Re: [GRIMDARK] Fallout Equestria: Project Horizons Discussion

[Sindri]

Okay, look memory orbs are a plot hole in the original fallout equestria.
They could store memories in massive quantities, create copies of pony's minds and store them in computers, and attach souls to computers and have the soul run a computer program without any previous knowledge into how binary works or how terminals work, but they couldn't copy combat knowledge? If I were in their universe and they told me, "hey I found a way to download a entire consciousness into a computer, but we still haven't found a way to copy knowledge from pony to pony" I would have thought someone was pulling my leg.

It's a real slap to the face when it comes to suspension of disbelief.

You can transfer factual accounts easily, and more effectively than any book or recording. The problem is that there's a big difference between knowledge and experience. They could, easily and cheaply, transfer knowledge from anyone to anyone. They could, with the absolute pinnacle of their technological achievement, put the sum total of a person's experience into a Crusader Maneframe. But they couldn't copy experience, couldn't cut it up and use the useful parts. Knowlege, sensory memory, that's all just data and easy to work with. But its not clear if a full experience can be separated from a living soul at all.

Magical Mystery Cure:

Yeah, in my mind the divergence point is between season 2 and 3, with the first two seasons being entirely in line with FoE and the third taking place in a similar but distinct universe. The Crystal Empire and the Twiscension have felt felt shoehorned in for toy sales, rather than something that was well thought-out and written. King Sombra, turning into an alicorn, none of that happened in the FoE 'verse. Cadence still has wings but it's because she's a mutant, not because she's a deity. Celestia and Luna are deities, or damn close to it.

More importantly, fuck you Luna's dress is adorable (and I'm sure it was quite fashionable last time she had cause to wear a dress). Also Rainbow Dash looks classy as fuck in a pointy feathered cap.

just look at this classy motherfucker:

And I think it's been confirmed that your horn doesn't get any longer when you become an alicorn. Sorry Blackjack.

[O. Hinds]

Brushing update:
It's going reasonably well so far (Somber described the chapter as "horribad", if I remember correctly, but you know him.). I'm afraid that we definitely won't be finishing tonight, but I'm hopeful that we'll be able to finish on Sunday. If we can't, though, the chapter won't be up until next month, since Somber will be busy at the con next weekend.

[Caoimhe]

Remind Somber to take lots of pictures of the con. That also means not just shots of the floor/shoes!

[Vergil]

Brushing update:
It's going reasonably well so far (Somber described the chapter as "horribad", if I remember correctly, but you know him.).

I am ready for the greatest chapter ever

[Exodus Hero]

Brushing update:
It's going reasonably well so far (Somber described the chapter as "horribad", if I remember correctly, but you know him.). I'm afraid that we definitely won't be finishing tonight, but I'm hopeful that we'll be able to finish on Sunday. If we can't, though, the chapter won't be up until next month, since Somber will be busy at the con next weekend.

I was clicking on the refresh button for a good ten minutes before I had the good sense to check the forums :|

[Icy Shake]

Well, I've just finished watching the new episode, and I found it very, very okay. The quantity and nature of the singing wasn't quite to my taste, but, for the most part, I neither liked nor disliked the episode; given how things could have gone, that's probably good.

I'm not sure, though, whether I prefer Magical Mystery Cure's sublime blandness or the Royal Wedding's mixture of the interesting and cool with the eyetwitchingly bad.

That's kind of how it impacted me; I really hope it's a cross-season three parter, as then it could at least feel like there's more direction to it, but this episode came off to me as poorly paced, with the first 60% rushing by and being solved too easily (and not making much sense), while the latter portion was entirely devoid of conflict.

Magical Mystery Cure:

Yeah, in my mind the divergence point is between season 2 and 3, with the first two seasons being entirely in line with FoE and the third taking place in a similar but distinct universe. The Crystal Empire and the Twiscension have felt felt shoehorned in for toy sales, rather than something that was well thought-out and written. King Sombra, turning into an alicorn, none of that happened in the FoE 'verse. Cadence still has wings but it's because she's a mutant, not because she's a deity. Celestia and Luna are deities, or damn close to it.

More importantly, fuck you Luna's dress is adorable (and I'm sure it was quite fashionable last time she had cause to wear a dress). Also Rainbow Dash looks classy as fuck in a pointy feathered cap.

Yes, it is, and yes she does. But Celestia looks like she's wearing a tacky carpet.

I've, of course, always felt the split came prior to the end of Season Two, and we still don't know Cadence has wings (or a horn, for that matter--I think she's only been referred to in correspondence, which didn't mention her appearance, but I'm less confident on this) or why in PH, and Shining Armor (to the best of my recollection) hasn't yet even made that much of an appearance, but the Season Two finale could be fit in, if perhaps inelegantly.

I wanted to add something to the memory orbs discussion, but it's hard to think of much that hasn't been covered adequately.

So on a final note, I have a question arising from chapter three:

He opened up the crate [inside the crashed Ministry of Peace skywagon] and took out two empty syringes and two boxes of some kind of canned meat.

Was this really meat (or is this just BJ getting something wrong), and if so, why is MoP dealing in canned meat? I don't recall anything suggesting ponies went omnivorous before the world ended (have we seen any indication of that?), but maybe it could be for griffon mercenaries or something. I guess it probably doesn't matter that much, but it's been bugging me for a little while.

[O. Hinds]

So on a final note, I have a question arising from chapter three:

He opened up the crate [inside the crashed Ministry of Peace skywagon] and took out two empty syringes and two boxes of some kind of canned meat.

Was this really meat (or is this just BJ getting something wrong), and if so, why is MoP dealing in canned meat? I don't recall anything suggesting ponies went omnivorous before the world ended (have we seen any indication of that?), but maybe it could be for griffon mercenaries or something. I guess it probably doesn't matter that much, but it's been bugging me for a little while.

I'm not sure what the answer is, but I hypothesize that perhaps the meat wasn't intended as food.

[Harmony Ltd.]

So, uhmm... unrelated to any current discussion, but I got myself thinking...

Apart from Megaspells & Balefire bombs, was there anything in pre-Apocalyptic Equestria that would have justified the fact that you can find rad-x and rad-away everywhere, and that it was apparently commonly used even then ? I mean, I may have got something wrong (most probably), but it seems that rad-away were in common use even before the Apocalypse.

What would have been the reason for that before the Apocalypse ?

[Harmony Ltd.]

So on a final note, I have a question arising from chapter three:

He opened up the crate [inside the crashed Ministry of Peace skywagon] and took out two empty syringes and two boxes of some kind of canned meat.

Was this really meat (or is this just BJ getting something wrong), and if so, why is MoP dealing in canned meat? I don't recall anything suggesting ponies went omnivorous before the world ended (have we seen any indication of that?), but maybe it could be for griffon mercenaries or something. I guess it probably doesn't matter that much, but it's been bugging me for a little while.

I'm not sure what the answer is, but I hypothesize that perhaps the meat wasn't intended as food.

High-proteinic food supplement in case of severe blood loss or things like that ?

[CamoBadger]

So on a final note, I have a question arising from chapter three:

He opened up the crate [inside the crashed Ministry of Peace skywagon] and took out two empty syringes and two boxes of some kind of canned meat.

Was this really meat (or is this just BJ getting something wrong), and if so, why is MoP dealing in canned meat? I don't recall anything suggesting ponies went omnivorous before the world ended (have we seen any indication of that?), but maybe it could be for griffon mercenaries or something. I guess it probably doesn't matter that much, but it's been bugging me for a little while.

Ponies were omnivorous before the war.
- Pinkie talks about Hot Dog eating contests during the Running of the Leaves.
- Rarity makes eggs for breakfast while Sweetie stays over.
- Their dinner with Discord had a gravyboat filled with brown gravy (which is made from the drippings of whatever meat you've cooked to go with it).

[O. Hinds]

So, uhmm... unrelated to any current discussion, but I got myself thinking...

Apart from Megaspells & Balefire bombs, was there anything in pre-Apocalyptic Equestria that would have justified the fact that you can find rad-x and rad-away everywhere, and that it was apparently commonly used even then ? I mean, I may have got something wrong (most probably), but it seems that rad-away were in common use even before the Apocalypse.

What would have been the reason for that before the Apocalypse ?

Hm... Some of it can be explained by working near radiation-involving machinery, but I suspect that a lot of it was defense-related. The less damaged Equestria would be from a strategic megaspell attack, the less likely the Pax Roamana would be to try one; having antiradiation drugs all over the place is part of that.

Nah, muscle grafts.
Canned because... why not?

You've got to preserve it somehow.

[Kippershy]

It's actually canon that ponies have radiation suits. Go watch The Cutie Pox and look out for when the townsponies find out AB has C.P.
One of them (or more) pulls out a hazmat suit WITH radiation symbol on it.

[Harmony Ltd.]

Yeah, that I know, but I just wonder what source of radiations they would have feared outside of weaponized megaspells, considering they don't have an equivalent to nuclear power for civilian uses as far as I know.

Would they have been fearing nuclear weapons even by the time of FiM ?

[CamoBadger]

I think it has 3 or 4 ponies in those suits, and they just had them in their houses.

Welcome to the dark side of FiM.

[Ketchup]

This brings us back to the war-in-the-background theory.

[Kippershy]

Oh, was it biohazard? my bad memory there.
Still, the idea of hazardous stuff is definitely canon and so radiation can't be all that far off from it, right?

[Harmony Ltd.]

Oh, was it biohazard? my bad memory there

[Harmony Ltd.]

^ By the way, I like how everyone look worried, and Berry Punch is like "Hey, cool, what's happening ?"

[Moodyman90]

She's drunk, she doesn't care.

Course this means she's a very aware drunk.

[CamoBadger]

^ By the way, I like how everyone look worried, and Berry Punch is like "Hey, cool, what's happening ?"

And the filly in the back is entirely unamused.

[Harmony Ltd.]

@ Swicked : we could always say it's a biohazard suit, but that the animators just went for cool and put a radioactive symbol instead of the biohazard one. It would fit given the context of the episode it features in ("The Cutie Pox")

[Kippershy]

So I was right!
I was damned sure it was a radioactivity symbol but didn't have the bother to check and didn't want to make an ass of myself by insisting I was right without proof.

Not that I'm trying to have a game of one upping you or anything like that, just saying is all.

[FeatherDust]

It's called the blank slate theory. The theory pretty much says that the reason why we are different in how we act from animals is that we are taught how to think. Like from a physical standpoint some animals do have the mental capacity of five year olds, but they don't act as such because they aren't taught what we as humans know... From a biological standpoint human beings are not special at all.

Not entirely true. Without getting into the complicated arguments of an ongoing scholarly/scientific debate, the human brain appears to be pre-programmed at birth -- designed on a genetic level -- to handle language and imagination in a way that animals are not. Some parrots come close, but in general animal brains do not include the critical component of human thought, which is context. At the most basic level, that means the same sound can mean something totally different depending on the sounds around it and the environment at the moment -- but even more so, humans are uniquely able to generate an entirely imaginary context, and then make statements within that non-existent mental context.

In other words, I can talk about not only "yesterday" but "tomorrow" and "someday". I can say, "IF this happens, THEN I will do that." To make that simple statement, my brain has to take the current situation and all my memories, construct a hypothetical situation inside my brain, determine all the possible ways I could react in that situation, select one that I determine to be the 'best' answer, and then communicate that to somebody else. And all that happens without me thinking about it; it all happens behind my eyes in an instant.

The whole "human beings are superior" thing is a logical fallacy when you break it down. We are superior because we have civilization and able to communicate information between each other and transmit information and teach others. It is not our biological processes that make us superior, it's our knowledge. Knowledge is power.

Knowledge IS a biological function. It's back to that whole 'imaginary context' thing; to learn from mere communication, you have to be able to create that universe inside your head and find how the information you're being given fits into that.

[Icy Shake]

Ponies were omnivorous before the war.
- Pinkie talks about Hot Dog eating contests during the Running of the Leaves.
- Rarity makes eggs for breakfast while Sweetie stays over.
- Their dinner with Discord had a gravyboat filled with brown gravy (which is made from the drippings of whatever meat you've cooked to go with it).

Sorry; I guess I should have said "carnivorous", as I was already aware of eggs, milk, and butter as part of their diet. I guess I figured that the hot dogs were vegetarian, since those are a thing, and that it was Discord who made the gravy, without Fluttershy knowing what went in it. But looking back, it's implied that his only role was setting the table, so I guess she's probably the one who made it.

Re Featherdust: To the qualitative neurological differences, I'd add the quantitative Dunbar's number; primate social groups are correlated with brain size/structure, suggesting an important relationship between neurological characteristics and the potential for sociological and technological advancement, if you assume group scale effects are important to these aspects of development.

[Moodyman90]

Wasn't there some scientist who wanted to see if if you could raise a chimp to be like a person, so he took a new born chimp and raise it along with his son.

As in he raised the chimp like his son, like a human. First few years they developed the same but eventually the kid grew up and progressed while the chimp just stayed the same.

[Harmony Ltd.]

Well, to be fair, a newborn, up until one year, is probably "dumber" than a chimp of similar age.

It's later on that our brain circuitry really start to take-off.

[SilentCarto]

More importantly, fuck you Luna's dress is adorable (and I'm sure it was quite fashionable last time she had cause to wear a dress).

I think that's kind of the problem. Luna's style leans more toward Rainbow Dash's end of things, in my opinion. She's not a pretty pretty princess. She can do slinky or dashing, but ruffled sleeves and a fishtail dress? ...yeah, no...

Also Rainbow Dash looks classy as fuck in a pointy feathered cap.

just look at this classy motherfucker:

Oh, hell yes. Rainbow Dash can pull off the Musketeer look like nobody's business. On that note, though, I have to imagine that Pinkie's hat does not actually include an ice cream cone -- she just put it there to save for later.

[SilentCarto]

But Celestia looks like she's wearing a tacky carpet.

You know... she really, really does.

Explaining the Joke:

Or one of those horrible formless muumuus. Cadence, on the other hoof, looks great. Those Crystal Empire tailors have got some style.

[Sindri]

Cadence, on the other hoof, looks great. Those Crystal Empire tailors have got some style.

Well, they've got the experience. Luna probably hasn't worn a dress in over a thousand years, and Celestia regularly showed up at the Grand Galloping Gala naked. Cadence is the only princess who cares about fashion, and thus has the only competent royal seamstresses.


As for the radiation suits and chems, I figure that cartoon-era Equestria had sufficient tech (what with the skyscrapers and all) that they had some experience with harmful magical emissions from experimental or exotic devices. Before the war started only those working with such things, and the excessively paranoid, would own such things but as soon as megaspell attack became a possibility production would have ramped up and they'd be distributed all over. Luna planned to win the war, not survive it, so she needed a way for her citizens to keep fighting even while the zebras used the worst weapons imaginable on them.

As for the human intelligence debate, I dunno. Every day I hear of more and more "exclusively human" traits displayed in one animal or another, and some seem to get fairly close to the abilities of Homo Sapiens at least in a few respects, but none of them seem to get far enough. Some will build arsenals, demonstrating planning for the future. Some display empathy not only for those around them but for photographs and abstract representations. Some birds can recognize themselves in a mirror, use it for grooming, and display vanity. A hive of insects will achieve engineering wonders which would take human architects months to design lesser versions of. An octopus can figure out solutions to complex and unknown problems with no experience, habit, or instinct to guide them. The technology of animals is primitive where it exists at all, but no more so than our ancestors' was even after the time when they became indisputably human.
But an ape raised like a man is still missing something fundamental, they're not quite enough.
I hold out some hope for octopi, dolphins, and other highly advanced animals who haven't been studied sufficiently yet, and there's definitely something more than simple instinct at work in many animals, but I don't know if we'll ever find another species with intelligence as we understand it.
The creation of art seems to be our defining feature, as silly as it might sound. Others might gather pretty things to attract the attention of a mate, they might craft tools or weapons, but they would not spend time and resources to create something as frivolous as a cave painting.

[Stringtheory]

The creation of art seems to be our defining feature, as silly as it might sound. Others might gather pretty things to attract the attention of a mate, they might craft tools or weapons, but they would not spend time and resources to create something as frivolous as a cave painting.

Another thing could be our recording of history, I don't think we've seen that in nature either, though that would probably require being able to translate their language, and/or know what we're looking for.
Also my personal theory for why we're sentient and no other species on the planet seemingly is, is that for us, there was enough constant change to our environment to keep us on our metaphorical toes (enough so that evolution/natural selection couldn't give us new biological traits), so we had to keep adapting to our new environments, primarily by using tools, and now apparently art

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