sacred
kest
world with:
>i realized, last week, while finishing neil gaiman's latest novel, just
>why i failed. it's no astounding revelation. it's something that any
>'authorship for dummies' instructional will tell you on the book jacket.
>don't even need to read the first chapter. no matter what i do, i
>cannot write about characters that people can care about. i can only
>write about me.
>
That's kind of the point, you know. Write what you know and all that. All
novels are really autobiographies in one way or another. They're also all
about people you know. The guy at the deli, your roommate, the kid you knew
in second grade. So now that you've figured this out, are you writing
again?
k
Calhoun
> >why i failed. it's no astounding revelation. it's something that any
> >'authorship for dummies' instructional will tell you on the book jacket.
> >don't even need to read the first chapter. no matter what i do, i
> >cannot write about characters that people can care about. i can only
> >write about me.
> >
That's something I fight with alot. And as was said, you can only
write about what you know. What I normally do is I just freewrite out
my ideas until the "me" in the characters evolve into their own
entity. That way I still retain some relation to my character but I
do not make myself the hero/villian/whatnot.
Keep writing..
Calhoun
zcatcurious
> >cannot write about characters that people can care about. i can only
> >write about me.
> >
>
> That's kind of the point, you know. Write what you know and all that. All
> novels are really autobiographies in one way or another. They're also all
> about people you know. The guy at the deli, your roommate, the kid you knew
> in second grade.
...and then there's the idea that you should write about yourself,
because it will be new and different and interesting. or that you
should write pure invention, nothing you know at all, for the same
reason. but plans and purposes and inspirations abound, and none of
them are gauranteed. good writers go unnoticed for decades, even for
their whole lives. bad ones get published all the time. who are you
writing for, anyways? a lot of (IMO) the best stuff has come from
people who were writing for themselves. and whenever i feel
despondent about my own ability, i head down to a bookshop or library
and check out all the utter trash that manages to be published. i can
at least do better than them
-zcatunpublished
Tiny Human Ferret
>
> In article <91376C415ke...@207.217.77.21>,
> ke...@spamfree.nettrip.org (kest) wrote:
>
> > All novels are really autobiographies in one way or another.
>
Actually, they're not, not if it's writing of quality.
To quote almost every author who's come under this particular criticism, but
commonly attributed to Stephen King: "the technical term for people who
believe that writers really are about what they write about is 'idiots'".
Autobiographical elements may creep in; for instance, one might work events
that have happened to one's self into the story, or one might include
interesting tales one's had from others into the fabric of the story.
However: particularly in stories of the fantastic, or of science-fiction,
autobiography simply isn't what it's about. For instance, "idiots" (see
above) have claimed that because I wrote a novel in which both vampires and
spies (not to mention AI weapons-systems) figure prominently, that I am
either a spy or a vampire. Now, I could as easily come back with something
to the effect of "by the same logic I am also likely to be an AI
weapons-system". Okay, I admit it, I am a six-legged telefactor equipped
with compact fusion and armed with a superconducting railgun, running
JIT-compiled self-aware and self-metaprogramming JAVA code downloaded from
an escaped distributed AI executing on compromised supercomputers.
Autobiography my ass.
The only sort of writing that is truly autobiographical is the
autobiography.
And I have to repeat myself regarding surrealism necessarily injected into
literature, from the "klaatu_FAQ.html":
"Deconstructing Surrealism to show that the artist is mad [through the
mistaken theory that "all writing is autobiographical"], in-general (and
often by the Surrealist's design) only proves the Deconstructionist to be a
fool on a fool's errand."
>
> > So now that you've figured this out, are you writing again?
>
> nope. i'm thinking about it, but not doing it.
>
> as i said, i can't write interesting characters, i can only write me.
Look, I'm at a point where generally-speaking I am not writing fiction right
now. Why? Oh, I can write myself with no problem, it's just that most people
probably wouldn't be interested in reading about the non-adventures of a
pompous ass. I could write believable other people if I placed them in
situations which were they were far removed from present social structures.
However, the writing that I feel I do best is very near-term SF, but I've
been so estranged from almost all elements of society for so long that I
really don't think I could do realistic social interaction nor realistically
depict society. The easiest thing for me to write right now _would_ be close
to autobiographical, that being a surrealist satire of the "alien visitor"
variety.
Characters don't need to be interesting; if you take incredibly "average"
people and put them in situations which are interesting, those incredibly
average people will do interesting things, or if they don't, you can write
interesting demises or comeuppances for them. The difficulty is generally
coming up with an interesting situation, an interesting set of conflicts,
and finding some way to get these incredibly-average products of their
incredibly average formers lives, into those interesting situations in a way
which doesn't exceed the reader's willing suspension of disbelief.
The truly difficult thing to do is to write a character which is more
intelligent than the author; in your case, that would take some doing.
>
> --nightshade--
--
Whom thou'st vex'd waxeth wroth: Meow. <-----> http://earthops.net/klaatu/
kest
world with:
>In article <91376C415ke...@207.217.77.21>,
> ke...@spamfree.nettrip.org (kest) wrote:
>
>> So now that you've figured this out, are you writing again?
>
>nope. i'm thinking about it, but not doing it.
>
*cough* darkarts-...@topica.com </listplug>
>as i said, i can't write interesting characters, i can only write me.
And I bet you think you're dull and boring.
k
--
Sound and Fury [TM]
kest
>
>> In article <91376C415ke...@207.217.77.21>,
>> ke...@spamfree.nettrip.org (kest) wrote:
>>
>> > All novels are really autobiographies in one way or another.
>>
>science-fiction, autobiography simply isn't what it's about. For
I didn't say it was it what it was *about*. I said that's what they *are*.
Writers don't write from a vacuum, you know. It may not be 'let's spell my
life out in excruciating detail', but quite frequently that princess that
fights the dragons has two character traits from your girlfriend and that
way of tossing her head came from the lady on the bus and the dragon is,
little known to the reader, based on that really bad day you had last
spring. And if that's not autobiographical, I don't know what is.
Tiny Human Ferret
Stated that way, you can _almost_ get away with calling it
autobiographical... but not quite.
If you said "elements drawn from the life experience of the author
inevitably find depiction or representation within the works" that would be
accurate enough.
However, the sloppy phrase you've been throwing around, "all writing is
autobiographical" (or something quite similar), is incredibly sloppy beyond
mere slop. Some folks however, will simply seize on it as a truism. And from
the casual acceptance of this exceptionally flawed truism, they may very
well come up with the common wisdom (a.k.a "idiocy") that "since the work is
autobiographical, from this work we learn such-and-such about the author".
This sort of deconstruction _is_ possible to a limited degree, to _experts_.
Yet due to the prevalence of the meme, there are people who simply don't
know squat who think that because they've read this-or-that or even all of
an author's work, that they know everything about the author, their origins,
their creative influences, etc etc. And such people are the sources of the
worst-imaginable sorts of fan-mail and fandom, or may be the most bitter
critics of the author, rather than of the author's work.
Are we clear on the difference between "elements drawn from the life
experience of the author inevitably find depiction or representation within
the works", and, "all writing is inherently autobiographical"?
>
> k
>
> --
> Sound and Fury [TM]
Signifying?
zcatcurious
> the dragon is,
> little known to the reader, based on that really bad day you had last
> spring
or high-school maths teacher, methinks
-zcatlitstudent
kest
>If you said "elements drawn from the life experience of the author
>inevitably find depiction or representation within the works" that would
>be accurate enough.
>
Yeah, but that takes too long to say. :P I suppose it all depends on what
you mean when you say 'autobiographical.'
>beyond mere slop. Some folks however, will simply seize on it as a
>truism. And from the casual acceptance of this exceptionally flawed
>truism, they may very well come up with the common wisdom (a.k.a
>"idiocy") that "since the work is autobiographical, from this work we
>learn such-and-such about the author". This sort of deconstruction _is_
Other folks' idiocy is hardly my problem.
zcatcurious
> In article <3BC74C45...@clark.net>,
> Tiny Human Ferret <kla...@clark.net> wrote:
>
> > Characters don't need to be interesting; if you take incredibly "average"
> > people and put them in situations which are interesting, those incredibly
> > average people will do interesting things,
>
>
> i cannot do situational very well. i'm an internalist.
Joyce. Beckett.
> besides which, it's cruel to put common characters in bizarre situations.
>
> what a horrible thing to do to some poor, unsuspecting person; to turn
> their world upside down just to watch them flail.
Joyce; ordinary people in ordinary situations
> > The truly difficult thing to do is to write a character which is more
> > intelligent than the author;
>
> actually, i've tried that.
>
> it didn't work out too well;
> the character just ended up loathing me.
but that's good! the character developed a personality of its own!
you've done it now, though; we're just going to keep bludgeoning you
until you give in and write something
;)
Tiny Human Ferret
>
> > > In article <91376C415ke...@207.217.77.21>,
> > > ke...@spamfree.nettrip.org (kest) wrote:
>
> > > > All novels are really autobiographies in one way or another.
>
> > autobiography simply isn't what it's about. For instance, "idiots" (see
> > above) have claimed that because I wrote a novel in which both vampires and
> > spies (not to mention AI weapons-systems) figure prominently, that I am
> > either a spy or a vampire.
>
>
> there are autobiographical elements to all writing. you write from
> experience.
Yeah right, are you really ready to believe that I have vampires or spies in
my reality? Hey I _live_ in DC, I am not a _part_ of DC. "just another
fucking observer."
> you write from your own desires. you may not be a spy or a
> vampire, but you choose vampires and spies for a reason. perhaps
> vampires symbolize to you creatures who are apart from their world, not
> able to take full part in it. perhaps they are romantic in this, and in
> their sad damnation. they are persecuted, and hunted. and spies may
> represent those who control their situations with finesse, though are
> still tragically secluded.
Frankly, so far as I can tell, the only difference between spies and
vampires that I've ever been able to discern is that there's a slight
possibility that the vampires might get over their inherent sociopathy. Plus
they tend to live longer, at least within the literature. Related issues?
who can tell. Maybe that's what I was trying to explore. But enough about my
pathetic attempts to write anything of value.
>
> or maybe they mean something else entirely. the point is, you chose
> spies and vampires not because you are the UnDead 007, but because they
> represent something of you, something you fear, or embody ideals to
> which you aspire.
Heh, both, and neither. Let's just say that it's all being done and done
much better on "Dark Angel". Be kind to your neighbors, even though they be
transgenic chimerae, okay?
To tell the truth, I chose spies and vampires because those were the only
paradigms within which the then-present affairs of DC and the transnational
community were understandable by me. And thus I wrote a novel length parable
which couldn't possibly be understood by anyone who wasn't in and about the
scene at the time.
But the point here is you.
Look, I'm like one of those teen wunderkind coders who invent entire
programming languages between the ages of 16 and 19, and thereafter remain
basically competent within their own inventions but are both incapable of
creating anything new or learning to cope outside their own fields. I've
done my thing and am reduced to badly typing to UseNet; when I am done with
UseNet I will with all assurance never be heard from again in this or in any
other life. I'm a truly sad case: whatever creativity I might ever have had
has been reduced to essayistry.
For you, as near as I can tell, essayistry is just you warming up. Therefor,
I do pray you will go forth and kick ass, take names, and generally whup up
on all comers. I think you doubt yourself too much. If I've got you pegged
remotely into the right place on the board, you're just opening up your
talents and my advice to you would be to take advantage of your tendency to
be a keen observer and a mopey philosopher, and also to take advantage of
your ability to thrive in solitude rather than to suffer from isolation. So
as much as we'll miss you, get outta here and go knock off a novelette or
two.
And BTW... doing horrible things to real people is cruel. Doing horrible
things to poor inoffensive characters in novels is "making things
interesting".
If you can feel the suffering of your characters as if they were real
people, that is probably the highest recommendation to the calling of being
a novelist. Ask Ms Brite, I suspect she'd tell you much the same. So
probably would any writer. Empathy sells. It may be all that does sell.
--klaatu, NP: Banarama "Venus.mp3" for no particular reason other than
that's where my mouse clicked.
>
> --nightshade--
>
> --
> --nightshade--
> 'whoever said it was a small world
> was either a liar or a fool' --concrete blonde
--
"We look through a glass but darkly:
What we see is more colored by our beliefs,
than what we believe is colored by what we see."
"Is life so dear, or peace so sweet, as to be
purchased at the price of chains and slavery?" - P. Henry
Be kind to your neighbors, even though they be transgenic chimerae.
Re-transmission of this e-mail expressly prohibited.
Non-UseNet re-transmission of this article is a willful violation of US
Copyright Law and the Berne Convention. Statutory damages are $250,000.00
Siobhan
<ns_de_cybax_ya...@microsoft.com> wrote:
>In article <3BC74C45...@clark.net>,
> Tiny Human Ferret <kla...@clark.net> wrote:
>
*Especially* if it's an outright lie.
Siobhan
just sayin'
....Normal is what cuts off your sixth finger and your tail...
{http://www.virulent.org} sio...@virulent.org
Convergence VIII Montreal Committee Alpha Male
Angels Among Us http://altgothic.com/c8montreal/
zcatcurious
> zcatc...@yahoo.com (zcatcurious) wrote:
>
> > Joyce. Beckett.
>
> *bleargh*. *hmmmph*.
>
> beckett i can deal with; not so molassesy.
no molasses in chaos. have you read Watt; an insane narrator's
retelling of an insane narrator's account of what happened?
Tiny Human Ferret
Stated that way, you can _almost_ get away with calling it
autobiographical... but not quite.
If you said "elements drawn from the life experience of the author
inevitably find depiction or representation within the works" that would be
accurate enough.
However, the sloppy phrase you've been throwing around, "all writing is
autobiographical" (or something quite similar), is incredibly sloppy beyond
mere slop. Some folks however, will simply seize on it as a truism. And from
the casual acceptance of this exceptionally flawed truism, they may very
well come up with the common wisdom (a.k.a "idiocy") that "since the work is
autobiographical, from this work we learn such-and-such about the author".
This sort of deconstruction _is_ possible to a limited degree, to _experts_.
Yet due to the prevalence of the meme, there are people who simply don't
know squat who think that because they've read this-or-that or even all of
an author's work, that they know everything about the author, their origins,
their creative influences, etc etc. And such people are the sources of the
worst-imaginable sorts of fan-mail and fandom, or may be the most bitter
critics of the author, rather than of the author's work.
Are we clear on the difference between "elements drawn from the life
experience of the author inevitably find depiction or representation within
the works", and, "all writing is inherently autobiographical"?
>
> k
>
> --
> Sound and Fury [TM]
Signifying?
Jennie
>Heh, both, and neither. Let's just say that it's all being done and done
>much better on "Dark Angel". Be kind to your neighbors, even though they be
>transgenic chimerae, okay?
You know, Donald's a transgenic chimera. Medically. :\
>If you can feel the suffering of your characters as if they were real
>people, that is probably the highest recommendation to the calling of being
>a novelist. Ask Ms Brite, I suspect she'd tell you much the same. So
>probably would any writer. Empathy sells. It may be all that does sell.
It might make for good writing of novels, but it can make it
difficult to function as a person. The thing is, when one of my characters
suffers on account of the actions of another person, I don't just
experience the suffering, I experience all the emotions created by the
infliction of the suffering; they are the ones which are hard to handle;
they are the ones, IME, which _really_ sell; they are the reason that I
often need to walk around by myself for a few hours after finishing a
piece, because I don't trust myself to be near my loved ones. Empathy is
all about looking at the world through the eyes of others, and seen
through certain eyes, the world is appealing in a way which I personally
would prefer it not to appeal to anybody.
That's not to say that I believe there's anything which
shouldn't be written about, any subjects we shouldn't explore in art; I
just think it's worth bearing in mind that the risks are taken not only by
the writer.
Jennie
--
Jennie Kermode jen...@innocent.com
http://www.triffid.demon.co.uk/jennie
"When I last saw my baby she was turning blue
"And I knew that pretty soon her sweet life was through."
Tiny Human Ferret
>
> In article <3BC92529...@clark.net>,
> Tiny Human Ferret <kla...@clark.net> wrote:
>
> > Yeah right, are you really ready to believe that I have vampires or spies in
> > my reality?
>
Heh heh... I am _so_ not going to go where I'd love to go with this. As I've
said before, "it's all true, _especially_ the lies". Hey, really, I'm just a
humble expatriate tailor.
>
> > Hey I _live_ in DC, I am not a _part_ of DC. "just another
> > fucking observer."
>
> observing is being a part of.
Ah, " if you know that Heisenberg is spinning in his grave, does that mean
you can't know where he's buried"?
I think I will go titter inanely for a while.
I mean, "observing is being a part of"... if you think about it, if I notice
a cadre of sp00ky P33p3l lurking around my neighborhood, well, does living
in a neighborhood full of sp00ky p33p3l make me a sp00ky d00d? Or does it
just make me easily sp00k3d?
>
> > Frankly, so far as I can tell, the only difference between spies and
> > vampires that I've ever been able to discern is that there's a slight
> > possibility that the vampires might get over their inherent sociopathy.
>
> well, whatever. i wasn't going for accuracy, i was going for example.
> as you said, anyone who thinks they can read a few offhand comments and
> a paragraph or two an look within the psyche of the author is an idiot.
>
> > To tell the truth, I chose spies and vampires because those were the only
> > paradigms within which the then-present affairs of DC and the transnational
> > community were understandable by me.
>
> and that makes your choice somehow less representative of who and how
> you are? ;P
I think what it meant at the time was that I should take an extended
vacation. Which I did. (I'm still on it, I guess.)
FWIW, I spent most of the late 1980s wandering around town muttering
something to the effect of "I am a stranger in a strange land, but not a
stranger far from home". This is, I suppose, why I favor surrealism. It's a
corollary, I guess, of that whole "when the going gets weird, the weird turn
pro".
I am still trying to figure out who and how I am. And every time I think I
have it figured out, I get horribly depressed. More mopey points for me.
>
> > other life. I'm a truly sad case: whatever creativity I might ever have had
> > has been reduced to essayistry.
>
> mopey points.
Oh, definitely. I was carrying them around with me but they poked holes in
all of my pockets so now I just let my mopey points pile up on a shelf in
the basement.
>
> > For you, as near as I can tell, essayistry is just you warming up.
>
> LOL. well, i suppose one should discount nothing.
>
> > I think you doubt yourself too much.
>
> i think i doubt myself quite a bit, but i think i doubt myself just the
> right amount. self-doubt can be a motivator.
>
> no. really.
Aargh, engineers! Self-doubt can also prevent shoddy-product lawsuits; or,
if you have insufficient self-doubt, you should hire a "test-to-destruction"
department.
>
> > If I've got you pegged
> > remotely into the right place on the board, you're just opening up your
> > talents
>
> stop that. you sound like those highschool aptitude test results, and
> my counselor scratching his head not being able to read it, telling me i
> could do just about anything i want. that's silly.
Okay, so maybe you can't play hockey or guitar. But hell, you could always
collect sigfiles and quotable quotes, and then have characters wandering
around a novel into situations where such utterances would be appropriate to
the situation or environment. I think you would get Surrealism points for
that.
>
> > And BTW... doing horrible things to real people is cruel. Doing horrible
> > things to poor inoffensive characters in novels is "making things
> > interesting".
>
> how certain are you of that distinction?
Um yikes. I think this discussion is taking an unsettling turn towards
something amounting to validating solipsism. You know, the whole "play
within a play within a play" thingy. Does a character in a simulation --
that the character perceives as reality -- take offense at the cruel and
whimsical author of its existence, or does it lapse into reveries about the
hamhandedness of plot devices? Or does someone writing a stupid novel about
imaginary beings cause the imaginary beings become rather less imaginary and
to take offense and annoy the author until he is forced to write the
imaginary beings into a rather appalling and surrealist comeuppance? Which
said imaginary beings find even more annoying, forcing said author into some
mad cmsg newgrouping? Oh crap, I better stop now, there's a giant
pocketwatch melting all over my tree and... the... _fish_...
> i'm not very.
Please accept the advice of one who knows, "that way lies madness". It's
just writing, it's just fiction, it's just a story.
> and i'm not
> sure i'm willing to take that chance.
Well, you definitely wouldn't want to wind up like me...
-- klaatu, wanders off muttering about "the fish, dammit!" and "someone
stole my overcoat and I am not leaving until I get it back"!
>
> --nightshade--
--
Be kind to your neighbors, even though they be transgenic chimerae.
Tiny Human Ferret
>
> On Sun, 14 Oct 2001 01:39:53 -0400, Tiny Human Ferret <kla...@clark.net> wrote:
> >Heh, both, and neither. Let's just say that it's all being done and done
> >much better on "Dark Angel". Be kind to your neighbors, even though they be
> >transgenic chimerae, okay?
>
> You know, Donald's a transgenic chimera. Medically. :\
So are a lot of my neighbors, as near as I can tell. The world-famous I-270
BioTech Corridor is about two miles from my house, including the place where
back in 1995 or so some idiot actually poured a gallon of active
transposonation mix into a greywater drain; $DEITY alone knows what the hell
is living in the storm drains. I'm damn sure not going to look.
> >If you can feel the suffering of your characters as if they were real
> >people, that is probably the highest recommendation to the calling of being
> >a novelist. Ask Ms Brite, I suspect she'd tell you much the same. So
> >probably would any writer. Empathy sells. It may be all that does sell.
>
> It might make for good writing of novels, but it can make it
> difficult to function as a person.
In real life, I guess you meant. Yeah, heh -- you know that was probably one
of the main thrusts of my first novel, the lead character having been one of
the first of the annoying-by-now crop of (yet-another) attractive young
vampiresses painfully afflicted with excessive empathy for her prey. Hey,
she can slice and dice with the best of the genre's antiheroines, but she
feels just so terrible about it as she does, dontcha know. I guess
literarily it's a surrealist approach to contrast-of-extremes, the values of
empathy versus the exigencies of surviving a dog-eat-dog world.
> The thing is, when one of my characters
> suffers on account of the actions of another person, I don't just
> experience the suffering, I experience all the emotions created by the
> infliction of the suffering; they are the ones which are hard to handle;
> they are the ones, IME, which _really_ sell; they are the reason that I
> often need to walk around by myself for a few hours after finishing a
> piece, because I don't trust myself to be near my loved ones. Empathy is
> all about looking at the world through the eyes of others, and seen
> through certain eyes, the world is appealing in a way which I personally
> would prefer it not to appeal to anybody.
One has to wonder, then, about Mr Harris while writing about Hannibal Lector
in _Silence of the Lambs_. That would have to be very strange head-space to
get into to write such an authentically chilling evil bastard. But I concede
your point, in this particular case one certainly doesn't empathize with the
mad doctor, one must of course empathize with the victims and their
victimization, and I suppose that's more of a selling point to more readers
than it would be a selling point to the thankfully rare folks who would
agree that liver is best served with fava beans and a nice chianti.
> That's not to say that I believe there's anything which
> shouldn't be written about, any subjects we shouldn't explore in art; I
> just think it's worth bearing in mind that the risks are taken not only by
> the writer.
Hrm. I think I'll go write a lot of exceptionally wholesome plain-vanilla
pr0n, then.
>
> Jennie
>
> --
> Jennie Kermode jen...@innocent.com
> http://www.triffid.demon.co.uk/jennie
> "When I last saw my baby she was turning blue
> "And I knew that pretty soon her sweet life was through."
--
Be kind to your neighbors, even though they be transgenic chimerae.
Tiny Human Ferret
Someone wrote a novel about Kissinger's _Senate confirmation hearings_?
Egads.
--
Be kind to your neighbors, even though they be transgenic chimerae.
Tiny Human Ferret
>
> In article <3BD1BF83...@clark.net>,
> Tiny Human Ferret <kla...@clark.net> wrote:
>
> > > observing is being a part of.
>
> > Ah, " if you know that Heisenberg is spinning in his grave, does that mean
> > you can't know where he's buried"?
>
Well, I couldn't really say for sure, but I think it goes without saying
that if there are any other Heisenbergs, they are spinning the other way, or
are in different states.
>
> > I think I will go titter inanely for a while.
>
> > I mean, "observing is being a part of"... if you think about it, if I notice
> > a cadre of sp00ky P33p3l lurking around my neighborhood, well, does living
> > in a neighborhood full of sp00ky p33p3l make me a sp00ky d00d? Or does it
> > just make me easily sp00k3d?
>
> i don't know what, specifically, it makes you, but it makes you somehow
> different than if you hadn't noticed. it makes you someone who has been
> effected enough to take up and right about it, which is a sure sign that
> you have been influenced.
What, novelistry is a symptom of cognitive disorders? <ponder ponder> Okay,
I was under the influence! that explains it.
>
> it may also make them different if they've noticed that you've noticed.
Ah, yes. and if they've noticed that I noticed that they noticed, etc. Oh, I
think I've solved that Heisenberg thingy, he's spinning in his grave in the
direction opposite from poor ol' Confucius, misparaphrased above. And all
about their graves klaatu and a lot of imaginary beings are dancing in
circles.
>
> > This is, I suppose, why I favor surrealism. It's a
> > corollary, I guess, of that whole "when the going gets weird, the weird turn
> > pro".
>
> i find that reality can, occasionally, be far more surreal, and vice
> versa. i never had any idea that i spent my entire life in an acid trip
> until after i had experienced the latter several times and the former
> once.
>
> 'this is the strangest life i've ever known.'
Oh reality is definitely very strange. Often, dreams make more sense.
>
> > > i think i doubt myself quite a bit, but i think i doubt myself just the
> > > right amount. self-doubt can be a motivator.
>
> > Aargh, engineers!
>
> ;P
>
> > if you have insufficient self-doubt, you should hire a "test-to-destruction"
> > department.
>
> life *is* destructive testing.
>
> > Okay, so maybe you can't play hockey or guitar.
>
> actually, i'd like to be able to play guitar. and blues harmonica. but
> they're stored in the regrets jar, like so many pennies.
Well, there are a lot of instruments remaining. MIDI synths come to mind...
>
> > But hell, you could always
> > collect sigfiles and quotable quotes, and then have characters wandering
> > around a novel into situations where such utterances would be appropriate to
> > the situation or environment. I think you would get Surrealism points for
> > that.
>
> eew. that would be like writing a story to incorporate the 'quotes
> wall.' that's like, dessicration. i wonder if i still have that. i
> think many people have had them. i think many more should. when i was
> in college, i had large sheets of paper scrawled with various sayings.
> i think i should see if i still have those anywhere.
Write about someone who comes a bit unhinged when they finally find their
"quotes wall" and it's entirely different from what they remember, but still
has their handwriting... and the more it bothers them, the more the quotes
slightly change...
>
> > > > And BTW... doing horrible things to real people is cruel. Doing horrible
> > > > things to poor inoffensive characters in novels is "making things
> > > > interesting".
>
> > > how certain are you of that distinction?
>
> > Um yikes. I think this discussion is taking an unsettling turn towards
> > something amounting to validating solipsism.
>
> invalidating it, i'd think.
>
> > You know, the whole "play
> > within a play within a play" thingy. Does a character in a simulation --
> > that the character perceives as reality -- take offense at the cruel and
> > whimsical author of its existence, <snip>
>
> or the ability of your creations to recognize the ludicrous nature of
> their creator, and up and destroy your reality on you.
>
> ever read greg egan, 'permutation city?' while i generally consider the
> inifitine array of universes postulate to be so much mystical claptrap
> to console godless sci-fi fans in the face of their own paralyzing fear
> of life, it's a good read nonetheless.
Yes, I've read it. You may or may not have noticed that peculiar
involutional systems tend to have rather prominent positions in many of his
works...
> well, why not consider the potential state of your creatons? if
> something other than chance created our universe, i strongly suspect it
> was never notified of what it has done. else, what can we do but loathe
> it it's rabid indifference. if i'm to play god/dess, damnit i don't
> want to be criminally negligent, much less actively evil.
Well, I guess one way to be a deity conspicuous by one's absence would be to
simply never create anything...
>
> > Please accept the advice of one who knows, "that way lies madness". It's
> > just writing, it's just fiction, it's just a story.
>
> so is life.
When surreality and reality are indistinguishable, what do you have then?
>
> --nightshade--
>
> --
> --nightshade--
> 'whoever said it was a small world
> was either a liar or a fool' --concrete blonde
--
zcatcurious
>
> > Oh reality is definitely very strange. Often, dreams make more sense.
>
> same difference.
do you usually wake up quickly? like to an alarm clock?
Tiny Human Ferret
>
> In article <3BD46C48...@clark.net>,
> Tiny Human Ferret <kla...@clark.net> wrote:
>
> > > i don't know what, specifically, it makes you, but it makes you somehow
> > > different than if you hadn't noticed. it makes you someone who has been
> > > effected enough to take up and right about it, which is a sure sign that
> > > you have been influenced.
>
> > What, novelistry is a symptom of cognitive disorders? <ponder ponder> Okay,
> > I was under the influence! that explains it.
>
> the brain for just a moment. you experience things, even through
> observation. these things change you. extreme example: no one ever
> lays a finger on you, but all your neighbors get weekly beatings for
> three years. your walls are thin. tell me you're not effeted.
Thtop it, I am _not_ effeted! Thilly.
But yes, you're right.
True story: or at least as true as I remember or perceived it...
Mercifully short.
>
> > > 'this is the strangest life i've ever known.'
>
> > Oh reality is definitely very strange. Often, dreams make more sense.
>
> oddly, i don't have many of those. or cannot remember any of them.
> same difference.
Ah, Dream evidently still hasn't rounded them all up, I guess. (see early
"Sandman" if you miss the reference...)
I occasionally remember the nightmares, generally of the Night Hag variety,
or occasionally the Mud Shark type. You know, you're stuck in quicksand and
there's something nastily toothy swimming around in there with you. When you
see it, you wake up screaming... at least I do.
Other than that, I don't much remember. Flying dreams, sometimes, which
generally amount to a VR tour of the neighborhood with a PoV about 100 feet
up.
>
> > > actually, i'd like to be able to play guitar. and blues harmonica. but
> > > they're stored in the regrets jar, like so many pennies.
>
> > Well, there are a lot of instruments remaining. MIDI synths come to mind...
>
> bah. fake music.
>
> okay, i'm fine with computer-generated|altered music, but i was raised
> on hippie sh*t. can't get analogue out of my blood.
Me either, which is why I haven't sold my Strat yet.
>
> > Write about someone who comes a bit unhinged when they finally find their
> > "quotes wall" and it's entirely different from what they remember, but still
> > has their handwriting... and the more it bothers them, the more the quotes
> > slightly change...
>
> like trying to read a dial clock while tripping. amusing for three
> minutes, unless you actually are.
>
> actually, i've used that parlour trick in a bit of linguistic code. i
> tend to find it incredulous.
Philip K. Dick used this sort of thing to great effect. Try reading _A
Scanner Darkly_ sometime. Now there was a man who knew how to slowly slip
surreality into the mix. Or, worse, his short work "Faith of our Fathers"
doesn't even bother trying to slip it in, he bangs a character with it
outrageously, and then makes matters worse by convincing the character that
it wasn't surreality, but rather reality -- and a hideous one -- with which
he was getting banged.
>
> > Yes, I've read it. You may or may not have noticed that peculiar
> > involutional systems tend to have rather prominent positions in many of his
> > works...
>
> do i smell more disease theory coming?
Well, as they say, "artists generally don't do art because they're happy and
well-adjusted". Hopefully nobody will misinterpret this as a suggestion to
go make people miserable in the hope they'll turn out to be the next Van
Gogh.
>
> > Well, I guess one way to be a deity conspicuous by one's absence would be to
> > simply never create anything...
>
> or to keep ones creations simplistic enough that you don't empathize
> with them. say, systems on the order of complexity of the left front
> leg of a bumblebee.
>
> > When surreality and reality are indistinguishable, what do you have then?
>
> henrick heller? aldous salinger? fillet of horseshoe sandwiches?
All of the above, and almost any moment I spend outside of my basement.
Hell, I feel like massively discrediting myself... Okay, one day I'm sitting
down at the local park, trying to not notice the people.
Out in the field, the elderly master spies are taking their ease with a nice
game of boules between assorted lounging in chaise-lounges and drinking iced
tea. The Stealth Ninja Strike Team are out playing baseball at the other end
of the field, occasionally one or two sneaks off into the woods and so far
as I can tell, never comes back, or whoever comes out of the woods to take
their place isn't the same -- though of course they're remarkably similar --
as the one or ones who went in. Eventually they finish their five innings
and pack up and vacate. The occasional Reptoid drives through, generally
pointing their little flashy thing in my direction as they head back out,
which generally gives me a nice headache but sure doesn't make me forget
them or anything like that; quite the opposite. Squirrels play in the woods
and vast and endless streams of crows fly past in the late afternoon,
uttering oddly mellow quorkings. Later in the season, I will again witness
the crows picking over the trash on the parking lot that the squirrels pull
out of the trashcans. I'll probably find even more dead deer on the parking
lot once winterkill season comes around, though of course they're never
winterkilled. Usually they only have one entry wound, though sometimes the
local dogs have got at them, or maybe coyotes have got 'em. Hard to tell.
Hell, it could be werewolves, it wouldn't surprise me much. I've been
through the place after dark a time or two, I damned sure wouldn't hang out
there. I know the area very well, and between my decent nighteyes and the
pervasive and inescapable glow of the ubiquitous sodium lights reflecting
off of the inevitable overcast, I can get around just fine... but I also
can't get over that feeling of watching eyes following me with a predatory
precision.
Some daytimes I go for a wander in the woods of the park, and the great blue
heron I see everyday in the same place at the same time is, these days,
waiting until I get closer before flapping morosely off, and every day he
flaps a little less far. One of these days he might just stand there and
watch me go by, which will be cool. The deer are easily spooked, as always,
but they aren't exactly bolting from me these days, they tend to just
saunter quickly in a direction perpendicular to my own path. Back in the
field by the bike path, the occasional Young Accountant rides by on their
mountain bike, dressed like a bumblebee. Every now and then, so does a
grrlgang, four or five young things, a bit underdressed, all smiles and
girltalk and probably armed to the teeth. They really should get some
kneeguards, I'd hate like hell to see anything happen to those knees if they
took a spill. The occasional baffled foreigner wanders through, probably off
looking for their dead-drop somewhere down the bike-and-hike path. Now and
then a cop cruises through, doesn't see a damned thing except for maybe me
reading a book. After office hours are over, in the time between when the
sun settles behind the tall trees that ring the place and the time when the
sun actually sets and closes the park, the odd skinny people with the
pointed ears and fast hands and bad hairlines show up and clearly it's time
for me to go get some booze and go back home, watch the neighbors check
their watches, close the doors and blinds behind me and head down to the
basement, turn on the evening news and the second I see Peter Jennings,
start drinking heavily.
>
> --nightshade--
zcatcurious
> zcatc...@yahoo.com (zcatcurious) wrote:
>
> > > oddly, i don't have many of those. or cannot remember any of them.
> > > same difference.
>
> > do you usually wake up quickly? like to an alarm clock?
>
> lounge around in and out of sleep most of the morning.
the rate at which people wake up seems to affect their memory of
dreams and also their lucid dreaming. i'm a "high inertia" sleeper -
i take ages to get there and ages to get out again. in the process of
drifting out i have lots of dreams that i remember, and i usually
realise in at least one of them that i am dreaming. at this point i
take over and start doing magick, incl flying. most people i've met
who say "i never fly in dreams" also get woken suddenly
maybe being woken by the clock most of the time trains your system
against conscious dreaming
Tiny Human Ferret
>
> In article <3BD6B9A1...@clark.net>,
> Tiny Human Ferret <kla...@clark.net> wrote:
>
> > > tell me you're not effeted.
>
> > Thtop it, I am _not_ effeted! Thilly.
>
>
> > I occasionally remember the nightmares, generally of the Night Hag variety,
> > or occasionally the Mud Shark type. You know, you're stuck in quicksand and
> > there's something nastily toothy swimming around in there with you. When you
> > see it, you wake up screaming... at least I do.
>
> cannot describe what makes them frightening. for example, one was a
> conceptualization of infinity -- an infinite mass of some indeterminate
> stuff, dividing infinitely, into infinitely small parts. another was
> simply about a rope, swinging back and forth -- a pendulum in simple
> harmonic motion. scared the shit out of me.
Hey, didn't I once tell you, in the manner of one of Benton's
"visualizations of AG denizens", that you were a giant truncated pyramid
with a glowing disembodied eye floating above it? I believe this admission
of math nightmares is possibly proof of my assertion, which formerly I had
considered allegorical.
I suppose I should be jealous, since I can barely do math at the level of
factoring quadratics, and here you are not only dreaming about it, but
having bad dreams about it. At least you can tell the difference between
good and bad math dreams. My only math dreams once resulted when I quit
smoking marijuana, and I once woke up from a dream of really struggling to
factor quadratics, which somehow segued into interpolating cube roots. I
didn't sleep for days after that.
>
> dreams of the non-nighmare variety that i have are often muted and
> indifferent. i'm somewhere. there is someone i know with me.
> sometimes we are talking -- these i wake from feeling full. sometimes
> there is no talking, sometimes we sit silently in a grey boat in a grey
> lake, sometimes we are naked, sometimes we are f*cking at a bonfire
> bacchanalia, and i'm utterly indifferent. these i wake from feeling
> solemn and empty.
I think this last one is classically interpreted as accepting the loss of a
significant other...
>
> > > do i smell more disease theory coming?
>
> > Well, as they say, "artists generally don't do art because they're happy and
> > well-adjusted".
>
> actually, i meant in the pervasive intricacy of cooperative systems.
>
> > Hopefully nobody will misinterpret this as a suggestion to
> > go make people miserable in the hope they'll turn out to be the next Van
> > Gogh.
>
> i doubt it. we're more likely to try to cure the next van gogh.
I feel better already... and never felt less like being creative. Then
again, when I'm feeling creative, I tend to write about scary monsters
taking over. When I'm not feeling creative, I just figure that scary
monsters took over years ago and I should just deal with it.
> i
> forsee art becoming more subtle, though; as more and more measures are
> taken to cure misery, full-blown expression of poor mental health will
> be downplayed, (for a time, perhaps), and we'll see more expression
> through detail. that's just my theory. the unwashed masses fond of
> emotive exaggeration may prove me wrong.
Actually, I think you're totally right about the expression through detail
thing; in which case, Neal Stanifer is clearly the future of art.
>
> > Hell, I feel like massively discrediting myself... Okay, one day I'm sitting
> > down at the local park, trying to not notice the people.
>
> i can't do that. especially when i'm tired. when i'm tired, i tend to
> have my eye easily caught by motion.
I must be tired as hell all of the time... anything moves anywhere, *boing*
instant lock-and-track. I did say _trying_ to not notice the people. Oh the
joys of mega hypervigilance.
<sneeps>
zcatcurious
> I occasionally remember the nightmares, generally of the Night Hag variety,
> or occasionally the Mud Shark type. You know, you're stuck in quicksand and
> there's something nastily toothy swimming around in there with you. When you
> see it, you wake up screaming... at least I do.
i'll usually start by running, but when it catches up i tend to attack
and kill it, often messily - i spend plenty of time with my cat, and i
guess the attitude rubs off.
> Other than that, I don't much remember. Flying dreams, sometimes, which
> generally amount to a VR tour of the neighborhood with a PoV about 100 feet
> up.
does it hurt - the flying, i mean? i, and some other people i have
asked, sometimes get this sensation of stinging pain while flying
and do you ever fall, and die?
i heard dying in a dream would kill you, then i did it, and i'm still
here. maybe it's like the poster in the English Dept reception - "God
put me on this planet to do certain tasks, and right now i'm so far
behind that i may never die"
-zcatcurious
Tiny Human Ferret
>
> In article <3BE5CC86...@clark.net>,
> Tiny Human Ferret <kla...@clark.net> wrote:
>
> > Hey, didn't I once tell you, in the manner of one of Benton's
> > "visualizations of AG denizens", that you were a giant truncated pyramid
> > with a glowing disembodied eye floating above it?
>
> divine guardianship. i'm more aligned with the pluvial and divine
> oversight.
Um, you like to watch it _rain_? Okay, you're a giant truncated pyramid with
a compact-yet-ominous stormcloud lightning over it.
>
> > I believe this admission of math nightmares is possibly proof of my
> > assertion, which formerly I had considered allegorical.
>
> though, if you infer that my dreams are gnostic, i can't offer an
> argument contra.
Gnostic, I couldn't say, not in the way I think you're using the term,
concerning direct knowledge of the imperceptable or of the perceptible from
a remove precluding direct perception. However, a great many people will
find a problem's solution eludes them, and they'll "sleep on it" and somehow
the mind solves the major problems while the body is snoozing, often leaving
the answer for the waking mind as an imaeg from a dream. Kekule's solution
of the benzene structure problem is the classic example, in which he dreamt
of an orobourous snake biting its own tail.
>
> > I suppose I should be jealous, since I can barely do math at the level of
> > factoring quadratics, and here you are not only dreaming about it, but
> > having bad dreams about it.
>
> then i shouldn't tell you about the time i designed a motor control
> algorithm in my sleep by dreaming in a cartesian system of displacement
> versus velocity versus time, eh?
>
> <voice style="church lady"> Well isn't that spatial. </voice>
Somewhere, in a special hell for punsters, you preside over a vast and
lesser field of those who rot amid the groans they've inspired.
I used to have fairly odd dreams in which I was a fog drifting through a
fog. Then a cat would walk through the side of a box and die horribly in
convulsions, accompanied by sustained meowing from inside the box. I
generally woke immediately afterwards and asked "when am I?"
> > My only math dreams once resulted when I quit
> > smoking marijuana, and I once woke up from a dream of really struggling to
> > factor quadratics, which somehow segued into interpolating cube roots. I
> > didn't sleep for days after that.
>
> i can see why.
>
> interpolation, even non-linear, is so, *approximate*.
Hrm. Now about that motor control algorythm... I've been trying to figure
out how to use arrays of stepper motors, gymbals, and mirrors to provide
extremely fine aiming of a laser at a moving target at great distances.
Everything I come up with seems to greatly resemble a Fresnel lens, with
fractal repetitive substructure (I think). Somehow I suspect that a
"fresnelized" mirror addressed on a semi-spiral track by another mirror
redirecting the source beam. Have I just re-invented the CD-ROM? Or should I
continue to overtax my poor damaged brain with unconscious calculations
inevitably resulting in MudShark infestations of dreamscapes from which I
wake screaming, or should I just give up and dream about Sxy Dth Chx, from
which dreams I generally also wake screaming, but at least I spend the rest
of my mornings thinking about antifashion instead of antiparticles?
>
> > I think this last one is classically interpreted as accepting the loss of a
> > significant other...
>
> sucky. i've got to stop losing people, then.
>
> --ns-- {or stop accepting it}
Probably stop accepting it. If you stop accepting it, you might be more
diligent about not losing them.
Tiny Human Ferret
>
> Tiny Human Ferret <kla...@clark.net> wrote in message news:<3BD6B9A1...@clark.net>...
> > I occasionally remember the nightmares, generally of the Night Hag variety,
> > or occasionally the Mud Shark type. You know, you're stuck in quicksand and
> > there's something nastily toothy swimming around in there with you. When you
> > see it, you wake up screaming... at least I do.
>
> i'll usually start by running, but when it catches up i tend to attack
> and kill it, often messily - i spend plenty of time with my cat, and i
> guess the attitude rubs off.
Erg. I generally struggle with the Night Hag, but she generally gets me in a
nice hammerlock and chokes me out, at which point I generally wake. Odd,
that.
There's nothing to be done about the MudShark other than to wake up
screaming. Well, maybe one night I'll be in a position to feed the Night Hag
to it, and I wonder what will happen then.
>
> > Other than that, I don't much remember. Flying dreams, sometimes, which
> > generally amount to a VR tour of the neighborhood with a PoV about 100 feet
> > up.
>
> does it hurt - the flying, i mean? i, and some other people i have
> asked, sometimes get this sensation of stinging pain while flying
Nope. Feels like swimming through really thin water. Really gotta thrash to
get any altitude...
>
> and do you ever fall, and die?
Well, I fall. I don't think I die. Usually I manage to pull out of it enough
so that I just crash, roughly the same thing as when you lock up the brakes
in a traffic jam, and slide into someone at 3MPH rather than wrecking at 65.
You still wreck, but one case doesn't involve stitches and weeks in
traction.
However, sometimes I simply plummet and thud.
> i heard dying in a dream would kill you, then i did it, and i'm still
> here. maybe it's like the poster in the English Dept reception - "God
> put me on this planet to do certain tasks, and right now i'm so far
> behind that i may never die"
I've seen that. Actually, I'm looking for a poster I've seen hanging on a
wall in a Uni library, it's titled "the Librarian" and it has an odd
eldritch babe displaying her nicely-ordered cabinets of ancient arcana and
lore to an incredulous goblin. I haven't been able to find a copy anywhere.
>
> -zcatcurious
Tiny Human Ferret
>
> In article <3BEA8A23...@clark.net>,
> Tiny Human Ferret <kla...@clark.net> wrote:
<snips>
> > I've been trying to figure
> > out how to use arrays of stepper motors, gymbals, and mirrors to provide
> > extremely fine aiming of a laser at a moving target at great distances.
> > Everything I come up with seems to greatly resemble a Fresnel lens, with
> > fractal repetitive substructure (I think). Somehow I suspect that a
> > "fresnelized" mirror addressed on a semi-spiral track by another mirror
> > redirecting the source beam.
>
> by 'fresnelized' you mean arrays of mirrors to better facilitate the
> aiming?
Okay, let's say you have a fairly flat mirror. You have fairly large motors
to rapidly get it aimed in the general direction and then as-rapidly halt
it. Smaller motors refine the aim, even-smaller motors further refine the
aim. I see it as sort of jittering into final position with a motion almost
resembling peristalsis. A burst is fired on-target and then the mirror
starts to retarget, not on a best-track to the new position but to track the
target through expected possible dodging. Anyway, it's sort of nested
gimbals.
By "fresnelized" I was referring to a fresnel lens's stair-step surface, the
way I envisioned stacking the gymbals and motors has that sort of
stairstepped look. So, it occurs to me that it really might be easiest to
have a device that has precisely cut pits in the surface which are [as it
were] pre-aimed and focussed, the reflective analog of an insect's
compound-eye working in reverse. (sort-of...[1]) This would amount to a
variant on the fresnel lens, except it would be cut into the face of a
mirror rather than onto the surface of a regular lens. The idea here is that
the primary aiming mirror doesn't have to move much, and the other mirror
doesn't have to move at all.
> i don't know, the whole thing sounds rather complex, and i
> think the scale would have to be fairly large in comparison with the
> target's range of motion to give you anything more meaningful than a
> direct aim. what is your method of feedback for tracking the target?
> or is your target a reliable system of fixed positions?
Target tracking would probably be something not much different from frame
capture of HDTV signal, standard motion detection algorythms for acquisition
of fast-moving objects, and then an initial illumination strobing providing
track refinement data to determine if the object is truly ballistic, or if
semi-dirigible, to see if and how well it can dodge, calculation of the
probability cloud if not truly ballistic, then start punching at expected
future locations if it can dodge, fairly wide focus, heat it until it stops
dodging and goes actually ballistic, then hard track it with tight focus to
slice chunks out of it.
Then again, probably it would make as much if not more sense to just use a
standard disco laser setup if I was actually trying to do this sort of
thing. I think I was actually just trying to get some mental exercise.
>
> > Have I just re-invented the CD-ROM?
>
> perhaps, except i think you have the aparatus arcing across the disc
> surface.
Um yeah. Well, in this case, instead of simple binary pitting on the CD, the
pits are shaped, each "address" refocusses the impingent beam back out to a
specific place. Hrm, rapid platter selection of targeting optics? Each track
on the "CD" being a solution domain, covering probable tracks? I think I
need some aspirin. Ow.
Footnote:
1. An insect's compound eye surveys a large chunk of volume around it,
concentrating that light through many channels into a central array. If one
were to replace the central nerve bundle collection with fiber-optics with
tips bent outwards to channel the collected light through a lens onto a film
surface, one basically gets a bug-eye view on that film surface. If you make
the film surface into a flat mirror, very slight motion in the aiming of a
laser on that flat mirror surface can select a specific element of the
compound eye, simulating a rapid sweep through the volume observed by the
total compound eye.
(I think I have just reinvented compound-prism arrays.)
kest
world with:
>>> i heard dying in a dream would kill you, then i did it, and i'm still
>> here.
>
>i seriously doubt it. i think there are two reasons why people don't
>often experience death in their dreams. first, they probably wouldn't
>know what to imagine, and their minds say "okay that's it, end of
>dream." second, death in dreams most likely takes place under stressful
>circumstances. if your mind thinks that you're falling off a building,
>i wouldn't be surprised if it jolts you awake with a bit of adrenaline
>to brace you for the fall.
>
I have this theory that each way I die in a dream is a way I won't die in
real life. This is probably bullshit. In any case, dying is always very
clear and memorable. Sometimes when I die, I wake up. Once I went to
heaven, and it looked like my kitchen and smelled like chocolate chip
cookies. I managed to convince myself in that one that I definitely wasn't
dreaming.
>now, not entirely off-topic, while dreaming, has anyone else found the
>erogenous zone of an angel?
No, but I've kissed demons. Does that count?
zcatcurious
> > > I've been trying to figure
> > > out how to use arrays of stepper motors, gymbals, and mirrors to provide
> > > extremely fine aiming of a laser at a moving target at great distances.
> > > Everything I come up with seems to greatly resemble a Fresnel lens, with
> > > fractal repetitive substructure (I think). Somehow I suspect that a
> > > "fresnelized" mirror addressed on a semi-spiral track by another mirror
> > > redirecting the source beam.
> >
> > by 'fresnelized' you mean arrays of mirrors to better facilitate the
> > aiming?
>
> Okay, let's say you have a fairly flat mirror. You have fairly large motors
> to rapidly get it aimed in the general direction and then as-rapidly halt
> it. Smaller motors refine the aim, even-smaller motors further refine the
> aim. I see it as sort of jittering into final position with a motion almost
> resembling peristalsis. A burst is fired on-target and then the mirror
> starts to retarget, not on a best-track to the new position but to track the
> target through expected possible dodging. Anyway, it's sort of nested
> gimbals.
<raises hand>
...um, except that the more mirrors you put into the path of the beam,
the more energy loss you will get - mirrors are never absolutely
reflective
and, considering that you're working over "a great distance", you
already have diffusion to deal with. similarly, each beam of a
focused multiple-beam system will get diffused. and diffusion=less
concentrated heat, which is the working power of a laser weapon
maybe particle-stream would be more effective, if they went down a
sort of magnetic "barrel" - but only if the barrel could be made
*absolutely* uniform, because otherwise it would be like a high tech
musket; lots of spin on the projectile = large flight-path deviations
at the "muzzle"...
-zcatamateur
Tiny Human Ferret
Yuppers. Hence, an array of laser weapons.
BTW, one mirror or prism array would of course be the desired number. Two I
think will probably turn out to be workable. Three? Eh, getting a bit too
complex and as you say, lossy.
>
> maybe particle-stream would be more effective, if they went down a
> sort of magnetic "barrel" - but only if the barrel could be made
> *absolutely* uniform, because otherwise it would be like a high tech
> musket; lots of spin on the projectile = large flight-path deviations
> at the "muzzle"...
There's another little problem with CPB weaponry, if the target isn't on the
axis of your extremely large and massive final LINAC you have to reorient
the axis of your extremely large and massive final LINAC.
Of course, nothing beats a barrage array of railguns. However, axis
reorientation considerations apply, probably moreso than for CPB.
Damn, I love writing SF. I should do it more often. Actually, I should just
do it.
Thanks for the input, folx. Time for me to write yet-another uninteresting
novel with uninteresting characters leading uninteresting lives, in the
course of which novel's publication I do the traditional klaatu thing of
pulling an Arthur-C-Clarke precluding about a hundred or more patents.
>
> -zcatamateur
Tiny Human Ferret
> >now, not entirely off-topic, while dreaming, has anyone else found the
> >erogenous zone of an angel?
>
> No, but I've kissed demons. <snip>
We've met?
`Una
>world with:
>>now, not entirely off-topic, while dreaming, has anyone else found the
>>erogenous zone of an angel?
It's easy to find the erogenous zone of an angel.
Come visit and I'll show you.
`Una - the love platypus
Mark Greene
>maybe particle-stream would be more effective, if they went down a
>sort of magnetic "barrel" - but only if the barrel could be made
>*absolutely* uniform, because otherwise it would be like a high tech
>musket; lots of spin on the projectile = large flight-path deviations
>at the "muzzle"...
>
>-zcatamateur
>
That would be the now popular Einstein-Bose state of matter. Sort of, in that
they are all in a uniform state ala photons in a laser, but you have to cool
them to get them there, so they are not in a high energy state. Not sure if
anyone has tried to accelerate a stream of E-B particles at anything yet.
--
mark
Tiny Human Ferret
Yup. It's about seven years old now, I think, it was the so-called "matter
laser". I'm not entirely sure about them using anything other than gravity
to accelerate them. There was also some interesting Fermion research going
on which would probably be more amenable to exploitation for weapons uses.
Remember, BEC are IIRC mostly of the sort of atoms with all electron shells
filled, the Fermions IIRC are ones with valences, unfilled electron shells.
BTW -- the latest weird and wacky paper of extreme fun-ness I've seen had to
do with a single-calcium ion being used as a nanoscale probe of optical
fields, which at first appeared to have poor Max Planck spinning in his
grave: "In near-field imaging, resoluton beyond the diffraction limit of
optical microscopy is obtained by scanning the sampling region with a probe
of sub-wavelength size. In recent experiments, single molecules were used as
nanoscopic probes to attain a resolution of a few tens of nanometres.[1]
..."
_Nature_ being the thick-ass reading that it is, and being the sort of place
that doesn't mind putting things back to back that they think ought to get
the respective authors talking, they followed up this article with
"Ultrafast generation of magnetic fields in a Schottky Diode": "The basis of
our approach is to optically pump a Schottky diode with a focussed, ~150-fs
laser pulse. The laser pulse generates a current across the
semiconductor-metal junction, which in turn gives rise to an in-plane
magneti field. This scheme combines the localization of current injection
techniques with the speed of current generation at a Schotky barrier.
Specific advantages include the ability to rapidly create local fields along
any in-phase direction anywhere on the sample, the ability to scan the field
over many magnetic elements, and the ability to tune the magnitude of the
field with the diode bias voltage."[2]
So, taken in the context of Bose-Einstein Condensates, Ultra Cold Fermions,
laser cooling, etc, I hereby propose that it might be possible to cold-trap
BEC and UCF and accelerate them as well as maintaining very high degrees of
positional control from nanoscale "shepherding" of finely-controlled single
ions. It may be possible to combine the Schottky diode pumping-lasers with
the laser-cooling systems in the cold-traps, and if so, it might further be
possible to create and maintain ultracold high-density "coherent matter
streams", in effect, a massively compacted ordered matter stream storing
very high amounts of energy as kinetic energy _with almost none of that
energy being expressed as heat_. If such streams could be directed towards
external targets, even with no other considerations, the expansion from BEC
or UCF states would be considerable, particularly if inertially contained in
one direction by the follow-on stream; if many such streams of elements
notable for high-energy reactions in STP domains were co-impingent on
target, this could be militarily highly-effective.
>
> --
> mark
Footnotes:
1. "A single-ion as a nanoscopic probe of an optical field", _Nature_, 2001
November 1.[3]
2. "Ultrafast generation of magnetic fields in a Shottky diode", _Nature_,
2001 November 1.
3. No, poor ol' Professor Planck is not spinning in his grave, this might be
down below the Planck length but all he ever said was that there were things
too small to _see_, he didn't say anything about things being too small to
_feel_.
--
General Public Release, GNU license. ("copylefted")
Mark Greene
>Remember, BEC are IIRC mostly of the sort of atoms with all electron shells
>filled, the Fermions IIRC are ones with valences, unfilled electron shells.
Yes, I do. I could not recall the "BEC" acronym at all at the time I posted,
and was too lazy to look it up.
FWIW,I wish they had gone the other way with the naming conventions. Then we'd
have a valen instead of an electron, and the super-symetric folks would have to
contend with having a valentino. :-)
>So, taken in the context of Bose-Einstein Condensates, Ultra Cold Fermions,
>laser cooling, etc, I hereby propose
Cool proposal. You should write that up all formal like, and hit the
Department of Energy's web site and see what the requirements are for applying
for a research grant. Something like that could keep you employed and doing
very little work for a very long time.
--
mark
Tiny Human Ferret
Bwa! Hahahah! I'd have to get a college degree first. Chance of that ever
happening are, well, doubtless you've heard the ice-skating in Hell thing
once too often already.
Besides, I figure if it's that obvious to me, doubtless there are a lot of
people to whom it's one heck of a lot more obvious. I seem to remember some
fairly good SF maybe 20 years ago which dealt with something along the lines
of what I was proposing; it had something called a "graser" which was a
"gravity laser".
What interests me more than a BEC/UCF matter-laser cyclotron is the fine
scanning at nanoscale, I see the next generation of microscopy beyond the
scanning-tunneling microscopy (STM) emerging from that calcium-ion thingy.
And as we know, once you start working with feeling things instead of
looking at them, Planck and Heisenberg start getting uncomfortable and
nervous and so do a lot of the limitations they postulated. For instance,
the STM permits one to place matter as well as measure position, charge and
temperature. I think the atomic force microscope does similar things, I
guess I should research it. And what the hell is a "phonon", the unit
measure of propagating impetus? Hrm, ponder ponder. WWW, here I come.
>
> --
> mark
--
zcatcurious
<snipt colossal amounts of hellishly technical jargon that goes way
over my uneducated head>
this seems like a good spot to post a physics query.
i saw this BBC doco a wee while ago about a couple of odd things [1].
one was an experiment in which they managed to draw power from a
vacuum. i didn't know this was possible, but then what i know about
physics couuld be written on one side of A4. with a crayon.
but the thing that made me most curious was something that they
referred to as "quantum tunnelling". basically, it went like this:
two microwave projectors, in parallel, and two receptors, in parallel.
between one projector-receptor pair; a vacuum. for the other; a
microwave-proof block. not just a shield, but a solid block that ran
almost the whole length of the space. they fired up the cyclotrons,
and timed the transmission. naturally enough, the first one (vacuum)
crosses at the speed of light. what is oddest about the second
(block) is that not only does it cross, it crosses *faster*. this
was, they said, a demonstration of something called quantum
tunnelling, whereby the microwaves basically went from point A to
point F without bothering about the points in between [2].
as i said, i don't know nothin' 'bout no physics, so i have to ask,
has anyone else heard anything about this stuff?
-zcatignorant
[1] FYI, it was *not* shown on April 1
[2] while it is widely known that kittens can do this (qv especially
Fritz Leiber, 'Gummitch and Friends'), i did not know other things
could
Tal
<snip>
>was, they said, a demonstration of something called quantum
>tunnelling, whereby the microwaves basically went from point A to
>point F without bothering about the points in between [2].
>
>as i said, i don't know nothin' 'bout no physics, so i have to ask,
>has anyone else heard anything about this stuff?
Ah, quantum tunnelling! Just one of the many fun and amusing ways to
astound and impress with particles!
Yes, this and many more bizarre and wierd things can be found in your
latest edition of 'Quantum Mechanics, or How the Universe F**ks With
Our Heads'! Read up on it - it's fairly interesting stuff actually.
And remember kiddies - photons go both ways ;)
--
Tal
Commander, 101st Heavy Perking Squad
Lexgoff Mobile Infantry
"We're mobile! We're infantile!"
Tiny Human Ferret
>
> Tiny Human Ferret <kla...@clark.net> wrote in message news:<3BEFF2AE...@clark.net>...
> <snipt colossal amounts of hellishly technical jargon that goes way
> over my uneducated head>
>
> this seems like a good spot to post a physics query.
>
> i saw this BBC doco a wee while ago about a couple of odd things [1].
> one was an experiment in which they managed to draw power from a
> vacuum.
Aiee, idiots messing around with the zero-point forces are going to destroy
the universe someday, I'm sure of it.
>i didn't know this was possible, but then what i know about
> physics couuld be written on one side of A4. with a crayon.
>
> but the thing that made me most curious was something that they
> referred to as "quantum tunnelling". basically, it went like this:
> two microwave projectors, in parallel, and two receptors, in parallel.
> between one projector-receptor pair; a vacuum. for the other; a
> microwave-proof block. not just a shield, but a solid block that ran
> almost the whole length of the space. they fired up the cyclotrons,
> and timed the transmission. naturally enough, the first one (vacuum)
> crosses at the speed of light. what is oddest about the second
> (block) is that not only does it cross, it crosses *faster*. this
> was, they said, a demonstration of something called quantum
> tunnelling, whereby the microwaves basically went from point A to
> point F without bothering about the points in between [2].
>
> as i said, i don't know nothin' 'bout no physics, so i have to ask,
> has anyone else heard anything about this stuff?
Oh, sure!
You want a mind bender? Heh.
You know the classic experiment involving a light source, two slits in a
baffle, and the interference patterns you get on the other side? Block one
of the slits and you _still_ get interference patterns. Heh, some of those
interference patterns are due to photons which haven't been diffracted from
the blocked slit, they're photons from adjacent universes, more or less.
This sort of weirdness happens all of the time. Try to not let it upset you.
A gajillion brand-new universes branch off of all of us, off of everything,
every instant. I suspect that many of them reconverge for the most part, but
basically we really are all little more than probability functions drifting
through other probability functions.
>
> -zcatignorant
>
> [1] FYI, it was *not* shown on April 1
> [2] while it is widely known that kittens can do this (qv especially
> Fritz Leiber, 'Gummitch and Friends'), i did not know other things
> could
--
Jennie
<ns_de_cybax_ya...@microsoft.com> wrote:
>i think that differs from person to person, and their conceptions of
>what flying would be like. i've only flown a few times, and those
>mostly when i was attempting to be more lucid.
For me, it's like swimming. I guess that's because swimming
has given me most of my experience of moving around in three dimensions.
>now, not entirely off-topic, while dreaming, has anyone else found the
>erogenous zone of an angel?
Oh yes. And naturally it's not anything physical, such as
people might expect. It's just _there_. :)
Jennie
--
Jennie Kermode jen...@innocent.com
http://www.triffid.demon.co.uk/jennie
"But I'll be there for you, as the world falls down."
zcatcurious
>
> Ah, quantum tunnelling! Just one of the many fun and amusing ways to
> astound and impress with particles!
>
> Yes, this and many more bizarre and wierd things can be found in your
> latest edition of 'Quantum Mechanics, or How the Universe F**ks With
> Our Heads'! Read up on it - it's fairly interesting stuff actually.
>
> And remember kiddies - photons go both ways ;)
so the next most obvious question is, can it be deliberately
harnessed. i mean, is this the route to sci-fi teleportation? the
problem with harnessing the kittens is, of course, that they will
never do what you want - given a clear opportunity to teleport,
they'll probably aim for the nearest supply of chicken
zcatcurious
>
> You want a mind bender? Heh.
>
> You know the classic experiment involving a light source, two slits in a
> baffle, and the interference patterns you get on the other side? Block one
> of the slits and you _still_ get interference patterns. Heh, some of those
> interference patterns are due to photons which haven't been diffracted from
> the blocked slit, they're photons from adjacent universes, more or less.
>
> This sort of weirdness happens all of the time. Try to not let it upset you.
> A gajillion brand-new universes branch off of all of us, off of everything,
> every instant. I suspect that many of them reconverge for the most part, but
> basically we really are all little more than probability functions drifting
> through other probability functions.
so you're saying that the most accurate way to insult someone is to
say that they are highly improbable?
Tiny Human Ferret
>
> Tal <t...@irkar.com> wrote in message news:<2j82vtcgne8jrpti3...@4ax.com>...
> >
> > Ah, quantum tunnelling! Just one of the many fun and amusing ways to
> > astound and impress with particles!
> >
> > Yes, this and many more bizarre and wierd things can be found in your
> > latest edition of 'Quantum Mechanics, or How the Universe F**ks With
> > Our Heads'! Read up on it - it's fairly interesting stuff actually.
> >
> > And remember kiddies - photons go both ways ;)
>
> so the next most obvious question is, can it be deliberately
> harnessed. i mean, is this the route to sci-fi teleportation?
Weeeellll.... see Michael Crichton's latest novel. It's very good and covers
this in detail. Of _course_ it's fiction! Probably. For now. I guess.
At present, quantum tunnelling occurs constantly, but the problem is,
there's simply no real way to either predict where it'll come out, or to
make some specific particle pop out someplace, or pop back in someplace
specific. If you could induce the quantum tunnelling of some entire object,
probably all you'd have done is to turn it into a fog randomly scattered
throughout the multiverse.
Tiny Human Ferret
Well, it's more like only a highly-improbable universe would have someone
like them in it... and then you could wonder loudly which gods you offended
to have to be sharing a universe with such a doofus, etc.
Mark Greene
>You know the classic experiment involving a light source, two slits in a
>baffle, and the interference patterns you get on the other side? Block one
>of the slits and you _still_ get interference patterns.
My personal pet theory on this is that the photons that hit the target are not
the ones that left the gun. At least not all of them. Some are photons that
were ejected from from the blocking material. Because the photons shot from
the gun have spin and angular momentum, that all of these attributes are
transfered to the photons they eject, so that those photons continue along the
merry path set by those that came before them.
Or something like that.
--
mark
Glenn Olson
<kla...@clark.net> wrote:
>Bwa! Hahahah! I'd have to get a college degree first. Chance of that ever
>happening are, well, doubtless you've heard the ice-skating in Hell thing
>once too often already.
So that should be any time now...
--
"I want to be pretty *and* kick butt"
- 19 y/o girl's reaction to Angelina Jolie as Lara Croft
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A4894-2001Jun14.html
Tiny Human Ferret
>
> On Mon, 12 Nov 2001 11:02:54 -0500, Tiny Human Ferret
> <kla...@clark.net> wrote:
>
> >Bwa! Hahahah! I'd have to get a college degree first. Chance of that ever
> >happening are, well, doubtless you've heard the ice-skating in Hell thing
> >once too often already.
>
> So that should be any time now...
Nah, let's just say that college was actively hostile to me. It was so
hostile, as were the students in-general... well, I took a good look at the
upperclassmen and decided that if the ultimate point of college was to make
me one of their peers, I did not want to end up like that so I just really
stopped caring. And when you stop caring about college, you don't do the
work and then you can either drop out, or flunk out. I was too apathetic to
even drop my classes so I flunked out. And you know what? I wish I had a
better educations. And you know what else? If I don't have to go to college,
I get whatever education I can. InterNet has proven singularly useful at
doing that. Reading assorted professional journals has been helpful, as has
been the public library. Does it bother me that I don't have a degree? Not a
bit. I very well remember how I came to utterly loath the entire student
body of the University of Maryland, and I am quite aware that all a college
degree would do for me would be to assure that I'd be working with a lot of
people I loathe, who were products of a system I loathe. Hey, sure, I'm
bitter... but it's better than loathing what I'd become should I manage to
complete college.
On this issue, hell is nowhere close to freezing, it's very hot indeed.
`Una
>(`Una) wrote:
>
>> >(--nightshade--) challenged the
>> >world with:
>
>> >>now, not entirely off-topic, while dreaming, has anyone else found the
>> >>erogenous zone of an angel?
>
>> It's easy to find the erogenous zone of an angel.
>> Come visit and I'll show you.
>
>well, i walked right into that one, didn't i.
I'm getting better at this pickup line thing, neh?
`Una - the love platypus
for a good time call...
8675309
--
Gothae Una Verus, The Young Locust
http://www.velvet.net/~una
alt.gothic has warped my fragile little mind
Jennie
<ns_de_cybax_ya...@microsoft.com> wrote:
>In article <slrn9v2nji...@triffid.demon.co.uk>,
> jen...@triffid.demon.co.uk (Jennie) wrote:
>> Oh yes. And naturally it's not anything physical, such as
>> people might expect. It's just _there_. :)
>see, now that's disappointing. i was hoping for some sort of
>universally common conception of how it might work. which of course
>makes my revelation sound incredibly inane:
> wingpit.
The angels I've dreamed didn't have wings. They weren't really
composed of solid matter at all, and they were sort of triangular. They
simply had to be approached from the right angle.
Jennie
--
Jennie Kermode jen...@innocent.com
http://www.triffid.demon.co.uk/jennie
"We're all in the gutter, but some of us are looking at the pavement."
Jennie
<ns_de_cybax_ya...@microsoft.com> wrote:
>so the angels had angles, did that? would the right angle from which to
>approach them have been the appropriate angle, or the meeting of two of
>their edges orthgonally?
A sort of in between angle. One can only properly discern it
when focusing on them in such a way that the angles are all wrong.
Jennie
--
Jennie Kermode jen...@innocent.com
http://www.triffid.demon.co.uk/jennie
"I'm covered in bruises from mixing with losers;
"It's the black and the blue that's seeing me through."
Tiny Human Ferret
>
> On Mon, 19 Nov 2001 20:59:47 -0500, --nightshade--
> <ns_de_cybax_ya...@microsoft.com> wrote:
> >so the angels had angles, did that? would the right angle from which to
> >approach them have been the appropriate angle, or the meeting of two of
> >their edges orthgonally?
>
> A sort of in between angle. One can only properly discern it
> when focusing on them in such a way that the angles are all wrong.
Careful there, Jennie. If you learn to easily perceive non-Euclidian spaces
you might learn to move through or into them. I can only suggest that you
re-read your Lovecraft before you give such movement a try...
>
> Jennie
Jennie
>Careful there, Jennie. If you learn to easily perceive non-Euclidian spaces
>you might learn to move through or into them. I can only suggest that you
>re-read your Lovecraft before you give such movement a try...
Perhaps I like my Lovecraft differently. Sometimes I think it
might be brillig. :)
Tiny Human Ferret
>
> On Fri, 23 Nov 2001 10:22:21 -0500, Tiny Human Ferret <kla...@clark.net> wrote:
> >Careful there, Jennie. If you learn to easily perceive non-Euclidian spaces
> >you might learn to move through or into them. I can only suggest that you
> >re-read your Lovecraft before you give such movement a try...
>
> Perhaps I like my Lovecraft differently. Sometimes I think it
> might be brillig. :)
Why do I suspect you're also a big fan of really old Theodore Sturgeon SF?