#magically scientific

[thestuffedalligator]

Debate about the evolutionary history of the common leprechaun (Sutor hibernicus) enters its second century, scholars split on the lines of leprechauns as dwarves (family Montihominidae) or leprechauns as pixies (family Puerihortidae). Genetic analysis reveals that leprechauns are descendants of the Irish hare (Lepus timidus). The chamber of magical phylogenetics explodes in rage.

[wikinley]

Does a USB drive get heavier as you store more files on it?

Nope. Paradoxically (and theoretically), the more you save on a flash drive, the lighter it gets.

USB drives use Flash memory, which means the the ones and zeros of the data are stored on transistors.

When you save data, a binary zero is set by charging the float gate of the transistor, and a binary one is set by removing the charge.

To charge it, we add electrons, and the mass of each electron is 0.00000000000000000000000000091 grams.

This means that an empty USB drive (which mostly holds zeros) weighs more than a full USB drive (which has ones and zeros). Add data, reduce the weight.

[creature-wizard]

Most people who believe in some "weird" thing like magic, ghosts, extraterrestrial visitors, cryptids, or whatever are not "anti-science." They generally believe that science is fundamentally correct about most things, but cannot adequately explain the "weird" thing they believe in.

If there is strong evidence against said weird thing, it's much more likely that they're just unaware of it, rather than being aware of it and actively choosing to disregard it. It's also more likely that they're unaware of scientific models that adequately explain it, rather than choosing to completely disregard said models.

Also, some people have genuinely had bizarre experiences that scientific models simply cannot explain yet. Like "three people in a small community independently had the exact same prophetic dream about an event they had no reason to expect" kind of bizarre. And when shit's this weird, the "scientific" explanations are just insultingly reductive.

Scientific literacy is good and should be encouraged, but being rude and dismissive to people who believe in "weird" things isn't the way to go. Most people who are into "weird" stuff tend to be curious by nature, so if you just present them with accessible scientific material that doesn't talk down to them, they'll often happily dive right in.

[gingermintpepper]

Tbh, I'm kind of obsessed with the almost tragedy of Eiland and Caldarus in Fields of Mistria. Eiland's dedicated his life to uncovering the secrets and stories hidden in Mistria's archeology - he's single-mindedly devoted to it, so much so that even his side hobbies are influenced by his love of history and desire to know more about Mistria's but it's that devotion that makes him so blind to the magic right in front of him.

It's Eiland's sharp eye that sees Caldarus' statue behind that tree on the farm. It's Eiland who whacks away at the bark with the axe fruitlessly until he's assisted. It's Eiland who coaxes the player to help repair Caldarus' statue and subtly ropes them into joining his History Society. It's Eiland who is devoted to the steles, who gets so excited at the prospect at uncovering a new piece of old Mistria's puzzle that he cuts his outing short to rush to the museum. It's Eiland who realises that all of the different eras of artefacts dug up in Mistria's soil must mean that Mistria itself was once the cradle of civilisation for Aldaria.

And yet, with all of that knowledge, he's still so, so blind to what's right in front of him. He doesn't realise that Juniper is a witch, he merely knows that she is familiar with all manner of the arcane and assumes it's a scholarly pursuit like his instead of what it actually is - Juniper's lifestyle, Juniper's culture. And ultimately, I think that's why he's blind to Caldarus and the magic right in front of him.

Eiland isn't taking the time to stop and really think about what all these artefacts and armaments mean. He isn't considering that remnants of old Mistria still live, he isn't even able to grapple with the question of whether or not it's right for him to dig up the armour at the stele when it's clearly hidden there for a reason. Eiland is completely detached from the history he's searching for and that's why, even with magic and the truth about Mistria right in front of him, he'll remain blind to it.

[tasenwrobots]

(Click for better quality )

Some really badass villain music playing in the background.

Y'all should check out @onionninjasstuff 's villian PB&J au. It's really cool! Love your art n comics Archie :]

[dailyfigures]

Misaka Mikoto ; A Certain Scientific Railgun ☆ eStream

[khattikeri]

yue qingyuan is actually quite the anomaly when it comes to airplane shooting towards the sky's projection onto his own characters.

airplane's projection onto shen jiu is obvious: shen jiu lashes out cruelly at others and is extremely bitter about being abandoned. even when he has no malicious intentions he is misinterpreted; he passively accepts others' perception of him as an irredeemable, unworthy person because he thinks it's futile to defend himself and does not take action to change those perceptions out of pride and intentional detachment, continuing the cycle that brought him pain.

yue qingyuan does share some of airplane's own traits (namely being evasive, passive about harm that comes his way, and heavily self-pitying) but something about his role in shen jiu's life... honestly makes me wonder if yue qingyuan is meant to represent how airplane's parents acted towards him.

yue qingyuan (airplane's parents) and shen jiu (airplane) used to be family but now treat each other more like colleagues if anything. on the rare occasion yue qingyuan does talk about more personal matters with shen jiu, he never addresses the elephant in the room and can only say "sorry"-- which infuriates shen jiu, who views those 'sorries' as completely useless, empty words that don't answer his actual question of why he was left behind.

shen jiu and yue qingyuan offer startling insight into how airplane and airplane's parents respectively might've acted prior to the transmigration, especially in light of airplane's extra chapter where we find out his parents divorced, remarried, started new families, and cut off all contact and financial support from him.

it makes me wonder how badly airplane craved their affection and attention that his PIDW drafts included a backstory for yue qingyuan where

he actually always intended to come back to shen jiu

he was tragically unable to come back because of circumstances out of his control

he never gives shen jiu closure or clarification, not out of apathy , but because he cares so much that he feels sickeningly guilty.

it is honestly really sad how that real life trauma ended up twisted and projected onto yue qingyuan and shen jiu, and especially how yue qingyuan's hidden connection to him is more like wish fulfillment on airplane's part, wanting a world where that's the answer his parents refuse to give him.

so yeah, airplane does project himself onto yue qingyuan as he does with many of the PIDW characters, but the connections between yue qingyuan's role in shen jiu's life and airplane's parents in his own also share a lot of telling similarities.

[marlynnofmany]

I've been reading a lot of science fiction and fantasy stories lately, by a lot of different authors, and I've noticed an interesting trend. Not something that happens all the time by any means, but something that's more likely to happen in one over the other.

Magic fixes problems while science causes problems.

And it makes sense that it would be that way, because magic is something that we don't really have, and we can only imagine what we would do with it if we did. Magic is just altering reality in ways that logically shouldn't happen, given our current understanding of physics. If we could change reality with a snap of our fingers, oh man we would do so much good with it.

But science. We've seen what science can do. And before it can achieve the lofty goals that it sets out to do, it goes through any number of failures and setbacks. We've seen the mistakes. We've suffered through them. Then in fiction, we extrapolate what could happen with advancements that we haven't quite reached yet.

With science fiction, we tell cautionary tales of a that future could be. With fantasy, we tell fairy tales of a past that never was.

Not every time. But often enough to notice.

[rt-nique]

SLYTHERIN TIM DRAKE‼️

⚠️ spoilers for fic Scientific Method by vogon_poet

binged Scientific Method by vogon_poet about 2 months ago and this fic single handedly dragged my ass into Harry Potter 😭

ALSO I AM A SLYTHERIN!TIM TRUTHER!!!! MY BOY IS SO BADASS I LOVE HIM!!! He’s so smart and science-ing the fuck out of magic, I loved it when transfiguration finally clicked. Amazing writing from the author!!

AND I LOVE HOW THE AUTHOR MERGES TIM AS A WIZARD AND TIM AS ROBIN!!!!! It’s such a great balance between keeping Batman canon and letting Tim explore being a wizard and how he impacts the wizarding world, and the mix of magic martial arts is so cool.

I want to draw Tim and Blaise next, I adore their friendship!!

ps Tim is actually good at potions (the facial expression is just funny)

[jadedaegis]

Type III Stars, Metyr, and How Fkcugni COOL it is to see Fantasy allude to such technical knowledge *swoons*

SO LIKE I AM A HUGE SPACE/ PHYSICS NERD

So, I noticed a sort of "theme" to the progression of Elden Ring's "Shooting Stars" that mirrors how star formation is... well, a thing!! Metyr has lost touch with the Greater Will because Type III Stars have lifespans of "Only Millions of Years!" The microcosm is the most literal definition of the words you can get- a micro-cosmic space.

A Singularity. So!

In the great scheme of things the Type I stars would most likely be the Fallingstar Beasts you find throughout the Lands Between; Type II Stars would be entities like the two Astels and the Elden Beast! Entities that have lived long enough to start really mixing things up. And then we have Metyr. The oldest star- a powerful direct offshoot of the Gravity of Greater Will- ordered and told what to do by gravity until that gravity went inward and disappeared, pulling Metyr's focus inwards. After all, if you travel infinite distance over the infinite space-time surrounding a singularity you could "get to it," ...but you can't. Metyr looks to a ceaseless void, as she was broken; collapsed through unknown means into an indiscernible cosmic white noise. The information that could be gleaned by the Greater Will is simply erased by the inherent rot of the Lands Between, and an infinite space-time firewall stops it from recycling.

Not even Erdtree Burials truly recycle.

[shibaleeart]

Shoutout to canonically physically disabled characters that can still wreck shit if they want to ~!

[cooookiemonster]

touma/accelerator

[turtleblogatlast]

Huge missed opportunity to have more teleportation hijinks with Mayhem and Leo tbh

Could have so easily been made into a great April & Leo episode 😭

[bingeeaterblog]

Hi Tumblr Cody is a toaru fan now look at my straight people

[rockingtheorange]

Why so pookie?

Why so big busty?

Why so both?

[dailyfigures]

Shokuhou Misaki ; A Certain Scientific Railgun ☆ FuRyu