The Factory Floor

12:47 AM

0

Combating Science sold as Magic Link to original question (closed with 4 reopen votes) Tags: technologymagicstrategy Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic. – Arthur C. Clarke Question There are two planets, A and B. A is a global state ...

Hosch250

@JavaScriptCoder The sandbox is for posting new questions to test them out before posting on the main site :)

Also, @James, want to hammer-reopen @JavaScriptCoder's question?

Gryphon

@Hosch250 I'd give it the 5th reopen vote, except mine's one of the 4 already there.

Shalvenay

1:12 AM

@Hosch250 link?

Gryphon

2

Q: How to combat magic as science?

Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic. – Arthur C. Clarke Question There are two planets, A and B. A is a global state with little conflict, while B is a medieval warlord state with constant conflict. A has advanced technology, while ~0.1%...

Shalvenay

@Gryphon reopened

Gryphon

@Shalvenay Thank-you.

Feeds 4026

1:47 AM

0

A: Sandbox for Proposed Questions

Teaching Happiness on Spartan Teenagers through Basketball In a world where Spartan way of life is the code of living, you somehow became transported into this world and decided to become the envoy of peace. The first step which you think would end wars is teach the boys how to play and enjoy Ba...

JavaScriptCoder

3:47 AM

@Shalvenay thanks! I admit my patience was running a bit thin

Feeds 4026

5:32 AM

0

A: Sandbox for Proposed Questions

Dropping a huge tower, what happens to the ground? Tags: reality-checkphysicsgeology Background Aliens have decided to re-invade Earth. Their opening move is to drop large assault towers from portals over the ground. Properties of impactor These towers are approximately cones five kilometers...

AndyD273

12:59 PM

@Hosch250 Huh, I wonder if it is more effective to carry a fireslug using a shadow instead of the woven basket...

Hosch250

@AndyD273 Probably, if you can keep your concentration.

Even a beaver-sized animal would get heavy--and they probably have to carry it between them so as not to get burned.

Hmmm, now I'm imagining a shadow chasing the creeps with a fireslug.

Secespitus

1:14 PM

My carrier pigeons have been replaced by spoons: how can I send messages?: "Yup. All my pigeons are now spoons." <- a normal day on WorldBuilding.SE :D

Hosch250

:(

I had an edit, then Separatrix did a new edit, and mine got rejected.

I guess he just had a slightly different style for the PS.

Kepotx

"but at least my horses aren't forks"

Hosch250

I'm strongly tempted to write an answer saying to tape a message to the spoon and send it off.

2

Kepotx

gosh, you was supposed to make gold out of lead, not spoons out of pigeons

2

@Hosch250 yup, they are spoon-shaped, but it isn't stated that they can't fly...

Secespitus

@Kepotx You have to start somewhere :D

I've got to say, that new user has a very interesting sense of humour: "i try to make them fly, pigeons were better at it. Even with the trebuchet, the distance is to short be useful ( unless i create a network of trebuchet all around my kingdom)"

Kepotx

1:39 PM

boom, HNQ

Secespitus

Obviously. One of the best clickbait titles I've seen in some time.

And a funny question that is actually completely on-topic.

"I need a system to relay short messages over longer distances in a medieval time - but I can't use pidgeons because of this specific change in my world."

Hosch250

Hmmm.

Now I'm thinking about an answer that keeps the privacy of pigeons while transferring messages.

Because, the best idea proposed so far (polish the spoons and invent morse code) has the same problems as telegraph operators.

The message can be intercepted or leaked.

Secespitus

Anyone else thinks this sounds like a worldbuilding question?

in The Awkward Silence, 3 mins ago, by Tinkeringbell

@apaul I really don't know why you'd make a catapult out of excrement. Doesn't sound very sturdy to me.

AndyD273

@Hosch250 Why you use code. Even a pigeon can be brought down with a hawk or arrow and intercepted.

Ajnatorix Zersolar

@AndyD273 or by a flying spoon.

Secespitus

1:51 PM

@AjnatorixZersolar They don't fly very well though.

Ajnatorix Zersolar

@Secespitus I guess...that would be an interesting question, "best way to make spoons fly using X materials/technology."

Gryphon

@AjnatorixZersolar How high can one launch a spoon, while maintaining enough accuracy to have a >50% chance of striking a target the size of a pigeon, using only medieval materials and engineering?

AndyD273

@Secespitus That's why you have to bundle the spoons up, so it becomes a flying cloud of spoons when launched by trebuchet. It also helps to sharpen the edges of the spoons.

Hosch250

@Gryphon You hire an alchemist to turn your spoons into falcons.

Secespitus

@AndyD273 Yes, perfect to deliver messages. Messages of the form "You die today!"

Ajnatorix Zersolar

1:55 PM

@Gryphon @AndyD273 fun with spoons :D

Hosch250

OK, now our spoons have an identity crisis. They have to prey on their ex-brothers.

Secespitus

@Hosch250 Poor spoons...

Hosch250

:)

Gryphon

@Hosch250 Great, we've invented cannibal spoons.

2

Ajnatorix Zersolar

this is when i imagine a random person walking into this room and going "what the!?"

Secespitus

1:56 PM

@Gryphon Now that's one hell of a creature-design

Gryphon

Also, obligatory xkcd:

Their biggest mistake was bringing Rachael Ray and Emeril to tour the lab and sign off on the project. That's when Spielberg caught wind of it.

2

Ajnatorix Zersolar

Anatomicly correct "spoon demon" or "demonic spoon"?

Journeyman Geek

Depends

Secespitus

@AjnatorixZersolar The normal Factory Floor craziness

AndyD273

Anatomically correct cannibal spoon pigeon?

Secespitus

1:58 PM

@Gryphon There's always an obligatory XKCD

3

Journeyman Geek

is it a demon in a spoon, or a demon that is a spoon? Or a spooning demon...

Gryphon

@AjnatorixZersolar Believe it or not, there've probably been worse times to walk into here.

Ajnatorix Zersolar

@AndyD273 I would instantly favourite something like that.

@Gryphon like the sharp-pine-needle conversation?

Secespitus

@AjnatorixZersolar Nah, the discussions about secespitalizing posts were far worse

Hosch250

LOL.

Gryphon

2:00 PM

@Secespitus Yes, that would have been a bad time to walk in.

Ajnatorix Zersolar

Apologies to any government-organisations, but spoons are fun (demonic smile)

HDE 226868

@AjnatorixZersolar Or even a non-random person. That's my response when I walk in here every morning.

4

AndyD273

@Secespitus I tried to do a google search to figure out what that word meant, which brought up the original forum post, at which point I remembered I was part of that conversation...

Ajnatorix Zersolar

ah, If worldbuilding SE had news headlines...

Secespitus

@AndyD273 :D Nice

The "assassin NGO" discussion was also quite fascinating

HDE 226868

2:03 PM

Do we have a "Greatest Hits" list of the wackiest conversations in here? We should.

7

Hosch250

+1 for that.

Gryphon

@HDE226868 Yeah, I got five stars for: "I check to see what's going on, and see a long discussion about exactly how sharp evergreen needles are."

Ajnatorix Zersolar

"pigeons terrorised by flying cannibal spoons"

5

Hosch250

We should bookmark them.

@AjnatorixZersolar Strike imminent.

Gryphon

@AjnatorixZersolar Was the entire point of that comment to see how many stars you could get?

Ajnatorix Zersolar

2:04 PM

"new trees are sharp, they look like evergreens but hurt more"

@Gryphon more examples of worldbuilding headlines, so no.

Secespitus

@HDE226868 I don't think we have something like that, but we should definitely create it.

Hosch250

@Secespitus Use the bookmark feature.

Secespitus

@AndyD273 Here's your chance

AndyD273

@Secespitus :D

Kepotx

a few more question and area51 will see a spoon.SE appear

we should at least create a spoon tag

MichaelK

2:14 PM

Are they rusty spoooooons?

Salad Fingers Full Series (1-10)

►

AndyD273

I really like that the Virtual Trebuchet exists.

MichaelK

@AndyD273 They should make that a plugin to Kerbal Space Program.

HDE 226868

2:31 PM

@AndyD273 Turns out there are a number of trebuchet calculators out there.

AndyD273

@HDE226868 Yeah, found a few

Green

@AndyD273 I wish they had one of those for Floating Arm-King Arthur Trebuchets.

AndyD273

Though the ones I found ignore things like drag, friction, etc

Green

@AndyD273 yeah, that's a bummer.

Kepotx

" Spoons weigh very little, and a low-mass projectile should be slung further than a high-mass projectile" => the fact that a spoon is really light doesn't mean that air/wind can have huge effect on it, and therefore make them not so great?

13km seems really huge. also, the further shot mean larger area, it could be hard to cacth a spoon (even if it survived)

MichaelK

2:43 PM

@Kepotx You are entirely correct. The square-cube law plays into that. Air resistance is dependant on the square of the size. This means that an object that is twice as large "bleeds" 4 times more the energy per distance travelled. But the amount of kinetic energy — for a given speed — is the cube of the size... so the twice as large object has 8 times as much energy when it leaves the trebuchet.

HDE 226868

@Kepotx Yes, you're right, and I've already removed that sentence from my answer.

MichaelK

@Kepotx Then again: now you have to build your trebuchet to actually put 8 times the energy into that projectile.

HDE 226868

I don't know what the end balance would be; on the one hand, a lower-mass projectile has a lower moment of inertia and lower mass, and so, if imbued with the same kinetic energy, it should travel faster and farther. Plus, it has a smaller cross-sectional area. But air resistance would also be more important, given the lower mass.

Kepotx

as probably no simulator-concepter even though that trebuchet would be used to launch spoon, I suppoe the best thing to do is test it with a real trebuchet

2

some castle still have functional trebuchet (or similar siege-weapon), because it's funny and attract tourist. we should write to one of them so they could test it

MichaelK

@HDE226868 Well if you have a constant amount of energy... then we are stuck with some pretty tricky equations.

HDE 226868

2:55 PM

@MichaelK I'm not sure I follow.

The same amount of energy (roughly) should be transferred to a lighter projectile than to a heavier projectile loaded in the same trebuchet, no?

AndyD273

@HDE226868 If it was a spherical spoon in a frictionless vacuum, maybe?

6

Gryphon

@AndyD273 I feel like a spherical spoon might not be very useful as a spoon.

HDE 226868

A spherical spoon is just a ball with a hole in it, I think.

AndyD273

@Gryphon Yes, but you're talking physics equations. They kind of have to simplify things to make those more elegant. But the math does work out.

Kepotx

@AndyD273 use trebuchet to launch spoon instead of simply walk is already quite absurd, if now we need to create vacuum each time we send a message...

AndyD273

3:10 PM

If you need some help with the math, let me know, but that should be enough to get you started! Huh? No, I don't need to read your thesis, I can imagine roughly what it says.

HDE 226868

@AndyD273 I'm an astrophysics major at a liberal arts school. Does that make me even more annoying?

3

Hosch250

Possibly?

Nothing pisses me off more than liberal-arts majors.

AndyD273

@HDE226868 At least in astrophysics you deal with objects in a vacuum on a normal basis while still being real world conditions.

The other two are still lost on the infinite plane of uniform density.

5

Hosch250

Physicists and chemists and such are at least usually moderately intelligent if they don't have to drop out.

LOL, the infinite plane of uniform density :)

Kepotx

today star wall: xkcd and (cannibal) spoons.

HDE 226868

3:14 PM

Both spoon questions are on the HNQ.

I guess we're spoons.stackexchange.com now.

Kepotx

guess what will be tomorrow's star wall (probably xkcd and another weird thing)

Hosch250

@Kepotx Possibly something related to poisons.

Poison is a common topic here.

Kepotx

is there a minimum question before we can create the spoon tag?

AndyD273

Designing a very hard to detect poison?

@Kepotx Probably more than 2.

Kepotx

@Hosch250 the goal with a poison-related question is to make a title to freak out people once it reach HNQ

2

Hosch250

3:18 PM

@Kepotx Not really.

Kepotx

"I posion my wife with X, would the effect be hidden if I gave her Y"?

Hosch250

The goal is to lure people in, get them to click it, then freak out after they visit the page.

Kepotx

remove that star! we are not tomorrow yet!

Hosch250

OK.

Kepotx

that's better. come back to normal with spoon-related stuff

(well, normal according to worldbuilding standard)

Hosch250

3:23 PM

OK, I'll feed my wife a poisonous "edible" spoon.

What kind of antidote do I need to put in my other edible spoon?

Gryphon

@Hosch250 Hmm, is gallium poisonous?

HDE 226868

@Kepotx No minimum.

Hosch250

No, I mean one of those kind that you can literally eat.

Mike Nichols

3:44 PM

Always funny to me when a question with multiple good answers is closed as "unclear what you are asking." Clearly, other people were able to figure it out...

HDE 226868

3:55 PM

@MikeNichols shrug It happens. Part of the thing is that questions should be understandable and clear to most people, not just some. So when enough people can't understand what the author is saying, it behooves the author to correct things.

FoxElemental

4:12 PM

I think I'm using all my stars for the day :)

Hosch250

Please amuse me while my code compiles :)

I think we need some more variety in story-go-round. Why don't y'all go and add a post.

FYI, we are just about ready for a chapter split, so feel free to add one if you want explore a major-ish theme.

I was thinking about closing out the discussion a bit, then splitting the chapter and going into H & J doing the 3rd challenge.

AndyD273

@Hosch250 I think a flashback to the capture of the fireslug would be great.

Hosch250

Me too.

That's something I was thinking we could flesh out in the dialog or in a flashback. Not sure how to work it in just yet.

Also, I think you are getting around the 150 character limit, or whatever, with the multi-line trick :)

I should start using that a bit. It gets tricky to have meaningful dialog with this little text.

Cool.

AndyD273

@Hosch250 Yeah, I'm cheating a bit, but I try REALLY hard to keep it close. Plus it makes it a lot easier to read when stuff is broken onto multiple lines.

@Hosch250 I agree. For a bit of background, when we last left Jarilo and Hemdul at the end of Chapter 5, they had just warded off an attack by some ruffians, but in the process had broken one of their jars of fire slug slime. They needed to replace it, but were out of jars to store it in, and it has to be stored in an airtight container to keep oxygen out. Jarilo had joked that they should just capture a slug and take it with them. And apparently they managed to catch a young one.

Hosch250

4:35 PM

FWIW, Niardul et al have solved the challenge of storing fire-slug slime in a bark container with some sort of plug.

But, that may not be relevant here, as they actually captured one, so they have an essentially unlimited supply.

AndyD273

@Hosch250 I think it was a jar with a plug, not a bark container?

Hosch250

Feel free to work in some new details about the fire-slug too. There's quite a lot unknown still. All the current info is in my question.

@AndyD273 Was it? I thought there was a scene with them making them.

in Story-go-round, Mar 23 at 22:43, by Bellerophon

Bremdag and Niarhdul draw small knives from their bags and move over to the trees while Brokhem keeps an eye out for any dangers. It doesn't take long for them to gather three large chunks of bark which Neidhal begins trying to shape into scoop shapes.
"Are you sure this will work?" asks Bremdag "The burnt tree over their didn't seem very flame prooft."
"The bark isn't fire proof but it will hold the slime for a minute or so. That should be ample time to get it into a bottle." replies Niarhdul holding up a finished scoop "Who wants to go first?"

I guess it's both?

Ohh, that's a scoop.

AndyD273

yeah

Hosch250

They have separate jars for storage.

AndyD273

I just found that section

Hosch250

4:38 PM

OK, so ignore my imbecility.

AndyD273

Grabbing fire slug slime with your hands may not be wise... Kinda napalmy

Apparently slugs have 27,000 teeth, and weird mouths...

A Slug's mouth in action

►

Hosch250

I thought they kind of poked it so it would walk onto the basket, then they just snatched it up and took off before it could walk off.

Might have to repeat it every so often if it tries to walk off.

Or maybe the basket has pointy things on the edge.

Feeds 4026

7:05 PM

0

A: Sandbox for Proposed Questions

tags: science-based,timetravel Let me start by quoting this article from Scientific American: Let’s do a quick thought experiment. Imagine you have a nifty time machine and decide to pop one month into the past. Maybe you need to avoid a parking ticket or a particularly debilitating curry, t...

James

7:17 PM

Someone please agree that this is entirely too broad?

79

Q: How would it make sense that spellbooks or grimoires teach only one spell?

In a JRPG-like setting; Spells are chanted, mana is consumed, and spells can be learned through grimoires or spellbooks, how would it make sense that a spellbook teaches only one spell? If it is like cooking, like say, how to bake a cake. Why would it take a whole book to learn? How could I make...

magic

Hosch250

@James Agreed, given it's described as a recipe.

James

@Hosch250 And there are absolutely no constraints.

I sometimes miss the days where I could see basically all the questions on the site.

NotATyrant

7:33 PM

hello

just post two question on the site, ask a third one (how tall my wife would be if she was turend into a spoon, and weight the same), but i delete it as it was off topic

i undesrtand why it was badly seen, as i could answer it myself easily

i still have another question, and wonder if it's on scope

could wi cast stainless steel with my spoon, with a medieval technology?

Hosch250

7:56 PM

Hi, @NotATyrant!

It might be on topic (I'm newish here, so I'm not as familiar as the experts), but it would depend on how exactly you phrased it and what constraints you had.

Just off the top of my head, medieval tech could probably work with existing stainless steel to a certain extent. The trouble, as I understand it, was mostly around the problems of purifying it.

However, I'm usually wrong, so don't take this as word-of-god :)

You could post the question on the sandbox: worldbuilding.meta.stackexchange.com/questions/6168/…

Some regulars watch that and help make sure questions are on-topic before they actually get posted.

NotATyrant

Zbra, @Hosch250!

thanks for the tip, i will try it

FoxElemental

8:57 PM

Why no quantum-aify?

Hosch250

Ask James.

FoxElemental

@James Why no [room-tag:quantum-aify]?

Oh before I forget

What's the stance on users creating new chat rooms for the sake of testing room admin privileges (like a temporary Sandbox)?

Mithrandir24601

9:42 PM

@FoxElemental I don't think it's a problem, but I'm not sure... If you ask in the sandbox room, they might temporarily allow you do try it out there, but I wouldn't bet on it

Waits for @HDE's announcement

HDE 226868

Hey all! The rep requirement for meta has been lowered to 1. Please keep an eye out on meta as new posts come in, probably at an increasing rate.

8

@Mithrandir24601 grins

Mithrandir24601

re: the 'questions about the real world are officially on-topic now' thing - does this count?

HDE 226868

I'm on the fence about that one. I honestly don't know what the precise circuit is that the user's referencing.

Mithrandir24601

9:59 PM

@HDE226868 I'm struggling a bit to understand why it's about Worldbuilding, to be honest

HDE 226868

I don't think it is; I also don't think it's likely to be helpful to many future worldbuilders, either.

Worldbuilding Meta

0

Q: Opinions about the new Technobabble tag

A recent question introduced the technobabble tag. Click here to read its wiki. I like this tag. I think it reflects the highly creative nature of the site and balances the fact that far too often we favor the science-half of "science fiction." We consider "how to name my X" questions off-top...

discussion on-topic specific-tag

HDE 226868

@James any thoughts on the question @Mithrandir24601 linked to?

Mike Nichols

10:20 PM

@Mithrandir24601 That seems to be a pure physics question. However, it's likely off topic there because it isn't mainstream physics. Even if it isn't off topic it is likely a duplicate of the various other "perpetual motion with magnets" questions. So it doesn't belong here, but if you do migrate it to the physics exchange it will almost certainly be closed anyways.

Transcript for