Silly Childhood Misconceptions on Fantasy Elements?

[halfeye]

That actually sounds pretty cool.

An actual torus world example would be most JRPG worlds, if you follow the logic of how you move on the world map. Going off the east side brings you on the west side (and vice versa), going off the north side brings you on the south side (and vice versa).

That's just the flat screen wrapping around, it is effectively topologically analogous to a torus, but the lengths are always the same, where with a torus the inside is shorter than the outside.

[Bohandas]

That's just the flat screen wrapping around, it is effectively topologically analogous to a torus, but the lengths are always the same, where with a torus the inside is shorter than the outside.

It's called a Clifford Torus

[halfeye]

It's called a Clifford Torus

I do like that, but somebody linked to it on another page, and at four dimensions, it's probably overthinking what is essentially a two dimensional property.

I've done screen wrapping in Conway's Life, it's not canonical Conway, but I like to think he'd have approved. In Conway's Life it's fairly easy to do, you have a one cell border around the screen, which isn't seen, but is used in calculating the next generation of on screen cells, it's filled with copies of the opposite side's edge cells, and the corner cells are filled with copies of the diagonally opposite corner.

[bulbaquil]

I've done screen wrapping in Conway's Life, it's not canonical Conway, but I like to think he'd have approved. In Conway's Life it's fairly easy to do, you have a one cell border around the screen, which isn't seen, but is used in calculating the next generation of on screen cells, it's filled with copies of the opposite side's edge cells, and the corner cells are filled with copies of the diagonally opposite corner.

I like toroidal Conway's Life and how the gliders that otherwise would spin off into infinity instead return to the starting area and may re-interact with the still-lifes and oscillators whose parent generations spawned them.

[halfeye]

I like toroidal Conway's Life and how the gliders that otherwise would spin off into infinity instead return to the starting area and may re-interact with the still-lifes and oscillators whose parent generations spawned them.

Yeah, it is nice, however my point was it's purely two dimensional, there is nothing four dimensional about the calculation at all, so going four dimensional in an analogy of it seems a bit excessive, it seems to imply that if a three dimensional space wrapped around that would take five or six dimensions (not counting time, which if you did would take it to at least six or seven).

[Segev]

Yeah, it is nice, however my point was it's purely two dimensional, there is nothing four dimensional about the calculation at all, so going four dimensional in an analogy of it seems a bit excessive, it seems to imply that if a three dimensional space wrapped around that would take five or six dimensions (not counting time, which if you did would take it to at least six or seven).

The "purely 2 dimensional" construct requires a teleportation operation. To make it a surface that is consistent at all times, it has to be a 2D face embedded in a 4D object, is the only thing people are saying.

You can do a 2D projection of the surface of the Earth as a "purely 2D mathematical operation," but to have it be a continguous surface without teleportation operations, it has to be embedded on a 3D sphere.

[GreatWyrmGold]

Not necessarily. They simply see in different wavelengths, as with the example earlier in the thread of glass being almost entirely transparent in visible light but opaque in infrared. They would be blind to "normal" light that we see, but they could still see perfectly fine otherwise.

There would be a lot of issues with that, though. Not only would normal colors be thrown off, different wavelengths of light pass through different materials differently.
It's not something that the invisible guy just wouldn't notice.

But gold is already gold, so how does it get more goldified?

I never said it made sense. It's just amusing. "I should have known this would find some way to fail..."

Yeah, it is nice, however my point was it's purely two dimensional, there is nothing four dimensional about the calculation at all, so going four dimensional in an analogy of it seems a bit excessive, it seems to imply that if a three dimensional space wrapped around that would take five or six dimensions (not counting time, which if you did would take it to at least six or seven).

To be fair, our own reality might have several dimensions wrapped up inside it.
Or something like that. I'm more of a biologist than a string theorist.

[Wardog]

Add me to the very small list of people who never assumed vampires had syringe teeth.

A few (mis)conceptions that I did share with others (and have only just remembered that I did):

* Witches/wizards being a distinct type of creature, rather than just people who know majic. Justified in my mind by the fact that numerous legends and folktales feature witches or wizards that were hundreds of years old and seemingly no connection with the rest of society. (And, of course, the fact that in some stories they explicitly are a different species).

* Why do Friar Tuck types get super agility and unarmd combat skills? (My first encounter with the "kung-fu monk" character class was in a second-hand copy of Bard's Tale I got for my old Amstrad CPC. I didn't have the manual for it, so if there was an explanation there, I didn't see it).


Not a fantasy misconception, but when there were first introduced in RE and history lessons at school, it was never explained were the Philistines and the Prussians came from. So I naturally assumed (based on the similarity of the names) that the Philistines came from the Philippines, and that the Prussians were the same people as the Persians.



Edited to add: regarding Vader choking the Rebel captain, having just watched it on YouTube, I'm pretty sure that is the sound of his neck being crushed.

[Segev]

For "witches as non-humans," we have at LEAST as far back as Bewitched to justify that. (And I stand by my fanon theory that Bewitched and Sabrina the Teenaged Witch are in the same setting.)

[Zaydos]

For "witches as non-humans," we have at LEAST as far back as Bewitched to justify that. (And I stand by my fanon theory that Bewitched and Sabrina the Teenaged Witch are in the same setting.)

Bewitched was inspired by I Married a Witch 20 years earlier which also pulled the different species bit. Bell, Book and Candle was another source for Bewitched but only predates it by 6 years.

Of course you also have the combination of witches with hag-like creatures from Northern European folklore (Grendel's mom, or Black Annis). Actually Black Annis is sometimes postulated to be a European version of the Russian Baba Yaga who is pretty close to the archetypal witch. I'm not sure how well founded that is, but at a cursory glance it makes sense (physically similar, both find children in the woods and kill/eat them, have iron body parts to do this with). The classic Greek witches were the Graeae which were also inhuman.

I guess what I'm saying is the line between hag and witch was blurred before witch was really a thing.

Edit: Another silly one of mine (seeing the vader bit made me think of it) that good guys couldn't Force Choke people (Luke does in Episode VI when he has to get past the two Gamorrean guards, he says to let him pass and waves his hand so it's easy to take it as the Mind Trick but if you watch the guards they reach for their throats and start gasping for air and Luke just walks off leaving it unclear whether he killed them both or not).

[Segev]

Bewitched was inspired by I Married a Witch 20 years earlier which also pulled the different species bit. Bell, Book and Candle was another source for Bewitched but only predates it by 6 years.

Of course you also have the combination of witches with hag-like creatures from Northern European folklore (Grendel's mom, or Black Annis). Actually Black Annis is sometimes postulated to be a European version of the Russian Baba Yaga who is pretty close to the archetypal witch. I'm not sure how well founded that is, but at a cursory glance it makes sense (physically similar, both find children in the woods and kill/eat them, have iron body parts to do this with). The classic Greek witches were the Graeae which were also inhuman.

I guess what I'm saying is the line between hag and witch was blurred before witch was really a thing.

Nothing about Baba Yaga suggests that she isn't "just" a powerful magic-user who may have been twisted by unearthly age (using magic to prolong her life idefinitely). She MIGHT be a fey or other inhuman creature, but she's not explicitly non-human. That said, good points overall.

Edit: Another silly one of mine (seeing the vader bit made me think of it) that good guys couldn't Force Choke people (Luke does in Episode VI when he has to get past the two Gamorrean guards, he says to let him pass and waves his hand so it's easy to take it as the Mind Trick but if you watch the guards they reach for their throats and start gasping for air and Luke just walks off leaving it unclear whether he killed them both or not).

I always thought that was just that the mind trick was keeping them from protesting or acting on their objections, despite those objections still being present. So they found themselves metaphorically choking on their words (as opposed to literally choking).

[Zaydos]

Nothing about Baba Yaga suggests that she isn't "just" a powerful magic-user who may have been twisted by unearthly age (using magic to prolong her life idefinitely). She MIGHT be a fey or other inhuman creature, but she's not explicitly non-human. That said, good points overall.

Oh yes, I've seen things based on Russian fairy tales that hint Baba Yaga's humanity was sometimes questioned, but my knowledge of Russian fairy tales is very limited and mostly points to Baba Yaga being an old woman with magic. My point was that the English version of of the Russian (human) witch Baba Yaga was an explicitly non-human ogress and that the are witches human or non-human question dates back to the earliest stories of witches. Not that Baba Yaga was an ogress herself. Sorry for the confusion.

I always thought that was just that the mind trick was keeping them from protesting or acting on their objections, despite those objections
still being present. So they found themselves metaphorically choking on their words (as opposed to literally choking).

Well when the mind trick is used else where it causes them to respond as if it was their idea, not start to slump against the wall gasping, so it'd be sort of weird for it to change. Conversely when force choke is applied people reach for their throat in that manner. That said as a kid I wouldn't have fathomed that Luke might actually choke people, although the idea works especially with the little cues that Luke is precarious about Light or Dark in the movie, only finally making the decision when he decides that he cannot kill Vader. Though that in turn points to 'good guys shouldn't be force choking' but simultaneously it points towards 'force choke is just a utilization of telekinesis and good guys can do it it's just using the force to a bad end which is the path to the dark side' (so more like how it's presented in the Stackpole books, than in KotOR/Star Wars d20).

[Segev]

Total tangential side note: Given that the difference between Light and Dark side seems to be presented as one of "cold will" vs. "hot passion" fueling your force powers, I've always wanted to see a Dark Side user who fueled his Force-use with positive emotions. Joy, excitement, wonder. "Look what I can do!"

[Kitten Champion]

Hmm... I think a large amount of my ignorance of witches and wizards is that I didn't really get exposed to much historical information about them, as a lot of it's unpleasant. That, and a lot of media portrayals try to make them seem more fantastical - when dealing with more general audiences or kids specifically - in order to try to get around religious communities' disapproval of the occult.

Though, yeah, there's a lot of mythic tradition to the non-human or goblin-ish witch besides - something like Yubaba from Spirited Away sticks in the consciousness for instance and clearly comes from that.

Well when the mind trick is used else where it causes them to respond as if it was their idea, not start to slump against the wall gasping, so it'd be sort of weird for it to change. Conversely when force choke is applied people reach for their throat in that manner. That said as a kid I wouldn't have fathomed that Luke might actually choke people, although the idea works especially with the little cues that Luke is precarious about Light or Dark in the movie, only finally making the decision when he decides that he cannot kill Vader. Though that in turn points to 'good guys shouldn't be force choking' but simultaneously it points towards 'force choke is just a utilization of telekinesis and good guys can do it it's just using the force to a bad end which is the path to the dark side' (so more like how it's presented in the Stackpole books, than in KotOR/Star Wars d20).

Always bugged me, Jedi are not pacifists generally and frequently dismember sapient beings with laser swords utilizing Force-honed reflexes, but asphyxiating someone with the Force is frowned upon. It just feels like they care more about the actual killing weapon than the death itself.

[bulbaquil]

Not a fantasy misconception, but when there were first introduced in RE and history lessons at school, it was never explained were the Philistines and the Prussians came from. So I naturally assumed (based on the similarity of the names) that the Philistines came from the Philippines, and that the Prussians were the same people as the Persians.

I thought the Prussians were from Russia. The P stood for "pre-", so the Prussians were the "pre-Russians".

And similar regarding the Philistines. I thought that they "evolved" (like Pokemon) into the Phillippians in New Testament/Roman times, and then "evolved" again into the Filipinos in modern times.

I also thought "Pharaoh" was the actual name of the king of Egypt, not just a title.

(I hadn't so much as heard of Baba Yaga until I started playing the Reign of Winter Pathfinder module.)

[digiman619]

Total tangential side note: Given that the difference between Light and Dark side seems to be presented as one of "cold will" vs. "hot passion" fueling your force powers, I've always wanted to see a Dark Side user who fueled his Force-use with positive emotions. Joy, excitement, wonder. "Look what I can do!"

There's an excellent scene in one of the Dresden Files books where a corrupting influence tries to use a "negative emotions lead to the dark side" speech that Harry counters in that exact manner.

[Segev]

There's an excellent scene in one of the Dresden Files books where a corrupting influence tries to use a "negative emotions lead to the dark side" speech that Harry counters in that exact manner.

Which book/scene? I've read them all, but I'm not sure to which you're referring.

[Bohandas]

Total tangential side note: Given that the difference between Light and Dark side seems to be presented as one of "cold will" vs. "hot passion" fueling your force powers, I've always wanted to see a Dark Side user who fueled his Force-use with positive emotions. Joy, excitement, wonder. "Look what I can do!"

That would be something like Jonathan Teatime from the Discworld books. He'll do something like acquire a magical artifact of destruction and exclaim "I'm gonna have so much fun with this!".

And to a lesser degree it's like the protagonist from the ICP song Mister Happy ("I love you, now gimme your neck; Let me teach you about love and respect. Respect the fact that I love to kill!...")

[Segev]

That would be something like Jonathan Teatime from the Discworld books. He'll do something like acquire a magical artifact of destruction and exclaim "I'm gonna have so much fun with this!".

And to a lesser degree it's like the protagonist from the ICP song Mister Happy ("I love you, now gimme your neck; Let me teach you about love and respect. Respect the fact that I love to kill!...")

Could take it that direction, but I was expressly envisioning somebody who isn't a bad person at all. At worst, an imp due to irresponsibility, but even that's not necessarily the case. Just...very happy to have cool powers.

[Rockphed]

Edit: Another silly one of mine (seeing the vader bit made me think of it) that good guys couldn't Force Choke people (Luke does in Episode VI when he has to get past the two Gamorrean guards, he says to let him pass and waves his hand so it's easy to take it as the Mind Trick but if you watch the guards they reach for their throats and start gasping for air and Luke just walks off leaving it unclear whether he killed them both or not).

Thinking about it, I think he was more pushing them away by the neck than force-choking them.

[goto124]

I've always thought witches were a subspecies of humans. Or humans with a special 'magic gene'. Harry Potter-style wizards.

[Segev]

I've already posited that Sabrina the Teenaged Witch and Bewitched are the same setting. Now I'm wondering if Harry Potter might be, as well. What if the reason for the differences in their "wizarding cultures" is simply that Bewitched and Sabrina are American and Canadian wizard-cultures? The American witches stayed more "in touch" with mortal trends, while at the same time being even more arrogant and condescending because they treat theirs more like a "better secret society" than a "separate society."

[digiman619]

Which book/scene? I've read them all, but I'm not sure to which you're referring.

In White Night, when Harry has found out that Lash has been messing with his head to make him more malleable, he has a talk with her when he mentions that as an impression, she's just as malleable as he is. He specifically says that emotion, even dark emotion, can be used as a force for good. If I can find where I put my copy of it by this evening, I'll quote the relevant text.

[GreatWyrmGold]

Nothing about Baba Yaga suggests that she isn't "just" a powerful magic-user who may have been twisted by unearthly age (using magic to prolong her life idefinitely). She MIGHT be a fey or other inhuman creature, but she's not explicitly non-human. That said, good points overall.

The distinction between "originally human" and "never human" isn't really made in most ancient legends. They're generally terrible at worldbuilding. Or maybe they were meant to be set in some big shared universe that everyone was expected to understand the details of?

I've already posited that Sabrina the Teenaged Witch and Bewitched are the same setting. Now I'm wondering if Harry Potter might be, as well. What if the reason for the differences in their "wizarding cultures" is simply that Bewitched and Sabrina are American and Canadian wizard-cultures? The American witches stayed more "in touch" with mortal trends, while at the same time being even more arrogant and condescending because they treat theirs more like a "better secret society" than a "separate society."

It could work if you ignore or carefully interpret Harry Potter supporting information. Throw in a couple other loosely compatible wizardy universes and you'd have quite the fanfic.

Spoiler: Star Wars

Show

Well when the mind trick is used else where it causes them to respond as if it was their idea, not start to slump against the wall gasping, so it'd be sort of weird for it to change.

"You just ran a mile. Lean against that wall and catch your breath. And, uh, clutch your throat to...help the air flow, I guess."

Total tangential side note: Given that the difference between Light and Dark side seems to be presented as one of "cold will" vs. "hot passion" fueling your force powers, I've always wanted to see a Dark Side user who fueled his Force-use with positive emotions. Joy, excitement, wonder. "Look what I can do!"

Or someone with both, who can draw on both sides of the Force. Or a fantasy-bipolar Force-user whose moods and Force ability do an about-face at times. Or at least someone who uses Sith powers for good or Jedi powers for evil.
Now, wouldn't that be an interesting way to make the protagonists the underdog rebels? "The leader of the new Jedi Order after Luke vanished just doesn't care about people, but because of how idolized the Jedi are after Luke took down the Empire, no one really argues with him."

Always bugged me, Jedi are not pacifists generally and frequently dismember sapient beings with laser swords utilizing Force-honed reflexes, but asphyxiating someone with the Force is frowned upon. It just feels like they care more about the actual killing weapon than the death itself.

There's a lot that's screwy with Jedi philosophy.

[Cazero]

There's a lot that's screwy with Jedi philosophy.

Jedi philosophy makes perfect sense. They're rational sociopaths. Like Vulcans.

[Arbane]

Jedi philosophy makes perfect sense. They're rational sociopaths. Like Vulcans.

Unless the new series changed things drastically, Vulcans are very much not sociopaths.

"The needs of the many outweigh the needs of the one, or the few."

[Segev]

In White Night, when Harry has found out that Lash has been messing with his head to make him more malleable, he has a talk with her when he mentions that as an impression, she's just as malleable as he is. He specifically says that emotion, even dark emotion, can be used as a force for good. If I can find where I put my copy of it by this evening, I'll quote the relevant text.

I can find it, myself, with that to narrow it down. Thanks!

The distinction between "originally human" and "never human" isn't really made in most ancient legends. They're generally terrible at worldbuilding. Or maybe they were meant to be set in some big shared universe that everyone was expected to understand the details of?

This is actually explicitly true; most myths were folklore of their originating era, and people knew the general stories surrounding them as well as most people today know the story of Superman. We don't NEED to keep re-telling the "escaped Krypton, raised by the Kents" part; we could start Superman stories with him just being Superman in Metropolis, with Lex Luthor as his arch enemy, and people would accept it. They'd even accept elements that drew on Lex's enmity, Lana Lang's old flame status, and why Superman might be sensitive to dead fathers (even though that's a mixed trope depending on the version) without having to have explicit flashbacks.

TL;DR for this part: you're right; the shared universe with expected zeitgeist knowledge of who these people are and what their other mythoi entailed was very much a thing.

It could work if you ignore or carefully interpret Harry Potter supporting information. Throw in a couple other loosely compatible wizardy universes and you'd have quite the fanfic.

The parts that need the most ignoring are also only lightly brushed upon, I think: anything referring to American magic. The rest can be held up as "cultural separation." Well, that, and why HP wizards need wands but Bewitched witches do not. So that's probably the biggest hurdle.

Unless the new series changed things drastically, Vulcans are very much not sociopaths.

"The needs of the many outweigh the needs of the one, or the few."

"WHEN WILL YOU LEARN, PRIME, THAT THE NEEDS OF THE MANY OUTWEIGH THE NEEDS OF THE FEW!?"

[Amaril]

Total tangential side note: Given that the difference between Light and Dark side seems to be presented as one of "cold will" vs. "hot passion" fueling your force powers, I've always wanted to see a Dark Side user who fueled his Force-use with positive emotions. Joy, excitement, wonder. "Look what I can do!"

"Even when trapped by karma's cycle..."
"The memories we leave behind will open the door!"
"Even when the universe stands in our way..."
"Our seething blood will determine what will be!"
"We'll break through time and space..."
"And defy all who would stop us to grab hold of our path!"

Spoiler: WHO THE HELL DO YOU THINK WE ARE?

Show

Always bugged me, Jedi are not pacifists generally and frequently dismember sapient beings with laser swords utilizing Force-honed reflexes, but asphyxiating someone with the Force is frowned upon. It just feels like they care more about the actual killing weapon than the death itself.

I assume it's a similar thing to the Laws of Magic in The Dresden Files. In that, there's nothing saying wizards aren't allowed to kill, they're just not allowed to kill with magic (at least, not mortals--monsters are fine, because they don't have souls). The idea being, specifically using magic to kill corrupts your soul and drags you further towards darkness, because magic is powered by emotion and belief, and by using that power for destruction, you're allowing the kind of belief that can do that to take root within you. The Jedi probably think the force works the same way, so they stick to killing with physical weapons.

[GreatWyrmGold]

This is actually explicitly true...

I'd say "That's the joke," but the joke was intended to imply that the myths were intended to take place in our world. So I failed on multiple levels.

The parts that need the most ignoring are also only lightly brushed upon, I think: anything referring to American magic. The rest can be held up as "cultural separation." Well, that, and why HP wizards need wands but Bewitched witches do not. So that's probably the biggest hurdle.

I meant things like the Pottermore information on American wizardry.

I assume it's a similar thing to the Laws of Magic in The Dresden Files. In that, there's nothing saying wizards aren't allowed to kill, they're just not allowed to kill with magic (at least, not mortals--monsters are fine, because they don't have souls). The idea being, specifically using magic to kill corrupts your soul and drags you further towards darkness, because magic is powered by emotion and belief, and by using that power for destruction, you're allowing the kind of belief that can do that to take root within you. The Jedi probably think the force works the same way, so they stick to killing with physical weapons.

Maybe it's just me, but any monastic order which preaches about the value of life and nonviolence while teaching new monks how to use laser swords to kill people (and supernatural powers that make them better at doing so*) seems a bit odd, even if they don't directly kill people with the Force.
*I've heard a lot of people talk about Force-enhanced strength, speed, and so on. Even if that's not canon anymore, there's still Force Precognition.

[Bashhammer]

Welp, now I feel left out because I never thought vampires had syringe teeth. I always thought went bite neck, pull out teeth, drink blood.

Closest thing i can think of to a silly childhood thingy is me calling paladins paladalins and scimitars shmikters because my older brother kept calling them that out of boredom. The first one was when I was watching him play Ogre Battle 64 (and also why we all call cataphracts cadillacs and yell CRIMSON NOTE in a demonic voice whenever a third stage red dragon uses it) and the second came from him playing Diablo 2.

Edit:

"The needs of the many outweigh the needs of the one, or the few."

THE NEEDS OF THE MANY OUTWEIGH THE NEEEDS OF THE BRITISH!