I recently re-watched Dr. Horrible

[conuly]

And when I say "recently" I mean "several times over the past few days". I tend to fixate on things like that. As a child, it wasn't at all unusual for me to read the same book three or four or more times in a row, and then pick it up again a few weeks later to repeat the process (and that's why I have parts of A Little Princess memorized).

Anyway, this has gotten me thinking about Penny's last words. Thinking about them more than just "God, Joss Whedon really sucks", that is. Am I the only one who thinks that maybe Penny was intentionally trying to twist the knife there? I mean, she'd just watched her boyfriend humiliate her and insult all the people in the room (people she works with and cares about) and her friend-friend went nuts and shot up the place, incidentally injuring her in the process. I mean, I don't know, it just seems like if there's ever a chance to be a little bit vindictive, that's the time. A lifetime of suppressed bitchiness coming out right at the end, to somebody who whole-heartedly deserves it - I'd do it. Wouldn't you? You're supposed to lie and be nice to dying people, but dying people get to do what they want consequence-free, don't they?

I need to find a new hobby, I think.

And on the subject of hobbies, I think we've worked out that centaurs probably don't work and humans can't fly, but mermaids are still on the table, right? (Borrowers and Tinkerbell-type fairies are right out, of course. Too small. Maybe if they were chubby and furry like mice? But then they'd effectively BE mice, wouldn't they?)

Comments

[mc776]

Hair, shoulders, boobs cause too much drag to be worthwhile.

Unless we're talking about something like the aquatics in Man After Man (GIS it yourself plz as I am at work)

[conuly]

Google Image Search? I'll assume that and try it!

And I'm assuming no boobs or long flowy hair.

[mc776]

Second and last pic

moar hear (warning: it is flagrantly obvious to anyone remotely familiar therewith that the OP has never read the text of the book)

Why are borrowers out again?

[marveen.livejournal.com]

As I recall, from the illustrations the Borrowers wore quite a lot of clothing, unlike Tink (whose physics can be handwaved away with the idea of magic). Considering that what is "normal" fabric for a five-foot-tall human would be heavy and stiff for a five-inch-tall human, might that not provide enough insulation to make a dollsize humanoid workable? They also tended to live in human dwellings, so this is room temperatures we're talking about, not hard frosts.

(If they tended towards the plump, that would help also.)

Re: Why are borrowers out again?

[conuly]

Apparently the square cube law rules out both giants and little bitty people. I might be tragically misunderstanding it, though, in which case I'm relieved to hear this!

Re: Why are borrowers out again?

[ksol1460.livejournal.com]

Tinkerbell in fact was a bit plump. Barrie says she was slightly inclined to embonpoint.

Re: Why are borrowers out again?

[conuly]

Traditionally, Tinkerbell was, in fact, a flashlight. No mass.

Re: Why are borrowers out again?

[marveen.livejournal.com]

Explains why I had no idea what that meant, so was remembering the movie.

(I read Peter Pan at such a young age that when Barrie dropped in an aside in narrative about "reading between the lines" I actually turned back the pages looking for a smaller font printed between the others.)

Wasn't Tink also blue, and the story tells us that "girls are pink, boys are brown and the blue ones are little sillies who don't know what they are"?

[oloriel.livejournal.com]

Too small. Maybe if they were chubby and furry like mice? But then they'd effectively BE mice, wouldn't they?

Nah, they'd effectively be bats. (Hey, you only said "chubby and furry LIKE mice". I know that bats aren't actually related to mice except on the "mammals" scheme of things.)

Perhaps you could get humans to fly after all by giving them a different bone structure, or an air bladder like sharks have? If they deviate from normal humans by having wings, you may as well build in additional differences ;)

I suspect that if I were Penny, I'd certainly spend my last minutes snarking and snapping at everyone. Unless I were too preoccupied whining about stuff that causes me pain at the moment, of course.

Re: Why are borrowers out again?

[elenbarathi.livejournal.com]

Ayup, it's the square/cube law. Hypothetically, one could genetically engineer little bitty humanoids easily enough - start with one of the prosimians, eliminate the fur and tail, alter the pelvis and spinal column, etc. - the result wouldn't be a human, though; it'd be an upright-walking hairless lemur.

Re: Why are borrowers out again?

[conuly]

Science is ruining all the books and all the movies and all the comics and everything. Who writes these laws and how do we get them repealed???? Where's the justice? Where's the altered humanity?

Re: Why are borrowers out again?

[elenbarathi.livejournal.com]

It's not the amount of insulation on their bodies that makes a difference. Naked mole rats are tiny and hairless, and they get along all right without clothing.

The problem is brain anatomy, and the limitations thereof. There are plenty of mammals with brains no bigger than Borrowers' would be, and some of them (like mice) have considerable capacity to learn certain things, but there's no room in those tiny skulls for a neocortex.

Birds are a whole other matter, because their brains are structured completely differently (http://www.quora.com/How-do-the-different-brain-structures-of-birds-and-mammals-affect-their-cognition-and-behavior) from mammals.

I've always assumed that the Borrowers were the result of magic, even though the books don't say anything about this one way or another, because it makes no sense for them to have evolved that way.

[elenbarathi.livejournal.com]

*raises hand* Altered humanity right here. Still can't fly, can't shape-shift, can't breathe water, can't turn invisible, can't 'phase' through walls... because altered or not, human is still human, and there's only so much alteration we can take.

But hey, you WANT spiders the size of wolves, or worse, the size of houses? You want triffids walking around spitting poison, and giant talking carnivorous plants, and murderous disembodied hands, and the Lepus? You want have to to worry about gremlins tearing up the wings of your plane, and your kids falling out of bed into alternate dimensions, and your dead relatives coming back to eat your brains?

You want invisible people, flying people, people who can walk through a wall or mist through a keyhole, random shape-shifters turning into who-knows-what whenever they feel like it? You want telepaths and firestarters? Sheesh, ask most people what they'd do if they had a super-power, and the usual answer is that they'd make mischief!

The laws of science are what protect us from all this.

[elenbarathi.livejournal.com]

Bats are actually more closely related to us than rodents are - they're like little flying lemurs. If we were tiny, with fur and wings, we'd basically be bats.

An air bladder helps sharks because air is lighter than water. In order to help a flyer, it would have to be filled with something lighter than air, like methane.

[conuly]

The laws of science are what protect us from all this.

Yeah, but it's like reading a regency drama. When I read books set in the past and daydream, I'm not the peasant. Not unless the peasant is going to get rich. I'm not the prisoner either, or the nun. No, I'm the one swooshing around in gorgeous period dress and getting all the guys and, incidentally, all the cash. (I'm also solving everybody's problems because, hey, it's my fantasy and I can be like that.)

When the laws of science change to match the way I *want* them to be rather than the way they *are*, I'm not the one getting smooshed by a gigantic spider or having my house burned down. I'm the one getting rich by selling spider repellant and non-toxic abestos. And if they're a real nuisance, I don't see why I can't selectively edit science. Other than the fact that there's apparently no appeals process, that is.

[conuly]

Or, to put it another way - I have the wings and they don't weigh me down, but that doesn't mean people are divebombing me either. They're just nifty.

[conuly]

And all this time I thought aeriemice were actually rodents. You live and you learn!

In order to help a flyer, it would have to be filled with something lighter than air, like methane.

Oooh, like the Airborn trilogy? But I can see how likely that's going to turn out to be if you pull the threads.

Re: Why are borrowers out again?

[conuly]

Naked mole rats are tiny and hairless, and they get along all right without clothing.

They're also damn weird. What sort of mammal has exactly 11 nipples? Thy fearful (lack of) symmetry indeed!

I've always assumed that the Borrowers were the result of magic, even though the books don't say anything about this one way or another, because it makes no sense for them to have evolved that way.

Didn't the first book strongly imply they were an invention of the bored sick little boy?

[oloriel.livejournal.com]

I thought they were actually related to hedgehogs, not lemurs. Huh. That'd make them perfect for fairies, though! ;)

So what? Mammals can produce methane, right? :D

[elenbarathi.livejournal.com]

Hmm, you're right that they're more closely related to hedgehogs than to lemurs, both bats and hedgehogs being of the Laurasiathera (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laurasiatheria). They've changed the taxonomy since I was a student; used to be they were in superorder Archonta (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Archonta). Apparently the flying primates theory (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flying_primates_theory) fell apart under DNA testing, and the entire order of Insectivora (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Insectivora) has been abandoned. Good to know; thanks!

[elenbarathi.livejournal.com]

Herbivorous mammals produce methane; I don't think carnivorous mammals produce much. Of course, flying foxes are fruit-eaters, so it is possible for a plant-based diet to provide enough fuel for a fler. Flying foxes are really light for their size, though, and they spend more time eating than they do flying.

Adding methane-filled air sacs to this being with the 23-foot wingspan, skeletal legs and enormous wedge-shaped chest isn't going to help the poor unweildy thing look any more like a human, or any more capable of getting about on land.

[elenbarathi.livejournal.com]

I love naked mole rats. They had them at Point Defiance Zoo once when my daughter was young; they were amazing. I could well see them having been people once, with whom some Goddess was most displeased, or even a race of fairies cursed by a rival fairy queen, to be what they are now.

There's something about their blood that lets them live with very little oxygen, which might be a very handy trait to patch in to a genetically-engineered human flyer, because efficient oxygenation of both wing-muscles and brain is one of the big problems. Bigger heart and lungs means bigger, heavier chest, which already has to be massive to anchor those wing-muscles, and the weight goes up accordingly. But if the blood is like naked mole-rats' blood, that grabs every molecule of oxygen out of every breath, maybe the heart and lungs don't have to be quite so big.



The first book made it clear that Mrs. May, who first told the story to her niece Kate, had never quite known whether or not to believe her little brother's tale - he died in the war as a young man, so he wasn't around to ask, but even as an older lady, she still wasn't totally sure. In the second book, though, Mrs. May and Kate go back to the town of Leighton Buzzard, and discover evidence that it was all true.

[elenbarathi.livejournal.com]

LOL, of course there's an appeals process. It's called "Peer review".

Y'know, as a young Witch, I learned how to scry, how to astral travel, how to read the Tarot, cast a horoscope, bless and purify a house, see my past lives and help others find theirs, invoke the faeries and the spirits, banish harmful elements and draw down the essence of the Goddess. And I was very good at all these things, and later, very successful at teaching others how to do them. So much for the laws of science, eh?

Wrong, because... okay, when I do certain things, certain things happen, or appear to happen... ahh, there's the rub; how can I tell what appears to happen from what does happen? What exactly AM I doing, when I do thus-and-so; if it's really working, why is it working? And if it's not, why does it loook like it's working?

This is why any sufficiently advanced Magick is indistinguishable from Science: sooner or later, one is going to ask that fateful question, "How can I tell what is true?", and the Mystic Folderol all becomes irrelevant.

My endless fantasy-adventure tale is all about the consequences of magick - specifically, the accidental (or was it?) collision/intertwining of three drastically different forms of magick. There ain't no such thing as a free lunch for my characters - they got a lot of magickal power, plus functional immortality, dumped on them without asking, warning or telling them, with no instruction manual, shortly after they'd been magickally trapped in a mostly-dead state for 500 years, so life has been kinda difficult for them. One of them can fly, but twice he's gone too high and run out of air, and he's also nearly impaled himself on a tree-branch. Oh, and fallen naked out of the sky into a river in the middle of the night.

With fictional magic, one can have all the giant spiders and rabbits in waistcoats one desires, and no one complaining that Mr. Mole's lifestyle is insufficiently mole-like. It's like in that old song Three Laws of Thermo (http://pigsandfishes.com/filks/mikefilk/thermo.html), right? If you're writing science fiction, the science has to be plausible; if you're writing fantasy, you just have to make it sound mystic enough.

Nobody knows where the Hobbits came from. The Elves and Men were created by Iluvatar; the Dwarves were created by Aule and the Ents by Yavanna; the evil creatures were created by Morgoth, but the Hobbits just sort of... appeared. Tom Bombadil, too; the Elves call him Eldest of All, and he has a special bond with the Hobbits.

Anyway, Tolkien specifically says that after the Third Age, the Hobbits grew smaller, shyer and fewer. They were always clever, though; quiet, sensible folk, good at making things - and we know that some of them cross-bred with the remaining Elves, the Avari who did not wish to go to Valinor - so, there's the magic and the dwindling, all explained in one neat package; the Borrowers are the descendents of the half-Elven Hobbits of the Fourth Age.

[conuly]

Peer review never reviews my peers in the way I hope. Last time I tried them they kept telling me I should play more nicely and not shout out the answers. Boo to peer review.

[conuly]

Wow, naked mole rats are somewhat more awesome than I thought!

They're still weird as hell, though.

[conuly]

Wait, would an enormous wedge shape chest at least make them look like a caricatured superhero?

[elenbarathi.livejournal.com]

Nah, that's just their way. All true scientists shout out the answers, and a whole lot of them don't play nicely. It's like going on one of those dreadful talent-search programs: being treated like shit isn't about *you*; they treat everyone that way.

[elenbarathi.livejournal.com]

Ummmm... well, maybe? *trying to picture that* But I'm inclined to think probably not, because the point of the wedge would be sticking out of the middle of the chest.