Pixel Scroll 11/30 The Doom That Came to File770

(1) TOLKIEN AT THE PLATE. Pitchers’ faces turn almost gargoyle-like at the moment they deliver the baseball. Major league baseball blog Cut4  decided it would be amusing to match those expressions with melodramatic quotes from Lord of the Rings.

The pitch face. Completely uninhibited, wholly pure. Every pitcher has one. It takes a lot of effort to throw a pitch 90-plus mph, after all, and pitchers can’t exactly worry about what arrangement their features make while trying to hit their spots. And so, the pitch face is one of baseball’s most totally human elements.

Below, some of the best we saw this year. And to explain their greatness, we captioned them with quotes from the only movies as epic as these faces: The Lord of the Rings trilogy….

“A day may come when the courage of men fails, when we forsake our friends and break all bonds of fellowship, but it is not this day.”

pitcher

(2) SWEDISH SF ART. A fine gallery accompanies a brief interview with the artist in The Huffington Post’s, “Sci-Fi Painter Simon Stålenhag Turns The Everyday Into Dystopia”.

One artist working actively to infuse visions of the future into scenes from the present is Simon Stålenhag, whose narrative paintings have recently been collected into a book, thanks to a successful Kickstarter campaign. The paintings in Tales from the Loop show children and adolescents traipsing across gray plains, energetic in spite of their glum surroundings. Power lines and radio towers dot the skyline, alongside foreign machines, hefty and ominous.

That Stålenhag’s imagined robots stand beside clusters of desktop computers, scoreboards and hatchbacks makes their existence that much more believable. “Look what we’ve created,” he seems to suggest. “Imagine what else we can create.”

staylenhag art

(3) FERMI PARADOX REDUX. A long time ago there was a famous commercial for a hamburger chain that mainly consisted of an elderly woman interrupting a rival’s ad copy, shouting “Where’s the beef?” The Fermi Paradox has a similar effect on speculations about intelligent life in the universe – and Jim Henley’s new post puts a dent in a favorite corollary — “Fermi Conundrum Redux: The Singularity as Great Big Zero?”

Half the objections come from transhumanist types saying that “We’ll just send our robots” or “mind-uploading” or “frozen genetic material raised by AI nannies” or self-replicating Von Neumann machines etc. – the whole LessWrong kitbag of secular eschatons.

But it occurs to me that all that does is bring those notions into the orbit of the Fermi Conundrum, née Fermi Paradox*. The Conundrum, as we all know, runs, “Where is everybody?” That is, we should see evidence of intelligent life Out There or right here or, if you’re especially cynical, should have been wiped out by another civilization before we even evolved this far, just to be on the safe side. The answer, “Maybe there just aren’t any other intelligent civilizations,” almost has to count as the most probable answer to the conundrum at this point.

(4) NEWITZ BIDS GOODBYE. Today was Annalee Newitz’ last day at io9 and Gizmodo. Newitz and Charlie Jane Anders co-founded io9 in 2008. In “I’m Heading Out to the Black. Farewell, io9 and Gizmodo!” at io9, Newitz announced:

And this is where my path diverges from io9 and Gizmodo. This past year managing both sites taught me that I’m not actually interested in being a manager. I want to write. That’s why I got into the writing business, and that’s what I want to do for the rest of my life. So I’ve accepted a position as tech culture editor at Ars Technica, where I’m excited to be devoting all my time to writing about the cultural impact of technology and science.

Did I mention that change is scary? Actually, it’s terrifying. And amazing. And a fundamental, banal part of being trapped in linear time. Anyone who loves the future, or who looks forward to a tomorrow that’s different from today, has to accept the uncertainties of change. Your Utopian vision might lead you straight to the shithole. But sometimes, your one-year speculative experiment grows into a giant robot that saves humanity from giant monsters. You won’t know until you actually veer off the road you were on, and steal a little plutonium to fuel your dreams.

Newitz says Katie Drummond will carry on Gizmodo.

(5) NaNoWriMo PROGRESS. Misty Massey asks “Did You Win NaNo?”  at Magical Words,

Today is the last day of NaNoWriMo, or National Novel Writing Month, a gloriously insane thirty-days of writing like your head is on fire and your booty is catching. I’ve participated for a whole lot of years now, although I never win, because this kind of writing is just not what I do. Despite having been told time and again that I should just write it all down and fix it later, I can’t. It needs to be as perfect and wonderful as I can manage the first time, so my writing style is Eeyore-slow.  But I still sign on for NaNo every year, just in case.  I managed about 9,000 words. Which, for me, is a stunning achievement.

(6) FAVES. Stephanie Burgis lists her “Favorite MG Novels of 2015”. And lo and behold, Ursula Vernon, you are Number Six…

  1. Castle Hangnail, by Ursula Vernon, is a wickedly funny fantasy novel with a fabulous heroine, and it turned me into a huge Ursula Vernon fan. You can read my full review here.

(7) JESSICA REVIEW. Jim Henley’s post “Jessica Jones (And Her Amazing Friends): A Netflix Original Series” sounds like he’s going to keep watching, if you ask me.

(8) BANGING ON. Larry Correia notifies his readers “JP Enterprises is now offering MHI [Monster Hunter International] and MCB logo AR-15 lower receivers” – a logo etching on a gun part.

I just had a fun thought. While certain other bestselling novelists are writing sanctimonious ignorant tweets bleating for more gun control, Larry Correia offers you custom rifles. 🙂

JP-MHI-1024x867

(9) THE RACK IS BACK. Lou Antonelli made sf and fantasy the dominant genres sold at the Dollar General store in Mount Pleasant, TX, as he explains in “Help the spin rack make a comeback!”

In talking about publishing original fiction [in a 2008 article by Antonelli], [Tom] Doherty mentioned that those paperback spin racks we used to see in stores and pharmacies were often a point of entry for people to the s-f and fantasy genres.

They used to be ubiquitous – those tall, vertical wire racks that you could spin around to see all four sides loaded up with mass market paperbacks. Doherty noted how the consolidation of book distribution had all but eliminated them. He said he hoped the fiction published by Tor.com would serve the same function as a point of entry for new readers in the digital age.

…Now, fast forward two and half years, to the summer of 2011. I was scheduled as a panelist at ArmadilloCon in Austin, and one of the panels was on “Secret History”. The Thursday before the convention I stopped at a local Dollar General in Mount Pleasant to pick up some groceries on the way home from work, and while standing in line, I caught sight of a spin rack.

Yes, Dollar General still believes in the spin rack. I walked over and saw that among the books was a copy of Steven Brust’s “The Paths of the Dead”. While I don’t read high fantasy, I bought the book because Brust was on the panel with me.

The following Sunday afternoon, as the panel on Secret History broke up, I stopped and pulled the book out. I told Steve “you know you are a best-selling author when you’re on the spin rack in the Dollar General in Mount Pleasant, Texas! That means your books are sold EVERYWHERE!”

(10) OUT WITH THE OLD. Jeff Duntemann’s photo of “Samples from the Box of No Return” is like a fannish time capsule.

I’m packing my office closet, and realized that The Box of No Return was overflowing. So in order to exercise my tesselation superpower on it, I had to upend it on my office floor and repack it from scratch.

I hadn’t done that in a very long time.

You may have a Box of No Return. It’s downstairs from the Midwestern Junk Drawer, hidden behind the Jar of Loose Change. It’s for stuff you know damned well you’ll never use again, but simply can’t bring yourself to throw away. A lot of it may be mementos. Some of it is just cool. Most of it could be dumped if you were a braver (and less sentimental) man than I….

There follows a descriptive paragraph of the treasures discovered. And things less that treasured.

I tossed a couple of things, like my SFWA membership badge. SFWA wanted to get rid of me for years for not publishing often enough; I saved them the trouble. Rot in irrelevancy, you dorks; I’m an indie now, and making significant money. Some promo buttons were for products I couldn’t even recall, and they went in the cause of making room. But most of it will go back in the (small) box, and it will all fit, with room to spare for artifacts not yet imagined, much less acquired.

(11) Today’s Birthday Boy

  • Born November 30, 1835 – Mark Twain

  • Born November 30, 1937 – Director Ridley Scott

(12) ONE STARS. Scalzi, Leckie, Rothfuss and others reading various one star reviews out loud.

(13) ABRAMS INTERVIEW. “J.J. Abrams Is Excited for Mothers and Daughters To See Star Wars: The Force Awakens.

The Star Wars: The Force Awakens director stopped by Good Morning America on Monday to talk about the upcoming release, and how he’s hoping it won’t just be a “boy’s thing.”

Star Wars was always a boy’s thing,” Abrams said. “I was really hoping this could be a movie that mothers could take their daughters to as well.”

In the interview, Abrams also confirmed that he at first refused the offer to direct the new Star Wars film, saying that it was a franchise he so revered that he “thought it would be better just to go the theater and see it like everyone else.” After talking to producer producer Kathy Kennedy, however, Abrams said the opportunity was “too delicious and too exciting to pass up.”

Video of the GMA interview is at the link.

[Thanks to Martin Morse Wooster, Paul Weimer, Mark-kitteh, and John King Tarpinian for some of these stories. Title credit goes to File 770 contributing editor of the day Greg.]

Update 12/01/2015: Corrected the link to Jim Henley’s review of Jessica Jones.

654 thoughts on “Pixel Scroll 11/30 The Doom That Came to File770

  1. Sure Zimmerman was found legally not guilty. Most of what the jury had was his own self-justifications, true or false. Martin couldn’t say much, being dead and all. Morally, however, I think there’s no doubt at all that Zimmerman was guilty. You, yourself said he shouldn’t have done the things he did. He was certainly the aggressor in the encounter, or he’d never have gotten out of the car.
    Would it have made a difference to your assessment if Martin was a woman? Given that someone had stalked me for several blocks in a car, and then gotten out, and had a gun (Zimmerman claims he didn’t brandish it, but a) you don’t have to brandish a gun for it to be noticed, and b) given Zimmerman’s track record, I’m pretty sure he did brandish it), Martin had a perfect right to defend himself. If he’d had a gun instead of a sidewalk, would you be applauding him? After all, it’s not a bad example of a “good shoot” for Martin. It’s just, apparently, an example of a “bad sidewalk”. And nobody has the right to bear sidewalk….

  2. Camestros Felapton, I think you are missing the point of correlative studies. They don’t mean anything if the things being correlated are not causally linked.

    If you do a study that shows Javex bleach is present in the homes of X% of murder victims, will a ban on Javex reduce the murder rate? Obviously not.

    Something else these gun-in-the-home studies frequently don’t address, was the person shot with the gun that was in the home? Or were they shot with some other gun? We don’t know, they didn’t say. Somewhat confounds the issue, wouldn’t you agree?

    If drug studies were done with designs like this, it would be a national scandal.

  3. Mr. Phantom

    In perusing your blog, are you one of Mr. Beale’s Dread Ilk? Because it sure sounds like it, and that would explain the (lack of) rational arguments you’ve presented here. Seeing as you’re so hung up on SJWs and CHORFs and all.

    Police shoot the wrong people all the time. How is it a good idea to trust them with your defense? Are you kidding me?

    As I’m white, I don’t have to worry about that as much. That’s also a separate discussion. In any event, I will not carry a gun. Period. This is a decision I have made, and I will bear the consequences for it, in the unlikely event there are any.

  4. Cally said: “Martin had a perfect right to defend himself.”

    If, and only if, he was in immanent fear for his life, sure. Let’s go with that, let’s make Martin the good guy. So there he is, fighting off the White Hispanic.

    But he died. Because he didn’t have a weapon sufficient to defend himself with.

    So please tell me again why having a gun on you is such a bad idea? Trayvon would have gotten to eat his Skittles if he’d been carrying that night.

    Cally, having “rights” counts for sh1t. Rights are for courts. You have to live through the fight first.

  5. Police shoot the wrong people all the time. How is it a good idea to trust them with your defense? Are you kidding me?

    Trained people make mistakes with deadly weapons. Therefore we should encourage untrained people to use deadly weapons, because that’ll work so much better.

  6. redheadedfemme said: “In perusing your blog, are you one of Mr. Beale’s Dread Ilk? Because it sure sounds like it, and that would explain the (lack of) rational arguments you’ve presented here. Seeing as you’re so hung up on SJWs and CHORFs and all.”

    You check out my blog? Thanks.

    I have never, to my knowledge, read any SF by Mr. Beale. I don’t know of anything he’s written that interested me. I may have linked his blog once, there was a funny picture.

    My arguments do not lack reason my dear, they just disagree with you. I may possibly be -wrong- about things, but not because I didn’t think about it. If I am wrong I usually admit it. So far in this thread I have yet to see anything that persuades me to change my mind, just lots of yelling and poo flinging.

    I will admit to having an abiding hatred of bullies. To the extent that SJWs behave as bullies, such as the odious Shirtstorm incident, they get to share in that.

    As to CHORFs, anybody who objects to me paying money and voting on a Hugo nom because I’m not the “right sort of person” and therefore shouldn’t be allowed an opinion is a self-refuting bigot.

  7. I will agree with ThePhantom on one point:

    Police shoot the wrong people all the time. How is it a good idea to trust them with your defense? Are you kidding me?

    I don’t trust the police and would like to see them disarmed as well. And it’s not an unrelated point since the primary justification for arming our police officers (while those in, for example, the UK do not carry guns) is so that they can deal with an armed population.

  8. Cally said: “Trained people make mistakes with deadly weapons. Therefore we should encourage untrained people to use deadly weapons, because that’ll work so much better.”

    That didn’t go the way you wanted, eh?

    If you knew how badly trained most policemen are, you would wet your pants. The training and range time I’ve had over the years is more than any cop ever gets unless they are in a SWAT team. I am no big deal, I hasten to add. Many people are better marksmen than I.

    Cops are useless for protecting you. They come along -after- and clean up. They can’t shoot for sour apples, they kill bystanders all the time and cover it up, they’re corrupt, and their judgement is cr@p more often than you’d like to think.

    See Martin/Zimmerman for elucidation.

    Make up your mind Cally. Either the cops are going to be the solution or they’re the problem, you can’t have it both ways.

  9. Amina, I have a question. How is a disarmed police force going to disarm the rest of the populace?

    Next question, do you think an armed police force will be able to disarm the populace? Isn’t that a bit… Soviet?

  10. Phantom:

    Cally said: “Martin had a perfect right to defend himself.”

    If, and only if, he was in immanent fear for his life, sure. Let’s go with that, let’s make Martin the good guy. So there he is, fighting off the White Hispanic.

    But he died. Because he didn’t have a weapon sufficient to defend himself with.

    What does Zimmerman’s ethic background have to do with it? And if Martin wasn’t in immanent fear for his life, than he was sadly mistaken, as he lost that life shortly thereafter.
    Are you now saying that Martin should have been armed? Should all young men without criminal records always go around armed with guns? Would that lower the crime statistics?

  11. So please tell me again why having a gun on you is such a bad idea? Trayvon would have gotten to eat his Skittles if he’d been carrying that night.

    Actually, what everyone here but you is saying is that the best case scenario would be that neither man had a gun. Period. Zimmerman had some past issues that made it clear he should not carry a gun, and shot someone. According to you, shooting someone is an awful thing and to be avoided. Zimmerman, therefore, suffered horribly from his choice to carry; he has a permanent black mark on his soul. And Martin suffered horribly, too, as did his family.

    So we all argue give neither man a gun and both men and the people who love them would have suffered vastly less; and you argue that both men should have been carrying. And I say, that might have made the outcome different, but in what world and what way does it make the outcome better?

    As for home invasions: The second piece of gun safety I was taught (the first is, “assume all guns are loaded”) is “never point a gun at a human being unless you are really, truly, ready to use it.” The point being, a gun is not a criminal deterrent, it’s a deadly weapon.

    We all agree that discharging a gun in self defense is a failure, albeit a better failure than being dead. However, with that rule drilled in my head, I, and I think others here, argue that the failure is at the point where I have to point the gun, and consider the consequences if that turns out not to be enough to intimidate the assailant. You, on the other hand, seem to be arguing that pointing a gun is a magical event that only leads to self defense if the bearer is an idiot.

    (I’ve pulled a trigger twice in my life, incidentally, at a dead tree in the middle of a lake. My weapon of choice is a bow. Which has much lesser failure modes because there’s no confusion whether it’s loaded, and a greater chance of survival in case of accident or even deliberate assault. Has pretty similar safety rules otherwise, so I have practiced putting weapon safety in practice. Also means I have an idea how much practice is needed to stay in practice with a weapon, which is rule # 3 of safety: practice enough to know realistically what you can and cannot do.)

  12. @Phantom I note you possibly answered one of my 6 questions https://file770.com/?p=26299&cpage=11#comment-373600 if you count changing the question. It seemed a simple enough question Why own a gun if you aren’t prepared to use it? (see original comment for aftermath issues). The other 5 have been ignored. They were detailed and implementation related. Can I say I’m *shocked* that you are unable/unwilling to answer 6 basic questions?

    All I’m seeing is more arguing that each individual SWM should be allowed to own guns because you don’t trust the government to determine who should own guns. You are afraid to have the government know about the guns you own. You know the government knowing about the car(s) you own is scary enough but Not your guns man noooo. That last I’m tacking on since my discussions about guns have been linked to car licenses and registration (why shouldn’t they be similar). I’m going to assume one of the reasons you keep ignoring my comments relating the two is either you don’t have a good answer to refute my actual statements or you hate that the government decides who can drive and requires you register your car. Or as stated before you don’t respond to real questions and have discussions with women (see 6 unanswered questions mentioned above for additional support of this thesis).

  13. @Cally: I believe The Phantom’s position is something like “Let them try to kill each other; God will sort things out.”

    For some people, Hobbes’ state of nature is something to avoid. For others, apparently, it is devoutly wished for.

  14. Cally said: “What does Zimmerman’s ethic background have to do with it?”

    That was the whole point of the uproar, Cally. Black kid gets shot by white guy. But then Zimmerman turned out to be a Hispanic guy, so on the news we got the hilariously bullsh1t “White Hispanic”.

    “And if Martin wasn’t in immanent fear for his life, than he was sadly mistaken, as he lost that life shortly thereafter.”

    I think perhaps Martin was less innocent that you would like to make out, given that he was shot sitting on Zimmerman’s chest and beating his head on the ground. That’s not the cut-and-dried scenario you’d like it to be. A jury found Zimmerman innocent. Maybe they were wrong, but they knew more about it than you or I do.

    My problem with Zimmerman is, he was alone, doing what cops are supposed to be doing but he’s not a cop, and broke every rule in the book on how to handle an unknown assailant. The whole thing was avoidable and stupid, given the info I have. Maybe that’s unfair, maybe there’s things I don’t know, but that’s my opinion for now.

    “Are you now saying that Martin should have been armed?”

    Didn’t Martin have a pretty long rap sheet?

    “Should all young men without criminal records always go around armed with guns? Would that lower the crime statistics?”

    Yes, and yes. Gun control began with the Sullivan Act, which was passed specifically to deny guns to blacks in NYC. Gun control is still essentially racist in it’s purpose and execution. States when the authorities are compelled to issue permits to all qualified individuals have -lower- crime and murder rates.

    I can’t help it if you don’t like the facts. They are what they are.

  15. Shao Ping said: “@Cally: I believe The Phantom’s position is something like “Let them try to kill each other; God will sort things out.”

    You know, that is truly offensive. I defy you to show where I’ve said that in this thread. You are a cretin, sir.

    Tasha Turner said: “Or as stated before you don’t respond to real questions and have discussions with women.”

    I’ve been ignoring you because you’re not interested in having a discussion, you’re just raging on. Say something sensible and we’ll talk about it.

    Example: “Why own a gun if you aren’t prepared to use it?”

    Use it for what? Target practice? Hunting? Shooting rats in the woodpile? Or do you mean “why own a gun if you’re not prepared to kill a human?” The purpose of having a gun is not to kill people with it, Ms. Turner. Your assertions are disgusting.

  16. Bows and arrows – loved them as a kid. We kept a target at home and several bows and blunted arrows for the kids in the neighborhood (1970s small town New England).

    Never aim a bow in the direction of people or animals unless you intend to kill something. Even if using blunted arrows this is drilled into you. ER visits caused by an arrow are bad. A blunted arrow in the right (well wrong) spot can kill someone. If your lucky it only does minor damage instead.

    Gun safety is much more serious than blunted arrows. An accident is much more likely to be lethal. And like the idiots in 4-wheel drive who think it’s safe to drive 80MPH on ice who cause accidents because tires don’t have traction on ice. Guns give a false sense of security which leads to people doing stupid stuff – like ignoring the cop who says “wait for us to come” and stalking a kid and killing said kid. Without a gun both would probably be fine today because idiot would have waited & kid would have arrived home.

    People react funny when you pull weapons on them. This is not going to be everyone’s sanest thinking moments on either side. No one knows how they will react if a gun is pulled on them. Very few people know how they’ll react in a gun emergency situation and even those don’t know how they’ll react in different kinds of situations. Might do great in the middle of a combat situation surrounded by other trained army buddies. But find yourself in a convenience store being robbed might react inappropriately for that situation and get someone killed because you forgot everyone around you are civilians or you have a PTSD flashback.

  17. It is very easy. You don’t sell a gun to a person with anger management issues. If you allow that to happen, you are an idiot.

  18. No, Trayvon Martin didn’t have “a pretty long rap sheet.” He’d been suspended from school for possession of a small amount of marijuana. No criminal record. And despite the avid fantasies of those raised with the worldview of the War on Some Drugs, or traumatized by too-early viewing of Reefer Madness, those of us of a certain age, or currently living in Colorado, can only laugh at the idea that marijuana use causes violent behavior in its users.

    Trayvon was just a teenager walking home, and Zimmerman stalked him, confronted him, killed him, and probably lied to police about the sequence of events. E.g., he told police Trayvon had jumped out of the bushes at him, but there were no bushes or any similar vegetation in the area that Trayvon could have “jumped out of.”

  19. The Phantom on December 5, 2015 at 2:05 pm said:

    Camestros Felapton, I think you are missing the point of correlative studies. They don’t mean anything if the things being correlated are not causally linked.

    I don’t think I am missing the point of correlative studies but as the study we are discussing wasn’t one I do wonder why you are changing the subject.

    If you do a study that shows Javex bleach is present in the homes of X% of murder victims, will a ban on Javex reduce the murder rate? Obviously not.

    If I do a study and discover that Javex bleach is more likely to be in the homes of murder victims than non-murder victims at a statistically significant level then I have found something interesting. It would be a notable finding that would require further investigation. If lobby groups for the bleach industry then loudly denounced my works and politicians funded by the bleach industry then forbade me from doing further research I’d start thinking ‘What do they know that I don’t?’.

    Something else these gun-in-the-home studies frequently don’t address, was the person shot with the gun that was in the home? Or were they shot with some other gun? We don’t know, they didn’t say. Somewhat confounds the issue, wouldn’t you agree?

    As in maybe gun owners are more likely to have a gun accident than shoot an intruder because people come round to their house to show them their guns and the gun owner gets accidentally shot with those guns rather than the ones they own? Doesn’t help your case much. Remember that you are trying to show the study was somehow not just invalid but so obviously invalid that everybody else here are idiots for even looking at it.

    If drug studies were done with designs like this, it would be a national scandal.

    Remember that stuff I told you about randomized placebo controlled double-blind trials? You need to go back and read that bit again.
    Not all medical issues can be studied in the same way as a good drug trial. The impact of lifestyle choices are not easily studied by a controlled trial for example. Epidemiological studies (which, yes, are often correlative) for example http://pmep.cce.cornell.edu/profiles/extoxnet/TIB/epidemiology.html

  20. Our war on drugs is a joke. We go after kids instead of the people at the top. We spend way too much money to do little to change the system. But that’s a rant for another time. LOL

    Any good SFF with drug themes? Books might be more interesting than feeding our gun troll.

  21. Liz Carey said: “No, Trayvon Martin didn’t have “a pretty long rap sheet.” He’d been suspended from school for possession of a small amount of marijuana. No criminal record. And despite the avid fantasies of those raised with the worldview of the War on Some Drugs, or traumatized by too-early viewing of Reefer Madness, those of us of a certain age, or currently living in Colorado, can only laugh at the idea that marijuana use causes violent behavior in its users.”

    So, no record. Then you’d have no problem with Martin carrying. He’d be alive now, bad-guy Zimmerman would be dead. Or, and this is the most likely thing, they’d both be alive and the cops wouldn’t have even been called because nothing would have happened.

    I thought that is what you wanted? It’s what I want.

  22. The Phantom on December 5, 2015 at 2:49 pm said:

    Amina, I have a question. How is a disarmed police force going to disarm the rest of the populace?

    Well, we keep being told how gun owners are law-abiding patriotic people who support the police, so presumably (unless that is all untrue) they won’t have any problem at all. Or are you saying that the peaceful law-abiding patriotic people who support the police will start killing police officers?

  23. Books might be more interesting than feeding our gun troll.

    That’s for sure.

    I’ve just started The Mechanical by Ian Tregillis. Fascinating premise. I liked Gene Wolfe’s A Borrowed Man, but I think I might like this one even better. I’m still searching for my fifth Best Novel ballot slot.

  24. Phantom, all due respect (and AFAIC it’s none at all), but you’re a gun-happy fool who shouldn’t be allowed out without a responsible adult to keep an eye on you.

  25. Camestros Felapton said: “Or are you saying that the peaceful law-abiding patriotic people who support the police will start killing police officers?”

    You are really quick to get to the killing people part, aren’t you? I’m suggesting it would be impractical, not that we should have a civil war.

    I also doubt that any conceivable police force, armed or not, could possibly collect up all the arms and ammunition in the USA. It’s not even in the realm of possibility.

    I direct your attention to Canada and the 7 million people who risked a 10 year jail term by not registering their rifles. Canadians are less quick on the trigger than Amurikans, or so I keep being told.

  26. PJ Evans said: “Phantom, all due respect (and AFAIC it’s none at all), but you’re a gun-happy fool who shouldn’t be allowed out without a responsible adult to keep an eye on you.”

    Well thanks for finally tossing off the fake-face and saying what you really think. And think based on nothing at all, just knee-jerk bigotry, let it not be passed by unremarked.

    Rest assured, I will continue to do exactly as I please regardless of your disapproval.

  27. @Phantom

    Snowcrash said: “1. Support your claim that the study cited is bunk.”

    I did. At length. You are ignoring what I said. I will now say it again. This time, try reading it.

    No, you repeated your argument. I asked you to support your arguments. You still have not offered anything to support them. I’m in no way inclined to let you palm the card in such a way.

    Show evidence to support your claim that the study cited was bunk. Provide the relevant citations and quotes from the FBI Uniform Crime Report that support your claim that there have been instances where someone with a gun has stopped/ help stop a mass shooting incident. You said it’s there, but you’ve yet to demonstrate it. This is now the 4th time I’ve repeated the request, after you clamed that it was there.

    I’ve let you blather on for long enough. Show up, or make it even clearer than you already have that you’re an empty can.

    Amina, I have a question. How is a disarmed police force going to disarm the rest of the populace?

    Next question, do you think an armed police force will be able to disarm the populace? Isn’t that a bit… Soviet?

    Personally, I think it’s a little bit Australian. Which I will note is among those countries that you’ve been very careful to not mention.

  28. redheadedfemme on December 5, 2015 at 3:52 pm said:
    Books might be more interesting than feeding our gun troll.

    That’s for sure.

    I’ve just started The Mechanical by Ian Tregillis. Fascinating premise. I liked Gene Wolfe’s A Borrowed Man, but I think I might like this one even better. I’m still searching for my fifth Best Novel ballot slot.

    The next book in the series is just out too.

  29. I’ve just started The Mechanical by Ian Tregillis. Fascinating premise. I liked Gene Wolfe’s A Borrowed Man, but I think I might like this one even better. I’m still searching for my fifth Best Novel ballot slot.

    I’ve added the books to my File770 Hugo growing mount TBR. Both look interesting. I still have a slot or two open.

  30. Sorry the link didn’t work. I don’t know how to fix it.

    In the meantime, books about drugs. I really enjoyed Afterparty by Daryl Gregory. And there’s always Dune.

  31. The Phantom: Police shoot the wrong people all the time. How is it a good idea to trust them with your defense? Are you kidding me?

    Civilians shoot people all the time. A lot of the people who carry guns are wildly irrational, as you have demonstrated yourself to be, as the Puppies discussing taking their weapons to Worldcon have demonstrated themselves to be. How is it a good idea for me to trust them to carry weapons? Are you kidding me?

    Why is my right to not get shot by a wildly irrational person with anger management problems trumped by those wildly irrational persons’ right to carry weapons?

  32. While the piñata understudy seems to keep going, a question about The Mechanical by Ian Tregillis – is it as…dark/ depressing “hard-hitting” as his Milkweed Triptych books? I really liked those, but I would never re-read them. It just wound up being so ongoingly gut-punching.

  33. I’d like to know the answer to that, too, snowcrash. I just have my limits as to how much dark I can take. And the fact that the blurb is by GRRM isn’t reassuring in that instance. 😉

  34. Why is my right to not get shot by a wildly irrational person with anger management problems trumped by those wildly irrational persons’ right to carry weapons?

    Indeed.

    Here in 9930, we haven’t eradicated the impulse toward violence, but we have found ways to make it less likely people will act on that impulse.

  35. Why is my right to not get shot by a wildly irrational person with anger management problems trumped by those wildly irrational persons’ right to carry weapons?

    This, so much this.

    Even back in 796 we are asking these questions about weapons and people’s right to live a life not being attacked by every angry and/or irrational person around them. They might have been feudal or classist but they’ve always existed to maintain law and order. Weapon control laws have been around in civilized countries since they first became civilized. (WB time machine)

  36. snowcrash on December 5, 2015 at 9:18 pm said:

    While the piñata understudy seems to keep going, a question about The Mechanical by Ian Tregillis – is it as…dark/ depressing “hard-hitting” as his Milkweed Triptych books? I really liked those, but I would never re-read them. It just wound up being so ongoingly gut-punching.

    Not yet, but I think Milkweed built up the darkness in increments. The themes are more about free-will rather then predestination but there is a similar sense of people trapped by events. Also the main characters (apart from Jax – the central clockwork robot character) are not that nice themselves, so I’m less inclined to care about them as much as I did in Milkweed. But there is a nasty brain surgery bit which is distressing in itself and distressing in its consequences.

    [Also as I’m particular fond of specific kind of transport and robots and hence robot forms of that kind of transport there was a bit I found extra sad about which I can’t say more without spoiling things.]

  37. lurkertype on December 5, 2015 at 9:29 pm said:

    I’d like to know the answer to that, too, snowcrash. I just have my limits as to how much dark I can take. And the fact that the blurb is by GRRM isn’t reassuring in that instance.

    Overall I’ll say, as violent as Milkweed but not as dark – at least by the Milkweed standard of lbhe onol orvat cbffrffrq ol zbafgebhf ryqevgpu orvatf naq nyy orpnhfr bs n qrfcrengr cebzvfr lbh znqr, naq gung onol vf tebjvat hc gb qrfgebl nyy bs uhznavgl naq lbh ner pnhtug va n cerqrfgvangvba genc naq gur bayl jnl bhg vf gur cflpubgvp cebqhpg bs Anmv rkcrevzragf jub neenatrq gb unir lbhe puvyq xvyyrq va gur svefg cynpr.

  38. Cally said: “Trained people make mistakes with deadly weapons. Therefore we should encourage untrained people to use deadly weapons, because that’ll work so much better.”

    That didn’t go the way you wanted, eh?

    If you knew how badly trained most policemen are, you would wet your pants. The training and range time I’ve had over the years is more than any cop ever gets unless they are in a SWAT team. I am no big deal, I hasten to add. Many people are better marksmen than I.

    What didn’t go the way I wanted? If, as you say, cops are badly trained, than how is it not obvious that most civilians are even worse trained? After all, cops start out being civilians, and get cop training on top of whatever civilian training or lack thereof they already had. I never said I thought that cops were perfect. I just think they’re a heck of a lot better than any random bunch of untrained vigilantes.

    “Are you now saying that Martin should have been armed?”

    Didn’t Martin have a pretty long rap sheet?

    No, he didn’t. Why do you assume he did? Is it because he was black? You seem to be assuming a lot. Like that both would be alive if both had been armed, for instance, rather than that a man with known serious rage issues who’d been stalking Martin for blocks wouldn’t have just shot him when he saw a gun.

    Given their known histories, if I was forced make the choice as to which of them was more fit to be carrying a gun, it would be Martin, not Zimmerman. But it would have been far better for both if neither had been.

  39. No offense to all the honest and thoughtful people here, but I am getting bored with people who make remarkable claims and never once give any supporting documentation for them, who seem to think that “supporting documentation” means just saying more stuff.

    I’m going to go read some better crafted fictions now.

  40. @Camestros Felapton thanks for the additional info about The Mechanichal.

    One of the things arguing with gun trolls can do for me is remind me of all the reasons I’m for gun control and get new ones added if I’m hanging out with smart people. I don’t spend much time around people who are for arming everyone and just how poor their arguments are is good for me to be exposed to occasionally. Generally I avoid people like this because it makes my head hurt. When it’s close family I changed discussions before we get close to this point of *headdesk*.

    I love how on file770 we can choose to stop reading a thread once bored and move onto great books recommended by fellow filers.

  41. Rev Bob: But will our interlocutor ever get off the island of Conclusions? It requires swimming across the Sea of Knowledge, after all….

  42. @RevBob

    Perhaps we should call this particular comment thread The Phantom Trollbooth.

    LOLOLOL

    Here is your Internet for today, sir, on a nice shiny silver platter.

  43. @The Phantom: The problem with gun geekdom is that you all think you can be trusted with deadly weapons but everything you all say and write convinces the rest of us that you can’t. You don’t understand human nature; worse, you don’t understand yourselves. As a famous gun-wielding movie character once said, “A man’s got to know his limitations.” You folks don’t.

    As for the practical problems of gun control – are we gonna go house to house? – I don’t think we need to do any such thing. It’s all about the odds, and patience. In a generation after a reasonable regime is enacted, the key metric – percentage of households owning at least one firearm – will be way lower than it was. (It was already on a 30-year downward trend until the US elected a black guy.) We don’t need to eliminate every gun in the country or the entire black market. We just need difficulty and time.

  44. Rev. Bob on December 6, 2015 at 5:15 am said:
    @Peace:

    Perhaps we should call this particular comment thread The Phantom Trollbooth.

    I think that concludes the discussion perfectly.
    (The internets, sir, are shiny and yours.)

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