DiLithium crystals are so yesterday. The Discovery series, which everyone seems to parrot in complaining about, uses Spore Drive.
You just sort of flip over and 'pop' up anywhere you wanted to go. First time Captain Gabriel Lorca, sitting in the Captains chair, experienced it all he could say was "woah". By the way Captain Lorca is not your touchy feely 'let's have a discussion' Captain... he is a mean SOB and would think nothing of wiping out an Admiral or two. Treats the crew ok, sort of, most times. One nasty dude.
I saw the episode where Tilly dropped the f-bomb on the night it aired and it shocked the heck out of me. I did the instant playback 3 times just to make sure that's what I heard. That got by the censors somehow but has been edited out in every rerun I've seen. Captain Lorca scolded her instantly and to watch her mouth on the bridge and never wanted to hear it again.
I understand there is to be a season 3 but it's set a thousand years into the future. All exciting stuff.
Twenty Twenty eh? Imagine that and I'm still here.
MiningmanDiLithium crystals are so yesterday. The Discovery series, which everyone seems to parrot in complaining about, uses Spore Drive. You just sort of flip over and 'pop' up anywhere you wanted to go.
Yeah, but the longer you go, the less likely you pop up in the anywhen you wanted to arrive. It seems to have escaped Stamets and Straal (or at least the writers putting words in their mouths a la Goon Show) that you can't overcome probabilistic uncertainty with ANY number of discrete processing steps. Of course you can tunnel that character from the Wond-La series to serve as navigator and use the world of fantasy to get to Speirin MST3K, the difficulty being that you might leave any number of readers behind with each progressive jump into relative uncertainty...
Can the recognition that Prototaxites spp. include Midichlorians be far behind? They are surely missing a stitch if not.
Yeah, but the longer you go, the less likely you pop up in the anywhen you wanted to arrive. It seems to have escaped Stamets and Straal (or at least the writers putting words in their mouths a la Goon Show) that you can't overcome probabilistic uncertainty with ANY number of discrete processing steps. Of course you can tunnel that character from the Wond-La series to serve as navigator and use the world of fantasy to get to Speirin MST3K, the difficulty being that you might leave any number of readers/viewers behind with each progressive jump through selachimorphic space into relative uncertainty...
On the whole, if I have to trust wildlife to get where I'm going, I'll eschew the whole S-eye mayhem and stick with tried-and-true planoforming, where at least I could specify proper feline technology. Where would I ever find pond scum* which could compare with that?
To be more precise, it's more like a fungus among us, but that detracts from the Cordwainer Bird style reference...
I just love it when these threads descend into the goofy!
A nice break from those sourpusses on the "Trains" Forum!
The "Classic Toy Trains" Forum is a nice break too, but there isn't much going on over there right now.
Flintlock76I just love it when these threads descend into the goofy!
It's OK, Wayne, even though you're a dane we still love you.
Now I do have to admit "dane" must mean something I'm not familiar with. I'm certainly not of that ethnic persuasion, I'm of Irish-Italian extraction for those who don't know, a "Carpetbagger" to some Virginians or a "Galvanized Yankee" to others, deep down inside still a Jerseyman, a former "Officer and gentleman by act of Congress," and above all an American.
Dane? As in Great Dane? I don't know, I've owned Basset Hounds since 1977!
It's the short form of the term SF fans have for people who are concerned with matters of this world, and not other worlds.
That term, "dane," is new to me, too, so I checked it out on Urban Dictionary, Flintlock. I think you should as well.
Overmod It's the short form of the term SF fans have for people who are concerned with matters of this world, and not other worlds.
Oh.
Well Gawdamighty, I have enough on my hands worrying about THIS world! Those on Vulcan or other places will just have to sort things out for themselves!
Same with Mudbloods, Muggles, Purebloods, unicorns, allecorns, bronys, pegasisters, you name it.
PS: I'l bet you never guessed I'd know who Robert April was, did 'ya?
PPS: Correction. I've been owned by Basset Hounds since 1977!
Geez there must be 40 definitions of Dane and a whole lot of them are very nasty.
Methinks you would have to be quite specific and stress which definition you are referring to and in no uncertain terms, with a lawyer reading out the narrow meaning in that particular usage.
Better to be safe than get jumped in an alley you've been chased into.
NKP guyThat term, "dane," is new to me, too, so I checked it out on Urban Dictionary, Flintlock. I think you should as well.
Don't EVER go by what Urban Dictionary tells you. There are all kinds of dubious 'wisdom' as you might suspect from a site that lets any anonymous troll provide their "insight" for the unwitting to stumble across.
In SF, 'dane' is short for 'mundane' -- not in the boring-and-ordinary sense, but concerned with actual-world things. I admit Harlan used it with a sharper edge sometimes, but he's dead now.
I confess that I STILL think the original concept with Bob April should have been tried.
How about "Voyager" with Genevieve Bujold as Captain Janeway?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8SIZcDWKyw0
I'll tell you what, "Sci-Fi" and even comics left me in the dust a long time ago. Every time I walk through the "Sci-Fi and Fantasy" and "Graphic Novel" sections of the local Barnes and Noble my eyes have glazed over by the time I get to the end of the aisle!
OvermodIn SF, 'dane' is short for 'mundane' -- not in the boring-and-ordinary sense, but concerned with actual-world things.
I'm sure you're right, but in what years was this term used? I lived in SF for a while, yet I never encountered it. Isn't "dane" really just another term for a "square"?
Is "dane"ever found in the works of SF's Beat poets?
As far as Urban Dictionary, duly noted.
Flintlock76 Now I do have to admit "dane" must mean something I'm not familiar with. I'm certainly not of that ethnic persuasion, I'm of Irish-Italian extraction for those who don't know, a "Carpetbagger" to some Virginians or a "Galvanized Yankee" to others, deep down inside still a Jerseyman, a former "Officer and gentleman by act of Congress," and above all an American. Dane? As in Great Dane? I don't know, I've owned Basset Hounds since 1977!
No, you're no carpetbagger. I think you are more like the man who came down from New England for his health after the War, and my great-grandfather took him in and helped him regain his health--and he stayed in the South. His son was a good friend of the family.
Johnny
Actually Johnny, the only time I was called a "carpetbagger" down here was all in fun by a co-worker who knew that I'd know what it meant! I didn't take offense at all and got a laugh out of it.
When another one called me a "Damn good Yankee!" I knew I'd gotten the "galvanized" status!
Wayne
NKP guy I'm sure you're right, but in what years was this term used? I lived in SF for a while, yet I never encountered it. Isn't "dane" really just another term for a "square"?
Oh, my. I'm tempted to quote Jeff Foxworthy:
"You may be a dane if... you think SF means "San Francisco" when talking about speculative 'scientifiction' (to use the term that pioneer Hugo Gernsback (for whom one of the premier awards has been named, tried to establish for the field).
SF is to 'sci-fi' as SF is to 'San Fran' for little Friskies. And remember well that "Frisco" is the name of a RAILROAD, not a name that any Resident would tolerate...
I don't think the term ever made it even into mainstream literature, as it doesn't have the edge that, say, "cowan" does ... or something like "mudblood" either.
Now, as I mentioned, there has been a snarky-at-best element in the fandom since, well, the 1960s. To devotees of fanac the derived meaning of 'mundane' as ordinary and boring may indeed come to the fore. I have never used it that way and certainly don't intend to start now, with Wayne of all people.
Flintlock76When another one called me a "Damn good Yankee!" I knew I'd gotten the "galvanized" status!
When I first went down to Louisiana, I had heard of the terrors of Mr. Boucher's brother Creel. He had been described as almost the quintessence of crotchety, high-intelligent meanness ... and as having a pathological, abiding hatred of "Yankees".
When I was introduced to him as someone from 'up north', I swear his eyes flashed yellow, and he said ... winding up for the first pitch, I suspect ... "So you're the Yankee I've heard so much about..."
I said ... looking him right in the eye ... "Yes, sir. I am a Yankee, both sides of my family are from Connecticut, and I'm proud of it. But sir ... I am no damn Yankee."
He laughed, we hugged like brothers, and were close friends ever after.
OvermodOh, my. I'm tempted to quote Jeff Foxworthy: "You may be a dane if... you think SF means "San Francisco" when talking about speculative 'scientifiction'
Chalk up my misunderstanding to yet another anagram I didn't get immediately. Add it to the heap along with BOGO, FOMO, YOLO, AUCE, and others. I thought SciFi was the abbrv. for SF. At least I knew it didn't refer to the airport.
So. If I can't speak it, at least I can read danish, as it were. Cool.
* * * * * *
I well recall that immortal line from Rodgers & Hammerstein's South Pacific:
"There is nothing like a dane, nothing in the world;
There is nothing you can name, that is anything like a dane."
Overmod-- A small criticism, if I may. Is it possible that you use far too many abbreviations and acronyms in your postings?
I swear you could compose an entire 2 paragraph explanation of something or other using nothing but abbreviations and acronyms although you may have to use an emoji or two here and there for clarity and bridging.
I suppose you would need to use some words, such as 'is' 'up' and 'the' or combination like 'is up' or even better yet 'up the' but I suspect you would quickly establish IUT , meaning of course 'is up the' .
Now most of us know you use an iPhone for most postings but how difficult is it to write Sci-Fi instead of SF. Most males would almost instantly think 49er's and therefore San Francisco.
Perhaps upon first usage you spell out the full word and then after that the capitalized initials will become apparent.
( Actually it would be quite amusing to see a technical explanation using nothing but capitalized initials, in the same vein as we had those funny scientific explanations straight from 'the professor in the lab' videos featured on a thread some time ago)
NKP guyI thought SciFi was the abbrv. for SF.
Not your fault, and it did NOT help that the 'official' cable channel started out as 'SciFi' and then morphed after complaint into something even sillier.
Calling serious science fiction 'sci-fi' is (or was, when I was active in the culture) one of the deadliest insults possible; it's seen as a denigration of a form already prone to dismissal as 'not really literature'. Come to think of it, not too different from popular perception of model railroading, or railfanning. I do suspect I should be abbreviating it sf (in lower case) to avoid confusion with San Francisco.
Airport is SFO, though. If we are allowed to mention such things on a railfan forum without disclaimer...
I generally hate it when there are common acronyms/initialisms that get named or defined right away. On the other hand, I also hate it when I run across those like KTHXBYE or Z9M9Z that send me out for lunch to Google ... and sometimes a pus bath at Urban Dictionary before I can put the picture together.
If anyone has any complaints about salty jargon or abbreviations, let me know. Either in posts or via PM. (charlie hebdo certainly does!) I'll try to fix the stuff that makes little sense.
MiningmanOvermod-- A small criticism, if I may. Is it possible that you use far too many abbreviations and acronyms in your postings?
Specifically, I got carried away when you mentioned the Spore Hub Drive, and made some references from the 'official mythology' around it.
Stamets and Straal are the researchers who supposedly started the research into the mycelial whatever-it-is-that-links-the-universe-behind-the-scenes.
They supposedly didn't get very far in using it effectively until a 'tardigrade' inadvertently thumped into their current 'time-space continuum' supposedly showed them how the other half navigates. The (rather good, in my opinion) young-adolescent series about "Wond-La" prominently features tardigrades with very different characteristics, which I could evoke in context.
Prototaxites is the genus of the 'spore-bearing' stuff that makes the s-drive work. That it is somewhat similar to Midichlorians, the secret cause of humanity's ability to tap into the Force, as well as to Jack Chalker's chilling Dreel, is a source of fun to those who know or appreciate the literature of microscopic races... Of course if it is 'mycelial' it's a fungus, not protozoan in the usual sense, hence the reason 'pond scum' while a fine thing for sarcasm is not quite exact enough for the science part of scientifiction...
"Speirin" is the highly-arcane (at least to me) equivalent of 'warp' levels for the s-drive. They make even less sense than Stardate ... and that takes some doin'. I made fun of the tendency by invoking Speirin 3000, or more precisely the initials for the (excellent!) show Mystery Science Theatre 3000 (the 3Kas in Y2K). Think of the hyperdrive scene in Hardware Wars...
S-eye is a reference to jumpdoors in a couple of Frank Herbert's stories (you will know him most probably as the author of the early Dune books) and one of the problems with it was that, if one of the protagonists died, everyone that had ever used an associated jumpdoor would, too. And planoforming is Cordwainer Smith, in particular from The Game of Rat and Dragon, which ends with the uncorrupted version of the quote in that pond-scum sentence.
And of course, if you look up 'selachimorphic' in conjunction with 'jumping something' you will figure it out fairly quickly ... if you know your tropes. (Which I've seen considerable evidence of in certain other threads.)
Oh good Lord, I need a Tylenol, or as we used to call it in the business...
"The Technicians Friend." Along with Tums, and Ben-Gay, and Band-Aids...
Flintlock76Oh good Lord, I need a Tylenol...
No, what you need is Excedrin. (For Excedrin Headache #MST3K?)
No one but a moron uses Tylenol. It's one of the undocumented leading causes of actual deaths in modern America, and that it continues to be offered on the market is something of an insult to pharmacological science.
But hey! at least it doesn't cause imaginary Reyes syndrome! Or the ulcers that we now know are caused not by acid but by H. pylori...
Re: Spore Drive and related:
My friends have gathered to discuss. This is the Morchella Esculenta tribe which lives nearby me in the woods. They know things.
MiningmanThey know things.
Do they know how tasty they are?
They do! They consider it a rite of passage. They know they can offer benefits.
Overmod Flintlock76 Oh good Lord, I need a Tylenol... No, what you need is Excedrin. (For Excedrin Headache #MST3K?) No one but a moron uses Tylenol. It's one of the undocumented leading causes of actual deaths in modern America, and that it continues to be offered on the market is something of an insult to pharmacological science. But hey! at least it doesn't cause imaginary Reyes syndrome! Or the ulcers that we now know are caused not by acid but by H. pylori...
Flintlock76 Oh good Lord, I need a Tylenol...
Oh, so there IS something to that old saying from the 80's...
"End it all with Tylenol!"
Looks like the saying's true, "The ugly mushrooms are the safe ones!"
Or so they say. I leave picking "mushes" to the pros, I don't take chances.
How do they go with beef gravy or tomato sauce?
Morels are best cut in half and sauteed in butter. My wife has also made cream of morel soup.
Login, or register today to interact in our online community, comment on articles, receive our newsletter, manage your account online and more!
Get the Classic Trains twice-monthly newsletter