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Post by Dr. Jar on Oct 12, 2013 19:48:23 GMT -8
@brett= Or me, I find animals fascinating and always will. The recent fMRI study involving dogs was informative. We had some interesting classes in college about magnetic senses in birds and the calculations owls use to find and capture prey by their auditory senses. New use for the SUBPAR chatboard; Sharing science.
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DKender
Only One Skeleton has the Power to Control both Life and Death, Light and Dark, Words and Blank Space, Our Humble Lives Continue Only by the Grace and Magnanimity of This Skeleton
Nay, let us walk from fire unto firey skeleton ...
Posts: 9,204
Gender: Unknown Skeleton
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Post by DKender on Oct 12, 2013 19:52:17 GMT -8
What'll happen to poor magnetic field-sensing animals when the poles get wonky before their switch? D8 So confusing! Haha. Aw.
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Post by Thy Dungyeon Maestyr on Oct 12, 2013 20:34:19 GMT -8
Ho-ho, I see a direct disagreement between Christopher and Jara likes/dislikes. To each their own. On an unrelated note Jara, what is "bottomless magic syndrome"? And DeeK, my psychic powers are a bit more "super" than sharky lateral sense. More like Carrie. But then, the metaphysic that facilitate magicky stuff in my sci fi setting reflect the profoundest willful ignorance of the actual laws of physics, so maybe getting magical enuf to dodge the DeeK hate? I also suspect Indea is far more comfortable with what Kelly & I termed as embarrassment humor, which again, to each their own. Steampunk can be pretty divisive these days. I loved it before the word was coined. Jules Verne was good fun. Kate Beaton captured the steampunk h8 well with this comic: www.harkavagrant.com/?id=266I suspect Jara's feelings about animals would be quite different from my own, even while we might support almost all the same legal positions and environmental laws. Life is complicated like that. If the author of the fox study did his research in the same region, there indeed may have been a cause other than magnetism, just based on the foxes' feel for the landscape. Speculative, but could be cool. Jara- maybe you could start a science thread in Kingfisher Talk/Miscellany, or that kinda stuff could just go in the OOC. Whatchu think?
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Post by Dr. Jar on Oct 12, 2013 20:37:59 GMT -8
@chris= OOC is good for me. Bottomless magic= When there are no defined laws of how and why magic can be used, so instead of following logical rules of a confined universe it becomes THE MAGIC OF PLOT CONVENIENCE which I find..annoying. In general increasing logic in a story's construction will earn points from me, even if the concept doesn't have a logical basis. It follows rules and has structure like physics and real world ideas. And yes, likes and dislikes lists are like that.
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DKender
Only One Skeleton has the Power to Control both Life and Death, Light and Dark, Words and Blank Space, Our Humble Lives Continue Only by the Grace and Magnanimity of This Skeleton
Nay, let us walk from fire unto firey skeleton ...
Posts: 9,204
Gender: Unknown Skeleton
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Post by DKender on Oct 12, 2013 20:44:16 GMT -8
@ Christopher - Oh, yes! You've dodged it.
But the guy who wrote "The Wild Y" (featured on Pseudopod, the weekly horror podcast) has not.
That's right! I'm talking about you, guy!
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Post by Thy Dungyeon Maestyr on Oct 12, 2013 20:58:35 GMT -8
Haha, DeeK. First X, then Y. There's no winning with the terminal letters of the alphabet. Jara- I totes feel ya on dat one. An opposite extreme one could fall into is making the universe feel like a video game or RPG, where guys say "Oh no! He's level seven and I'm out of power points!"
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Post by ∆§Indea§∆ on Oct 12, 2013 21:01:31 GMT -8
@chris- You'd have a little clearer in your definition of embarrassment humour, but probably so. I don't like stories ( there's a few English comedies like this) where ill luck follows the main character, he is constantly made the buffoon of and other characters berate them constantly.
Eh I hate to use the foreign card as I am fraught to do but some of it is probably cultural differences. Self deprecating humour is more prevalent here so we tend to find things less offensive/embarrassing. Perhaps I'm wrong though.
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Post by Dr. Maneep Pamplemousse on Oct 12, 2013 21:10:11 GMT -8
I don't read much and I don't seek out culture and such. I only realized steampunk was a trend when it started appearing on Facebook among the not RPG crowd. Still, I mostly ignore those people, so I still appreciate it. I guess if I let a thing I like be torn down by other people adopting it, then I'd just be a hipster. I'll stick with liking the things I like.
A lot of the things I'm seeing on Jara's list, for instance, seems to be almost a bullet point list of elements in the Forgotten Realms campaign setting, in particular the novels of R.A. Salvatore and Ed Greenwood. I'll admit I don't like all of their stuff, but I like most of it.
I guess, besides being culturally isolated (mostly self-imposed) and non-adventurous, I have less exposure (or overexposure) to different things, mainstream or alternative. Generally, I find that the more I question or probe the things and the people around me, I find that I loathe and hate them and I become increasingly disgusted with the human race. So I find it easier on my bipolar brain to just ignore the crap, lest I fall into a funk so deep that I might contemplate harming myself or others. I've gotten pretty close to that edge before.
Also, until recently, I've had minimal immersion in the non-heteronormative world, I find that I probably do a lot of things and would say or represent a lot of things that would potentially be deeply hurtful to other people. It's not intentional, I just haven't had time to develop a sensitivity and awareness to those folks.
I have no idea where I was going with this. Hopefully, I didn't overthink my wording on anything and give the impression that I was trying to make excuses or defend offensive speech. I'm just saying, in our hetero-dominated society, a person has to work to be sensitive. Or I do, anyway, because my brain is easily overwhelmed and overstimulated when I try to do more than one thing at a time. And when I say one thing, I mean one, very narrow thing. Frankly, I don't even know if I think and speak at the same time; it seems I mostly think and then speak my thoughts.
And I still have no idea where I was going with this.
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Post by Thy Dungyeon Maestyr on Oct 12, 2013 21:10:47 GMT -8
Indea- You might be right. Embarrassment humor may take the same form you described (Fawlty Towers and Black Adder may have had moments like that), but more often it's just the main source of laughs on American sitcoms. Make the characters super uncomfortable and look like jerks! So funny!
For me & my guy, humiliation is the least pleasant thing about memory - it sticks forever. I remember spelling a word wrong in the second grade and I'm 37. So it just isn't funny to us... That said, there could be situational exceptions, which you could probably feel out by looking at the SUBPAR archives.
Brett- I feel like you're overthinking it and making yourself a little upset. We have our own forms of self-imposed isolation too. Just write what you like and don't like in the fiction you pursue. It's supposed to help you when you start writing. I'll explain more about why if anyone's curious.
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Post by Dr. Maneep Pamplemousse on Oct 12, 2013 21:14:59 GMT -8
I remember spelling a word wrong in the second grade and I'm 37. In your defense, the Crayolas back then used the English spelling of grey, and you were at that age where you use crayons an awful lot, I think it was unreasonable for the teacher to mark you wrong for using the e instead of the a. A friend's kid (preschool age, maybe kindergarten) was asked to draw something that started with the letter T, so he drew a trapezoid. The teacher didn't give him the credit. Not the same thing, but similar.
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Post by ∆§Indea§∆ on Oct 12, 2013 21:19:33 GMT -8
Actually it sounds more like we're on the same page mostly with that stuff. There's a difference between humorously awkward or momentarily embarrassing (Stuff easily brushed off) and humiliation. I don't like humiliation on any level either, hence I really dislike shows like 'Jerry Springer' because it's often at the expense of other's dignity.
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Post by Thy Dungyeon Maestyr on Oct 12, 2013 21:23:24 GMT -8
Cops might even be worse. I accidentally saw one little scene of Cops when walking by a TV someone else was watching, and it was mad transphobic and horrible.
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Post by Dr. Maneep Pamplemousse on Oct 15, 2013 20:56:37 GMT -8
I tried to think about this and I came up with nothing. I think I tend to just lose myself in a good story. I couldn't tell you what makes it "good", but when I find them, I sometimes lose track and it's almost more like watching a movie in my mind than reading a book. I'm assuming the setting and actions and emotional responses of characters all need to be well elucidated, but I wouldn't know how to do that myself or even how to describe that to someone else.
I would say that next time I read a book, I'll write down what I like about it, but I think the next couple of books I will be reading are going to be the complete Calvin and Hobbes and the first two volumes of the complete Pogo...
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Post by Thy Dungyeon Maestyr on Oct 16, 2013 0:00:57 GMT -8
OK, I'll let ya know something about me and Kelly. We didn't differentiate between media when we wrote our lists. A few items are writing specific, but most of them relate to movies, comics, etc.
I think you should base yours on stories with a longer arc than one strip, so not C&H or Pogo. Just pay attention next time you watch a movie or TV show. Or think of the challenge in those terms, and you might find it easier even without a movie in front of you to judge.
The point of the lists is to remind you of what you like, because people have a tendency to create stories that feel "important" in some way, but in practice is completely uninteresting to them. It's a weird phenomenon - you will forget to write what you like and start to write what you dislike. The lists are to help with that.
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Post by Kristi is prescribed skeletons on Nov 1, 2013 5:01:33 GMT -8
Like it:
Mysteries Suspense Charismatic but unassuming characters Older troubled blokes Old ladies Mental disability Non-human animals Rats Arthropods (e.g. bees, moths) Birds (e.g. cacatuidae, chickens) Classical non-human animal type monsters Situational comedy Detective fiction Infamous good protagonists Flamboyancy Previously established relationships
May it die slowly in a fiery pit: Comedy that's gross Animal abuse Child Abuse Inaccurate portrayals of minorities or other species Sexualized women passed off as "strong female characters" Characters defined by their romantic life or sexuality Historic inaccuracies
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