .. unseasonal predictions bring variety .. variety be in good or adverse dimension ..

and ..

patience be the only construct of exist ..

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morphimus · 3 years ago

Note

I know you've probably been asked a hundred times already, I know its tagged as a inside joke and that is most likely nothing more then a very large shitpost collage. But the fuck is dirt world? It has completely consumed my attention span and is causing my worldbuilding brain to fixate on it because I love analysing and trying to pick apart and understand bizarre, weird and unusual ideas, especially if I can borrow liberally from it for whatever hairbrained project I am working on at the moment. I beg of you. This is prime worldbuilding real state.

Dirtworld is an alien world that evolved in such a way that practically everything is simply dirt. No trees, no grass, no mushrooms, nothing of the sort really, perhaps worms, certainly microbes, but not much at all that we would recognise as life like on Earth, one of the sole exceptions being the dirtworldians, an intelligent (and even spacefaring!) species much like ourselves. Nutrient rich dirt for meals, dirt as building material, different kinds of dirt used for every purpose you could imagine, from skin care to space flight.

And being such a world where all is dirt and dirt is all, many words for non-dirt things typically derive from a root word that itself means dirt. For example, the Dirtworldian word for lake might derive from the word for the type of dirt found near lakes. You can stretch this concept to cover damn near everything, from natural features, to technological inventions. If the word for car is derived from both the word for motion and the word for structure, and the word for motion itself is derived from the word for a landslide (dirtslide, really), and let's say the word for structure has its roots in the materials used to make it... then naturally that would make the Dirtworldian word for car translate into something like "dirtdirt."

The key to making this linguistic bullshit work however, lies in an extremely old literary record, with writing invented drastically sooner than it was by humans, comparatively. This allows for the origins of words to be much more well known, and thus much more likely to be known to mean dirt.

This whole thing started as a little improv bit between myself and a close friend, making up funny little details as we went on. Sort of like a more ridiculous and stupid version of Darmok and Jalad at Tanagra.

The meme post itself was something I made on a whim, fashioned after similar other posts like this one for example. "Imagine the memes that would occur if Dirtworld made first contact" essentially.

About the setting though, one might ask what are the Dirtworldians like? How did they evolve among the dirt? What is their culture and society like? What are the fauna of Dirtworld like? The politics? The dirt? Or what about even the dirt dirt? There's plenty more I could say about it, but I think this post is long enough already, and I encourage you to use your own imagination to fill in the gaps.

If anybody out there wants to use the concepts of Dirtworld for their own worldbuilding, borrowed in whole or in part, I give you my blessing to do so. Run wild with it!

#dirtworld #world building #jmc #linguistics #inside joke #dirt

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nicklloydnow · 2 years ago

Text

“Every so often a film comes along with the capacity to break a friendship in half. Those of us who saw Prometheus in 2012 may understand what I mean. The exploding head, the inexplicable pale giant, the unresolved mysteries of humanity’s origins—it all left me enraged. Where is the Xenomorph?! Listening to a friend outside the theater insist that Prometheus is an excellent film, that it’s an intelligent film, one that I might just not necessarily understand, well, it drove me up a wall. And it made me want to blast my phone, and our friendship, into the vacuum of space. I thought he was full of shit.

(…)

For over a decade now, people have complained that Prometheus doesn’t make sense, that Scott never tells us why our creators despise us, and that, because this goes apparently unresolved, the movie just doesn’t have a cohesive message. They say it can’t live up to such bulletproof classics as the first three Alien films, since those combine satisfying horror action with very simple motivations–in those films, the Aliens are among us, and we have to kill them before they kill us. That’s it.

Although it’s a pretty lousy way to enjoy the vast and colorful world of film—always requiring directors to answer all the questions they ask—if you are looking for conclusions, they’re all there in Prometheus. You might just not have given the film enough of a chance to notice them. The humans in Prometheus, except for perhaps Dr. Shaw, are prideful creatures of ignorance, vanity, and, of course, bottomless greed. One of the central criticisms of Prometheus is that the scientists aboard the Prometheus are too dumb to be believable, that they operate with such arrogance that it’s almost impossible to sympathize with them. But have you ever considered that Scott might have characterized them that way for a reason?

(…)

You don’t need to look far beyond the borders of Prometheus to see why, after more than 30 years since Scott made the relatively optimistic Alien (hey, at least Ripley survives with the cat), the director may have become a bit more nihilistic about humans. The way in which we’ve torn this planet to shreds, how we’ve turned the natural world into our own personal toilet, how tax-skipping billionaires rocket off into space instead of trying to solve real, dire issues such as poverty or world hunger. The misery, the violence, the subjugation constantly frothing around the corners of our every waking day–hey, maybe he’s trying to tell us something here?

(…)

Since Scott will likely never get a chance to tie off the prequel trilogy he all-but-promised us, this film, with all its philosophy and promises of grandeur, will never feel fully satisfying. It'll always appear a bit smaller than it needs to be. But remember, as David says, "Big things have small beginnings."”

“10 years ago, Prometheus hit theaters and people freaked out. If you’re looking for a movie scarier than Alien, Prometheus fails. It’s got some terrifying moments, but none that top the messy originality of its source material. If you’re looking for a movie with a more cohesive aesthetic, Prometheus again fails to top Alien. It merely borrows from its predecessor’s basic design, resulting in technology that looks way slicker even though the movie is a prequel.

But Alien is a horror movie that happens to be set in space. You could move the action to a drilling station or a submarine. You could even swap the chest-bursting xenomorph for a demon or a genetic experiment gone haywire. It wouldn’t be the same movie, but it would have the same spirit.

Even King Kong has ties to Alien insofar as the idea of capturing and then using a beast is a trope that exists across different genres. The basic story of Alien — while an aesthetic triumph of minimalism — is not reliant on science fiction to actually work.

Once you hold this very specific criterion in your brain, it’s easy to see why Prometheus is a more interesting science fiction story than its more famous horror progenitor. The premise of the film concerns the notion of panspermia, the theory that human beings were seeded on Earth by aliens. And, although Prometheus presents this theory to be essentially true, the unfolding implications impact all the characters in profound ways.

(…)

In Alien, none of these questions exist. It’s only about survival. In Prometheus, the art of speculative fiction, the idea that the audience and the characters are actually contemplating big ideas through a sci-fi lens, doesn’t just drive the story, it is the story. You can’t take the science fiction out of Prometheus and make it work. That may not excuse its flaws, but for people who truly love the genre, it should encourage you to cut the movie a break.

Ridley Scott made an Alien prequel that no one wanted about huge philosophical subjects that are hard to discuss. He crammed all of that into an action-horror that used a similar plot structure to a more famous film he already directed. For most moviegoers, this audacious experiment failed. In fact, the more by-the-numbers approach in the troubled sequel, Alien: Covenant, proves how much Scott retreated from some of his bigger ideas in Prometheus.

But none of that changes this film’s thoughtfulness. In a sea of sci-fi movies trying to play the hits, Ridley Scott’s Prometheus tried to get weird. And for that, it remains one of the better sci-fi movies of the 21st century.”

“Alien is an excellent haunted house horror movie. Seriously, it’s great. Aliens is a constantly entertaining war movie. But Prometheus manages to combine spooks (that creepy first act), action (that flame-filled second act) while adding the element that makes it transcend for me – philosophy. Yep, Ridley Scott was brave enough to shove a philosophical exploration of the very nature of human existence into his summer blockbusting Alien movie sequel/prequel/reimaginequal. And for that he should be applauded.

When some people look to the sky, they see God. Others just see stars. That dichotomy is at the root of Prometheus ’ big question: If there’s no God, where did we come from? And it goes further: can God exist in a scientific world? Prometheus is Scott’s attempt to splice the wide-minded wonder of Kubrick’s 2001: A Space Odyssey with the DNA of the summer-movie template.

I’ll concede that it’s an experiment that didn’t work for everyone, but just because you didn’t get it doesn’t mean it’s not a good film. There’s so much to love in Prometheus , whether it’s the subtle theme of creators rejecting their creations, the jaw-slackingly beautiful visuals (as pretty as anything in Scott’s back catalogue), or the mindbending implications of that key conceit.”

#prometheus #alien #xenomorph #ridley scott #h r giger #iris scott

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