#and my brain was just 'what if also scifi'

[lenreli]

Day 10 - “Why are you kneeling?” [AU]

[AO3]

Dream wakes up with a gasp, head aching as he sits up on the bed, which ― “a witch,” a voice says, light and echoey and Dream looks around the room, finding no-one there, only shadows and the light coming in from the window, showing the stars, the closest planet a deep red planet with rings. “What are you doing here?” 

Swallowing, he looks around the room, attuning his senses, a presence in nearby shadows, so he looks to it with a fast-beating heart. “I need vampire hair,” he says, clenching his jaw. “I heard there was one on this station. Even with the trio of suns?” Dream asks, and the voice chuckles. 

“We solved that problem before people started space travelling,” the vampire says, stepping out of the shadows, and Dream almost swallows his tongue, face heating up under the intense stare he can now see. “What do you need the hair for, witch?” 

“To stop someone from finding me,” to his surprise, he answers honestly, feeling almost comforted as the vampire tilts his head, slightly frowning and Dream’s extremely aware of his blood rushing madly, especially ― south, as he stares at the vampire, at the dark brown eyes, the casual clothes, would’ve probably passed him on the station, he seems so ― ordinary. Attractive, but also ordinary. “Witch science said that vampire hair is good for that, making it seem people dead or untrackable with how you,” the vampire raises an eyebrow, “are,” he finishes lamely. 

“A runaway, then, or something like that,” the vampire muses and Dream glares, pursing his lips. “Do I get something in return, if I help?” 

Gaping, Dream goes over the words, expecting more ― resistance. “My blood,” he offers, voice dry, “you are a vampire, after all,” and the vampire’s eyes narrow, giving him a slow once-over that he can feel in his bones. 

“It has been ages since I had a willing human’s blood,” the vampire says, voice an octave lower and Dream suppresses a shiver. Within a breath, the vampire is on top of him, brown eyes gleaming before going to his throat, nose pressing against his pulse and Dream closes his eyes, “synthetic blood can only get you so far,” the man mutters against his throat. “Your name, witch.” 

“Dream,” he says, which is repeated softly against his throat, and Dream bites back a moan, and he hopes the vampire can’t sense how aroused he is. “Yours?” 

“Hob,” the vampire ― Hob, says, and Dream takes a deep breath as fangs scrape against his throat lightly. “Have you heard what vampire bites are like?” Hob purrs against his throat, the press of a sharp fang against his pulse and Dream swallows, already feeling too hot, cock throbbing against his jeans.

“I heard it’s good,” he says, and he smells rich salt, like that time he was near a saltwater ocean. “My blood, and I get a lock of your hair?” Dream asks.

“Oh yes,” Hob whispers, chuckling, “don’t worry, you won’t die,” Dream swallows ― and gasps, a moan getting torn out of him at the sudden pressure, pain against his throat as Hob bites down. Hob takes his arms, putting them around his shoulder, and after the brief agonising pain ― there’s pleasure as Hob feeds from him, like the blood taken is getting replaced by an aphrodisiac, and Dream moans, arching up mindlessly, chasing the growing bliss. 

“You, ah,” he whimpers, throat aching as he tries to speak, and he lets out a rough sound as Hob’s fangs reach deeper inside, and Dream can only hold onto Hob, a hand going to the other’s hair, orgasm practically out of his control as he grinds up against the other’s body, solid and warm. His orgasm continues as Hob feeds from him, stretched out until Hob stops, a tongue licking the stinging wounds, and Dream blinks at the ceiling as he breathes, the recent pain fading.

“I thought witch blood would be more ― witchy,” Hob hums, licking his lips as Hob looks down at him. “You okay there?” The vampire asks, amused as Hob rests his face on his hand, smiling, fangs poking out. 

“Yes,” he scratches, face heating as he’s suddenly aware of the mess inside his pants, and he covers the bite with embarrassment, feeling a light scar. The embarrassment doesn’t lessen as Hob slides off the bed, and ― “why are you kneeling?” Dream asks, alarmed ― and Hob looks up with an eyebrow raised, tugging on a lock of his hair, and ― right. He says a quick spell to take off and preserve the brown hair, putting it in his satchel of ingredients. “Thank you.” 

“Now, Dream,” Hob says brightly, pulling him off the bed with a twirl, “feel free to come by again, but please leave,” Hob says, ushering him out of the room before Dream can say anything in return.

#dc #the sandman #dreamling #dreamling fanfic #dreamling smuly #smuly 2023 #dream x hob #hob x morpheus #hob x dream #writing #not sfw #woke up to talk of vamp!hob/witch!dream in the server #and my brain was just 'what if also scifi' #so yes

[good-beanswrites]

My thoughts on how the Milgram mv machine works based on the evidence we have:

(I know there’s been discussion about where exactly the interrogations take place, but wherever they are,) the prisoners are made to sit in a specific chair near the wall that houses the machine.

It’s ordinarily hidden, but the wall panels shift aside to reveal it when the mechanical sounds play in the dramas. As well as the walls moving, the chair transforms to restrain the prisoner and attach whatever it takes to access their brain. The fact that none of the more frightened prisoners try to run or break it makes it seem like they physically cannot. This is why Fuuta sounds so panicked, and why Amane is suddenly helpless in front of Es in their T1 vds.

(My mind conjures very classic sci-fi mad scientist machines with wires, pipes, lights, nodes, needles, etc, but I’d love to hear how other people visualize it.)

In some vds (maybe all? I’d need to check,) you can hear Es take some steps right before their iconic line -- it would make sense that for safety reasons, the power mechanism is placed across the room. Once again it could be anything, but the sound effect makes me think of one of those giant wall-mounted levers you have to pull down.

The voice dramas don’t really provide the type of crime details that an actual interrogation would reveal, and it’s odd that they’re placed before the extraction rather than after Es gets to see the new details. This leads me to believe the machine functions with priming. All Es needs to do is get them talking about their murder, so it’s on their mind.

The video produced is much like a (non-lucid) dream. Even if the prisoners figure out that this is how it works, they can’t control it just by thinking really hard about something else. The murders produce the strongest emotional affect, and that’s what it picks up on. If someone else used the machine, it would default to whatever gave them the strongest emotional reaction in the ~15 minutes beforehand, hence why Es’ video focuses on their daunting task ahead. (The Undercover theory is still a bit loose, though, given the private shots that Es wouldn't have known about). It’s why the videos are usually closely linked to the vd topics/beats. I also like to think that the reason their prisoner colors appear so much is because they’re looking at those colors on their uniform 24/7.

The bell rings to inform Es that it’s the optimal time to use the machine -- the prisoner has been thinking about things for long enough that the video will be about their crime, and if the conversation lasts much longer they’ll start thinking of other things. It’s at a different time for each prisoner because it’s based on the specific conversation. I guess Jackalope is listening in to the interrogation, timing it perfectly. (The only one that kind of messes with this theory is Yonah, because they just keep talking afterwards lol, but it could just show that the interrogation is still in Es’ control.)

Their “Sing your sins” is the final priming nudge to get them to think of their actions as a sin, revealing their guilt.

Once activated, the prisoner enters a sort of trance/sleeping state. It’s very much like REM sleep, with the machine forcibly activating neurons and recording the output. The prisoners have asked Es what they saw, meaning they don’t remember the mvs. I like to think the prisoners do experience the mv in real time, acting as the major version of themself that appears, but can’t remember it afterwards. It’s when you experience a dream, but as soon as you wake up you’re just left with fleeting emotions and memories right on the tip of your tongue.

The video plays immediately upon extraction -- whether on a huge projection or little screen depends on which room it’s in. It simultaneously saves the memory so that Es can rewatch it later (on those old TVs in the jailbreak mix). The machine downloads the song and video together, but requires special parts to retrieve them. The technology is pretty new and fragile, so if one is broken, there might be a delay between when Es can hear the extracted song and see it with the video. (That’s my justification for Kotoko’s delays -- after 9 prisoners the parts wear out, or maybe Mikoto himself overheats it with his complex situation.)

Based on the lack of conversation we get afterwards, I picture Es leaving before the prisoner wakes from the trance. The machine adjusts their brain back to normal before they awaken, restraints freed and able to return to the rest of the prison.

It’s very much like a dream, so it’s not harmful despite the amnesia/head injuries the prisoners have. It does, however, exhaust them. Brain activity alone takes a lot of energy, so forced brain activity with added emotional strain would cause them to feel pretty drained the rest of the day.

#milgram #👍👍 #if theres anything contradictory please lmk -- this is how ive been taking the evidence we have so i definitely want to rethink things if #theres a mistake #but also i just wanna hear what people have been picturing 🤔 #i mentioned it before but the jailbreak tvs really did shift my brain from sleek tech to clunky old scifi vibes #im also still partial to an idea mentioned a long time ago about the prisoners waking up to catch the last few moments of their mv #and how heartbreaking that can be for some #but i feel like it would make more sense if there was no direct interaction after the extraction since es is overwhelmed with different #reactions (from us) and the prisoners themselves are raw with emotion and fatigue #i like the thought of interrogations occuring in that big courtroom (seen in undercover and now deep cover) #but that room seems way too echo-y for the vds to take place in #and it seems overkill to build every cell with moving panel walls and access to the machine #so the jurys still out on that one #(also hehe im still so excited that my oc fits very nicely into all of this but i kept this post 100% canon compliant) #analysis/thoughts

[chickenoptyrx]

I feel like its taking me a bit to get back into drawing, so please take this dumb blorbo doodle.

As usual idk what they're talkin about, I just enjoy drawin em

#i still *want* to draw dinosaurs #and am #but see. i watch the 1st 2 riddick movies and now a solid 50 - 80 % of my brain power is goin towards thinkin bout how much i love em #even tho theyre goofy dumb B scifi movies #...also i hate what the sequel did to jack. bad. very not good #anyway #my bullshit #no im def not just posting a dumb lil doodle so i can lk talk about the riddick movies in the tags #how dare no one even accuse me of that >:0 #...2nd movie kinda gave him brolys backstory tho. just a little

[clockworkreapers]

What sort of mutations an indigoblood might have? Excluding tails & wings

Since I only answer for Aleph Null as an AU and not canon or anything else I’m guessing that’s what you mean.

Any troll can have any mutation immagenable, none are blood specific because gene mutations are essentially errors in the code that makes up your dna, just like with humans. So it’s kind of anything you can think of tiny or large. The only limit is like a biological one- like your bones can’t just become metal or anything- plus that would be really bad for you tbh. Most mutations are uh not actually all too great when it comes to survival rates anyways…at least when you haven’t evolved to be compatible with said gene mutation.

Also im kinda guessing you’re looking for “acceptable in Alternian society” more over. There are a lot of gene mutations that are acceptable especially ones highbloods can get away with the biggest factor of them though is that it needs to be seen as beneficial to keep in the gene pool. If it can lead to causing problems for your body and well being thats how the empire decides to let you live. That and the thing they have about blood mutations since blood is what their entire social structure is built up on.

Like if you are a highblood that has a psionic gene mutation and you have psionics that’s fine. Rainbow drinker gene mutation? Yeah that’s also fine. It’s when you dip into the castes above you is when it becomes not fine, fins and gills on someone who doesn’t have violet blood is pretty much a cull me on sight sign- why? Easy because the people in power are seadwellers and they don’t want their traits to belong to those blow them, that would make you equal.

#I can’t exactly make a list of valid mutations cuz your dna can mutate in any number of ways #it’s inconceivable how many dif errors you’re genes could fudge #the only thing that matters to the govornment is if the gene fudging is beneficial to it #cuz the gov doesn’t care about actual people let’s be real here #it just cares about itself and what’s good for it #clock does big science brain things (not really) #also I hope we can all agree Alternia still kinda shitty for doing it even tho they would anyways #ah facist scifi societies my beloathed-even if that’s what canon is #alternia #aleph null AU #clock rambles

[frost0wl]

what's wild is that I've never considered myself a scifi enjoyer. I never choose anything for the scifi aspects bc I've always thought I just don't like it as a genre? And yet about 80% of media I've lost my mind about is scifi!!

#if im asked what genre I like I never answer scifi!! and yet!!!! #the x files. the locked tomb. doctor who. all MAJOR fixations #also add hunger games to the list bc those books rewrote my brain chemistry as a teen #i go nuts about time travel/messing with time or parallel universes. so uh #so maybe i've just been lying to myself this whole time and I actually do like scifi. oh shit #mine

[queenerdloser]

me, sharing my personal book tbr wishlist with my family so they don't end up buying me books i already have for christmas: i am going to get a good grade in what kind of books i want to buy which is normal to want and possible to achieve

#liveblogging life #i have over 1k books it's now impossible to tell my family to just get me whatever lmao #but my book wishlist is mostly just for me so when i go to a booksore or w/e and my brain farts i can remember what books i want #but i took a quick look over it and like... took off a couple that i dont necessarily want my fucking mom to know i want to read lol #my reading habits are voracious eclectic and sometimes very weirdly diverse #like. i have classic scifi and also biographies on french revolutionaries #contemporary romcoms and university press examinations of homosocial behaviors in the ancient world #idk man!!! i see a book and i think 'hm that looks like it could provide me with serotonin' and i want to buy it #it's also got like 100+ books on it. sorry 2 my family. #i told my sister all i wanted this christmas was like. a book from my wishlist and she said s/t along the lines of #but you already have so many! #and im like. well. maybe the reason i have so many books is bc. i like books lol #like idg the 'you have so many already!' argument tbh. if i have a lot that proves i obvs like it enough to buy them all so #it's a great idea to get it for me a gift. what's to explain here. #anyway the point is that im weirdly nervous to share this with my family. what if they judge the books i want to buy. i have a REPUTATION.

[two-calicos-in-a-trenchcoat]

You know....

Ive seen star wars....like all the older movies....

But ive retained like no information about them outside of common pop culture references

Like one year on May 4th there was a channel doing a star wars marathon and my dad had it on in the living room all day

And I sat in the living room and watched all of them cuz my best friend at the time was really into star wars

And all I remember about that day is random out of context scenes from the movies and extreme boredom and being so understimulated the entire time that I spent like half of one movie hanging upside down off my couch

So for all intents and purposes I did not watch star wars

#it was the same with lord of the rings #i really tried to get into lord of the rings #but any time ive tried watching the movies my brain just sort of gets bored and nopes out #game of thrones has similar vibes #idk what it is about those 3 franchises that just make my brain go ''NOPE boring. find something else to do'' #like a lot happens in them #some of character studies ive read over from people in the fandoms are interesting #honestly as far as general vibes while watching goes id probably group the harry potter movies in with them #and thats coming from someone who used to be really into harry potter and probably still would be if jkr wasnt a piece of shit #maybe i just dont like fantasy........ #does star wars count as fantasy? like scifi fantasy? is that a thing #i liked the witcher i guess but it was also kind of a drag to watch at times #comedic fantasy is ok

[canmom]

reading Brainwyrms by Alison Rumfitt. it's interesting. clearly part of the post-Topside wave of trans lit, with the same 'plugged in to twitter' energy, but way more British about it. which means most of the allusions are very transparent to me. it's a combo of... hardcore kink driven romance as the main arc, in a near-future setting in which TERFism goes further to the point of outright bombings, and a scifi element with alien brain parasites that it's gradually building towards.

compellingly written, I'll give it that for sure - I lay down to read for a bit and before I knew it I'd read like a third of the book. the main character's disaffected, traumatised air is well observed, and the kink doesn't hold back.

I think my reservation with it so far is that it feels a little too much like a polemic blog post about the way things are going. the MC Frankie is a trans woman with a pregnancy kink who survived a bombing at a GIC and now works in social media moderation - it's all stuff that is blatantly Relevant To The Argument, as it were. it's tricky to criticise it for that because it's like, what you're saying is that it's tightly constructed and thematically consistent and that's bad somehow? but I think I've come to feel that I like fiction to bring me something a little new and unfamiliar.

the chapter I most enjoyed so far was actually a more metaphorical, abstract interlude, in which resistance to fascism is cast as becoming 'one mass of queer flesh, which now grabbed and clawed...'; 'faces locked in kisses until they became one face. the cops would try to pull at this mass, but to no avail'. very 'faggots and their friends between revolutions' stuff.

the chapters which are presented directly as social media posts and articles are also sharply observed. i think a lot of fiction in which the internet features heavily suffers from not understanding the internet very well (Hosoda's Belle for example), but for example the chapter 'Curious Cat' where an anonymous person (blatantly Vanya) is sending messages asking for help with a parasite, and getting rebuffed or misunderstood, and the chapter where Frankie relates a murder of an instagram model by a stalker who posts about it to a reddit community devoted to her, read as very real.

a lot of the story is about responding to a terrifying political situation in sexual terms - a flashback chapter depicting Frankie having sex with some terf's pretentious brother ("with each thrust from him, she thought to herself, I am a traitor, I am a traitor to the cause"), or the preface which jokes about how in another world the author would be writing 'cool horror stories about vampires raping werewolves, ones with no subtext at all'. I prevaricate a little on whether this is a compelling examination of a theme that I do find interesting (the mysterious origins of sexual desire) or just edgy for its own sake.

this is an odd novel for me in some ways because while on one level, this is about people who I could very easily be a single degree of separation from were they real, it's also about a facet of life that is still quite alien to me and in many ways I only know about second hand. I've never been to a kink club (that wasn't in an MMO anyway lol), I'm way too much of a nerdy autist shut-in to know what it's like to be someone who would feel put out if she hadn't had sex in a week. so even before the parasite stuff, it's hard to know how much of Frankie and Vanya's stuff is real, and how much is fantasy. is this really how things go between people? it sounds kinda fun, but unlocking the door this far has already taken years.

when I've read books about the crazy lives that American trans girls supposedly live and interesting sex they're apparently having, they've been at a certain remove, the other side of the Atlantic. and this book feels sort of similar, even though I know it's set right on my doorstep. idk, I've never been good at this.

anyway I don't think I want to write fantasy novels so directly about The Discourse of the day, but it's probably good that someone is. that said, it's hard to parse like... ok, it's titled brainwyrms, and 'brain worms' is a common way of describing an obsessive, cultish idea you receive from the internet.

and like if you look at the newspapers, or twitter trans discourse, you certainly could believe that this country is on a rapid slide to putting us in camps. however, my day to day life has been... it's not without hostility, but the average street harasser isn't doing it because of a Guardian or even Mail article. this country has a subculture of deranged weirdos who hate our guts, and a political class who will happily stoke culture war shit to score points, but most normies I've met don't care one way or another that I'm trans - they might mention a family member or friend they know who's also trans. the day to day conflicts are over way more prosaic shit, the landlord vs tenant forever war, or how the kitchen should be cleaned. which of these windows is more informative of the 'overall' state of affairs? not that a more violent terf cult is a bad premise to write a novel around, but a sense of impending doom is a pretty powerful mechanism to keep you scrolling, right?

like in 20, 40 years - will the terfs really be bombing the Tavistock and banning transness, as Rumfitt imagines in her near-future setting preface? or will they go the way of those newspapers in Thatcher's time who smeared the gay movement, just as they smear us today? of passing political obsessions like 'new atheism'? I don't know the half-life of cult shit.

anyway, time to read the rest of the novel, and see how it handles this brew that it's concocted.

#fiction #sff #novels

[thefreakandthehair]

@eddiemonth prompt, oct 19th: Scifi/tech | Electric Eye - Judas Priest | Bewildered a/n: eddie pov, eddie & dustin friendship, dustin & steve friendship, and an excuse for me to weasel one of my favorite steve headcanons into something. un-betaed because I'm challenging myself to write these in under an hour. read on ao3 + masterpost | tumblr masterlist

After his release from the hospital and the unfortunate news that his trailer had been destroyed, Eddie goes from functionally homeless to having multiple spaces that feel like home. 

He’s been all but adopted by Claudia at this point, an offer extended immediately after hearing the version of the story everyone’s agreed upon— that the ground split open and Eddie nearly ate it pushing Dustin out of the way. It’s not quite the truth, but the theme is the same and anyone who’s willing to sacrifice themself for her son is welcome any time. 

Especially when he’s been called upon to help with Dustin’s science fair project. It’s out of Eddie’s league a bit, the actual science part, but he and his mechanical brain prove helpful. Kinda nice, actually, to use those hotwiring skills for good. 

Of course, it also helps that the government set him and Wayne up in a modest two bedroom house down the road, and that Eddie can practically smell Claudia's cooking when the windows are open. Like Garfield, he’s drawn to the Henderson house with the scent of a fresh lasagna. 

Bellies full and completed project sitting confidently on the kitchen table for tomorrow, they’re watching Star Wars movies in Dustin’s living room, one after another, and he feels just a touch like a traitor. Star Trek will always have his heart and Wayne can never know. 

“How’d you get into Star Wars anyways?” Eddie asks, sprawled across Dustin’s couch. 

“Can you believe Steve actually got me into them?” Dustin replies, curled up on the recliner. 

There’s an infinite number of ways a child might be introduced to the Star Wars franchise— a parent, a trailer before another movie, a carrier pigeon dropping a flier at their fucking feet— and they’re all more believable than Steve Harrington introducing Dustin Henderson to the sci-fi epic. 

“I’m sorry,” Eddie turns with wide eyes and a crooked grin to face Dustin. “What?”

“I know, right? It was uh, okay this is a little embarrassing.” Dustin cuts himself off, justifying some secret Eddie somehow hasn’t been told yet. 

He knows about the Mind Flayer and the Russians, and all the other Dungeons and Dragons lore that’d lived beneath his feet for years. What could possibly be left to make Dustin cringe like that? 

“Oh, do tell.” Eddie raises an eyebrow and gestures with an arm towards the expanse of space between them. “Floor is yours, young Bard. Spin the tale.”

Dustin rolls his eyes and throws popcorn at him. He tries to catch it in his mouth but he’s never been that coordinated. 

“It’s not really a tale. A few years ago, there was this school dance, the Snow Ball. I got all amped up, Steve helped with my hair, and then the night was a total fucking dud. Nancy danced with me which was like, super awesome of her, but I felt like shit after anyways.”

Eddie listens with rapt attention, pissed off that Dustin had such a relatable middle school experience and intrigued at this new sliver of Steve lore. Not that he cares. Obviously. Why would he? The idea of Steve helping Dustin get ready for the Snow Ball doesn’t conjure up words like adorable at all. 

He nods him on. 

“And uh, I called Steve the next day. He came over and we had pizza and he brought some of his favorite movies he thought I’d like. Star Wars had spaceships so obviously, easy choice. And here we are now with Return of the Jedi.” 

Okay, yep, that’s gonna be hard to tamp down the next time he sees Steve. Stomping his ill-advised crush into the ground beneath his Rebooks has been hard enough but now? Motherfucker. 

It’s also not lost on him that Dustin chose these movies today. Eddie feels like he’s stepping into some tradition that doesn’t belong to him, but he can’t squash the kid’s enthusiasm with his own insecurity. 

Instead, Eddie goes for the low hanging fruit.  

“Wow. Gotta tell you man, that’s maybe weirder than finding out about the monsters and shit. Steve’s favorite movie is Return of the Jedi?” 

Dustin snorts and laughs, toothless and free. Happiness isn’t new for Dustin, not anymore, but it’s still nice to see after all they’ve been through. 

“Well, that’s one of them. He always calls it ‘the ones with the teddy bears’, so people assume he means Return of the Jedi. But I know the truth. That dork loves Caravan of Courage.”

Eddie flips through his mental catalog of sci-fi movies and lands on a VHS cover: a couple of humans, a few Ewoks, and something that looks like a machine gun. If he remembers correctly, it has something of a cult following but wasn’t touted as a high point in the series. 

… And it’s Steve’s favorite. The one with the teddy bears. 

“Wait… what?!”

#eddie munson #eddie munson fic #eddie munson fanfic #eddie munson fanfiction #eddie month #eddie month prompts #dustin henderson #steve harrington #steddie #stranger things #stranger things fic #stranger things fanfic #stranger things fanfiction #myblurbs

[iamthekaijuking]

suaropods on earth are the absolute upper limit for land vertebrates, but is it because they have four legs? cause i was working on a scifi spec evo idea where the endoskeletal vertebrate-analogs have eight legs and it got me wondering if it means their sauropod equivalents can be even bigger in a similar earth like gravity

If it was just about leg numbers then land mammals wouldn’t be smaller than the biggest dinosaurs

In reality you need specific evolutionary pressures, circumstances, and unique and efficient anatomy to get big.

For sauropods it was entirely due to their internal anatomy. Sauropods are saurischian dinosaurs, which have hollow bones with internal scaffolding that likely made them stronger than if they were solid, as well as a very extensive respiratory system that included numerous air sacks, many of which ran through their bones. This ultimately allowed saurischian dinosaurs to massively cut back on volume and allow them to cool off easier and have more efficient respiration. There’s things we still don’t know about sauropod anatomy though such as how their circulatory systems combated their sheer verticality. Dinosaurs also have unidirectional respiratory systems, which is more efficient than mammalian two way airflow.

For modern baleen whales it has more to do with the aftermath of the last ice age and how it impacted the location of their food (keep in mind this explanation of the evolution of baleen whale size is based on my current understanding and might not be correct). Baleen whales actually used to be much smaller, around bus size. But during and after the last ice age the ocean currents changed and krill populations became concentrated around the poles. Because of this, baleen whales needed a way to eat as much as possible in one sitting and travel long distances efficiently. The easy solution was to get big, which became easier as their predators the macroraptorial sperm whales and Otodus megalodon gradually went extinct. A thing to note however, is that because they need more resources due to their size, the number of baleen whale species is lower than it was several million years ago. Also also, blue whales are getting bigger.

On earth, 200 tons is more or less the maximum size for animals, as the biggest whales, ichthyosaurs, and sauropods got around that size.

There’s more things to note though:

No, higher oxygen levels don’t make things bigger. Not even bugs. Modern arthropods are actually on average bigger than their Carboniferous counterparts, and the oxygen levels were way higher back then. And griffinflies, very active flying insects, lasted all the way into the Permian, when oxygen levels were lower than in modern day.

It’s important to consider what the bones of animals are made of as well as their structure. Different internal structures can handle stress better, and different materials can handle pressure differently.

Eight legs might be too many, as having more legs, while very stable, can be more energy costly. Two legs might not be able to support as much weight as four, but it is more efficient.

A very big thing animals have to fight with when it comes to size is something called the square cube law. Basically as something gets bigger its volume (insides) increase way faster than its outsides (surface area). If you had a 1 centimeter cube and doubled its size, the surface area would quadruple but the insides would increase eight times. But there are ways of combating this such as decreasing volume with things like air sacks or increasing surface area by being very wrinkly (that’s how human brains fit so many neurons!). And because things with a metabolism generate heat, big animals have to combat overheating because they have a lot of insides. That’s why elephants have such big vascularized ears and why their skin acts like a sponge to soak up water.

Also I have no idea how perucetus got so big, that glorious fatass

#ask #questions #anon #anonymous #biology #paleontology #palaeoblr #speculative evolution #speculative biology #speculative anatomy #speculative zoology

[kvalenagle]

Creature Fantasy Writing Tips #1 Sentient and Sapient are Different Words (and You Probably Mean Sapient).

There aren't a lot of resources devoted to writing creature fantasy, animal fiction, xenofiction, or similar human-free works, and I thought I'd help out a little by offering a few tips. My goal here isn't to judge or tell you that you're doing it wrong, but instead, I'd like to help you avoid a few pitfalls or give you more options as a writer. I'm also writing these after my brain is fried from getting my novel work done for the day, so hopefully this'll be coherent and fairly typo-free. With that in mind, here's your first tip. Sentience implies an awareness of self as an organism, while sapience implies wisdom, creativity, and near-ish human levels of intelligence. I think what throws people here is all those scifi documentaries about the "search for sentient life" in the cosmos. That phrase doesn't mean they're searching for little grey men with UFOs, it means they're searching for life larger than single-celled organisms.

If you sit outside reading this, turn around, and see that a squirrel has stolen your lunch, it is accurate for you to say "my sandwich was stolen by sentient squirrels." But if the squirrel shouts insults at you, came up with an elaborate plan to steal your sandwich, and this is part of the squirrel's four-year-plan to control sandwiches in your city, the squirrel is sapient. (It's also sentient, but since all squirrels as we know them are sentient, it'd be redundant to mention that.)

"So how far down do you have to go before life stops being sentient?" I've seen studies on sentience in beetles, so I'd assume below insects.

"Wait, but then.... where is the line between sentience and sapience?" This is a little tougher. Are crows, dolphins, gorillas, or whales sapient? It's a topic for debate, and rather than give you an answer, you can use those as an example of what the line looks like in your own writing.

This distinction can feel a bit pedantic, especially when your favorite scifi and fantasy writers are probably getting it wrong all the time. The thing about creature fantasy fans, though, is that they're here for sapient non-human protagonists, and they know the distinction. You will get angry letters if you mix these up.

That said... if you are writing sentient xenofiction, that's okay! Your audience may be smaller, but a book like Raptor Red by Dr. Robert T. Bakker was immensely popular and influential despite having just a normal Utahraptor as the protagonist. Depending on how you write them, you may get some claims that you're anthropomorphizing your characters. Maybe you want that, maybe you don't. That's entirely up to you. We'll talk about anthropomorphism and disanthropomorphism later on.

That's it for tip #1 =] Just a simple pitfall that writers find themselves in. I apologize ahead of time as you're going to see a lot of non-creature scifi/fantasy fans and authors say sentient when they mean sapient, and it's going to start to irk you as you fix it in your own writing. Just remember to be kind =] Unless you're in a situation where the difference matters, it's probably best to let it slide if someone uses sentience where they mean sapience. If anyone has any questions about how creature fantasy, xenofiction, furry fiction, or animal fantasy differs from other genres, feel free to ask any questions, and I'll try to answer them.

#creature fantasy #xenofiction #animal fiction #animal fantasy #paleofiction #sentience #sapience #furry

[epitomereally]

Celestial Navigation by @sabrecmc

18 year old Omega!Tony finds himself Bonded to Captain Steve Rogers. He isn't happy about it until he is.

An absolutely gorgeous story of learning to love yourself, even when you feel like you don't fit in & that you grew up wrong. I'm so happy to have gotten to bind this mammoth work for Sabre & as a gift exchange for @mourningmountainsbindery (who bound me this beautiful copy of Astolat's Let the River Run—JUST LOOK AT THAT COVER!).

Also to anyone who has @ed me lately (looking at u, em @powerful-owl & tacky @tackytigerfic particularly) & I've been derelict in responding, here is WHY.

This has been the longest binding project I've undertaken, both in page count and in time. My original message to Sabre was on March 16th—can't decide if I want to use the laughing or crying emoji here—and the colophon says I made the book in April 2023 (which was when I started typesetting, maybe). I had been randomly perusing dying videos on Youtube in bed on a Saturday morning, as one does, and came across a video showing how to spiral tie-dye. I IMMEDIATELY had a design premonition of the full design for this fic as a two-volume set, planted into my brain wholesale by the binding gods. I learned many new techniques throughout the process (edge painting, edge trimming/sanding, tie-dying/dyepainting, embroidery, typesetting meta from tumblr which copy-pastes with the worst goddamn formatting in the world, kill me now). Overall, alternately extremely painful & wonderful, and I'm extremely proud of this set.

Design-wise, I went whole-hog with the scifi stars theme. Endpapers are recolored versions of the star charts from the Apollo 11 mission:

Title page & chapter titles are both rips in the galaxy:

Epigraphs both star-themed:

Some more glamor shots because I'm so proud 💕

8.6 lbs // 3.8 kgs worth of books (~3000 total pages) 🥰

Celestial Navigation is also INCREDIBLY popular, and Sabre has been incredibly generous answering asks on her tumblr + writing additional one-shots in the universe. There is also a veritable volume of fanart. I was so inspired by seeing @robins-egg-bindery copy of ********, with its appendix of fanart & meta, that I promptly copied them.

fanart redacted because lots of the artists are no longer active on tumblr but just know i am ECSTATIC about the amount of art in these books

Lastly, I love how @clovenhoofbindery includes their 'Illustrator mess' with their bind posts, as a behind-the-scenes look into the wild process of designing these books. I don't actually have an Illustrator mess for this book (the chapter titles & title page pretty much came in one take), but I do have a DYING MESS. It took me sososo many tries to figure out how to get the dye to look how I imagined in my head. I ended up 'dye painting' instead of tie-dying in the end, but my inbox is always open to chat hand-dying/tie-dying/dyepainting (or what I did differently between any of these attempts). Numbers are the dying attempt.

Last process shot: I hand-dyed variegated linen thread to match the colors of the bind, which ends up being incredibly difficult to see on the finished bind, but was super fun while I was sewing!

Materials:

Body font: Kepler

Title font: Compaq 1982

Chapter number font: aliens & cows

Endpapers: recolored versions of the star chart used by Michael Collins during the Apollo 11 mission (archived at The Smithsonian)

Bookcloth: dyed using Dharma Trading Procion Fiber-Reactive Dyes

Title page and chapter headers: designed in Photoshop using the Ultimate Space brush pack by jeffrettalyn on DeviantArt

Metallic embroidery thread: Cosmo Nishikiito thread

I would dye for this embroidery thread. It is LIGHT YEARS better than the classic metallic embroidery thread from DMC: much easier to work with & much more sparkly. Literally so eye-catching; it truly doesn't translate to photos.

Paint for edges: Daniel Smith watercolor tubes in Iridescent Sunstone and Prussian Blue

Note: these are GORGEOUS watercolors. The color is so saturated and strong and beautiful BUT I don't think I'd recommend watercolors for edge painting. They went on very differently depending on the grit of the sandpaper I used for the edges + they sometimes bled into the pages + they had to be set with fixative, which then stuck the pages together.

#blood sweat and TEARS into this bind #and now it is DONE my god #stony #stony fanart #celestial navigation #my fanbinding #posts i actually wrote

[do-you-have-a-flag]

sorry to come back to this but this truly fascinates and concerns me for so many reasons

obligatory "Ah sweet. Man-made horrors beyond my comprehension." comment

so first of all: brain organoids. which are grown from human stem cells into just little brains with underdeveloped eyes, they have a lifespan of about 100 days because they are an organ without a system.

these brain organoids are something that have a lot of potential when it comes to studying any number of things. just off the top of my head i would think- the process of human development, disease studies, healing tissue development, foetal and premature development of consciousness, ect ect ect i'm not informed on this type of research so i will freely admit idk.

and they are using 16 at a time as processors with computer chips. okay sure, scifi aside, the structure of an organ being used for it's complexity compared to the limitations of material and efficiency in current technology makes sense. if it helps imagine if a branch or a kidney were hooked up to a computer chip and we found out that it worked as good or better than mechanical processors for a fraction of the energy use. i am also not informed on how most technology works, please keep in mind, but i am also not opposed to the idea of combining these types of technologies in theory. and the biggest downfall currently is short shelf-life of the organoids required.

but the thing is, i think, that this is specifically an early development of a brain, at what point is consciousness defined? there is no sensory system beyond the basic light perception of the eyes and the input to the brain but at what point is the responses automatic and at what point is it complex enough to be aware in some abstract way. this question is one that can be applied to any form of animal of course.... but i think also that it is strange that these organoids are being specifically developed from human stem cells and not any number of other animal as a brain is a brain and at the small scale they are growing these organoids most of the speculative benefits of human logic are irrelevant- they are operating at pre mature infant levels which could just as easily be achieved by any number of apes cells surely?

is there going to be a developmental cut off for these organoids? at what point of biological development is the ethical ick factor for consciousness? because of how stem cells are able to be harvested in a non destructive fashion things like lab grown meat make sense to me- those are consumed but can also offset the requirements for the meat industry- and if these organoids are also grown from stem cells that's great but at what point is making that many to be burnt through as processors a wasteful use when there are other possible avenues of study? the wide commercial release of such experimental tech seems a little risky considering how quickly new technologies are exploited- just look at bitcoin farms and ai scraping- for the sake of profit with no care for ethical implementation or construction or impact.

this is a weird post from me but sorry i just have some questions i want you the person reading this to think about with me, seperate to any deep reading of the science because i wanna focus on the personal reaction to the concepts, (feel free to read the science tho i encourage it) just something to chew on i'm not expecting any philosophically concrete answers:

would you use the brain organoid processor tech if you had the chance?

why?

Why is it important that these have to be grown from human stem cells

where is the line between organ and being/consciousness

let's contend: there is the world (physical) and there is the senses (contact with the physical) and there is the experience (interpretation)

is it the senses or the experience that makes a creature conscious? how complex do the senses need to be before the experience is positive or negative?

where is that experiencial definition? is it as simple as feels good feels bad?

is it the tendency to circulate repeatedly on the same neural pathway? how are those neurological reactions controlled? are they controlled?

how do you feel about scientific testing on humans?

how do you feel about scientific testing on animals?

how do you feel about scientific testing on plants?

how do you feel about scientific testing on fungi?

how do you feel about scientific testing on single celled organisms?

how do you feel about scientific testing on organs?

how do you feel about scientific testing on technology?

what do you consider the line to be for ethical research? is it funding? is it theory versus practice? is it use of information? is it method of data collection? is it intent? is it implementation? is it within a limitation of precedent? is it within a limitation of subject? are there areas you think should be left alone on principle? why?

what level of complexity is required for the question of consent of participant?

where should limitations be imposed on use? why would limitations be necessary? who has the right to information? who has the right to profit?

Who is profiting from these studies? where will this technology be used? who is competing with this technology? what other technologies might this impact? will other technologies using the same concept adhere to the same limitations/ethics?

do you think everyone using the brain organoid based processors for $500pcm are thinking about these questions? should they have to?

disclaimer: i am uneducated and uninformed in the fields of science and technology so this is one hundo percent a personal response to information i have very little context for. But i also think it's important to think actively about technology and avoid complacency about the way it impacts our lives so doing little thought exercises in response to articles like this is, I think, a good thing.

[nixite117]

Worldbuilding Brainstorm???

in most scifi settings, there is either a common language or some sort of technology that translates languages.

I like the second one and here’s why:

A common language is too easy. Since everyone knows the same language, everyone speaks with the same grammar structure and similar speech patterns. Sure, everyone has accents and some don’t ever evolve past “broken” common, but a single verbal language isn’t exactly… plausible… to every species.

Think of it like this: birds mimic spoken words and sounds, but rarely ever sound real. Same with ai voices. Sure you can get pretty close, but unless you carefully map out each little inflection in tone and pitch, an ai voice will mess up in inhuman ways. Because it’s not human.

Humans also mimic sounds, but it takes years of practice to make those sounds truly believable because our vocal cords simply aren’t designed to meow and chirp.

So who’s to say every alien creature is physically capable of making the sounds required to speak the common language? That’s awfully presumptuous >;P imagine if humans met aliens and the aliens all speak in a squelching, squeaking and chirping warble? What if they sounded like bears or birds? Many humans have trouble mimicking OTHER HUMANS, even if it’s just an accent. How would we be able to learn a language we physically cannot replicate?

A common language makes more sense for a newly blooming galaxy, one that hasn’t truly connected so much as made contact with each other. As a larger variety of creatures join the stars, however, it simply becomes implausible to continue relying on a “common” language. So they do what everyone in a scifi genre does best! They make technology.

Depending on how far along the timeline you have your story going, the complexity and variety of translation technology would vary. The earliest translation devices would be handheld or digital, and would be limited to simple sentences like our modern translators. The translation would be word to word like google translate, and the only languages available would be the main ones of each planet (for earth, it would be English).

But as technology advances, you go from handheld devices like tablets to headsets and microphones that automatically translate what you say and play it through a speaker. Then the headsets turn into visors and eventually you have a brain implant. Perhaps they work for any species, perhaps they don’t. In my universe, chip translators process any language for you and transmit that information to your brain rather than play it out on a speaker or give you text to read.

The reason I like this distinction is because a brain chip that processes language for you would be a WILD experience for me. You’d be able to hear the things the other person is saying, the exact way they’re saying it, but you’d be comprehending that shit in YOUR OWN LANGUAGE. SHITS CRAZY MAN!

Imagine hearing someone speak Latin, never having known a word of it, but understanding exactly what they want even though you couldn’t translate it word for word. That would be so fuckin trippy.

You could even go further by applying non verbal languages. Of course with any surgery, this would have risks and complications should your translator get damaged, but imagine the possibilities!

Technology isn’t perfect, so obviously it will sometimes be unable to figure out what that person is actually saying. For example, in English, we often repeat things to accentuate the point and make sure people understand what is important. Perhaps some species of alien don’t understand this, leading to confusion and maybe even misunderstandings.

“I have to get this done. I have to.”

“Have to what?”

“Didn’t you hear what I just said?”

“Of course I did! What else do you have to do?”

The thing about this, however, is that verbal language isn’t universal. In fact, most expression from species to species would be different. Each species might have different body language. Different emotional expressions. Different stress responses. Different displays of affection.

This would make room for a lot of things to be learned about humans. I have a handful of little fluff drabbles and humor I came up with on this concept. I just have a feeling there’d be some things aliens just wouldn’t be prepared to deal with about humans and vice versa.

#writing inspiration #science fiction #i just love the humans are space orcs trope #sci fi writing #original post #sci fi shitpost #writing #humans are space orcs

[hjeojeo]

Previous reblogged post (link) (quick summary: people online in creative communities don't interact with each other as they used to, don't share their thoughts and feelings of what art makes them feel, everything is content fodder they reflexively scroll through)

And this post on twitter (link) (quick summary of this video: someone expresses they always feel overwhelmed by messages, and someone else explains humans can't handle being available 24/7 bc this social change was only within the last 20 years so the current social expectation of prompt response is impossible, humans haven't evolved fast enough to handle this kind of stress)

Got me thinking about how everything really is backwards to what would help nurture a genuine community.

We're both too present and demanding of others' presence in the arbitrary ways, but also not present enough with the actual parts that matter like vulnerability with sharing yer thoughts to someone else.

I know that we all know that it's cause of capitalism, but i feel like there are some things we collectively could do about it instead of waiting for capitalism to eventually crumble.

I know that for myself it helped a lot to budget my time online, bc i know my brain can only take so much info before it's just stuck in scroll mode without processing anything (gotta accept that yeah yer gonna miss like 99% of what's going on, but you'llbe able to process yer 1% of what you experience better imo). And i try to remind myself to not just anger respond to ppl when theyre weird/rude to me bc ppl Get a certain way online when they can't experience the irl experience of a whole ass person in front of them (i just ignore those ppl tho bc i don't have the patience or energy to try to interact with those rank vibes).

I think the hardest part is being vulnerable and talking to ppl openly, but i can't tell if that's cause of growing up in an abusive home or bc internet social atmospheres have become so stagnant and moldy, probably both; but i am trying to put some active effort into being more vulnerable and genuine as often as i can even tho i gotta do it with gritted teeth sometimes

Truly, current day is the scifi dystopia of surveillance state government, weirdest social expectations and norms, active modern colonialism and genocides, slavery reskinned as prison system, and probably more I can't remmeber at top of my head.

But i guess like those scifi dystopia genres, all the individual can do is collective efforts as a community, and also fight tooth and nail to nurture yer humanity and human experience...starting with seeing past the usernames and profiles to the actual human being that sits behind the screen..

Cause if you start there, it may naturally lead to the actions that you might want to do but feel that you can't- like showing up for other people/community/people in need/etc, i think when yer in a frozen state everything will feel impossible to you, but i think if you get moving it'll slowly become more obvious to you what the next steps can be, and then i guess that's how you gradually become the person you want to be (you never start off knowing yer full path, sometimes you don't even know yer next step, but you might have some inkling of a thougut of what to try that might help you get information for the next step)

Hm...Idk i have bad habit of trying to neatly summarize stuff for my small brain, this is all stuff for me to digest in the long term

#personal rambling #long post #is this a long post i cant tell im on mobile

[assiraphales]

i just finished tlou and i just. cannot turn my brain out thruout. im in medicine and the medical stuff keeps killing my immersion bc like there ARE cleaning agents that can kill fungi and spores. they can come in aerosol canisters that u can just set off in a room. like throw a couple of those in the kc sewers and ur good. antifungals would stop the fungus cell walls growing. like i’m not saying it wouldn’t have been ugly but if someone stopped and rubbed 2 braincells together it couldve been fine also there is no way in hell that the cure would have worked IF they were even right about the mechanism of action because it was entirely conjecture its not like anyone bothered to check!!!!!! i know its scifi ish but oh my god

everyone was so busy with in fighting / rebellions / power / controlling the masses that no one spent any time dealing with what should have been the biggest issue — the infected. because they were manageable! they had a ton of weakness from fire to head wounds to like you said. cleaning agents that work against fungus. there should have been task forces whose job was hunting down and taking care of infected, or scouting out their locations, or trapping large herds of them in buildings and then bombing the buildings. creating defendable towns outside of cities bc it’s so much easier for infected to hide there, and the infrastructure was crumbling. it’s like besties pls sit down for a second and think about this

#the last of us #tlou