#and I think its related to group theory so its even more cool

[yoneda-emma]

analysis my beloved <3

[chemblrish]

hii how are you? I'm currently studying inorganic chem, mainly coordination compounds but it's proving difficult. I'm unable to fully grasp what's going on. Can you please advise me on coordination compounds and inorganic chem in general? thank you!!

Hi!

Inorganic coordination chem is part of my thesis, you've come to the right place :) Also, I'm going to make this a university-level thing - I didn't study coordination chem in school, so I'm assuming that's the level you expect - but if you actually need advice on studying high school inorganic chem, please let me know!

First, a textbook rec: I studied off Cotton's Basic inorganic chemistry a lot and I liked it. My professor recommended Atkins' Inorganic chemistry too; I admit I didn't use it that much bc I also had some Polish textbooks I found very helpful, but from what I did see, it seemed very comprehensive and in-depth - so if Cotton isn't enough, Atkins might be better for you.

Inorganic chem

orbitals matter: I think it's important to grasp orbitals and hybridization before going any further. This stuff keeps coming up again and again, so if you find yourself struggling with understanding concepts in inorganic chem, I'd suggest making sure you understand atomic and molecular orbitals first.

periodic table trends: please don't memorize them. Please. Understand them. There's a reason why, for example, atomic radii decrease within periods even though both electrons and protons are added as you move to the right (the screening effect - and again, orbitals!). Once more, I liked the way it was explained in Cotton's textbook.

I found flashcards very helpful for studying the properties of the elements and their compounds as that's mostly memorization. Same for HSAB, really.

if your inorganic chem course covers elements of group theory too, here is a website my thesis supervisor told me about :) I think it's pretty great. If you're digging really, really deep into it, Cotton has a whole textbook on group theory in chemistry (Chemical Applications of Group Theory), but I doubt you'd need it for a basic inorganic chem course.

I've also answered an ask on studying chemistry in general - perhaps you'll find it useful too.

Coordination chem

surprise, surprise: ✨ orbitals ✨. Once more, to understand what's going on with coordination compounds, first you need to understand the molecular orbital theory well.

metals oftentimes have a preference for a specific coordination number. Frequently, a whole group will have a preference for the same CN (group 7 ions, for example, prefer CN = 6). That doesn't mean other CNs don't exist, but knowing there's a pattern can be helpful while studying.

coordination numbers aren't totally random. The rules may not be strict and foolproof, but again, there's a general pattern that's worth keeping in mind: bigger ion usually = higher CN (duh?), CNs are usually even (and we still don't really know why that's so! Although it may have to do with geometry and symmetry) and sometimes depend on the charge of the ligand.

crystal field theory. Okay so CFT is really cool, but I see how it can be super confusing too. I'm not sure how deep you have to dig into this stuff for your course, so apologies if I go a little overboard 😅 My advise for studying it would be:

try to visualize the given complex, actually see the position of the ligands in relation to the orbitals

remember: it's all about lowering the energy. That's the core of CFT. Pauli's exclusion principle always, always stands, but CFT tells us coordination compounds are systems that "want to" have the lowest possible energy so bad they'll sometimes break Hund's rule to obtain it

keep in mind CFT is only a model. Some parts of it may not make any sense to you (like the fact it treats all metal - ligand bonds as purely ionic). It just so happens that despite its many simplifications that are obviously not true, CFT still accurately describes many complex compounds

I've had an ask on studying nomenclature, too.

again, I don't know how complex (pun not intended) you need my tips to get, so if you have any specific questions, feel free to hmu :) I'll try my best to explain

[finley-theal1en]

i don't know what compelled me to do this but here's a list of how mcsm incorporated and expanded on elements from the game and mc community!!!

along with aspects of how mcsm was written that i really like!!!!

allot of the following will be taken either from things i noticed in the game itself and things the head writer @/stirpicus's blog from like. years ago

so first of all, i love the direction they went with in mcsm. for the time it was made, you'd think they'd make something relating to Alex and Steve and even herobrine, or even the popular overworld vs nether trope that was around, BUT NO!! they introduce a new set of characters in an original setting with its own story

and having the ender dragon already be beaten and a finished arc is a breath of fresh air in my opinion

so instead they took the second(?) strongest boss, mixed it with the command block which they made stronger/more powerful than it already is and made the wither crazier than before, thats just fucking cool

the (old) order of the stone are awesome too, they took different types of mc players and made them into a group of heroes!!!! and it isnt the usual group from nowadays, like sure a warrior and an alchemist are typical but they threw in a builder, an alchemist, and griefer!!! thats fucking awesome!!!! and ivor as the alchemist isnt even the biggest fighter (because he's fucking old) which i love, they use his other characteristics as an advantage. before the ninja arc obviously

AND THE ORDER'S TEMPLE AND THE TRACKING MAAAPP!!! i love how they used and expanded on that feature

SAME WITH THE RAILWAY SYSTEM!!! TO TRAVEL LONG DISTANCES IN THE NETHER!! i wish we got more of that x(

now this might be biased cause i don't like ep2 thaaatt muchhh, though it deserved so much more when it comes to redstonia and boomtown, tho the concepts alone are really creative

only thing i can point out from ep3 is the grinder from soren's fortress, and how its just the actual mechanism to get loot and xp in game but on a larger scale. and the fact that the amulet doesnt work in the nether/end like any other tool of that sort!! small details!!!!

and this is just my opinion but soren's studies on the enderman feel like a jab at those enderman related theories from years ago xd

the far lands. i just really love that they added the farlands in ep4 was it?? and i love how they utilized the aspect of enchanting weapons, which they kept it as epic as in ep4 x(

the portal arc.. I LOVE THE PORTAL ARC. SO MUCH. it uses allot of aspects outside of mc survival like mini games and the community itself!!

like. episode 5 is literally just sky block, obviously. and it's got spawn eggs, which without the world build in the network would've been hard to implement BUT THEY STILL MANAGED TO ADD IT IN!!!

ep6 is murder mystery with some iconic mcyt. literally what more do you want!!!

ep7, pama's inspired by players who make redstone computers in the game like said here!!! thats so fucking cool!!!!

EP8 COULD'VE AND SHOULD'VE HAD SO MUCH MOREEE!!! and its inspiration is obvious too; the different mini games in mc and respawning!! i love that they added respawning in at least one episode

like the way they took elements from and outside of mc survival is so creative, especially with how they were implemented (even if sometimes they weren't accurate) and all the world build!!!!

season 2's more focused on the idea and limits of creative mode or the idea of a "god" in mc, and definitely has its fair share of world build, which is still really cool

i actually like how they went about revealing the admins and their connection to the overworld without it messing up the lore in s1 or having it come out of nowhere in a bad way!! like old OLD myth turned real trope worked out well here

also it felt like the sea temple scene was foreshadowing the aquatic update that was to come in mc at the time!!

and one thing about the sea temple, when the origins of the world and the admin were being explained, i'm pretty sure they mention how "the world was flat until the admin gave it hills and trees" and stuff, referencing both super-flat worlds and foreshadowing the bedrocking event!!!

and idk how many people actually know this but the structure block is an actual thing in mc?? i did NOT know about that till recently it's embarrassing

might just be me but i like to think that the original mobs romeo makes are also a subtle reference at mods and how people can mess around with that kinda stufff.... idk tho

from this point on i can't think of anything else in s2 that i could put in this ramble, but overall, mcsm writers and develops were fucking geniuses and i love how they put everything together ^_^ ty for any1 who read this far, and feel free to leave your own insights!!!!!

[berrychanx]

TMMN EP 16 Analysis

I have so much to say i don’t know where to start, I’ll focus on the character development and the episode itself I love that Lettuce seems more confident in herself, cares for her looks, takes the lead, volunteers to help etc.

Yes it’s all means to an end for her, to get closer with Shirogane but his words really left an impact on her,

 even before that she already wished to change at the start of episode 8

But if it wasn’t for his words she would probably never have the courage to change.

Look at that happy smile. even Zakuro notices she has changed and its doing all of this for a reason. Zakuro LITTERALY is the big sister of the group.

LOL, Ryou is in another world ..... Poor Lettuce is getting chrushed and pushed on into his chest...You can feel the embarassement in her face ... while Ryou is just there being Ryou ... he’s not even aware...He acts so different with the other girls and Ichigo...If it was Ichigo in Lettuce play he would start bashing her.

GOOD GIRL, DOING RESEARCH BEFORE HAND

Sorry for this two random screesnhots but this just proves my theory about this season, exploring the Blue Knight identidy and the search for the mew aqua

Ryou notices something’s wrong with Lettuce. he calls out for her (probably worried and to snap her back to reality) ... I feel sad for Lettuce, relating to the Little Mermaid story

Meanwhile Kish appears and tries to steal the earrings, everyone thinks it contains Mew Aqua but Ryou ain’t gonna let that happen. I’M SO GLAD FINALLY A CHARACTER THOUGHT ABOUT GRABBING HIS LACE XD

Anyways Kish and Lettuce fight, Kish wins the battle and retreats?? Because? Letttuce is thrown out by the window and into the ocean, sinking and comes in contact with a light, thinking its mew aqua Similar to episode 19 of the original anime

She gets transported into another time, when the aliens still inhabited this planet and we get more lore (seperate post)

Lettuce then helps her new friend by giving her some advice and words of encouragement like someone once did to her.

Back into her own timeline, Shirogane goes to her aid. Finally alone with Ryou, Lettuce comes to accept her feelings for him, and know the viewers have a confirmation that it was actually love

Shirogane is caught by surprise, his reaction says it all. HE NEVER THOUGHT SOMEONE COULD LOVE HIM, AND HAVING THE SHY GIRL FROM THE GROUP CONFESS TO YOU? WHAT? THE SHY GIRL?

He even forgets his cool act

At least he thanks her for having the courage to say something so important. BUT LIKE I SAID A COUPLE OF TIMES, THIS MAN ONLY LIVES FOR ONE THING AND ITS HIS LIFE WORK / PROJECT

He completely didn’t say no nor did he said yes..... it’s left on open and i hope once the season ends this subject is brought up again.

Like I mentioned on this post, Shirogane really cares for everyone, the burden he carries etc. Go read the post here,

I would translate it too, I’m sorry but I can’t answer your feelings right now, Lettuce

She took this in such a mature way, not loosing her compuster in from of him...

Ryou’s aware he hurt her feelings, that she’s broken, wanting to cry but holding it lal inside

He smiles at her and leaves her alone, despite being sad and heartbreaking, it was the best option in my opnion. She wouldn’t have cried in front of him.

I LOVE THE FACT THAT ZAKURO WAS THE ONLY ONE SELF AWARE OF THIS, MADE A DISTRACTION TO GET THE OTHERS WAY AND BE ALONE WITH LETTUCE AND COMFORT HER

She really is the big sister of the group, the big sister to all of the other girls.

It’s ok, you’re alone now, you can cry, let it all out.

And the episode ends with Lettuce crying in Zakuro arms. It was a fantastic episode in my opinion, I would love if it focused a bit more on the aliens culture, Lettuce asking questions  but I understand, the alien situation was there for Lettuce to compare herself with the earrings original owner and their situation and inspire her to confess to Ryou.

The original anime had thrown in this Ryoutasu moments but it was all very vague, New at least develops her feelings. I hope in the end she gets a definitive answer, if that never happens...nothing I can do but accept it, we know in a way the Mew Project is never “finished”, A la mode gave us the roses crusaders Return had the girls dealing with loosing parasites. There’s the PS1 game. So maybe leaving their relationship in open its for the best.

[1moreff-creator]

A Correction of my Roman Numerals Post (About IX - Levi)

Hey, it’s me again. So I made a post about the LGI MV and the Roman numerals attached to each character as well as a quote connected to each. However, I actually fucked up pretty badly on the background text in the Levi section, so I decided to make a post addressing that.

So, in my original post, I claimed the background text here related to the discovery of Pluto, since that’s what Google spat out when I put some of the keywords at the bottom. However, I have to admit something always felt off: the image in the background has nothing to do with Pluto or its discovery, as far as I could tell.

I didn’t look too much deeper into it, and that’s my bad. Turns out, the text is actually talking about something else. What tipped me off was this:

The text there on the forefront mentioned Jupiter, which made me think of Levi’s text. And turns out, it actually is related.

This is about a comet named Shoemaker-Levy 9, which yes, has both “Levy” and “9” in the name, I’m pretty sure that’s why Levi was even given IX in the first place. After a bit of research, I’m pretty confident this is the thing Levi’s background text is actually about. In particular, I want to give a shout-out to weightedblankettt, who in their downright spectacular post dissecting the MV managed to find the original image used for the background, which yes, was Levi’s.

So what’s the deal with this thing? It’s a comet which crashed into Jupiter in the 90’s, but the really noteworthy thing about it is that it was the first asteroid discovered in the Solar System which did not orbit the Sun (it orbited Jupiter), and its crash was the first extraterrestrial impact between two celestial bodies we where able to see via telescopes. This is thanks to the scientists it’s named after, who made predictions based on its orbit to figure out when the impact would happen.

The one thing that throws me off a bit is that you can clearly see 1930 in Levi’s background text, but… nothing regarding this comet happened in 1930. It wasn’t discovered until much later, and according to Wikipedia, it didn’t even start orbiting Jupiter until 1970, 1960 at the earliest. However, I did find a singular, notably shady source saying it may have actually started orbiting Jupiter in 1930, so there’s that.

So that’s cool and all, but how is this connected to Levi? Well, I actually think the comet is connected through Jupiter.

You see, the mere existence of this comet is actually proof of an astronomical phenomenon where, occasionally, Jupiter “protects” the planets of the inner Solar System by “sucking up” asteroids which would have otherwise impacted them into its orbit. According to Wikipedia, some astronomers claim mass extinction events on Earth caused by asteroids would have been much more common if Jupiter didn’t exist.

It’s not difficult to connect this to Levi.

As his quote states, he’s a very protective character. Like Jupiter protects Earth from asteroids, Levi offers protection to the cast. So there it is.

… And then there’s my theory. For like the fiftieth time, I’ll remind you I believe Eden’s the killer and Levi’s an accomplice. At first this protectiveness seems like a problem for that theory, but it really isn’t. Part of the theory already was that Levi lost faith in the rest of the group, and his protective instincts shifted over to Eden. In other words, the “inner planets” aren’t the rest of the cast anymore, just Eden.

In fact, the analogy may actually work better under that interpretation. Jupiter sometimes is struck by the asteroids it protects the inner planets from, as was the case with Shoemaker-Levy 9. In fact, this particular comet left behind a “bruise” even more noticeable than the Red Spot (or whatever that thing’s called). So it can be said (if you’re dramatic) Jupiter sacrifices itself for those it protects. Apply this to Levi, and the impact of Shoemaker-Levy 9 with Jupiter would be like Levi getting executed for protecting Eden. Though you could argue the “bruise” is actually an analogy for that scar on Levi’s shoulder, so it’s definitely not conclusive either way.

So, yeah, that was the main correction I wanted to make. Another small ones:

• Footnote 12 is actually on the screen after Min’s numeral, which wasn’t made clear, and I actually missed footnote 6 on Min’s section. It flashes on screen next to the hands in prayer, and the footnote is just “(Prayer)”. Not much to say about this one. I guess Min may have been praying because she was about to die? Idk.

•Also, I just completely forgot to mention footnote 7 is on Arturo’s section? The footnote states that 7 is considered lucky in Western cultures, before saying “Let’s skip it”. I guess I took the footnote too seriously, since I completely forgot it was there.

Anyways, it’s not like I know what it means. There’s nothing inherently lucky about Arturo, so it’s just weird. Though it’s worth noting this numeral appears right after the “correct/incorrect” code, which uses footnote 13, and 13 is an unlucky number. Again, cannot tell you for the life of me what the hell this has to do with Arturo of all characters, but it’s there.

Anyways, correction complete, thanks for bearing with me! Now, back to rewatching this video until I find wherever the fuck footnote 8 is! Seriously, has anyone found that one? It’s the only one I’m missing.

[kryptonitecore]

Re-Read: Transformers: Infiltration, #0-6

First things first, humans. Infiltration introduces its own crack team of teens and twenty-somethings to be the human viewpoint on the Autobot-Decepticon war, mostly centred around Verity Carlo, Hunter O’Nion, and Jimmy Pink. Now, Verity I am already familiar with courtesy of Wreckers things, but Hunter and Jimmy I don’t know from Adam.

Let’s start with Verity, my favourite of the group. I’m quite fond of Verity, and I don’t think it’s just because of Nick Roche’s version of her. I think as teenage protagonists being dropped into stories about ancient robots go, she’s an interesting one. However, while I like the concept of Verity there are some things in the writing surrounding her that I’m not a fan of. The references to Verity fearing Hunter are mostly played for jokes, but they’re a little too close together for my taste. I don’t know, it’s just the idea that a teenage girl and runaway with no support network who hitchhikes regularly being afraid of harassment is both pretty sad and pretty understandable, plus having multiple jokes about it/references to it so close together means that it’s harder to skim over those if they don’t land.

On a sort of related note, one of the things that really makes Verity stand out is her fear of rejection or abandonment, which causes her to preemptively reject connections with others, including by being hostile or sullen. I really like this, it’s a nice, distinct character trait and it makes the relationships with any Cybertronians more complex, as there is resistance and hesitation on both sides. However, with the way Verity is written I sometimes get the sense that her emotional volatility is mostly being used as a way to bond the male characters together. It happens almost immediately, where she gets annoyed over something and then Hunter and Ratchet, who have never met before, start talking about how ‘prickly’ she is. Not to preempt some of the later volumes of this series, but I think this is a habit that Furman had with Verity and, considering his track record, it kind of rubs me the wrong way.

Hunter and Jimmy are both alright, but I’m interested to see if they go anywhere. I’m particularly curious as to why Hunter is such a massive believer in the presence of mechanical aliens on Earth, considering it’s portrayed as a niche, conspiracy theory-esque idea? As in, he’s a full blown ‘drop out of work or school, sell my stuff, get in a van, and drive around trying to find proof’ kind of believer. Perhaps he’s supposed to come across as particularly gullible, but he doesn’t seem to go in for any other beliefs in the same vein. Another alternative is that he has had some kind of personal experience or connection that has convinced him, but we’ll see. I don’t know, I’m just used to the idea that people who tend to go for conspiracy theories that intensely tend to believe in multiple things. I don’t know how common it is to have one incredibly intense belief in one theory and then otherwise be completely grounded.

However, I did run into one of my repeated things with Furman’s character writing, and I think it’s that he has a sort of resting voice that he goes into? He mostly uses it in narration, but he will also sometimes use it for characters and suddenly different people with different personalities and backgrounds and interests will be talking the same way - at points I thought Verity sounded like Hunter who sounded like Jimmy who sounded like Ratchet, but I think it was all because they actually sounded like Simon Furman’s narration style. It’s not all the time, which is good, it just happens in a few scenes.

The Decepticons were not a major presence in a lot of this story. They are present as a threat, but they’re very quiet. Starscream is quite contained (by his standards), Megatron appears (and it’s a cool moment!) but he’s also speechless, and the others yell or groan - we even get an ‘ehh’ when one of them gets hurt.

There are some strengths to this comic. For example, the hilarity of the top secret Decepticon base just being… stuck out of a mountainside with an enormous purple sigil to it is incredible, as is Ratchet’s uncanny-valley-dwelling avatar who just never stops smiling and who doesn’t move his mouth when he’s supposed to talk. The idea of an infiltration protocol is also interesting and has a lot of potential for human-centric stories, so that’s valuable for the series as a whole, and the introduction of Megatron was really quite imposing, I think that artist nailed that bit and the sheer scale of him from Verity’s perspective.

Seriously, it's just there.

I’ve got some reservations about Infiltration overall, but I’m happy to give the rest of the series a go and see how it ends up.

[sentientgopro]

My parents are currently trying to figure out a way for me to not have to share a bedroom with my brother, to the extent of considering a room in the garden. I said its probably just not worth it, Ive managed living in the room with him for many years, Im sure I can make do for another year and a half, and she said to me "You can't just put your life on hold like that for a year and a half until you move out". And she has no clue that had an entirely different meaning to me.

Yes, I DO have to put my life on hold until I move out, in a much more severe and damaging way than she realises, because of her transphobic ass.

But regardless of the twat saying it and the irrelevant context, I've been dwelling on those words. Its already getting kinda difficult a month into cracking doing nothing. Ive still got about another 20 to go before I even START transitioning and thats far from an instant problem fix, isn't it.

And I already wanted to think more in detail about how it will go when they inevitably find out, but this has presented a nice opportunity to think about it a bit more. My Dad will be absolutely pissed, plain and simple, to the extent that I'd have to make sure he finds out from a long distance for my own safety. He's gotten very aggressive over alot less. My mother, on the other hand, is a much more complex question.

She's the only one I've really ever talked to about issues (particularly issues relating to Dad, as well as mental issues), shes a psychologist so she kinda has a bit of idea what shes talking about. and she has said, on many occasions, that she thinks I'm very emotionally intelligent. She thinks I know myself very well. So if I told her about something I know she fundamentally disagrees with, will she just forget all that?

The thing is, she's been locked into conservative beliefs, but she can be reasoned with. One example was of a general discussion over the existance of gender dysphoria and validity of trans people, and I convinced her that gender dysphoria is real, there are scientific explanations behind why trans people feel the way they do. And she cannot find an argument against me so she resorts to "Okay, people like that exist, but I think most just do it because they think its trendy" cool, an entirely unmeasurable, impossible to back up claim that I cant even outright disprove so it pretty much ends up as her being right because she just knows better apparently. But, up to outright convincing her to change her beliefs, she can be reasoned with.

And besides, if Im so emotionally intelligent, surely I should belong to the group of people who aren't faking it, by her logic?

Honestly, if she was just outright never going to accept me like him, itd be easier. But the fact that theres a genuine question here makes it so difficult. Like, her helping cover for me and keep it a secret from my Dad and Brother while I start HRT is a genuine, possible outcome. Its also very unlikely.

But, if I could convince her Im not making it up, which should work in theory, and if she holds the belief that I can't just put my life on hold, its a forseeable outcome. And I don't know how I feel about that.

(Short bit of context for the next bit) One of my Sixth Form teachers has gotten extremely ill, we don't know the details but basically, hes disappearing for a while and we dont know if hes ever coming back. He is the ONLY member of staff in the school capable of teaching the subject. So, my mother arranged a meeting with the head to ask what happens next, and raised concerns over my education. In return, the head tried to ignore it by pinning it on me, saying I'm struggling already, and basically turn it around on me as if our only teacher isnt disappearing.

So I tried defending myself in a few ways, one of them being, since the last round of tests, Ive been feeling like, ALOT better, better motivated, to an extent that is affecting me on a day to day basis and making it easier to get work done, so there should be a massive improvement since my last tests. So after the meeting, naturally, my mother wanted to know what it was exactly that changed, and I realised I fucked up. The thing that changed was realising I was trans and realising that, eventually, I could be happy, and I have something to look forward to and work towards. So now shes gonna keep asking and wanting to talk about what it was. She keeps asking to go on a walk and talk about it.

And it keeps making me imagine, far into the walk, after she keeps poking and prodding, just going, "Fuck it, leap of faith". Because the more I dont tell her, the more suspicious shes probably gonna become.

idk, theres no real end point to this. This is more of a vent than figuring out my feelings. Supportive relatives are great, unsupportive relatives suck, but questionable relatives are fucking anxiety provoking. This is nothing new Im discovering here, really, this is a trans experience thats older than time itself. But I've never been a big risk taker, so Ill probably just take the long route and make sure they find out as late as possible.

[edwinspaynes]

don't think i've heard from you yet a good old proper rant about the midnight heir, like aside from the character analysis from my ask ages ago. so go crazy please!!! you know my theories on it and i'm absolutely dying to hear anything you might have to say

OKAY SO THE MIDNIGHT HEIR.

As with most TSC old-timers, TMH was my first introduction to TLH. I will say that I'd seen the initial character portraits of the core TLH group already (sans Thomas, who isn't there). I felt immediately drawn to a couple of the portraits, namely Matthew and Cordelia.

I also was very excited because I dug the ~vibes~ of TLH based on those portraits and the things Cassie said about them. So I was PRIMED to love TLH and always had a preconceived notion that it was going to be my favourite series.

TMH did not disappoint. I was a little sad when neither Matthew nor Cordelia of the portraits showed up, but I loved James and Grace (and became a huge Grace defender for YEARS before ChoG. I hated her after ChoG and then she became my blorbo in ChoI. Grace and I have had a rocky road but she's probably tied for my 6th fave TSC character now).

In any case, I adored TMH James. Like, thought he was super cool. He gave off the vibe of Will if Will truly had have choices (without the curse) and made bad ones. Will if he was INSANELY self-destructive. And as someone who almost exclusively gravitates to either unhinged or traumatized characters, that James was a character that I found super compelling.

But I will say that it felt very much like an extension of TID to me, which made me a little sad because I wanted TLH to be its own thing.

Then comes NBS. Now, May 18th, 2015 was a Big Day for me. At 11 PM, NBS was delivered to my Kindle, and I devoured it on my deck outside.

I immediately understood several things upon reading NBS:

I was absolutely correct about TLH being the best series for me.

Matthew Fairchild was my kindred spirit and I had never felt so seen before as I did after reading NBS.

I dug the vibe of TLH, and that vibe, contrary to TMH, was extremely different from the vibe that TID gave off. It's dark academia vs light academia, and I think that as @thevagabondexpress said once, NBS is the point where Cassie decided that TLH couldn't be and shouldn't be a TID extension.

But I also saw a lot of differences in James. These differences felt natural to me - NBS James was a nice, quiet kid that was actually hyper-relatable, and to this day NBS James is by far my favourite James iteration. I assumed that something horrible had happened between NBS and TMH to "damn" him and change him horribly. I was interested in what it might be.

CLS James made me more curious, and then he felt utterly different in CHoG for no reason to me. James is a wibbly-wobbly character to me, but there are absolutely lovely iterations of him in the SS that I really wish we had gotten to know better.

Another thing about TMH that I find fascinating is Grace.

I really liked Magnus's scenes with Grace in it. Grace was kickass - she could fight in TMH (why couldn't she fight in TLH? Jury's out) and she was also very... self-autonomized, if that makes sense. She felt really traumatized and fucked up, but she almost seemed as though she... not liked her status as a blade, but embraced it. This is also confounding to me, but I think that it was something that naturally shifted as Cassie developed her in the coming years and changed the TLH vibe.

Idk how to end this but TMH is confounding. It's by far my least favourite piece of TLH content, even though I really like it. But like the initial portraits and descriptions, it also provides us with a glimpse into Cassie's process of creating and developing who are in my opinion by far the best set of characters she has ever made and probably will ever make.

[its-no-biggie]

OMG ive been summoned!!! okay okay lets see

first off. getting this one out of the way. i havent voted yet but i swear to god if calculus is winning right now im gonna be /pissed/ (not really lmao). not because its BAD or anything, i enjoyed learning about it, but its sooooo overhyped as The Hard One when conceptually its not even that interesting. wooaahhhhh find the area under a curve!! revolutionary!! like yeah the calculations are long and often difficult ESPECIALLY once you get into multivariable calculus but like. it gets way too much hype for what it is.

im tempted to vote algebra for how foundational it is but thats a boring answer. same with functions and relations. im also not voting for trig because i tutor high schoolers and im sick of it tbh. its basically just geometry a little to the left anyway.

ok at first i kinda skipped over geometry but you know what. thats a little unfair. euclidean geometry is generally very boring but higher dimensional geometry? hyperbolic or circular geometry???? where would we be as a society without klein bottles and mobius strips and hyper cubes and hyperbolic crochet. anyway if youre reading this you need to play hyperbolica its a simple puzzle game a la portal but instead of thinking with portals you have to think in hyperbolic space. where space has more. space. everything looks a little distorted and it totally fucks your spatial awareness its so fun. even something as simple as a maze becomes difficult because when you turn left 4 times you DONT end up where you started and it just doesnt compute in your brain. also the npcs are little robot guys and its so cute and charming. 10/10 excellent game. anyway yeah im not voting for geometry because a lot of it is boring but it does have its moments!

i went to university for statistics (well. technically actuarial science but its pretty much the same thing) so im a bit biased towards it. but its definitely the most useful kind of math for the average person to understand (aside from basic algebra) but its also like. really wild that it works?? that you can collect a big chunk of data and then determine correlations between variables with a high degree of accuracy. its basically the antithesis of what people think of math (rules and hard logic and one correct answer) but its still so rigorous and useful and so so important to understand

but more than statistics i am a huge fan of matrix theory. i really love matrix operations theyre SO SATISFYING and just really fun to do. especially when you apply them to linear algebra and solve a really messy system of equations that cant even be conceptualized on a graph.... augh its great. and its also one of the few kinds of math that i learned with a bunch of different number systems pretty much right away (bc its related to cryptography so using binary or mod 5 or whatever is actually useful) and that was really refreshing!! i love using different number systems. im not sure why its grouped together with set theory but i do also like set theory, its really fundamental like algebra (although its not nearly as well taught as algebra) and a lot of the operations are really unique so it kinda opens up what math is when you start learning about it. and of course there are a lot of number sets that i really like but that doesnt really have to do with set theory itself lmao

ANYWAY i think im gonna vote matrix theory. theres a few really interesting ones that arent listed here like game theory (ever heard of the prisoners dilemma?), topology (did you know that a mug is the same as a donut? also a straw definitively has one hole), and graph theory (i dont know that much about graph theory tbh i just think it looks really cool), but i really love matrices. i mean come on like

that rules. objectively that rules

[morsking]

you see, this is great about disco elysium because in a lot, and i say a LOT, of political theory irl you’ll find some pseudo-scientific philosophical bullshit that in some form or another tries to justify colonialism (hegel, being a core example) and as sad as it is even revolutionary politics are not immune to this meaningless posturing, because we live in a world where anyone can say anything and someone will believe it fanatically, because material discontent paves way for the disgruntled to find SOME justification in the fabric of reality for their plight and in fringe communities the first thing that will find them is some discriminatory conspiratorial bullshit. look at r*dical f*minism for example. without intersectionality you loop back around to eugenics, essentialism, conforming to the gender norm, and aligning with f*scists with all the bigoted -isms that come with it.

but i digress.

infra-materialism in disco elysium is a plausible example of how you can come up with all kinds of bonkers far-out navel-gazing about human physiology in relation to the political and material reality. and the worst part is, it didn’t come from nowhere. while the idea that you can just distort the laws of physics and change material and political reality by thinking is ludicrous, the fact of the matter is that humans are social creatures. we will pick up on whatever social trends and values are dominant in our surroundings, because... that’s just how we evolved. monkey see monkey do because monkey survive better in group so if not in group then danger you die! and the bourgeoisie exploit that evolutionary instinct, they create in-groups and out-groups in order to form a social foothold from which they can establish and preserve wealth disparity that benefits them. if everyone is convinced to agree that authority founded on wealth and influence is normal, then naturally they will seek to fulfill the systemic expectations of the institutions that enforce them. their ideas directly influence the world around them by creating a political reality, so naturally revolutionary politics within schools of thought are dedicated towards disseminating dissenting points of view, making the abnormal out of the normal by exposing the inner workings of class conflict and convincing people that it doesn’t have to BE this way. if we think very carefully about where we are and what got us here, the proverbial evolution of history of class conflict, we can direct where we can go, and we can arrive at a world free from class conflict by overturning the world order, the authority, that divides and subjugates the masses. 

so while thoughts DO influence our reality, it’s only because our beliefs give us the impetus to act in ways that are meaningful and impactful towards our surroundings. it’s a pretty basic idea, but the genius is in how the game presents it. political writings are a product of their time, a lot of them will simply not have the clarity of concept we can have now because they tried to deal with a topic that hadn’t really been explored yet (or simply had heinous ulterior motives). it’ll sound like drivel, the opioid-induced ramblings of someone who’s never gotten laid, touched grass, or ever properly had a conversation with another human being (let alone one from outside europe). the game says “a long time ago, someone really fucked up had a bonkers fucking idea, but it wasn’t bonkers enough to dismiss, so all kinds of people who were more or less fucked up expounded upon it to reach a conclusion, and they found that while it was a stupid idea, it wasn’t entirely baseless, so now we have more insight about human patterns of social and political behavior that can impulse real change in our material reality.”

and i think that’s really cool. the world of disco elysium is a fictional one with all kinds of outlandish names, countries, geographies, and ideas, but its writers understand our world and our history so well that the conceptual familiarities between ours and the game’s are eerie in their thoroughness. this world HAD to be built somehow, it HAD to have had political developments to situate the player where they are now, and it was built brilliantly! it was built with the same ideological methodological chaos as ours! and yes, it does make for a very, very bleak world, because it’s rife with all the same atrocities ours is, along with the messy, unsightly, complicated people that orchestrated and enabled them. but the point is that perhaps, much like revolutionary politics would have us internalize, is even though we may be painfully aware of our reality and cannot solve every single problem, whether individually or collectively, it’s not meaningless. understanding what the issue is and how it came about is the first step towards making progress, and we should not be deterred by disagreements about the amorphous shape of what progress is, because human beings as naturally curious social creatures are flexible, inquisitive, and will find ways to refine a solution even if it takes eons. what is vital, however, is that everyone understands that they can start now. they can become a part of something now. we can band in solidarity and start that discussion and put in the work now. and it won’t be in vain.

[undertale-data]

[Image Description: an Undertale chat box with the name “Chara” in its center, between a sprite of the red SOUL on the left and a Dating Hub CRIME measurer and a FRIENDSHIP level on the right. End I.D.]

Chara is the third most popular character in the fandom, with 196 responders (7.4%) choosing them as their favorite; however, their fans are divided on how to interpret them.

In the past, Chara was more often known as a villain, pushing the player on in the no mercy route. Some responders still made comments like “stabby stab” or “crazy ass” about them in their responses, but overwhelmingly more fans say that Chara is misunderstood and does not deserve to be demonized. Even if other Undertale fans still demonize Chara, it would make sense that those who choose Chara as their favorite would have a more sympathetic view of them. One fan with this view said, “They aren't a bad person. They're just a child who needs love.”

Of course, fans still connect them with the No Mercy route, even if it is in a different direction. “If shown the Darker path through No Mercy, something about them becoming a supremely powerful world-erasing Child God I just find incredibly cool. And the way they hold the Player accountable for their actions, the headcanons people have developed… [...] it goes beyond simple words.” While fans still enjoy connecting Chara with the No Mercy route, it’s interesting how there has been a shift away from Chara being the villain, towards Chara using their power to punish the player for going too far.

A third group of fans take an interesting approach in that they like Chara both as a murder child and as a tragic character: “there are so many different ways you can interpret their character, whether as the mastermind behind the genocide run, the flavour text narrator, or just a sad kid who wanted to help their family and the underground.” This wide room for interpretation is a major thing that Chara’s fans love about them.

Much like with Asriel/Flowey, fans like how Chara’s backstory is revealed gradually and throughout different routes of the game. “I love how their presence is so overt but exists almost entirely in subtext and implication you have to piece together. I loved going through text again and finding out more about them,” one responder said.

There’s lots of text to look through for fans who subscribe to the theory that Chara is the narrator of the game. Proving this theory goes beyond the scope of this essay, but it is believed widely enough to be regarded as canon by nearly all of Chara’s fans. If this theory is true, then Chara is with you throughout the whole game, making them feel even more relatable and comforting. A few fans even relate enough to them to kin them, either currently or at some point in the past.

Their trauma and how they are misunderstood seem to be two qualities that make Chara relatable. “I personally see them as a misunderstood, neurodivergent, nonbinary kid (like I was when I first played Undertale) who loves the Dreemurrs,” one fan said. The fact that there is so much left unknown about Chara leaves room for fans to project onto them as well.

While most of Chara’s fans do not demonize them, they also acknowledge that Chara is complex and not perfect. “We ought to remember Chara for who they were: not an evil villainous murderer, or a perfect golden hero, but a child, a child who made mistakes, a child who was mistreated by humanity, a child who loved their family and their kingdom. Just a child, who was the hope for both humans AND monsters.”

Much like with Asriel, Chara’s fans wish they could save them. While there is no ability to physically revive Chara within the game, they clearly live on in the hearts of those who love them, both within the game and out.

Highlights: (under the cut)

I think they deserve better. They aren't a bad person. They're just a child who needs love.

I kinned them so extremely hard from the ages of 13-16 and now they live in my brain forever.

I do wish there was more about them in the game, but for now, we ought to remember Chara for who they were: not an evil villainous murderer, or a perfect golden hero, but a child, a child who made mistakes, a child who was mistreated by humanity, a child who loved their family and their kingdom. Just a child, who was the hope for both humans AND monsters.

Their whole concept as the Narrator of the game and travelling along with Frisk (and the player) is very neat to me. Shame that fandom often interprets them wrong as a sadistic murderer :-( They're a kid who suffered and did what they thought was right at the time, despite being flawed

There is a lot to puzzle out about them, and it’s very rewarding to do so! I’m glad that the fandom consensus about them has gradually shifted away from the evil incarnate demon child image from the end of Genocide. They were once just a spunky kid who ate pie with their hands, knitted a big sweater, tried to talk like an adult, and liked to mess with their brother; they sacrificed themselves for a bad plan and a childish hope that would have never worked in the first place.

In Neutral and Pacifist paths, I prefer to view them in their past and present as kind and well meaning, if sarcastic and a punster at times. While if shown the Darker path through No-Mercy, something about them becoming a supremely-powerful world-erasing Child God I just find incredibly cool. And the way they hold the Player accountable for their actions, the headcanons people have developed... there's so many reasons, I don't think I could do it justice by just writing it down... it goes beyond simple words.

I love their vibe as villain but I'm sure they are not the villain here

Their backstory is so heartbreaking as there are so many different ways you can interpret their character, whether as the mastermind behind the genocide run, the flavour text narrator, or just a sad kid who wanted to help their family and the underground.

Stabby stab

I also love how they serve as the ultimate test of whether or not you've absorbed the pacifist route's lesson. You only see them in person at their worst, and the game never gives you a direct opportunity to show them Mercy, to forgive and comfort them like you get with Asriel/Flowey. It is entirely up to you to look at who they are and why they are that way, to take responsibility for the part you played, and to decide that, despite the harm they've caused to their family and your friends, this deeply damaged child deserves sympathy too.

I love what they represent - the partnership between player and character, and the lust for power when in an RPG-like mindset. They are their own character, certainly, and are more complex than that, but the idea of their death and reincarnation is executed in an amazing way.

Chara is not perfect by any means but they seem like someone who truly cares and wants to do good and holds themself to a high standard which is both admirable and tragic given the circumstances.

[Image Description: a wordcloud shaped like a red SOUL. Some of the most visible words are: Chara, Game, Story, Person, Child, Human, Character, and Love, which represent the most common words in the essays responders wrote about them. End I.D.]

Read the full list of responses shared with permission by clicking here!

[saltysaltdog]

I'm adding onto this just to include that just like Narinder's flowers grow in Leshy's domain, Narinder grows Leshy's favourite berries* (one developer's answer to stuff) instead of his own favourites like the other bishops.

So Leshy really is Narinder's favourite, only, and spoiled, little brother.

--

Actually I never got around to mentioning the elephant in the room, the updates and how they relate to this line from Shamura

Shamura: "Five points to a pentagram, five portents of doom, five siblings stood abreast, five gods and one tomb..."

They killed someone... or something powerful. Or perhaps, lost someone powerful.

I'd guess more of the former, but I can't discount the later, especially since shamura shares a line with the tablets.

He of havoc, he of blight; she of hunger, they of might. (He that lays a soul to rest; five remain of hundreds blessed.)

While an alternate version makes it explicit that the tablet writer detests the group and calls them heretics, it gives us three possibilities for who might be entombed.

The First, the tablet writer, or a god called Yngya.

The First is obviously powerful enough that they would work together to keep them dead, and the tablet writer might have been the last worshiper of the old gods, a strong opponent. (Either one could be the entity chilling in the crowns).

But the last possibility is the opposite.

Yngya cannot be found, and the leaves change no more. ‘Tis clear, now, that none shall survive this purging...

This makes it sound like Yngya was someone not only powerful, but perhaps more than that, someone valuable to the bishops.

[This bit you can skip its just Back to Shamura's line. Depending on your accent and poem structure ideas, it's off.

Five points to a pentagram, five portents of doom, five siblings stood abreast, five gods and one tomb..."

Naturally doom and tomb can rhyme, ABCB, but you might be thrown off if you expected a rhyme for C instead because of your accent. A, B, and (technically D now) again all end with m's, making C (abreast) really stand out that it doesn't have anything to match with while Shamura is trailing off, as if something is wrong (aside from leshy being dead). As if the tomb being there is unnatural and there should be someone there with them- at rest, nest, on a quest, etc. In a ABCCBA type poem.]

Assuming the above, I think Yngya might have been the old god of change and order, since she she was in control of the seasons. My guess is that Leshy took over her place to balance the pentagram, and that Narinder wanted to bring her back. Reversing death for a god might have been a more sacrilegious prospect than mere mortals or still just could have killed Leshy if all his followers suddenly reverted back to her.

But I think it's more likely they banded together to kill someone powerful. Perhaps a lamb if we're being thematic? One it would be dangerous to try resserection on.

Supposedly, in early development, the fox would have you mass sacrifice twenty followers to tell "you" that the lamb was a vessel for an even greater being. This was assumed to be the player, and in my opinion, that's lame. Glad they didn't do that. But if it was a reveal that the lamb was a vessel for the thing the bishops were trying to suppress? That'd be acceptable.

Anyway, it really throws a spanner into my super cool theory because we have so many options now, but that just means we have super cool options to play around with!

Yay!

Narinder and his relationship to the bishops. What caused their falling out?

The game tells you everything you need to know... (Spoiler, it was Leshy)

"Hapless Leshy" is how Haro describes them. And that just means he's very unlucky, unfortunate... doomed.

Leshy is the youngest god, the god of Chaos and flux. For a lot of people when they imagine Chaos, they think of something ever changing, a sensory overload that's never consistent and with no repeating patterns. Constant change.

Notably, Narinder doesn't have anything bad to say about him. His dialogue is limited to one line. "Leshy fell before you like a grain of sand before a tidal wave." Considering how verbose Narinder usually is this should strike you as odd. He comments about how happy he is with seeing the others fall, but not Leshy. He even holds himself in check if you do something that really upsets him, like sell out Ratau (cough cough) but he can't bring himself to demean leshy in the same way, nor celebrate at all.

He should be a natural ally to Narinder, who wanted change. And yet he's not.

"He was unalike the rest of his kin. While others dealt with flux; chaos, famine, pestilence, war. Things in which their constancy must transpose. And yet he was the inevitable; the obstinate and irresistible. The one who waits. Truly peculiar, 'twould then seem, has appetency to invite the novel and the new, break ancient vow and primordial bond alike. Traditions stagnate and appetites augment, nonetheless. Doubt tears faith asunder."

Switching between two states: change, is the natural order of things, Leshy should be inviting chaos, causing it... And there lies the problem.

Bonds of familial duty, turned instead to chains. Most voracious of appetites, curbed and contained. Most infectious of ideas cut off and cauterised before given chance to rot and spread. Cruel, verily. Alas, what other recourse was given? How does one kill Death? ... Alas. One cannot."

The final lines imply that they sacrificed their power, their growth, to stop Narinder, but what if it wasn't him they were doing it for?

Hear me out. Leshy is the youngest and the weakest, it could be that his powers couldn't handle the rate at which things were changing. If so, then he would only be an obstacle to Narinder. At first it would be fine, but if Leshy didn't get better, if the bishops couldn't cause meaningful change, new things, if change itself was making him sick and "Doubt tears faith asunder": wouldn't it be the one to "break ancient vow and primordial bond alike" be first in line for having the blame cast on them?

We don't have a clear idea on what shenainigains Narinder was up to, but both he and Shamura tell us one thing he was working on.

"The blame hangs heavy 'round my neck. I introduced him to ideas of change..." ".... Death cannot flow backward."

Bringing the dead back to life.

He praises you for doing so in response to one of his quests on his quest line. But that's not to say it's all he was working on.

--

Hang tight, because this bit is up for interpretation:

These guys.

Cute mushroom guys that infect you and try to turn you into a mushroom too, and once you die you can be replanted, again and again and again and again and a- its basically immortality!

They live in Narinder's domain, and yet they are Menticide Mushrooms from Anura given a follower form. They are unnatural, and fiercely hunted when they visit there, so they are not endemic to the area. If Narinder was playing with Nature's laws, turning mushrooms into people, or people into mushrooms, then what's to say he wasn't trying it on anything else?

Like say maybe... plants?

Yes.

Now technically a lot of enemies you fight have plant like features, so many in fact that it's like they were mass produced, existing everywhere except the silk cradle: Shamura's domain of war.

Now these plant creatures fight for the bishops, but that's not to say they are natural. We get normal frogs, insects, fish, etc, but we only get these plant-like worm followers after Leshy turns them into plant like creatures. I don't believe you can randomly happen across them. Perhaps these constructs were originally developed to ensure protection of his siblings, something to prevent them from wasting followers on defending their realms from weaker gods. Or launching assaults. After all, don't many people have a primordial bond to the land they grew up on? Having your favourite tree attack you would suck.

While maybe not a direct result of Narinder, although I wouldn't put it past him to look at a worm and crown and go "oh this'll be funny", I think it's possible that no other plant creature developed consciousness, that Leshy is special, unique, alone.

Perhaps everyone had different ideas on how to help him.

It's up to personal preference the order of events and the degree of sentience the plant enemies have, and thus the mental age of leshy when he became a god, but I'm inclined to think that Narinder still considers Leshy his baby brother, one who would be spared if he could.

(He also made the undead enemies you fight but that's probably obvious.)

But this is all speculation, entities like the gold loving tree exist, so there could be old entities that are plant based kicking around. And the mushrooms could just be from the giant dead god skull being a god of decay. It's hard to know for sure.

It'd be so funny if we could plant that mushroom and grow a giant god. Unlikely though.

-

So Leshy's existence is unprecedented, Chaos itself to many who see him. But why doesn't chaos help him? Narinder speaks about the "unordered beauty of his realm..." and his attack patterns are technically random, but most Bishops speak on their domain a lot.

Leshy doesnt.

"Winds of change blow; dost thou sense it? Around us, the world creaks and turns. Afore, it stood immobile. Motionless centuries grow rust. Now leshy has fallen..."

His domain was stagnant. Leshy is concerned with Narinder being a heretic, and thus you, because your rituals don't align with the old faith's practices. But since those "traditions stagnate", it makes sense why he is the least revered among his siblings, his grasp on the order, what those rituals are supposed to bring, isn't that good. He's probably just doing them because he's supposed to without understanding the greater purpose of them.

"The worm, it is hungry. It feeds. It partakes of our flesh. But that is the price for safety. For that we gladly give it all we have."

His average followers don't even use his name, or maybe they aren't really his followers at all? It's hard to know for sure.

"I recall Leshy. Prior to yourself, he was the last to bargain with me. Adept as he was, he rose quickly to the challenges of Godhood, aided by his siblings. Many were drawn to his chaotic ways"

He was helped out a lot by his siblings, likely to the point he would have died if he was alone.

do Narinder's siblings really think Narinder could have attempted to kill leshy after being perhaps monumental in causing his existence?

Part 2: yep.

Narinder says that Shamura "could never handle the multitudes of a being such as I" (paraphrased. I'm lazy.) Which we are to take as a statement on what he wanted to attempt with his power. With the sins of the flesh update however it might not be that simple.

Sup you slithery bastard.

What's key here is listening to how the other bishops talk about Narinder. Leshy refers to him as a heretic, Heket as a monster they chained below, Shamura as a brother and Narinder.

They used the term red crown for him, but with the notion of it's own independence Kallamar becomes the most relevant.

Kallamar: "Shamura, the Red Crown grows stronger by the day. Already it has succeeded where he has failed before. Leshy has been slain!"

There's a collective understanding of who "he" is. Narinder. But it is interesting that Kallamar never directly uses the term to refer to Narinder, only using pronouns. Isn't the vessel's success Narinder's success? This makes it sound like the red crown is an entity of its own, succeeding where Narinder failed, at least in Kallamar's mind.

It should be noted that Kallamar doesn't refer to you as the red crown during the events of the game. You are the vessel of it. Then when he needs to insult you, critter, beast. Then as a final plea, lamb. Before that however, after he figures out you arent leaving he tries to bargin with the crown directly.

It seems you cannot be stopped by disease or hunger. And he sends you back from death stronger each time. Please know, it was not my idea to cast out the Red Crown! The other Bishops, my siblings, the blame lies with them. Please, I beg you, spare me. Kill Shamura, but do not send me to my death. Do not send me to him!

Then finally, in post game, likely before seeing Kallamar again, when you have gathered enough sin the seller will ask you:

"I have dealt with Gods, and often pondered; does the Bearer wear the Crown, Or the Crown the Bearer?"

"Stay back! Stay away! Mercy, Red Crown, mercy..."

Of course once you have him as s follower and he realises you are not walking puppet for damnation personified he chills out.

According to the seller "Foolish though he may have seemed, he wielded the power of his Crown without discrimination." Meaning Kallamar might have the most experience with how screwy the crown may be on the minds of followers, and potentially gods if Chemach is anything to go by.

In this sense Kallamar might be the only one who believes Narinder to be innocent- in the sense that he was not in his right mind when he did whatever it was that made the bishops think he was trying to kill leshy- imagining him to be under some kind hypnosis, unable to tell friend from foe. So he always separates the two just in case. That being said, the need to imprison him for was probably encouraged by him.

Of course this all relies on the "he" mentioned being Narinder and not like Ratau or something. Kallamar does know him by name, weirdly enough. "Your friend Ratau was the last vessel sent against us," which begs the much funnier question that how does he know his name? Did they talk? Did Ratau just scream an introduction before every fight? Presumably that was decades ago Kallamar how do you even remember?

Not the worst ship I've seen.

All fun aside, some of Heket's lines can also be interpreted this way.

Heket: "So it is true. The Red Crown sits upon the brow of another."

"The Bishops… my family. Have they not suffered enough? Have I not suffered enough? We fought, pathetic vessel. We bled. We grieved. And yet the Red Crown wants more. No more."

"Pathetic, sniveling, vile puppet to the Red Crown. You have felled the youngest of us. We are the Bishops of the Old Faith. We protect against heresies such as yours. /....We will not tolerate such blasphemy. Your sins are many, and for that y... "

"You there, vessel of the Red Crown! Bow to me, or you will regret it!"

"It was not so long ago that we cast out the Red Crown. A mere thousand or so years. The heresy it preached could not be tolerated. Such noxious ideals... it could not be allowed. For this most damning of sins_"

The mention of sins and heresy is interesting because more less or we just got here. There's the idea that the crown itself is heretical, perhaps not just as a symbol. Since you know, it tells us to gather sin. But of course, in typical play you have murdered her followers in at least four crusades against Leshy then her so, plenty of heresy and sin there.

Theres no much we can gleam about Narinder's actions, but her dialogue suggests her battle with Narinder stemmed from what he wanted to accomplish/his vision for the future, rather than any attempts on Leshy's life- at least not directly- and considering Narinder says "Heket's words were more toxic and foul than the mushrooms that grew in her domain." I think they may have fought over policy and doctrine a lot. After all, nothing would be so wounding to Narinder than himself to be wrong and someone else to be right.

He calls her "arrogant" but Haro called her "temperamental". The two may not conflict, since haro also says she's "afeared by none" which is to say scared by nothing, not that in her rule nobody was scared of her. The seller calls her "vicious" and a "wicked beast", but also amusing in a way, which I'm more inclined to believe is him saying she was annoyingly persistent in trying to get past him into his portal thing than any form of true disdain. Then again she might have just eaten the god tears to see what they do instead of trading them. So many fun possibilities.

That being said, how do we reconcile Kallamar's belief that Narinder tried to kill Leshy with Heket's main complaint being his ideas?

Shamura.

Part 3: the tl;dr.

Shamura introduced Narinder to change, but according to Haro this should have been something he already knew from being around his siblings since their domains "transpose". Famine: feed. Plague: cure. War: peace. Chaos: order. So this has to be something different.

Shamura's domain used to be knowledge but now she is known for war. Her aspect changed, and it's likely this is what she means.

Narinder wanted to change Leshy's aspect. It would solve all his problems, allowing his other siblings to experiment instead of just stamping out anything new. Once he was set on his course Shamura couldn't stop him.

If leshy was already struggling and tried listening to Narinder and changing how everyone saw him, already having issues with cult management, this could have killed him. A god is nothing without followers. If Narinder started his plan without letting Leshy know, it definitely could have killed him.

The plan would require everyone's cooperation to work, rituals rewritten and spreading word of the change fast enough to keep it from being changed back. Shamura would have argued against it, noting issues that if brushed off by nari would set off Heket and they'd argue viciously, probably about Narinder's character and how callous ignoring the risks are. If Kallamar was put on the spot, already being a cowardly person he wouldn't be of any help. And the fight would continue.

It's possible leshy would have tried it just to stop his siblings, and done catastrophic damage to himself. After all, he's the only one who is said to eat the sacrifices directly. It's possible whatever happened forced him to need to eat food, something the gods usually don't bother with.

This would have cemented his belief in the rules as they are now, instead of however lax he may have been before. He may have liked the mushroomos or learning to make plant people before then and might have been the only one who was interested in what Narinder was doing and not trying to stop it.

You may think yourself righteous in your service to HIM. But you should not be so trusting of the Chained One.

He's the only one to comment on how your quest could be perceived as the right thing to do. He's been there himself and suffered for it.

Even so, Camellia still grows in the dark woods. They are the flowers that grow around any red crown rooms you may find, making them explicitly tied to Narinder.

And with Narinder's inability to celebrate his demise....

They couldn't quite bring themselves to hate the other.

[murdereraisuha]

Chapter 6 part 4 liveblog and summary (Tower 1 and 2, part 1)

Oh jeez I’ve been so focused on other stuff I didn’t realize the update dropped yesterday. Alright let’s get this show on the road.

Since this update is really long, I will be making multiple posts so please block the tag I use for liveblogs, #update screaming, if you don’t care about this stuff.

Obligatory warnings for spoilers and possible mistranslations.

Since no one in the fandom seems to know how to keep spoilers out of thumbnails, I already got a glance of the overblot, and I just gotta say hooooooooo boy. I love what’s going on with the face.

Okay onto the story. When we left off last time, the gang was about to split up into 3 groups to venture into each of the 3 towers of Tartarus. For this recent update, it looks like the story is split up so you can read the adventures of the 3 groups in any order? I’m watching this on youtube, so I have no idea how this is arranged in game. Anyway, I’m going to start off with the Pomefiore trio + Yuu group.

We start off with the group commenting on its cold and foreboding atmosphere. They try the elevator, and it doesn’t work at first, but then it suddenly turns on. Vil is apprehensive of it, but they enter and Ortho welcomes them to Tower 1 of Tartarus.

Ortho says some nonsense about Night Raven Quest, then pulls up a screen with Star Rogue and tells them to beat the game if they want to continue. The group sucks at video games and can’t beat it, so Ortho lowers the difficulty to beginner for them so their adventure isn’t over before it even begins. After they finally beat the game and Ortho rambles for a bit about character classes, Ortho says he’ll see them again at stage 2 and lets them out of the elevator. The gang proceeds to head down the stairs, deeper into Tartarus

As they walk, Vil starts up a conversation by berating Rook for leaving NRC and his duties as vice dorm leader in the midst of chaos, when the rest of Pomefiore would need him most. Epel is frustrated on Rook’s behalf, but Rook accepts Vil’s judgement. Vil moves on to Epel and Yuu going on this rescue mission despite how weak they are. However, with that said, Vil also admits that he was really happy when he heard that they had come here for him. And then hugs and kisses time.

I Am Uncomfortable.

Moving on, Rook and Epel explain Epel’s unique magic to Vil, then the conversation is interrupted by their first encounter with phantoms.

Alright. These designs are pretty cool. That one in the back looks kind of apple shaped and the other one has a bunch of gold stuff like a queen would, so I wonder if the phantoms each group encounters will be related to them in some way.

After taking care of the phantoms, the group discusses how dangerous it would be for these creatures to be let loose above ground. They then approach and enter the door to the asylum for phantoms.

While they’re looking at the boxes/cages the phantoms are kept in, Ortho announces his presence and locks the door behind them. This is “stage 2″. To complete the stage and leave, the group must find an ID card or password to open the door. The ID card they got from the staff won’t work; Ortho has erased the record of it from the system. This is a treasure hunting game. The ID card the group needs is held by one of the phantoms shut in the cages, so the group must search the cages to find the right one. However, since this is the beginning, Ortho gives them a hint by pointing out just 3 cages that they will need to search.

Ortho takes his leave, and the group begins the game. Of course, the first cage, which Rook opens, is a bust. Epel has a much harder time than Rook opening the second one, which is also a bust. We get another phantom design though.

I think this one is a seal? Okay no the things that look like fins are just ink blotches on the ground, so it’s more like a slug with stubby little arms. I think I’m gonna retract my previous theory lmao idk what this thing is.

And finally, the third cage has this. It’s kind of creepy how this one sounds kinda like a little girl, it makes me think that the phantoms reflect the characteristics of the mage that created them. This one has the ID card. The group is surprised that the hint was true and ponders about why the Shroud brothers are toying with them. After the awakening of a few phantoms prompts them to leave the asylum, VIl talks about how the Shroud bros can’t immediately unfreeze the phantoms despite having total control of the facility. He concludes that this whole “game” business is to make them waste time until the phantoms unfreeze.

They continue on, then the scene changes to the gate where Ortho and Idia are talking about the group’s progress and how fast the Titans are unfreezing. Pretty interesting conversation, not gonna translate it cause this update looks like it’s massive and if I do much translation it’ll take forever lol.

Going back to the Pomefiore group, Rook notices something walking on the stairs. Based on its size, Epel thinks that it’s Grim and starts to call out before Rook stops him since it’s actually a phantom. After its stopped, Epel worries about Grim, but Vil and Rook assure him that Grim’s smart and probably just hiding somewhere. They think Grim was just kept separate since he had to really recover from blot and succumbing to his feral nature as a magical beast. Rook and Vil ramble on for a bit about claw/nail care, then Epel asks them about how the two met, and Vil says that he only met Rook months after they entered NRC. Bruh we’re facing the end of the world here what the hell is this casual conversation?

Okay they’ve gotten to the next asylum now. This one is much colder than the last, so the phantoms still must be frozen. Epel tries the card they found previously on the door and it doesn’t work, and Ortho’s appearance confirms that “stage 3″ is about to start. The game this time is “let’s help a person in distress”. There is a researcher slowly freezing to death in a cage in this asylum, and the group needs the ID card that she has to leave.

The group starts breaking open cages to try and find her. Epel is getting better at opening the cages, and using the sound of her cries for help they finally find the cage she’s in. However, she turns out to be a phantom who rejoices in her new freedom before attacking. After retrieving the ID card, the group discusses the phantom’s ability to talk like a human before they leave the asylum. Deeper down, Tartarus is even colder, and the player has the option to express worry about Grim. Vil reassures them, then the group hears a series of loud thuds as the stairs begin to shake. It turns out to be a chonky boy.

Look at the size of this lad. Absolute unit. I try to avoid screenshots which make it obvious who’s video I’m using, but I had to get the size comparison + Jade just throwing a pie at this thing in here cause it’s so funny to me.

Anyway, this thing is actually the “Phantom Titans Earth” kept in Tower 1 that we heard about from the old guy in the last update. The group runs away to the hanger with the Thunder Spear and they frantically search the room as the Titan pounds on the door behind them. Thankfully, they find it quite fast.

After Vil uses the activation key, it transforms into this:

Pretty cool. However, it’s really big, heavy, and powerful, so much so that Vil is struggling to handle it. They fight the Titan again, and then...

omg I love this, their little chibi forms are so cute

They blast the Titan into the massive pit and it falls down towards the bottom. However, the attack uses most of the Thunder Spear’s battery. Since they’ll be defenseless against the Titan without it, they decide to rest in the hanger and check in with the other groups while they wait for the Thunder Spear to recharge. Instead of continuing with the Tower 1 group, I’m going to switch over to Leona and Jamil in Tower 2 now.

The two start their journey by briefly pondering how many floors Tartarus has. Leona asks Jamil to give him one of his “useless, jangly hair ornaments”, and then he yeets it into the pit to try and gauge how deep it is.

oh yeah I can already tell that this group might be my favorite of the three.

Like the Pomefiore group, the two approach the elevator, it opens for them, and Jamil guesses that it’s a trap and tells Leona to stay back. However, Leona ignores Jamil and just strolls in. Ortho appears and is disappointed by how unphased the two are by his appearance, and Leona says it’s because it’s easy to predict what a robot’s thinking.

Ortho then announces that they will be facing their 1st test. Jamil is apprehensive and cautious, Leona ignores him again and complains about how annoying he is. Their challenge turns out to just be the hydra whack-a-mole game that Leona played before. Jamil is still worried about what Ortho could be planning with this, says he’ll be the one to play, and even worries that the controller might be rigged to electrocute them if its touched. Bruh why are you being so worried in general & concerned over Leona’s safety???

Anyway, Jamil goes first and gets an instant game over.

Someone save this man.

Ortho lowers the difficulty down for him and talks a bit about the monsters they’ll face in Tartarus before letting them out of the elevator.

While walking, they talk about the cold a bit and Jamil offers to let Leona borrow his clothes (Bruh???) if he’s cold before Leona tells him to cut the act already or he’s leaving him behind. Jamil then confesses that he’s worried about the students left behind at NRC who don’t have their leaders. The conversation cuts off when they notice a dark area ahead where enemies could be hiding, and Jamil yet again asks Leona to stay back while he checks ahead. BRO Leona is not your responsibility why are you being like this.

The video didn’t even show the fight with the phantom so I’m gonna assume it’s the same as phantoms the other group met. Awww.

Blah blah talk about blot and what dangers could lie ahead

Leona: Hah... what a scared herbivore.

Jamil: Wha!? I’m not scared. I’m just covering for your recklessness!

Leona: Ah, I see. Do as you like.

...

Jamil: I’ll do so.

Right after that, they enter the asylum and Ortho appears. He says he’s been thinking about what Leona said about a robot’s predictableness, so he’s tried to make this more interesting for them. He points them to a piece of paper on their right which just has “dour” written on it in English, and tells them that is half of the password needed to move forward. The other half is in one of the cages. Ortho doesn’t give them a hint before he leaves, I guess he doesn’t like them as much lol.

In the first cage they find “lion”, but “dour lion” doesn’t work as a password. The next one is “fin present”, and Leona guesses that the password could be “find our present”, putting “dour” in the middle of the fragment they just found, but that doesn’t work either. Jamil keeps the memo from the third cage from Leona and goes directly to the door to input the password. The door opens.

Leona: I thought that there was a possibility that that pipsqueak lied about everything, but it looks like that wasn’t so.

Leona: Well then, what was the password?

Jamil: ... I think it would better if you didn’t know. I’m in a very bad mood right now.

Leona: Just say it.

Jamil: ... *sigh*

Jamil: The memo had “best!” written on it.

Leona: Best? If you combine it with the first letters that we found...

Leona: “do ur best!”... Do your best?

Leona: Those guys... They’re making fun of us!!!

Jamil: Look, as I predicted you got mad. This is why I didn’t want to say anything.

I know I said I wouldn’t translate stuff but ghgklfsgsklsdlkf

As they continue down the stairs, they discuss how Ortho has seemed to change between now and back when everyone was playing games together. Back then, Ortho didn’t seem to have much in the way of actual emotions, but now Ortho seemed annoyed when Leona called him a robot and the surprise he had for them in the asylum seemed to have been created out of malice.

Then, a phantom crawling from below ambushes them.

Mr. President, get down!

Leona is predictably pissed by this. The girls are now fighting The two start butting heads again over Jamil’s behavior’s being a nuisance. Leona tells Jamil that even if he tries to hide it, he can tell that he got injured in the recent fight, and that makes him a liability. Leona: “I would’ve been better off with that lying octopus bastard” Jamil: “unlike Azul, I’m a trained bodyguard. I’m much more useful than that frail guy.” 

Leona abruptly walks off into the next asylum. Jamil thinks to himself that Leona will soon regret his flippant attitude before following him.

Ortho welcomes them to the third trial, notices how serious they look, and worries how they’ll fare while being in such bad moods. I wonder why he’s using different words for the challenges each group faces.

Anyway, this trial is “he who controls water controls everything”. This trial has to do with the vats of cooling liquid embedded in the floor. The duo hear cries for help from a cage deeper in the room and spot an actual researcher there who’s stuck in the liquid due to his foot being caught by a rope attached to a sinking cage. Ortho reveals that the rope is actually a cable which, if cut, will open every cage in the room at once. To save the researcher before he drowns, they have to find a key which will let them unlock the guy’s leg from the cage. I’m not 100% clear on the details of what’s going on here so take this previous paragraph with an especially large grain of salt.

Jamil tries to think of a plan first, Leona just immediately starts busting open cages. After a few cages, one cage appears empty at first so Jamil approaches to investigate, but it turns out to be an ambush and Leona has to help him. Afterwards, Jamil thinks to himself that even though Leona is a pain, it’s best to endure it and stick with him. They argue a bit more about Leona’s recklessness until they finally find the key.

This whole time, the researcher has been panicking. However, once he’s free, Leona asks him to stand and it turns out he’s tall enough that he wasn’t actually in any danger of drowning. Bruh.

With that taken care, the duo get the guy’s ID card so they can continue on. They encounter the Titan of this tower, the ice phantom “Phantom Titans Crystal”.

I like the spinning halo of ink around its head and its smash attacks, very cool monster.

Leona holds off the Titan using his unique magic while Jamil searches the hanger for the Thunder Spear. Jamil finds it, but realizes that he doesn’t have the magical ability to handle it so he runs back to get Leona.

Using the Thunder Spear, Leona launches the Titan into the pit. With that, they settle down to wait the 3 hours it’ll take for the spear to charge. I thought we had to hurry??? Alright whatever I guess we didn’t have to hurry that much. Leona even takes a nap lmaoooooo.

I think I’ll end this post here and begin the next one with Riddle and Azul’s adventure. Stay tuned.

[isomorphismes]

There are no theorems in category theory.

Emily Riehl, Category Theory In Context

Mathematicians often tell her this; hence the book.

If I had to summarise her views in one sentence, it would be:

Everything is an adjunction.

I also like the division these mathematicians are making to her: essentially, a theorem is anything that solves Feynman’s challenge: by a series of clear, unsurprising steps, one arrives at an unexpected conclusion.

Examples for me include:

17 possible tessellations

6 ways to foliate a surface

27 lines on a cubic

1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 28, 2, 8, 6, 992, 1, 3, 2, 16256, 2, 16, 16, 523264, 24, 8, 4 ways to link any-dimensional spheres.

the existence of sporadic groups

surprising rep-theory consequences of Young diagrams, Ferrers sequences, and so on (you could say the strangeness of integer partitions is really to blame here…)

59 icosahedra

8 geometric layouts

Books which are bristling with mathematical ideas of this kind include Montesinos on tessellations, Geometry and the Imagination (the original one), and Coxeter’s book on polyhedra (start with Baez on A-D-E if you want to follow my path). Moonshine and anything by Thurston or his students, I’ve found similarly flush with shockng content—quite different to what I thought mathematics would be like. (I had pictured something more like a formal logic book: row by row of symbols. But instead, the deeper I got into mathematics, the fewer the symbols and the more the surnames thanking the person who came up with some good idea.)

Note that a theorem is different here to some geometry — as in The Geometry of Schemes. The word geometry used in that sense, I feel, is to have a comprehensive enough vision of a subject to say how it “looks” — but the word theorem means the result is surprising or unintuitive.

This definition of a theorem, to me, presents a useful challenge to annoying pop-psychology that today lurks under the headings of Bayesianism, cognitive _______, behavioural econ/finance, and so on.

Following Buliga and Thurston to understand the nature of mathematical progress, within mathematics at least (where it’s clearer than elsewhere whether you understand something or not—compare to economic theory for example), there is a clear delination of what’s obvious and what’s not.

What is definitely not the case in mathematics, is that every logical or computable consequence of a set of definitions is computed and known immediately when the definitions are stated! You can look at a (particularly a good) mathematical exposition as walking you through the steps of which shifts in perspective you need to take to understand a conclusion. For example start with some group, then consider it as a topological object with a cohomology to get the centraliser. Or in Fourier analysis: re-present line-elements on a series of widening circles. Use hyperbolic geometry to learn about integers. Use stable commutator length (geometry) to learn about groups. Or read about Teichmüller stuff and mapping class groups because it’s the confluence of three rivers.

Sometimes mathematical explanations require fortitude (Gromov’s "energy") and sometimes a shift in perspective (Gromov’s (neg)"entropy").

This view of theorems should be contrasted to the disease of generalisation in mathematical culture. Citing two real-life grad students and a tenured professor in logic (one philosophical, one mathematical, the professor in computer science):

I like your distinction between hemi-toposes, demi-toposes, and semi-toposes

I care about hyper-reals, sur-reals, para-consistency, and so on

Abstract thought — like mathematicians do — is the best kind of thought.

(twitter.com/replicakill, the author of twitter.com/logicians, ragged on David Lewis by saying “What do mathematicians like?” “What do mathematicians think?” —— And Corey Mohler has done a wonderful job of mocking Platonism, which is how I guess the thirst for over-generalisation reaches non-mathematicians.)

Paul Halmos knew that cool examples beat generalisations for generalisation’s sake, as did V. I. Arnol’d. And it seems that the people a Harvard mathematician spends her time with make reasonable demands of a mathematical idea as well. It shouldn’t just contain previous theories; it should surprise. In Buliga’s Blake/Reynolds dispute, Blake wins hands down.

[alter-fate]

Ok 4am Fate here with some random tmnt 2012 plotholes that I’m here to fix

ok ok so

basically I really like reptiles and think they’re super cool and I plan on owning a ton of them when I have enough money

and this leads to me being a bit of a nerd about reptile care.

do here’s the dilemma:

The turtles lived in the sewer, underground, for 15 years. This means throughout all this time, they are probably getting little to no actual sunlight. Which, irl, would be very bed for a turtle.

Turtles need de be getting some kind of UVB (ultra violet light), otherwise they’ll develop a condition called metabolic bone disease which basically makes is really hard for their body to process and absorb calcium so their bones become really weak and would also probably lead to a deformed or too small shell.

Obviously, this is not ideal for a group of mutant ninjas. And clearly, from the show, they are perfectly healthy and developed. So how did they get like that with absolutely no previous exposure to the outside world? Here are a few of my theories:

Surely after becoming a father to four mutant turtles, Splinter must have done some research on what turtles need. Both algae and worms are said to be high in calcium, which could potentially help with the issue. Certain kinds of algae, in fact, actually produce a form of calcium that is much easier for bodies to process, making it a perfect source of calcium for the turtles.

However, this on its own wouldn’t be enough. The turtles would still need some form of UVB light to grow up as healthy as they did. So there are a few more things we need to figure out.

A small amount of UVB light is produced from incandescent and fluorescent light bulbs, which both probably be used commonly in the sewer system. But the amount they emit is not nearly enough for a growing turtle. So, to find a solution, we must resort to assumptions and head cannons.

It is possible that master Splinter somehow got ahold of one or a few lights that are specifically designed to produce UVB light in reptile enclosures. He’d probably need more than one, or a really big one for all four mutant turtles, but regardless, this would solve the problem.

Another possible solution (and one I feel fits into the story a bit better) is the sunny spot above the tree in the dojo. Clearly that room is mainly lit by sunlight in the day time (otherwise how would the tree grow??). Any time the turtles would train in the dojo during the daytime, they’d be absorbing UVB.

Technically we could just leave it at that, but to get a proper amount of UVB light, they would probably need to spend significant time in the actual direct sunlight rather than just the ambient light filling up the room.

All this considered, I present you with some head cannons which I really like:

- Basking time! Master Splinter has designated a time of day (probably around noon or whenever they get the most direct sunlight in the dojo) where the turtles sit/nap/meditate in the dojo for an hour or so wherever the sunlight is most direct. Even once they are introduced to the surface they continue this routine, as well as when they flee New York to the farmhouse. This would be especially important for an injured Leo, who would need lots of sunlight to help him heal. While he was in a coma (btw I have more reptile-care HCs related to Leo’s coma and why it was so long but thats for another time), the other three probably took him outside with them to bask in the sun, or at least placed the tub in the bathroom somewhere it would get the most sunlight through the window.

- Relating to the algae they ate in the sewers, I imagine Donnie at some point figured out a way to modify the algae to be the most nutritious for them that it could be. This further helps explain the calcium problem. (As you can see on the show, the algae they eat is grown in large vats in Donnie’s Lab, furthering this theory)

Oh boy. That was a lot. If you read through all of this or even some of it I am astonished and amazed. (Good Job!!)

Anyways thanks for coming to my Ted Talk.

[sysmedsaresexist]

This is so stupid, I'm so tired of debunking this stuff. If you ACTUALLY want to educate yourself, you can find all of the full debunks pretty easily on my blogs, but let's run through quickly.

First, you're missing SEVERAL pages from the DSM that explain DID's connection to trauma. It's not in the criteria because you're not supposed to remember, but if you're going to use the criteria, use the REAL screenshots. It's weird to me that you didn't. Scummy. Also, in criteria B, the and/or traumatic memories doesn't make it optional, it means you might or might not remember your trauma. Like, it's right there, people.

Secondly, DID IS a trauma disorder. Trauma and stress related disorders is a new category based on short term, single traumatic events, in which the disorder can be clearly traced to the event. Dissociative disorders are placed next to those, but not a part of it, because it's a category based on symptom grouping. Not because they're not related-- DID is a trauma disorder, categorized by its dissociative symptoms, so they moved the whole damn dissociative section to put it next to trauma and stress disorders. Dissociative disorders also don't have a single traumatic event that symptoms can be traced to, so it doesn't quite fit under trauma and stress disorders.

From the writers of the DSM.

In b4 hypothesized-- we can see it now on MRI scans.

Thirdly, the guy who changed MPD to DID wasn't NEARLY as involved as people make him out to be. He had no authority on removing it. The only changes he was able to add to the DSM were cautionary statements about overdiagnosis, which were removed, in their entirety, two years later and he was never asked back. No one likes him. Not even the DSM task force. It's like everyone forgets he was only one man on a team of dozens working on that section. Stop bringing him up, he doesn't matter, you're twisting truths to make your point. Not cool.

Fourthly, most of the articles you link have been thoroughly debunked as unreliable, inaccurate, and/or unscientific. I actually spoke to the author of one of those articles and she doesn't support endogenic systems OR the use of her article in these arguments. Her article was one of the very first to look at healthy multiplicity as opposed to fusion as a viable treatment option for DID/MPD systems, and you're doing a huge disservice to everyone, and DID history, by claiming her article is about endogenic systems and including it in this.

Fifthly, we're not upset about endos using the terms because we think they belong to us (or, at least, most of us, though there's something to be said about the fact that system was used in the 1800's by Janet to refer to dissociated parts of the self), it's more... If you're not trauma formed, why would you have alters with certain roles? Why would you need them? Most roles have a very clear relation to their reason for forming in relation to trauma.

Aside from that, let's talk about IFS therapy. IFS shares many, MANY terms with DID. I like IFS, I think it's a very useful type of therapy. It works for a lot of people, it's good. It has, however, made it challenging to get treatment and diagnosis for DID/OSDD. Therapists are more likely to write us off into the more successful and easy to access IFS groups than to treat us for DID because the words we're using are the same. We fear the same will happen with endogenic systems using these terms.

Lastly, let's talk about the ToSD guys-- yes, guyS, because there were three that wrote the ToSD book. The actions of one don't override or negate the work of the other two. The whole theory isn't debunked because one guy is an asshole. Also, you know who actually came up with the theory? Janet, in the 1800s, and many people after him worked on it. The three guys we talk about now took those theories and put it into a book. They didn't actually come up with it, so this isn't the gotcha people think it is.

Did I cover everything? Every article you linked can be found in my blogs, debunked or discussed by me. If you ask nicely, I'll even do the work and find them for you, just so you don't make these same claims twice.

Some endo info for all of you!

https://endogenic-research.carrd.co/

Debunking Sysmed Claims (debunking-sysmeds.carrd.co)

Thank you and have a good day no matter your system origin