Posts
What are your favourite things to deep-fry?
Bonus points for pictures
Can you think any situation where it is ethical to use AI in the creative process?
Let me assure you that the idea of AI disgusts me. Not just because it debates the quality of work and is a "cheat" to get past the word target, but because it stripey the writer themselves of their accomplishments.
However, it does strike me that people might want to write about subjects that they don't know a lot about. Scientific knowledge, crime, historical stuff. Could that be an ethical place to use AI - not to write it, but to ask "what would confectionary in the 1300s look like?" (For instance). Just niche questions.
Or is there a much better, easier way to look up niche real-world details like that?
Advice on how to study and learn effectively at university?
Even though I want to pick up the textbooks and get an early headstart I can't beig myself to do it. I think I'll be in half-full swing tomorrow, but I figured it would be worth asking people's advice about this anyway because it's something I've struggled with a lot for the last 6 years.
I study engineering.
What's something in your life that you got through that you didn't think you'd get through?
It's Motivation Monday, I guess!
Regarding Sci-fi: Do you prefer it to lean more into the Sci element or the Fi element?
i.e do you prefer:
- technically grounded and plausible science elements (e.g The Martian)
or
- stuff so fantastical that it doesn't even warrant trying to explain it (Dr Who, some Marvel/DC stuff, Star Wars)
Another way to look at this would be Sci-Fi versus Science Fantasy, perhaps.
- Old-School Sci-Fi like HG Wells centers around a core scientific idea and the consequences arising from that,
whereas
- Science Fantasy (more prevalent nowadays) only looks to science - or the impression of some science - to serve the fantasy devices it uses.
So which is better?
Know of any books which tells a story across distinct snippets of someone's life, rather than a continuity?
a work of fiction that i really enjoy/ed is The Life and Suffering of Sir Brante, which is a choose-your-own-adventure story supported with character stats to game-ify it. in it, every chapter is a defining memory randomly from the MC's life, with a choice at the end for the reader
Clearly this is quite particular to the game mechanics they wanted to create; since i haven't read many traditional novels which do that sort of thing, i presume it actually makes it harder to tell a story.
Diaries do this i guess? The Diary of Anne Frank and Jeff Kinney's *Diary of a wimpy kid *(weird to put them together in a sentence) are 2 things i've read which match this style.
But I am quite interested if any traditional-style novel does it. Or would it just de facto become a fictional diary if you told a story in that way, since you'd feel compelled to date each event or provide a chronology?
I'd love examples if anyone has them.
Do you find that you have to challenge/call people out on things a lot in your life?
Just the title.
Do you know people who display serial dishonesty or other bad attitudes, and find yourself setting them on the right path?
My life is getting weird. This week might be my very last one of treating reality like it's real and not just a wacky simulation.
If things get too weird this week i'm going to fuck off to another part of the world and start a new life. My language skills are actuslly getting pretty decent and more possible destinations open up.
So recently i realised everyone around me just lies, making up elaborate stories. I used to feel guilty when i lied so easily and now i realise it was taught to me by everyone i grew up with.
There is no place for me in their constructed narrative. Not with my family who raised me, nor with friends. Not with the wider commumity I grew up in.
Ironically, most people want to move away and explore the world. I would have been happy to stay put, i love everything about where i grew up. But i found out how deep the lies run.
Freaked myself out with google calendar
A few days ago when i was feeling more motviated and organised i said "i'm going to rewatch one lecture every day in the evening this week" and added it to my calendar.
Today I just got a notification saying "LECTURE AT 6 !!!" and was like omg i'll never make it there in time and I'm so comfy and relaxed now; I forgot all about it and have already missed the first 2 days of my planned "relaxed revision week." No biggie.
I also do this over and over again. I write a schedule and then my brain forgets about it. Sometimes i'm pleasantly surprised to see "do x fun thing" when i'm locked in or busy spending time with other people instead.
Also took me longer that i needed to to start using Google calendar because i was terrified that it would display my schedule to anyone who looks it up using my email address. It doesn't, or rather you have to tick something to make it do that.
Going out and meeting people I don't know seems to leave me quite rattled
had a job interview. 2 large group exercises to assess team dynamics, then I interviewed for 2 different roles. Everyone there was nice, but:
-
can't stop feeling bad for the one interview that i definitely floundered. The first one seemed to go well but given how much i tripped over my words for the second one, it makes me think the first one went badly? Also got the sense
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I can't trust people being nice to me. It makes it feel like a big prank is being played on me and my entire reality is simulated / organised for some reason.
its kind of tough to be in one hall surrounded by other candidates competing for the same positions as you. Man.... But maybe that's better and I just have no stamina for job interviews.
I need to apply for ~500 more jobs this summer, just in case, but it leaves me really drained.
When writing a fantasy novel does it make more sense to appeal to a teenager audience or an adult one?
I'm thinking of something classic with feudal medieval vibes. Are there a lot of adult fantasy readers? Or is it better to dance around more traumatic NSFW events in the book to make it more suitable for teens?