1190: "Time"

[Asthanius]

So they're trying to figure out why the sea level is rising faster than usual... it's not the rivers, it's not the rain... is it a comment on climate change?

Perhaps. And how baby-infused coffee may be contributing to global warming...

But I can't start my mornings without Folgers Infant Instant Coffee!

[Qalyar]

It appears Cueball and Megan rebuilt a proper place to wait. Though I fear for the structural integrity of the scaffolding, given that it has no cross beams to our horizontal (the Sea to the right, Hills presumably to the left).

Maybe they were worried that they'd end up with one of the cross-beams out askew.

One on't cross beams gone owt askew on treadle!

Well what on earth does that mean?

I don't know ... I didn't expect a kind of Spanish Inquisition.<sup>1

1</sup>Particularly ironic, since I tried to launch the French Inquisition against the Templars Temporals earlier in the thread.
²Reading unassigned footnotes is still heresy, and will get you burned at the stake.^3
3Or, possibly, get you a burned steak.^4
4I can't cook.

[StratPlayer]

It appears Cueball and Megan rebuilt a proper place to wait. Though I fear for the structural integrity of the scaffolding, given that it has no cross beams to our horizontal (the Sea to the right, Hills presumably to the left).

Maybe they were worried that they'd end up with one of the cross-beams out askew.

One on't cross beams gone owt askew on treadle!

Well what on earth does that mean?

Okay, so a treadle is the pedal-thing that you see on looms and old sewing machines and things like that which are used to power a machine.
That's all I have.

Nope -- it's yet another reference to Monty Python and the Spanish Inquisition bit...


EDIT: Dangit-- Ninja'd!

[Angelastic]

And how baby-infused coffee may be contributing to global warming...

Well, growing/transporting/brewing coffee and having babies are big contributors to climate change. Hmm... but semen isn't, if used wisely. And what of snow?

[HAL9000]

It appears Cueball and Megan rebuilt a proper place to wait. Though I fear for the structural integrity of the scaffolding, given that it has no cross beams to our horizontal (the Sea to the right, Hills presumably to the left).

Maybe they were worried that they'd end up with one of the cross-beams out askew.

One on't cross beams gone owt askew on treadle!

Well what on earth does that mean?

I don't know ... I didn't expect a kind of Spanish Inquisition.<sup>1

1</sup>Particularly ironic, since I tried to launch the French Inquisition against the Templars Temporals earlier in the thread.
²Reading unassigned footnotes is still heresy, and will get you burned at the stake.^3
3Or, possibly, get you a burned steak.^4
4I can't cook.

Would this burned steak have been cooked by dropping it from orbit?

[cellocgw]

Actually, "defen[cs]e" is one of those words that can go either way, but is mostly spelled one way in the U.S., a different way just about everywhere else.

Actually, it's spelled one way just about everywhere, and mostly spelled a different way in the U.S.

"Defence" means to remove the chain-link boundary around your property.
"Defense" means to put it back up again as protection.

Naah. To remove a fence, you need the hyphen, to wit: "de-fence." Just as "defenestrate" means to leave via a window (really it does), while "de-fenestrate" means to remove a window (OK, I made that up). On the other hand, as any drunk NFL fan knows, holding up a pair of symbols, capital "D" next to [piece of picket fence] , means "hey you dumbass members of my favorite team, stop the other guys from advancing!"

[Qalyar]

It appears Cueball and Megan rebuilt a proper place to wait. Though I fear for the structural integrity of the scaffolding, given that it has no cross beams to our horizontal (the Sea to the right, Hills presumably to the left).

Maybe they were worried that they'd end up with one of the cross-beams out askew.

One on't cross beams gone owt askew on treadle!

Well what on earth does that mean?

I don't know ... I didn't expect a kind of Spanish Inquisition.<sup>1

1</sup>Particularly ironic, since I tried to launch the French Inquisition against the Templars Temporals earlier in the thread.
²Reading unassigned footnotes is still heresy, and will get you burned at the stake.^3
3Or, possibly, get you a burned steak.^4
4I can't cook.

Would this burned steak have been cooked by dropping it from orbit?

Oh no, I'm quite capable of burning the entire steak, not just destroying its outer layers through ablative charring!

Proper cooking methods for heretics aside, I'm trying to figure out what's going on with the dialogue. I think there are really two viable options from here. Either the characters really don't understand the world around them, except for structural engineering and ballistics, which is more than a bit surrealist ... or they're not idiots, but there are some fundamental assumptions about the world that we're failing to understand.

The sea rise curve, accounting for the fact that subjective time-per-newpix is a non-constant, looks pretty close to the sort of sinusoidal curve I'd expect a tide to have. And Randall, well, we know he's the type to pay attention to that sort of detail. Eyeballing the trebuchet shots, they look fairly believable, too. And that seems like a lot of trouble if all this dialogue is surrealist banter unrelated to reality.

But I don't think that helps us reveal what's really going on yet. Except I'm increasingly dubious that the water is water.

[HAL9000]

Would this burned steak have been cooked by dropping it from orbit?

Oh no, I'm quite capable of burning the entire steak, not just destroying its outer layers through ablative charring!

Proper cooking methods for heretics aside, I'm trying to figure out what's going on with the dialogue. I think there are really two viable options from here. Either the characters really don't understand the world around them, except for structural engineering and ballistics, which is more than a bit surrealist ... or they're not idiots, but there are some fundamental assumptions about the world that we're failing to understand.

The sea rise curve, accounting for the fact that subjective time-per-newpix is a non-constant, looks pretty close to the sort of sinusoidal curve I'd expect a tide to have. And Randall, well, we know he's the type to pay attention to that sort of detail. Eyeballing the trebuchet shots, they look fairly believable, too. And that seems like a lot of trouble if all this dialogue is surrealist banter unrelated to reality.

But I don't think that helps us reveal what's really going on yet. Except I'm increasingly dubious that the water is water.

Maybe they don't know how they got to where they are, so they don't understand the climate of the area.

[StratPlayer]

Actually, "defen[cs]e" is one of those words that can go either way, but is mostly spelled one way in the U.S., a different way just about everywhere else.

Actually, it's spelled one way just about everywhere, and mostly spelled a different way in the U.S.

"Defence" means to remove the chain-link boundary around your property.
"Defense" means to put it back up again as protection.

Naah. To remove a fence, you need the hyphen...

Whoa, whoa, whoa. You can't just warp into hyphenspace at the drop of a hat. You need a Holtzman Drive and a navigator first...

...well, unless the other team is inside your 20-yard line, then you can use your Redzone de-fense. Or, if you play Canadian football, you can use your Red Green de-fense...

[manvandmaan]

Proper cooking methods for heretics aside, I'm trying to figure out what's going on with the dialogue. I think there are really two viable options from here. Either the characters really don't understand the world around them, except for structural engineering and ballistics, which is more than a bit surrealist ... or they're not idiots, but there are some fundamental assumptions about the world that we're failing to understand.

Or, they are indeed idiots¹ who know nothing and also there is an Ikea in the neighbourhood that just happend to have a trebuchet, mini-trebuchet and also an assortiment of scaffolding/observation/observed platforms.

You don't need any structural engineering knowledge to follow an IKEA plan.
The ballistics could have been lucky shots. Remember that not all of them were on target.


¹ I don't mean that they are idiots, merely that they seemt to lack some basic knowledge. I'm with the Blue Lagoon theory to explain that.

[iisjreg]

It appears Cueball and Megan rebuilt a proper place to wait. Though I fear for the structural integrity of the scaffolding, given that it has no cross beams to our horizontal (the Sea to the right, Hills presumably to the left).

Maybe they were worried that they'd end up with one of the cross-beams out askew.

One on't cross beams gone owt askew on treadle!

Well what on earth does that mean?

Okay, so a treadle is the pedal-thing that you see on looms and old sewing machines and things like that which are used to power a machine.
That's all I have.

Nope -- it's yet another reference to Monty Python and the Spanish Inquisition bit...


EDIT: Dangit-- Ninja'd!

I think there should be a graph for number of Python References per newpage/newpix.

Also, shouldn't the fora post graphs be axis'd¹ with newpages/newpix, because, I mean, what the hell is 01:00!? no NewPoints for you...

¹ Yup. I did that. ^2
2 Oh no! Footnotes!!!!!

[mscha]

[Bytes]

I feel kind of sorry for cueball, he looks so lost...


EDIT, also, bets on for whether the sea breaching the dyke will be captured in a mid action shot, or just instant equilibrium.

[Febrion]

I wonder if cueball is really an AI powered by BBCode...

[thirds]

Maybe they don't know how they got to where they are, so they don't understand the climate of the area.

Not just climate, but primarily geography (or "anything" apparently). They don't know the size of the Sea, presence of other rivers or ground water sources. They see the Sea level rising and have prior expectations that the water level is dependent on the River feeding the Sea. However, the River they know about apparently is not connecting to the Sea as they would expect, even retreating recently.

River: small; retreating from Sea; expected to be feeding into Sea, but it is not; speculated existence of other rivers; fed from rain in hills;
Sea: big, but of unknown size; known to rise and fall; rising levels from unknown source or reason; rate of rise unusually high; bad-tasting;

Just have to work out the symbolism with respect to Time and Waiting.

[fhorn]

and another:

Litany update, if it please you, Oh great Omelette elemtropy:

Spoiler:

The Litany of The Waits:
Leader: Later!
People: Bye!
Leader: Wanna swim?
People: Yeah!
Leader: Pffthh
People: *cough*
Leader: You ok?
People: Just got some in my mouth.
Leader: Any idea where the river is now?
People: Still pretty far out. It's actually retreated a little this week.
Leader: I don't understand what the sea is doing.
(All observe a meditative silence)
Leader: I don't think we can build it much taller than this.
People: It's been fun, though!
(The leader makes a sipping sound)
Leader: Pfffth Pthuh! Yuck.
People: I've had worse.
Leader: Guess one of us should climb down.
People: Yeah.
Leader: The sea is rising.
People: Yeah.
Leader: Sea level rises and falls, right? It's changed before.
People: Not this fast.
Leader: The river hasn't even reached the sea yet.
People: The river is small. The sea is big.
Leader: How big?
People: I don’t know.
(Several beats of silence are observed.)
Leader: Does it Rain on the Sea?
People: I don't know; if it does it seems like a waste.
Leader: It rains in the hills where the river comes from, right?
People: Sure.
Leader: Are there other rivers?
People: I don't know.
Leader: There must be other rivers.
People: Otherwise the sea would dry up.
Leader: Maybe it's coming out of the ground.
People: Does that happen?
Leader: I don't know.
(Another moment of silent reflection.)
Leader: I don't know how the sea works.
People: I don't know how anything works.

[udscbt]

I missed a lot of posts (again) and I was wondering: what happened in the last 12 pages?

Much. And as Sir/Dame BlitzGirl has shown us, you must read it all.

Has the Cannon Law been written by the Ecumenic Council? Do we have a new temporary Pope/Mome?

They've decided they should kick things off with a fancy dress-up party, but have had a hard time putting it together. They keep firing the cannon ball planner...

A lot of speech has been shown lately, any crazy theory about what's happening?

I think it might be dialog.

1) I'm only a Cardinal (and a Prefect and a sandwich), she's the only Cardinal Tempus Viator, the First Of The True Followers Of Time’s time and I think even a Knight (and a lot of other things, but I don't know if they're official)
2) maybe I should make more bishops...
3) if I said that "it wasn't unobvious to me" is a false sentence, I would be lying

[StratPlayer]

Spoiler:

Cueball: "There's so many things I don't understand, like why do the fish stop swimming and lie on top of the tide pools after a heavy rain? Why do you hear the waves inside the big shells? Why are all these funny hairs growing on me? I wish a big book with all the answers to every question in the world would drop out of the sky and land in my hands right now. I'd read it till I knew everything."

Megan: "Oh Cueball, you can't know everything. Only Lord Randall knows everything."

Cueball: "Lord Randall - He can't find us any better than Santa Claus."


Source: The Blue Lagoon IMDB Quote Page

[Asthanius]

Hold on. This image gave me an idea:

What if there's a basic assumption we're making that isn't true? What if Cueball and Megan aren't adults?

Stay with me here: When you were a kid playing with your friends, everything was larger-than-life. Outside in the backyard with some sticks? You're pirates fighting off Blackbeard's men.
On the playground talking about this totally awesome TV show? Soon you'll be acting it out as the protagonists fighting against a Big Bad from your imaginations.
At the beach during high tide when there aren't many other people around? You build a sandcastle and a moat or wall to keep the water out, using sticks and rocks to act out a war between the castles. Suddenly, the water starts to breach the moat/wall that you made and you get scared because your castles are about to be destroyed. Maybe you try to get to higher ground, standing on piles of sand. Being as young as you are, you don't understand exactly how the world around you works. The water is rising really fast. What could be causing it? There's a river by your house, so that's probably where the water comes from, and the river must get its water from the rain, obviously. But does that mean it rains over the ocean? That'd be weird. There's already water there, after all...what if there are more rivers? What if you haven't seen them because they're underground? The world is a lot bigger than you thought, and you're kind of scared because now you realize that you don't really know anything.

Time is a metaphor for growing up.

EDIT: This goes along with the The Blue Lagoon stuff, but I'm saying that they're not stranded or anything, just young and ignorant about the world.

[histrion]

I could buy into that, but I'm getting hung up on their construction of the scaffolding. They at least seemed to know how to use the basic tools necessary to the task.

[Asthanius]

I could buy into that, but I'm getting hung up on their construction of the scaffolding. They at least seemed to know how to use the basic tools necessary to the task.

Either it's just imagination or one of them has an architect parent, so they picked up a few things from trying to be just like them.
Also, if they really did know what they were doing, they wouldn't just put a flat surface on four vertical beams; they'd used triangular shapes to keep the structure steady and strong. I only see one small triangle.

[SBN]

I think the characters may have gotten away from Randall. Doesn't happen to all authors, but it isn't hugely uncommon for authors to explain that their characters have done things they weren't supposed to do. He may now be just watching and waiting along with the rest of us. (Although, presumably somewhere ahead of us in Time.)

[Valiant Cookie]

I could buy into that, but I'm getting hung up on their construction of the scaffolding. They at least seemed to know how to use the basic tools necessary to the task.

And they have the knowledge and means to get supplies from IKEA.

[udscbt]

Hold on. This image gave me an idea:

What if there's a basic assumption we're making that isn't true? What if Cueball and Megan aren't adults?

Stay with me here: When you were a kid playing with your friends, everything was larger-than-life. Outside in the backyard with some sticks? You're pirates fighting off Blackbeard's men.
On the playground talking about this totally awesome TV show? Soon you'll be acting it out as the protagonists fighting against a Big Bad from your imaginations.
At the beach during high tide when there aren't many other people around? You build a sandcastle and a moat or wall to keep the water out, using sticks and rocks to act out a war between the castles. Suddenly, the water starts to breach the moat/wall that you made and you get scared because your castles are about to be destroyed. Maybe you try to get to higher ground, standing on piles of sand. Being as young as you are, you don't understand exactly how the world around you works. The water is rising really fast. What could be causing it? There's a river by your house, so that's probably where the water comes from, and the river must get its water from the rain, obviously. But does that mean it rains over the ocean? That'd be weird. There's already water there, after all...what if there are more rivers? What if you haven't seen them because they're underground? The world is a lot bigger than you thought, and you're kind of scared because now you realize that you don't really know anything.

Time is a metaphor for growing up.

EDIT: This goes along with the The Blue Lagoon stuff, but I'm saying that they're not stranded or anything, just young and ignorant about the world.

I like this theory! I mean, I would, if not for the lack of raptors.

EDIT:

I could buy into that, but I'm getting hung up on their construction of the scaffolding. They at least seemed to know how to use the basic tools necessary to the task.

In Bridge to Terabithia (at least in the film, I haven't read the book) the boy builds a bridge without any particular knowledge

[Caswallon]

Proper cooking methods for heretics aside, I'm trying to figure out what's going on with the dialogue. I think there are really two viable options from here. Either the characters really don't understand the world around them, except for structural engineering and ballistics, which is more than a bit surrealist ... or they're not idiots, but there are some fundamental assumptions about the world that we're failing to understand.

The sea rise curve, accounting for the fact that subjective time-per-newpix is a non-constant, looks pretty close to the sort of sinusoidal curve I'd expect a tide to have. And Randall, well, we know he's the type to pay attention to that sort of detail. Eyeballing the trebuchet shots, they look fairly believable, too. And that seems like a lot of trouble if all this dialogue is surrealist banter unrelated to reality.

But I don't think that helps us reveal what's really going on yet. Except I'm increasingly dubious that the water is water.

Maybe they don't know how they got to where they are, so they don't understand the climate of the area.

Which is why I believe they are on a giant colonization spaceship, which they do not understand, but has sufficient resources. My vote still goes with something RAMAish.

[Asthanius]

I could buy into that, but I'm getting hung up on their construction of the scaffolding. They at least seemed to know how to use the basic tools necessary to the task.

And they have the knowledge and means to get supplies from IKEA.

I think there might be a misunderstanding here: I'm saying that the sandcastles aren't actually that big and the other structures (including the trebuchets and flags) either aren't there or are extremely small and made of sticks, driftwood, rocks, seaweed, etc.

[histrion]

I could buy into that, but I'm getting hung up on their construction of the scaffolding. They at least seemed to know how to use the basic tools necessary to the task.

Either it's just imagination or one of them has an architect parent, so they picked up a few things from trying to be just like them.
Also, if they really did know what they were doing, they wouldn't just put a flat surface on four vertical beams; they'd used triangular shapes to keep the structure steady and strong. I only see one small triangle.

I don't even mean anything as complex as "well-versed in sound construction." I mean, like, they have sufficient knowledge on how to use hammer and nails (or power tools) without making mistakes or injuring themselves. Someone who's reached that point has probably already learned that there's more than one river in the world, and that it rains on the sea.

I think Randall's working towards a metaphor of some kind here. I'm tempted to return to one of my earliest theories, that they're not on a beach but on some sort of sinking craft, but that doesn't seem satisfactory any more either.

[SBN]

I could buy into that, but I'm getting hung up on their construction of the scaffolding. They at least seemed to know how to use the basic tools necessary to the task.

And they have the knowledge and means to get supplies from IKEA.

I think there might be a misunderstanding here: I'm saying that the sandcastles aren't actually that big and the other structures (including the trebuchets and flags) either aren't there or are extremely small and made of sticks, driftwood, rocks, seaweed, etc.

Like the Backyardigans!

[Asthanius]

I could buy into that, but I'm getting hung up on their construction of the scaffolding. They at least seemed to know how to use the basic tools necessary to the task.

And they have the knowledge and means to get supplies from IKEA.

I think there might be a misunderstanding here: I'm saying that the sandcastles aren't actually that big and the other structures (including the trebuchets and flags) either aren't there or are extremely small and made of sticks, driftwood, rocks, seaweed, etc.

Like the Backyardigans!

Show of hands: Who honestly thought that those three words would ever appear on the xkcd forums?

But seriously, yeah, that's pretty much exactly it.

[mittfh]

My vote still goes with something RAMAish.

I misread that as something Ranma-ish (as in Ranma ½), which would certainly be an unusual plot twist

[Asthanius]

My vote still goes with something RAMAish.

I misread that as something Ranma-ish (as in Ranma ½), which would certainly be an unusual plot twist

After that off-frame swim, Megan and Cueball actually switched genders and became indistignuishable from the other's previous form from our perspective due to the strange properties of the seawater.

[htom]

I could buy into that, but I'm getting hung up on their construction of the scaffolding. They at least seemed to know how to use the basic tools necessary to the task.

And they have the knowledge and means to get supplies from IKEA.

I think there might be a misunderstanding here: I'm saying that the sandcastles aren't actually that big and the other structures (including the trebuchets and flags) either aren't there or are extremely small and made of sticks, driftwood, rocks, seaweed, etc.

Like the Backyardigans!

Show of hands: Who honestly thought that those three words would ever appear on the xkcd forums?
But seriously, yeah, that's pretty much exactly it.

"Oh man, oh man, we're not going to survive!"

[belliott4488]

... , also, bets on for whether the sea breaching the dyke will be captured in a mid action shot, or just instant equilibrium.

"The dyke"?? That's not very Basically Decent.

And besides, don't we already have a lot of evidence that Megan likes guys?

EDIT: But more important that that: is the server down? Have we reached the end????
Never mind - it's up again.

[Montov]

I can relate to Cueball and Megan on the ignorance part. Maybe I should be building castcastles too, while I'm waiting.

Maybe they don't know how they got to where they are, so they don't understand the climate of the area.

Not just climate, but primarily geography (or "anything" apparently). They don't know the size of the Sea, presence of other rivers or ground water sources. They see the Sea level rising and have prior expectations that the water level is dependent on the River feeding the Sea. However, the River they know about apparently is not connecting to the Sea as they would expect, even retreating recently.

River: small; retreating from Sea; expected to be feeding into Sea, but it is not; speculated existence of other rivers; fed from rain in hills;
Sea: big, but of unknown size; known to rise and fall; rising levels from unknown source or reason; rate of rise unusually high; bad-tasting;

Just have to work out the symbolism with respect to Time and Waiting.

And the sea is swimmable. Also, rain on the sea is a waste. Which suggests the sea is not the substance as rain.

[StratPlayer]

I could buy into that, but I'm getting hung up on their construction of the scaffolding. They at least seemed to know how to use the basic tools necessary to the task.

And they have the knowledge and means to get supplies from IKEA.

I think there might be a misunderstanding here: I'm saying that the sandcastles aren't actually that big and the other structures (including the trebuchets and flags) either aren't there or are extremely small and made of sticks, driftwood, rocks, seaweed, etc.

Like the Backyardigans!

Show of hands: Who honestly thought that those three words would ever appear on the xkcd forums?

But seriously, yeah, that's pretty much exactly it.

Kids' shows... Another avenue of speculation I didn't expect.

But now that you mention it, is this not Cueball?

Spoiler:

"I'm just a kid ashore,
Each day I build some more,
I like exploring,
I'm Cueball..."

EDIT to Add:WOOOT!!! Top 'o the-- Uh, wait. Nevermind...

Sheesh... <facepalm> Too much Time... Too little coma...

[histrion]

Someone earlier in the needle-pulled-thingy - sorry, I don't recall who - said that C's quote about raining on the sea being "a waste" was probably a reference to Isaac Asimov's book Asimov on Numbers. I was able to find a copy of that book in PDF form online, but haven't had a chance to read it yet. Is it possible that the OTC is intended to have a mathematical symbolism of some kind?

[Asthanius]

I could buy into that, but I'm getting hung up on their construction of the scaffolding. They at least seemed to know how to use the basic tools necessary to the task.

And they have the knowledge and means to get supplies from IKEA.

I think there might be a misunderstanding here: I'm saying that the sandcastles aren't actually that big and the other structures (including the trebuchets and flags) either aren't there or are extremely small and made of sticks, driftwood, rocks, seaweed, etc.

Like the Backyardigans!

Show of hands: Who honestly thought that those three words would ever appear on the xkcd forums?

But seriously, yeah, that's pretty much exactly it.

Kids' shows... Another avenue of speculation I didn't expect.

But now that you mention it, is this not Cueball?

Spoiler:

"I'm just a kid ashore,
Each day I build some more,
I like exploring,
I'm Cueball..."

Both names start with C, have the same amount of letters, contain two L's, a U, and an A...It's a conspiracy!

[Qalyar]

Someone earlier in the needle-pulled-thingy - sorry, I don't recall who - said that C's quote about raining on the sea being "a waste" was probably a reference to Isaac Asimov's book Asimov on Numbers. I was able to find a copy of that book in PDF form online, but haven't had a chance to read it yet. Is it possible that the OTC is intended to have a mathematical symbolism of some kind?

Did you just ask whether it's possible than an elaborate xkcd comic is actually some sort of math puzzle? Of course that's possible!

But I don't think we have any evidence of that, unless the folks trying to make sense of the file hashes ever got anywhere.

[mscha]

Here we go, flooding starts.

[histrion]

Someone earlier in the needle-pulled-thingy - sorry, I don't recall who - said that C's quote about raining on the sea being "a waste" was probably a reference to Isaac Asimov's book Asimov on Numbers. I was able to find a copy of that book in PDF form online, but haven't had a chance to read it yet. Is it possible that the OTC is intended to have a mathematical symbolism of some kind?

Did you just ask whether it's possible than an elaborate xkcd comic is actually some sort of math puzzle? Of course that's possible!

But I don't think we have any evidence of that, unless the folks trying to make sense of the file hashes ever got anywhere.

"Is it possible" was intended to act as a rhetorical device indicating a desire for others to join me in exploration.

Oh, LordRandall, I'm really pedantic today.