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      Welcome!   03/05/2016

      Welcome, everyone, to the new 910CMX Community Forums. I'm still working on getting them running, so things may change.  If you're a 910 Comic creator and need your forum recreated, let me know and I'll get on it right away.  I'll do my best to make this new place as fun as the last one!

hkmaly

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Everything posted by hkmaly

  1. Story Friday, May 8, 2020

    You've heard of COVID-19, yes? We'll see how 'intelligent' the dominate ape is on our planet. I must admit the reaction to covid-19 wasn't exactly convincing. On the other hand, if it would clear the gene pool of anti-vaxers, it might be worth it. And it's actually good example: lot of effort goes into saving even the ones who got infected due to their own stupidity. I did, not all of them, and enjoyed the ones I saw; did not burn the species label into my cortex. I enjoy most of the superhero movies I see, but I'm not driven by an inner urge to view them. Well, I think I saw all X-Men movies, but I definitely didn't read all the comics. However, I though the species name of "Homo Superior" was repeated often enough. Exactly that: there was lot of "marketing" around GPL licence and how it's more free than free, but that was started by GNU. Licence of BSD is the classical free - you can do anything with it. GPL is the "viral" free - you can do anything except selling it. And neither matters, as both Linux and BSD can use most GNU stuff - and they DO. (Note that the GNU project have their own kernel. It's worse than both Linux and BSD - well, actually, theoretically better, but practically slower. And it was nowhere near to being ready when Linux and BSD already were.) I though so as well, but the fact that Canonical completely gave up and adopted systemd shaken my belief a little. There is still resistance, but there is lot of money on systemd side. BSD is not SO focused either. And Linux community fragmentation used to be it's advantage. From evolution standpoint, it makes LOT of sense. It's being tested right now, with the already mentioned systemd. And yes, systemd IS opportunity for BSD. A lot of individual animals will be tame towards a human if raised from young, as often happens with rescues, so there have been semi-tame foxes. But like bobcats, they tend to be skittish, as is fitting for a predator that is also small enough to be prey. Some Russian scientist has been working with foxes in the last couple of decades, investigating the whole notion of taming, and is developing a breed of tame foxes. Interesting. Dogs are eager to please you, the pack alpha, or in extreme cases will challenge you for (pack) dominance. ... I don't think the cases where the dog is thinking he's the alpha of pack are so rare. Yes. We will see. Someone might make them not bite. If russian scientists are working on foxes ... Hmmm ... ok, maybe the global warming won't help them so much. You think? If you've got to have a monitor, don't get one that can eat the dog and your kids. (But it will take a while, they have a low metabolism.) Not sure if "you think" refers to "marketing done" or "3 meters may be too much" These reptiles would likely be worse. I wouldn't mind meeting them in designated place. (ZOO) I don't insist on petting them, though. I like indoor spiders as well. I don't like flies, mosquito and most other stuff which will get inside if you are not careful and open the window with lights on. (The inspiration for naming the Microsoft product is clear.)
  2. Story Monday, May 25, 2020

    Oh, good idea. Would explain why Jay thought of him a Shaggy gross guy. And if he cast the spell as she was leaving, thinking she was out of sight that could explain how she got the spell. What we don't know is how long it takes for a EGS wizard to get a spell. Will just seeing it being cast do it or does it take an amount of setup before hand to get the spell? IMHO it was already said or at least implied that it depends on how difficult the spell is, with simplest spells definitely being possible to learn from single observation.
  3. Story Wednesday, May 27, 2020

    First, I would say that Edward, Noriko and Nanase's mom are only ones who would fit. I think that introducing new character would be weird and anyone else already established sounds unlikely to be there. Finally. Makes lot of sense and I agree she sounds most likely to me. With the additional note that I believe the reason she was there was that it used to be their family's house before Edward and Noriko married. She probably forgot about the mirror before that happened. Four enchantments. I've speculated that the mirror door might be a portal, or a surveillance device. At any rate, it's going to do something no one in the basement expects, maybe as soon as Friday's comic. Four enchantments. Could be both. This I certainly agree with, cus the person who made it had a concern of the door absorbing too much magic, with all that had gone on in the basement over the past year, it's either absorbed lots of magic by now, or has only been absorbing magic since the "not change". of course there may be a proximity factor that only come into play since the door was moved out into the open and has spells casted next to it. There is proximity factor, yes ... but also yes, four enchantments - it's possible the absorbing of magic works but some other part only started working after magic not-a-change. To be honest it does to me as well. But given the massive speculation about it being Nanase's mom, not Tedd's mom I thought I would point out we don't really know enough to make that call. My gut feeling is it's Noriko, but I'm willing to be surprised about it. It's also possible that we will never know because the door is going to do whatever it is it does and there will not be any more explanation about it. The Dan has been known to do that sort of thing before. Really? I would expect that EVENTUALLY we will find out. But can take years. Actually, even from Grace changing her clothes. Noriko is IMHO second possibility and this WOULD make sense ... except I don't believe this happened after Tedd was found to lack magic. Although ... maybe it happened while she was pregnant with Tedd, already knew about it and was preparing for observing him in different context than going to Europe and never return? And isn't pregnancy causing mood swings? BTW, yes it looks mirrored but that MIGHT be art error.
  4. Story Monday, May 25, 2020

    That might be confirmation that even adjusting the parameters of a spell is still using the spell. Tedd may not have seen Susan turn on the machine, but she saw Susan reprogram it. Still leaves open the question of which other spells can be learned when adjusted. Maybe, she was very interested in transformation spells, she may think that Tedd has access to a fair number of them. And she's right. Tedd can give her enormous number of transformation spells. I can see that, however the way Camdin was acting towards Luke indicated to me that he was in some sort of leadership position. Could be I've had too many flaky leaders in my past. As to Camdin being "shaggy gross guy", assuming not a leader, due to making passes at Jay, that fits. Hmmm ... ok, was going to dismiss the possibility she's part of Luke's group, but explained like this it would be possible. Or, well ... ... who do you think BROUGHT those pizzas? I can totally see her delivering pizzas to them and Camdin not being careful enough.
  5. Story Friday, May 8, 2020

    Generally, acting violently without the authorization of the dominant society leads to getting stomped by said society unless you have a large enough faction to elevate it to the level of gang warfare if not civil war. That's usually not that much comforting to people who didn't survived that violent acting. (But, yes, the typical case did involved person with good marketing who happen to obtain large enough faction to elevate it to war which wasn't civil - not even in name.) Think is, people known for having lot of consensual sex with lot of people usually DON'T have that many children, because they use methods to prevent that as part of their marketing. Convincing someone to have child with you is harder than just having sex. Well, ok, there are skill which can get you negative accomplishment on survival. However, it's quite hard: generally, even people so stupid to get mortally wounded by that are generally attempted to be rescued. Oh, and about the aggregate stuff: sure, lot of people protest very loudly against that, but we are still moving in positive direction. So far. Mostly. Yeah, doesn't pretty much everyone on the planet think they're Homo Superior and the rest of us are their Cromagnon cousins? But, please, go ahead and try, it should be amusing to watch. Inevitably, something will succeed us, and to do so, it will have to be superior in some sense. But whatever that is may not be something we intrinsically value. Do you want to say you didn't watched X-Men? Because that was very clear reference to that. We stopped shortly after the acquisition, and it was BECAUSE our managers, who use windows and rarely complain about that, said it became unusable. We switched to Slack. It has support of organizations like Red hat NOW. If in 1994 BSD had better marketing, Red Hat could've been producing BSD. Not sure exactly when it happened, but at some point Linux won over BSD and it was mostly about marketing as technically they were very similar. Well, if Red Hat destroys Linux with SystemD, BSD may get another chance. A cat's niche has some competition, but not a whole lot, and few as appealing. I think foxes fit a similar role, and have a similar appeal, obviously other slightly larger cats as well. Some of the raccoon relatives; the coatimundi was even kept by miners as a pet and called a 'ring-tailed cat', probably because of some similar behaviors, like eating vermin. Small raptors, but you can't let them run around loose or they'll fly away, owls as well. Snakes, but many folks fear them and would not view them as something to have around. A farmer might be more tolerant near the barn. Cats are somewhat aloof and independent, with an ability to do OK feral or semi feral, but they are authentically tame and bond with their owners; evidence EtC. I never heard about people having foxes. Now, I believe it happens, but is probably rare - just like the "larger cats" cases. Cats surely bond with their owners. However, where do you think all those memes like "you don't own cats, cats owns you" are coming from? Lizards don't fill the bill. Lizards and snakes don't bond. I doubt they have the mental capacity. Some species tolerate handling; that's not really the same thing. Lizards I would encounter would not be capable of eating mice. They do eat smaller insect pests, but their metabolism is low, so they don't kill all that many. They are more limited in habitat. You can't let it out and expect it to find it's way home. Larger lizards; iguanas are colorful, and vegetarian, and warm climate, smaller monitors would probably chase and eat mice, but all of the above, warm climate, and have nasty dispositions. All of that said, I will specifically allow skinks and similar lizards around the outside of the house because I know they're harmless, I can teach the kids to recognize then and nor be afraid of them, and they are eating something I don't want. Same with most spiders that have the good sense to stay outdoors. I must admit I don't have that much experience with lizards either (that's why I'm using general "lizards" instead of specifying which exactly), I'm just saying that I can imagine it could work. Yes, it's possible they are all too stupid or have other disadvantages. Note that monitor lizards ARE being used as pets and if their biggest disadvantage is they need warmer climate, well, did you heard about the climate change? (Also, they have marketing already done. It's hard to have anything with cooler name than dragon. Now, 3 meters may be too much, but if someone breeds something smaller and manages to keep it named dragon ...)
  6. NP Saturday, May 23, 2020

    I read CIF3. I got busy on some of his other articles, like the snake oil series. His whole 'Things I won't work with' series is about stuff like this. Still thinks these three are best. I've also had list "what made Azidoazide azide explode" (ending with "And my favourite - ABSOLUTELY NOTHING") ... but can't find it outside of this video ...
  7. NP Tuesday, May 26, 2020

    Speaking about which, what's your opinion on Deadpool? You can get some here. I find plausible that comments we make here also made someone elsewhere. Possibly someone reading it here and stealing the best stuff
  8. NP Saturday, May 23, 2020

    Oh, no doubt you could think of legitimate uses for something that energetic, then as the Nazis found out, it's not worth the risk. Which is sort of what you're saying; not useless exactly, just so impractical that you be a fool to use it. PS: Do you know about the other two? ClF3 and Azidoazide azide?
  9. NP Saturday, May 23, 2020

    While lighting a grill with LOx borders on insanity, maybe even climbs over the fence, LOx has legitimate uses, such as the heavier part of launching the Saturn V to the moon. FOOF, on the other hand, you have to dwell in that yard to even prepare it. (Which I did not know before I read the article. I did not know this was a thing. But in hindsight, it makes some limited sense.) Gotta love that store below the boiling point of liquid nitrogen. Just because you don't know what's something good for doesn't mean it's useless. That said, you probably do need to be crazy to work with it. Or at least to be near it - working with it remotely might be reasonably safe. PS: Do you know about the other two? ClF3 and Azidoazide azide?
  10. Story Friday, May 8, 2020

    There is even one group who tries really hard to evolve that skill. So far, it brought it lot of opportunities to find that violence is not THAT much disdained. Frowned upon, yes, but ... In fact, in modern (western) society, you don't need ANY skill to survive, unless war happens, in which case it's not marketing skill. It can be argued that marketing is useful to propagate your genes, but there is quite big group of people who DO have lot of children and their main skill is to know when to shout "that's racism!". From evolutionary standpoint, maybe less socialism WOULD help ... but, practically, I would prefer to finally get into applying genetic engineering to the old-fashioned "decide who should die" eugenics. "I wannna opt out!" Well, I belong to the group who would be proud to be Homo Superior if it happened to me, but there are apparently lot of people who see it differently. Also, well, Homo Superior would still count as "human" ... 's why I mentioned user reviews. Lack of marketing is also a failure to thrive; how many of Microsoft'sproducts would not be Microsoft products today if they were effectively marketed from the get-go? Well, I guess with proper marketing QDOS could thrive under different company, but I fail to see how that would be a good thing Or let's use Skype for example. Quite popular product with good marketing. It's quality went considerably down after being acquired by Microsoft. On the other hand, I hear argument that Linux is more popular than BSD mainly because it's more catchy name. And while I'm using Linux, I think it's only better because better marketing got it bigger number of programmers. Those tame species also give control over their evolution to us. Look at what that meant for dogs. The success of cats is different case altogether. They did not let themselves be tamed, but found a way how to get most of the advantages anyway. Harder path, more reward. Possibly filled only such space, because any other animal trying would be compared to cats ... and fail. Although ... maybe there is space for some lizard around. There is quite a lot of people having lizards (or snakes, but you can't really have snake on leash ...). It's different enough to not be compared directly, and they are not really that much tamed ... they are not there yet, it's not considered normal for lizards to wander around city the way cats do, but it can happen.
  11. Story Monday, May 25, 2020

    Tedd has to see the spell being cast. She probably has the same mechanism. Actually ... Tedd DID commented about Susan's fairy spell when she just modified it without casting anything. The Rise of Skywalker. At least it had no broom boy. Any reason to see it left? I have better idea: Maybe she wants to trade. Exchange spell for spell. Could be, but we really don't have a good time line on it. I suspect you are right, unless Jay was showing powers while in elementary school. In such case she would already know all Nanase's spells. Well, except guardian form I guess. Hmmmm ... I would think most people who see him often don't make that mistake, but considering this girl likes rumors AND is perfectly possible there is rumor like this AND she doesn't know Tedd herself ...
  12. NP Tuesday, May 26, 2020

    There is some slight movement in the plot direction. In fact, Justin agrees with you! Actually, Justin just said that Susan doesn't need to hurry, because if something bad is going to happen, it will happen five minutes before she gets there no matter how long will she spend optimizing her hair. However, Dan in commentary seem to imply there will be plot soon.
  13. NP Saturday, May 23, 2020

    I've always heard that as "any sufficiently analyzed magic is indistinguishable from science". From Girl Genius. You mean by Agatha Heterodyne. I'm sure you can light it even faster with FOOF. Also, it will probably burn down completely. Along with the grass below it. Now, question is if you find anyone crazy enough to try.
  14. Story Monday, May 25, 2020

    Certainly. It's Tedd she wanted to meet. I'm not sure why would she think Tedd is "her", though. Only two people have this misconception - Arthur and Van. (Most people are under misconception that Tedd is boy. Only few know the truth of him being genderfluid.) Could also be Diane, but yes, from the context it's most likely refers to Tedd. Interesting indeed. And lot of opportunities for her to get more spells if one of them is not careful. Hmmm ... did she already acquired Nanase's hair color spell or would she need to watch Nanase to CAST it and not just have it on her?
  15. NP Saturday, May 23, 2020

    True. Also, seems very unlikely. And, to echo one of the questions about teleporting humans and others, how does the incorporeal magic factor get teleported? Unlike the mind, it does not seem to be an emergent feature of the hardware. In universes where magic exists, mind is rarely just an emergent feature of the hardware. Usually, there is some soul, which is not at material plane at all. Might need to do some catching up when the body is teleported, but probably isn't that big problem as it doesn't seem to be limited in travel by anything. Like ... you know that in some universes Death is supposed to sever the connection between soul and body? I suppose if you teleport the body in such universe, the soul will get the classical "cartoon" moment of "wait what? Where's the body?" then get tugged by the cord and dragged back inside. And, back to the original question, the incorporeal magic factor typically hang on something - on soul, on aura etc - and this would likely be either also teleported or somehow dragged. And the final point: Between Q, Kevin Uxbridge, Prophets, El-Aurians and all those telepaths, do you seriously believe Star Trek universe lacks magic? Sure, it gets technobabbled somehow, but that doesn't mean it doesn't exists. And didn't some episode of VOY specifically involve some race's souls? Also, Vulcan Katra is something as soul. I'm sure they experimentally proved that it is transferred when the body is transported. It wouldn't be logical not to. (Not speaking about the fact that McCoy was certainly transported several times while having Spock Katra inside him.)
  16. Story Monday, May 25, 2020

    Nice to have it confirmed but no surprise, was already assuming that. About the only action by DGB that wouldn't make things worse would be to do a full reverse and instead of hiding everything, give parents and children alike genuine information. They could probably get away with just the bare essentials, as long as they were upfront that "Hey, this is the part we're sure won't make things worse to tell you." I would not rule that out as an action by DGB given that magic isn't on the top secret list of things any more. I think it would be the action by DGB even BEFORE. I mean, sure, Elliot was Tedd's friend, but I think at least during the time Edward was director, DGB would behave similarly with ANY family who's not-yet-adult kid would get powers or be affected by magic in way they can't clean up. And no, kidnapping Ellen was not considered clean-up solution. ... however, specifically in this case, I would suspect DGB would try to steal the whole cult. If she had a benign interest in meeting magic folks, she knows three of them are there. That's not what she wants. She is specifically not open about who and what she is, she is choosing to hide that she is Smoke. Check the face in panel 2. And her complaint? "I'm inconvenienced by the people Tedd chooses to hang out with." Her world revolves around her. An easily solvable difficulty; she could've just asked to meet Tedd. Panel 5 is downright ominous. Look at the background. Her face is downcast, and that's one grim frown. She looks like someone who is hurt by imaginary hurts, like they somehow conspired to inconvenience her. Panel 7 is foreshadowing trouble. I'm not connecting the dots, but she's not saying this in a positive way. Basically, I see, "You stepped on my imaginary puppy, you fiends! I will have my revenge!" I don't see it's about revenge. She's just planning how to use them, possibly to get to Tedd. Agree with the rest however. Seems that since she's a wizard, she either wants to acquire his knowledge and spells, or size up the competition, maybe both. She's wizard and she describes Tedd as wizard. She may not know what the distinction means in EGS universe, but she guessed correctly and she definitely wants to acquire Tedd's spells. From the little we've seen, she seems pretty good, but in EGS a 'wizard' by definition can learn other peoples spells. I don't think the title alone implies a level of skill though. Ashley was described as a wizard. Got to start somewhere. Actually, Ashley was described as exceptionally untalented wizard, implying that USUALLY wizards are more powerful. Still, not every wizard is as powerful as Tedd or agent Wolf, or has as strong ancestry as Nanase. It's possible her parents are not magic users BUT have magic ancestry and when those ancestries met result was wizard. Gee, that would be as unthinkable as say Luke Skywalker being Darth Vader's son, or Rey being the granddaughter of Palpatine. I'm not really married to this theory, but it has potential, especially if Dan keeps on using Jay. Jay wouldn't necessarily know anything about her connection to an Immortal, since they all seem to be shapechangers. ... ok, what movie was Ray being the granddaughter of Palpatine spoiler to? Arthur prefers to keep secret but also consider live he's created responsibility. I think he would tell her more about magic than Nanase's mother to Nanase ... ... and, BTW, Nanase doesn't trust her mother but otherwise ended up quite well. And I'm sure her mother would intervene in some way if Nanase would think of herself as monster and freak. Because she WOULD know. (Also, the answer is "No, you can't trust anyone, I'm glad you understood it so clearly, it's important lesson.") I'm not sure it's everything. Also, maybe they already have the drinks? I would assume you order the pizza to have it fresh and warm, but you can just have cola in fridge. Yes. And in fact, I didn't knew pizza places SELL drinks.
  17. NP Saturday, May 23, 2020

    Also, getting your potion stash to orbital velocity so you can store them there, ... why? With Star Trek technology, why not? On our current level of technology it's costly, yes ...
  18. Story Friday, May 8, 2020

    There are movements to grant 'person' status to some more intelligent critters. Preceded by decades by Heinlein. I guess results of this may influence how many people would insist to be classified as part of human species. Astonishingly, I find myself actually at odds with your assessment. I don't like being being marketed to but by manipulative ad campaigns, so generally also have a negative attitude toward marketing, and I can't see myself in that role, it goes against my grain. But marketing is ubiquitous, everyone markets (or they evaporate), not just businesses. Also, marketing is a source of information. If I am interested in a sale, I want them to handle the marketing well, and honestly. I don't like deceptive marketing, but i don't like deceptive a lot of things. I think a total lack of marketing would be frustrating. It would be difficult to find those brands you like; if they were even brands. And user review as part of marketing, like Steam does, much appreciated. Amazon as well. I like Consumer Reports, but there's so much ground to cover, and they have little resources for many of my interests. With the "mostly", it can still work , but ok, deceptive marketing is negative force. Sure marketing is source of information and if it somehow could be completely removed (which would be naive to think can happen) it would be frustrating. But marketing is not property of product ; if you select product based on it's marketing, it means you ignored how good the product itself is - and there are lot of examples where the product with better marketing is objectively worse. Yeah, I guess docile tamed animals are marketing themselves. Well, their genes are. Docile tamed ... I was talking about cats. Not just my idea, actually. In RPG terms, it was mentioned in nerfnow: Alone, lot of traits cats got recently would be disadvantage. But cat got big advantage due to symbiotic relationship with humans, and now it turns nearly parasitic as the original stuff we needed cats for (protecting our grain storages from rodents) is rarely needed now. From evolution standpoint, best cat is one which is cuddly enough to always get food from humans, but is careful not to end up owned, as that can reduce number of her offspring.
  19. NP Saturday, May 23, 2020

    No, not at all. I hadn't even considered that. Yet. I was implying that if you are already abusing alcohol due to this storyline you will probably need to turn to black market substances when it turns 200 strips. The comic you linked, oh, it was the boobs one. First panel. Oh, that one. True. And evacuating the space station wouldn't be nearly as hard as evacuating some alternative units as stadiums. (Ok, stadiums are usually used as units of surface, not volume ... but still.) Remember it's Susan. She may mean Terok Nor (Deep Space 9). Which has diameter 1,451.82 m but volume is unknown and hard to guess considering DS9's shape. (Meanwhile, Death Star has 160 kilometers in diameter and is mostly sphere so volume will be about 2 144 660 cubic kilometers while ISS has 915.6 m3)
  20. Story Friday, May 8, 2020

    Really? I think we are mostly moving the discussion to more and more different topics ... but ok, I'll try to limit what I answer to as well. What do you propose as a better alternative? That question assumes there IS a better alternative. Specifically for human, the alternative would be to basically count as human anyone who insists on it and has money on lawyers. Is it better? Hard to say. Microsoft is highly adept at marketing. They are not primarily a technological company, they are a marketing firm. I don't have the time to tell you all the things I don't like about Microsoft products. I use them all the time because they are mandated in the workplace. I get paid well to do so. but not because their 'better'. But marketing is indeed a force of software evolution, and many innovative software packages go extinct because they are poorly sold. Hardware as well. Do you doubt that Commodore had a winner in the Amiga? And that only inept handling killed it? It was creating commercials and movie segments when the industry standard pc could barely print a letter. I don't think microsoft IS a technological company. But yes, their marketing is superior. It's just marketing is mostly NEGATIVE force. The product taking advantage from marketing usually isn't different direction of evolution, but basically stagnation, no significant change. On the other hand ... the way cats turned "being attractive to humans" to evolutionary advantage isn't that different from marketing ... Yes ... interesting case indeed. You are not saying so, but you are agreeing. I think it's mostly agreeing but not completely. The various human factions that want to own a piece of this future. Oh, those. Yes, unless someone manages to get monopoly on evolution humans (which would be VERY bad but unfortunately can happen) there will be different factions with different ideas about what goals to pursue ... and which of them would survive IS type of evolution.
  21. NP Saturday, May 23, 2020

    Likely similar ones. In my area, non-essential services have pretty much shut down. But the ABC stores remain open. They understand priorities, man. You mean that the crime shut down? That black market disappeared? On a second read, I find it odd that a space station is being used as a unit of volume. Does she mean the ISS? Doesn't it vary, so you'd have to know what year, and even what is docked, assuming you'd count the connecting tunnel. Why not something more familiar, like a standard shipping container. Also, if you evacuate the space station, reseal it, then open the potion, you could fill it with one. It would be a sparse cloud, though. ... I think I missed something ... second read of what?
  22. Story Friday, May 8, 2020

    You raised the criteria earlier, if you can't breed with it, it's a separate species. Seems unlikely that as we spread and adapt, that we will be able to maintain compatibility. If most of our evolution will be done by nanotechnology and cybernetics, it's not only not going to change who we can breed with, it can actually help even with bridging the changes which WILL be in genes. Assuming we will want to, of course. Also, do you only count natural breeding (and what is considered natural for cybernetic organism?) or also breeding assisted with gene engineers who at that point would likely be able to breed human with can just for the fun? I already mentioned that this definition of species is not reliable. May be completely abandoned in future. You already listed lot of special things. Also, we have big brains (with lot of folds) in those big heads. And, because of such big heads, mother needs bigger ... hips and few other things, and for compatibility also fathers need something exceptionally big compared to other mammals based on body size ... And regarding the running: remember that we have exceptionally little fur. And that's not a mistake: it allows us to run longer without overheating. It's not (just) the distance itself: it's that in African savanna, we can pursue other animal so long they will cook themselves alive due to our superior thermoregulation. There is specific method of programming based on simulated evolution. The rest of those ... sure, there is evolution, but it's not entirely same as the biological one. In biological evolution, windows would be extinct long ago. The criteria are more complicated, and number of individuals hardly matter. (Actually ... for some plants, we already changed their BIOLOGICAL evolution that way. We can decide to change for example which kind of banana we grow, and clone millions of plants from single individual.) Yes, it's still evolution, but some general things said about evolution only apply to the biological one. New model of car may not have anything common with previous model of car from same company, yet it's survival depends on the company a lot. And fashion doesn't evolve, it's almost cyclical. Most of the rules about evolution and survival of fittest work better when you apply them on the companies and not the individual models of car. Cars basically shows a combination of evolution of companies making them and evolution of technology. It is in our nature to fear the unknown. There WILL be resistance to any attempts to evolve human. There already IS, actually. Now, can we completely prevent the evolution? I hope not, because it's definitely looks like bad idea. In a way. My point was that without a randomizing element, the evolution is not going to work correctly. Wait, who's goals?
  23. NP Saturday, May 23, 2020

    I wonder what substances you will be using when the arc goes to second hundred. Plus she likes her long hair. She likes how they look but it's gotten impractical. Also, she specifically wanted to reduce her boobs. It's possible that she only choose short hair because she knows she can make them longer easily, which is not true in canon. Well ... actually, it is, now with her having the wand of her alternative forms, but making them REALLY longer and not just temporary enchantment would be lot of work if she shortened them and she may not like the idea of being enchanted all the time just like Nanase. To conclude, this may be real Susan but with different kind of limitations on her look than in canon. Neither real Susan nor this is showing how would she REALLY like to look. Better argument for this not being Susan would be how sparsely clothed she is, but even that can be explained by her not feeling embarrassed when NPCs are watching her. She DID mentioned that she would like to wear less but finds it embarrassing ... (note that while that is non-canon arc, it's probably still valid in canon just like Hanma is real despite never doing the goonmanji experiment in canon).
  24. NP Thursday, May 21, 2020

    The assumption it's an element may be incorrect. I mean, considering all of the colors ... maybe the default Kryptonite is not the element itself, but it's oxide or more complicated mineral (again, look at sapphire - Be3Al2(SiO3)6), with other variants being different minerals containing the same transuranic element. And what other elements it's mixed with somehow modifies the effect. Maybe the pure metal form is malleable, but also safe for superman. There is precedent: Mercury. Pure metal mercury, while technically toxic, does very little damage before being eliminated from the body. Most of the compounds are much more toxic. Granted, this is mostly because the metal mercury is mostly not absorbed, but there may be different mechanism working similarly for the Kryptonite. Maybe the metal form re-absorbs most of it's radiation, while the various translucent crystals let it out.
  25. Story Friday, May 8, 2020

    Oh, #@%%, yeah; technology is the antithesis of evolution until you consider what makes it possible, then, it's just a branch of the big picture. If we are too stupid to prevent global warming/deflect the next asteroid/not nuke ourselves/survive pandemic/not cause pandemic, that's evolution in action, weeding the flower bed. Although, in the extreme, being the next Venus shuts down evolution, doesn't it? Hard to say, life has survived some major events, and lives in some unlikely extreme environments. I find very likely there is no evolution on Venus. There MIGHT still remain something here even if Earth ends up second Venus because there will be more life here and some may managed to adapt, BUT this is exactly the case of too big step: sometimes, the environment changes too fast for evolution to adapt, in which case evolution may fail. Evolution proved to be very effective way to solve the problem, but is not unstoppable. Sure, you can claim that it's weeding the flower bed, but if nothing remained, it's failure. It is theoretically possible our current form proves to be so great it will survive forever. It's very unlikely, though. Another, completely unrelated question however is if the form which will replace us will consider itself "still human, just with few upgrades" or separate species. I find very likely that sky.NET was not actually capable of replacing us and that after winning the war it would stop evolving and eventually existing. There doesn't seem to be much choice in case of Borg ... also note that Borg DID utilize nanotechnology. Biological evolution works with randomness - it's actually capable of using random mutations to effectively search for better solution and continue. For cybernetic systems, random change which is not fixed is extremely likely to simply destroy the system. Well ... actually, that may not be inherit property of biological versus cybernetic system, more like the biological systems being optimized in way that allows mutation and limit reach of defective mutations (cancer) versus cybernetic system too often having relatively few points of complete failure ... but still: unless someone deliberately designs cybernetic system capable of evolution using random mutation, it's not going to happen. Of course, it's possible someone will. Alternatively, evolution can continue indirectly, with our own opinion having big influence on what feature is considered positive but results eventually being tested for survival in classic way. If we colonize enough planets and won't do the mistake of all using same design (think windows), it can work. If not, well ... maybe there is some life we don't manage to destroy before we got to the point where our shortsightedness, laziness and comfortableness remove us from the evolution race. It should be. Universe is quite big. (Short answer: Yes, such systems can continue to evolve. If we let them.)