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lewis-winters · 3 years

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Hi! i really enjoy your daemon au and i-ve gone and watched the new his dark materials series because of it. i love your take on daemons and was wondering if you have nymore headcanons for the other boys? what's luz's daemon? liptons? how do you pick their names? are there any daemons who Re the same sex as their humans? you dont have to rwply if you dont want to i just wanted to tell you i enjoy your world very much!!

Oh, hi! I’m glad you’re watching the new His Dark Materials adaptation! It’s pretty good, huh?

I do have headcanons for not just most of the boys but for the world itself. Though I also call it His Dark Materials!AU alongside daemon!AU it’s actually more the latter than the former. The only things I carried over into this AU from the original world of His Dark Materials are the existence of daemons, the fact that daemons are made of Dust particles, and the existence of witches. The magisterium or any kind of theocracy doesn’t exist. The authority and the angels also do not carry over. Instead, our own religions exist, but there’s just as much emphasis on spiritualism and mysticism as there is on moralism, which I believe would be the natural development of religion in this world where your soul/daemon, the spiritual aspect of you, is literally there for everybody else to see.

All of the boys have small or medium sized daemons, the biggest probably belonging to that of Ron and Tab, who have an Ocelot daemon and a sheepdog daemon respectively. The reason for this being that small or medium sized daemons are easily carried and they, alongside bird or other kinds of flying daemons, are preferred by the airborne. You still gotta jump out of a perfectly good airplane largely undetected. Can’t do that with an elephant daemon.

Ok. This got real long so I’m putting the rest under the cut. tw: mentions of death, trauma, and mutilation.

Some of the younger boys’ daemons haven’t settled. Miller, Hashey, Garcia, and Jackson. Hashey and Garcia’s settle in Hageneu. Miller and Jackson never get the chance.

Shifty’s daemon, Myrtle, is a Capybara. But he doesn’t know that. Every time somebody asked him what his daemon was, he’d shrug, say ‘Don’t rightly know,’ then leave it at that. What can he do? Capybara’s aren’t native to Virginia and he’s never been out of Virginia. Webster was the one to tell him that Myrtle was a Capybara because he’d read about them in a book somewhere that one time. Myrtle was startled by this and said; “I thought I was some kind of dog!” that was one of the few times she ever spoke out-loud during the whole war.

As I’ve said before in this post, Lew’s daemon is a chameleon named Amalthea. For all of the events of episode 9, Lew kept her in his pocket and that scared almost everybody shitless, because it made it seem like he was walking around without a daemon. The replacements assigned to them around that time, like O’Keefe, thought he didn’t have a soul. He never bothered to correct them because that meant letting Amalthea out, and the idea of her being in the open and vulnerable made him especially ill. He’d rather people thought he was soulless than allow himself and Amalthea to get hurt again. Which is so Lewis.

Skip has a hummingbird daemon named Ilaria, which is a name that means happiness and joy. This daemon-human duo wasn’t hard for me to figure out. It just fits.

Malarkey’s daemon is an artic hare with a summer coat named Felis. She’s settled, but after Foy and after losing Skip and Alex and Buck, she changes again. Subtlely, of course, and not wholely. She stays an artic hare, but instead of a summer coat, she permanently has a winter coat.

It’s not uncommon in this world for your daemon to change after severe trauma. I bet as the field of psychology expands, so does the understanding of trauma’s effects on the soul expand. There’s many studies on the changing of once settled daemons in relation to soldiers’ PTSD.

Buck’s daemon, a male bald eagle named Romulus, changes entirely. Still a bird, but instead of an eagle, he turns into a snowy owl. Before the war, he was a chatty daemon. After, he barely speaks and only does so to Buck and, very rarely, to those close to them.

Eugene Sledge’s male daemon, Daecon goes from a blood hound and gets turned into a Luzon bleeding heart-- which, I know is on the nose but it’s just. It’s such a cool bird, ya’ll. I’ve seen one up-close and ever since that day, I have not known any peace. The shift would be painful and would happen very slowly. It was actually horrific and was a trauma in and of itself. That was the last time they ever changed, though.

I also headcanon that the longer you’ve been settled, the harder and more painful the shift.

Merriell Shelton’s daemon settles in Gloucester. Into what, I’m not sure yet, but a part of me thinks she’s settled into some kind of big cat from the rain forests. Either a cloud leopard or a jaguar. Her name’s Charlotte but he calls her Lottie. Don’t ask me why. It just fits.

That being said, I have some Thoughts about people with big cat daemons. They’re usually aloof. Like, they make a very impactful first impression but they’re mostly solitary individuals who are weird af and difficult to get to know. It takes a really special person to tame a human with a big cat daemon. Once you earn their trust, that’s for life. They’re also really self-assured and are very secure in their sense of self. There is almost little to no tension between big cat daemons and their humans, and if there is, it gets explosive.

Ron Speirs has a big cat daemon, a female Ocelot named Aurele. She never talks, not even to Ron. They have this silent gaze/telepathy going on. Ron also takes on a couple of animalistic traits because of it. They could also... stretch their bond really far? Which is scary as fuck. People think he’s the son of a witch who, in her desperation to make him immortal, made him go through the ritual that allows a witch and her daemon to part for long periods of time and great distances. This is not true. Ron and Aurele just have really high pain tolerance.

Eugene Roe, on the other hand, is the son of a witch. His maman, however, did not make him go through the ritual because he’s not her first son. She knows the pain of outliving her sons well. She loves him all the same but understands that he will die well before her. Eugene’s daemon is a male kinkajou named Louis. Which is both a surprise and also not. For much of the war there’s a lot of tension there. Louis craves connection with others, Roe needs isolation to keep their sanity. It kind of turns into this thing where, if you wanted to comfort Roe or be close to him, you’d have to go through his daemon instead.

Babe’s daemon is a squirrel. A very chatty female russian squirrel named Abigail. They talk to each other a lot, and Abby talks to other people a lot too. Sometimes, she even answers in lieu of Babe. They’re both very blunt and very out there, no hiding with Babe and Abby. It used to get them into a lot of trouble with the nuns at school, who believed that daemons are only meant to be seen and not heard. A+ Catholic repression.

George’s daemon was a little tricky to me. I know his daemon is female and that her name is Thalia. I also know that she can fly. My first thought was: Parrot, either a hyacinth macaw or a white cockatoo. But, I also really like the idea of George having a Butterfly daemon. Particularly one that looks like a leaf when her wings are folded up but is brilliantly jewel toned when she opens them. In the end, I opted for George entering the army, having not settled just yet, and he and Thalia are this kind of double-act, where she shifts into whatever form is necessary for the punchline of the joke. She only settles into a parrot (idk still what kind) after their first jump and all the excitement in Carentan. A gradual thing. They don’t even notice until just before the jump in Holland. When they miss someone, Thalia will mimic that person’s voice. First, it was George’s mama and the voice of her daemon, both speaking in rapid fire portugese. Later on, in Austria, Thalia starts imitating all the friends they’ve lost. Sometimes she’ll sound like Skip. Other times, she’ll sound like Bill. It takes a very long time for her to break this habit. To the point wherein she and George don’t even remember what her real voice sounds like.

Lip’s daemon settled really early and is a female Bonobo named Jane. Has been since he was ten and made man of the house. This, like Skip and Ilaria, was very easy for me to figure out.

Dick’s daemon is a Caracara raptor bird. I’m still figuring out the specifics so she doesn’t have a name yet. Sorry.

As mentioned, Tab has a sheepdog daemon named Marisa who enjoys keeping him and everybody else in check. Have you met a sheepdog? They will literally herd you. It doesn’t matter if you are not a lamb or a sheep. They will nip at your heels until you go where they want to go. That’s Marisa. She’ll nip at Tab’s heels, she’ll nip at everybody else’s heels. If you are going somewhere she does not want you to go she will make sure you know her displeasure.

It is also super funny when she looks Tab in the eye and goes “Down, boy.” It never fails to make Tab go red and make everybody else laugh.

Harry’s daemon-- and don’t get mad at me-- but Harry’s daemon is a Scottish Terrier named Saoirse. He carries her around strapped to his chest during jumps. It’s fucking cute. Don’t say that to their faces though because they will lose all respect for you. It’s a daemon suited more to a teacher than it is to a soldier, that’s for sure.

Bill’s daemon is a pit-bull named Darla. Scary looking one, too, with a very bawdy sense of humor. She will growl at you and pretend to bite and you will be very scared but she only does it as a joke. She’s honestly really cool. When Bill and Babe are walking around together, Abby likes to perch on top of Darla’s head. It’s adorable. Sometimes, when Abby gets too much, Darla carries her around in her mouth. It’s still cute. But only to them, everybody else finds it vaguely horrifying.

I know there’s this taboo of humans not touching other humans’ daemons but it’s kinda difficult in such close-quarters like theirs. It is also heavily implied in the original text of Philip Pullman, that the no-touching thing is a cultural thing. Like, I think in religions that deal a lot in repression like Catholicism or Protestantism, the touching of another’s daemon is a no-no and is only reserved for the most intimate of relations (i.e. marriage). But I feel like religions such as Judaism, Wiccan, Paganism, or even some branches of Folk-Catholicism encourage touch/celebrate that connection between two humans. Neither of these two beliefs are wrong, of course. It’s just a cultural thing and they carry with them both pros and cons.

I bet Lieb grew up very used to his daemon being touched by his mother and father or older siblings. It’s not taboo to him, though he recognizes that it’s taboo to others. He doesn’t get it though, and is constantly rolling his eyes every time somebody gasps when they accidentally touch someone’s daemon.

A lot of the boys just kinda ignore the touching daemons thing until they get used to it.

I’m not sure what Lieb’s daemon is or what her name is, too. I know she’s a social kind of daemon-- not solitary like a big cat or a reptile (like snakes). I thought maybe a wolf, but a wolf daemon is too... large and there are a lot of connotations attached to it. I think Lieb’s daemon is something medium-sized and unassuming. Not a dog. Not a domestic cat either. A part of me thinks flightless bird, but no. Not that either. Give me time. I’ll figure her out. As of now, I’m thinking either a marsupial or a canidae/fox but not quite. She’s a mammal, that much I know. Just don’t know what kind.

Grant’s daemon is a male domestic cat named Saladin. He’s either an Abyssinian or a Bengal. Either way, he’s really cool. Like super cool. They’re both super duper cool.

And... that’s kinda it. That’s all I have for now. I’m really sorry it got so long, anon. I get really excited when talking about daemons. It’s character study but with animals! Thank you for giving me this opportunity to ramble. This is where I leave you.

#band of brothers #dæmon au #bob aus #tp aus #the pacific #but only eugene and snaf #ask #bob hcs #tp hcs

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blissfulalchemist · 3 years

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“You can share my jacket with me, since you’re shivering.” + dealer's choice!

Thank you Kate! Look at me posting some writing with Hypatia without formal introduction. I hope you enjoy it. X

Cities were never much my thing. Even as a kid I always felt this need to get away to find open space, so much so my mom used to joke about putting me on a rocket to the stars, then I could have all the space I wanted. So while St. Louis was no New York or Los Angeles it was still a city and so it felt like a prison, a feeling that didn’t get better by being cooped up inside a building near twenty four seven. Those of us that were recruited were only allowed outside, fully equipped with fresh air, with supervision at specific times of the day, and then confined to our rooms once night came. Those were the rules and for me….rules were made to be broken. After a few failed attempts I managed to find the one way I could always, one hundred percent guaranteed, have access to the roof in the dead of night. My small haven on nights I couldn’t sleep, the moments of peace I could cling too.

Two years, I had spent two years with the Alchemists readying myself for whatever they had in mind for me. Though they never said much about what they wanted from me specifically but it seemed so far that I was to stay at one of their biggest facilities, never to be transferred out. I had seen other witches come through the doors, get some training or teach some class, and then leave just like that. Some of the women giddy with excitement about where they were being sent too, others rolling their eyes about how their job was probably going to be desk work, but I never left. Little orphan Annie, I stayed where I was, mastering my craft and being put through so much physical training I almost wanted to ask if I was to become an assassin. Not that they’d tell me, it was a need to know and I wasn’t in the loop that needed to know. Soon though, I hoped that it would be soon I would have a chance at my first field run to show them I was more than ready to help them in their cause.

For now I’m left sitting on the edge of this building looking up to the few stars I can make out and the cityscape sounds below me. I can hear footsteps as they approach the door on the far end of the roof, panic surging in my body for only a moment. I swing my legs back over from the edge, ducking down behind some electrical boxes, peeking just over the edge, heart pounding. The door opens and a figure steps out into the low lighting, male and tall, with a medium build. His clothing is a white collared shirt and beige blazer with matching pants, typical stiff Alchemist fashion. His features become more detailed as he leaves the shadow of the door, his auburn hair is falling into his grey eyes, hands in his pockets walking in my direction. The smile he wears almost hides the golden lily on his cheek from this angle as I stand, meeting his smile with a small eye roll, “No unauthorized personnel allowed up here Caro.” I cross my arms, shifting my weight onto my left leg, “Last I checked you’re not authorized.”

I smirk cocking an eyebrow, “And last I checked, neither are you, Conner,” he chuckles pushing his hair back, the pieces falling back to where they were, “Thought you left for the day already?”

He jumps up on the electric box crossing his legs beneath him, “Went to go and check on you and the recruits.”

My eyes widened, biting my lower lip, looking to the ground, “And you didn’t find me where I was supposed to be.”

Conner taps his nose twice, “Third time this month, T,” my mouth falls open and my heart races, “Don’t worry. I haven’t told and don’t plan too.” I let out a sigh taking a seat next to him.

“Not like they could do much about it if you did,” I shrug flipping my hair behind my shoulder. It seems I need to make the illusion spell stronger.

“I don’t even get a thank you,” he shakes his head playfully, “Typical Caro move,” he turns to me, face serious, “They could punish you still if they did find out though.”

I snort, “How? By transferring me out of this place,” I bring my knees to my chest, “I’d be glad for it. I’m starting to hate everything about this place.”

“You can’t hate everything about this place,” he says softly leaning his arms on his knees, “Can you?”

I glance over to him frowning as I see his solemn face, “No. Not everything.” I nudge his shoulder gently with mine, “Don’t hate you Conner. You’re about the only best thing about this place.”

The smile returns, “I could say the same about you, Tia,” I feel the corner of my lips start to pull into a smile, “If I felt that you were the best thing about this place, but the cappuccino machine takes that spot.” I groan rolling my eyes, of course he’d never admit to it, if he did it could be seen as getting too close to the “impure” witches. The Alchemists couldn't have that, nope, not while we still used our unnatural magic. All of us that joined made a vow to forgo our magic once the mission was over allowing ourselves to be pure once more. We both look to the city below us, the passing of headlights on the freeway grabbing our attention the most, “I always loved to see cities from above like this. Highways always reminded me of a river.” I scoff, rolling my eyes, “What was that for,” he asks, a smile evident.

“What was what,” I mock looking away from him to my right, nose pointing up.

He mimics my scoffing, “That. What was that for,” Conner pokes my shoulder a few times. “You got a problem with my views on the city?”

The longer I hold back any kind of response his teasing gets worse, until I groan, pushing his hand away, “I don’t have problems with them,” he rests his chin on his hand, eyes tired fixated on me, Conner doesn’t believe me. “I don’t honestly,” my hands are held up in defense, crossing my legs like him, “Just seems typical of a city boy to say something like that.”

Conner laughs, “Oh I see how it is now,” he shakes his head, “I didn’t live in anything close to a city until I was sixteen and even then it was only a small town.”

“What did you live on a farm before that,” I clear my throat, readying a terrible southern accent, “Hey y’all, my name’s Conner and this here is ma horse.”

I laugh as he rolls his eyes, “You think you’re real cute with your antics don’t you?”

“I think I’m down right adorable.”

“You’re far from adorable.”

“You got a better word to describe me farm boy?” I lean towards him resting my chin on his shoulder, my lips near brushing his slowly reddening cheek.

“I do,” he faces me, lips close to mine, whispering, “Annoying.”

I clutch my chest pulling away from him, “You wound me, Smallville,” the back of my hand makes contact with my forehead, leaning back, “I shall never recover from such an insult.”

“You insult me all the time.”

“I do not,” I lie, mouth falling open, “How can you accuse me of such a thing, cornhusker?”

“Just this morning you said the coffee had better taste than me for hair styles,” he starts to count on his fingers, “Then there was the other day where you said I was so stiff that even a stick wouldn’t fit up my ass. Or the time you said I don’t even shop at a thrift store for my clothing but the knock off of thrift stores.”

“Those are facts not insults,” I correct.

Conner gives a smirk, the only way his dimples show, shaking his head, “Guess it’s just tomato, tomato with you isn’t it. Also are you going to keep going with the farm related nicknames now?”

“Just until something sticks, Kansas.”

He runs a hand down his face, “I didn’t even grow up on a farm you know that right? You just assumed that.”

“So you just grew up in a house in the middle of nowhere?”

“Not really,” he leans back on his hands, eyes looking to the sky, “It was a single street with some houses scattered around it. The school I went to was next to the store, which was next to the bed and breakfast, and so on.” I stare as his eyes become a little glassy with the memories, “Our house was on a few acres of land, still within walking distance, and we had a garden.”

I almost want to laugh at the idea of him tending to different flowers, hands and hair filled with the blossoms, I don’t though, not with the look of happiness in his eyes, “Your mom a florist?”

He smiles, “Yeah. I guess so when you really think about it.” His head rolls to look at me lazily, “Guess we end up craving what we never got in the end.”

I tilt my head, “What do you mean?”

“You grew up in a city your whole life and yet when we found you, you were traveling the open road,” my heart aches at the mention of my life before here and how I may never have that again, “Always seemed to stick to the big open spaces of the desert.”

I flinch, “How do you know it's the desert that I spend the most time in?” Were they watching me for a lot longer than they told me originally? If they were, the question became why?

“Whenever I ask you about your favorite places you always respond with places in the southwest,” he says matter of factly. I should have guessed, Conner’s smart and the only person I have real conversations with in this place. He looks me up and down, the wind has started to blow harder sending a chill through my body, “Your clothing also says a lot about your weather preference.” I look down to the dark purple tank top, with jean cutoff shorts, fishnet stockings, and black boots, my eyes narrowing.

He laughs as I give a light punch to his arm, “It does not. I just like dressing this way.”

“Tell me this then: Do you own anything heavier than a jean jacket?” I look away grumbling, crossing my arms, the goosebumps prominent, “Thought so. You never see yourself as needing one since you’ll never go as far north as Utah.” I hate that he’s right, even in the summers I never go much farther and the forests somehow feel just as packed as the city. I always keep saying one day, but it never came, an excuse always coming up as to why I couldn’t and shouldn’t go. I shiver again, rubbing my arms, Conner already shrugging off his blazer, “Here,” he places it on my shoulders, “You can share my jacket with me, since you’re shivering.”

I push my arms though the sleeves, the warmth spreading through me as I inhale the spearmint and fresh cut pine lingering from his aftershave. “Thanks,” I smile, my dark hair blowing in the wind hiding the small blush I can feel on my cheeks, “Don’t think that I’ll be nice to you after this though.”

Conner laughs, lying back on the box, letting his legs hang off the edge, “Wouldn’t expect anything else from you Patia.” I shoot him a glare at the near use of my full name, “It’s not your full name, so I can get away with it.”

I sigh, stretching myself next to him, “For now, but you're on thin ice buddy.” My eyes search the stars picking out the different constellations hoping to see the one on my pendant.

“Why do you like the open spaces of the desert so much, T,” I hum, my mental star map lost for a moment, “The one thing I never really understood. I mean it’s pretty but there’s always something more with you to places.”

My hands reach for the silver pendant resting at the hollow of my collar bone, tracing the black engraved stars in the connecting parallelograms of Orion, “The stars. You can see all the stars at night.”

“That why you come up here?” I can feel his grey eyes on me as he shift slightly to get a better look, “To take in the ten stars that are visible?”

My brow knits, frowning as I turn to face him, “There’s more than ten stars to be seen here.”

He shakes his head, “I have counted many times over and I only get about ten, sometimes twenty on a really good night.”

I scoot closer to him, grabbing his hand, pointer finger out, “Let me show you. I can point out three constellations and the other stars I can see.” As I make invisible lines he keeps shaking his head, the lights hard to see or not there at all he claims. “I think you need to get your eyes checked, C-man,” I declare, shaking my head sadly, “cause you might be going blind and I can’t have that happen.”

“And why is that?”

“Because your life will fall to shambles if you can’t be graced with my beauty, that's why.”

He groans covering his face, “God what am I going to do with you?”

“You should be asking what you would do without me,” I tease, laughing at his features getting more tired with each word coming out of my mouth.

“I think it’s time to send you back into your cage for the night now,” he says, sitting up.

I whine, I know he’s doing it more for my safety, I’ve already spent too much time out here and the next checks would be coming soon. “Few more minutes,” I place my hand over his, Conner’s eyes glancing between his hand and my face a few times, “Please. You get to have me all to yourself for a little while longer.”

He stiffens, silent for a few moments before he swallows, nodding, “Okay. Just a few more minutes Caro.” Conner settles next to me, gaze avoiding me, keeping to the sky. The heat from his coat vanishing, the warmth of him that replaces it is enough to make the night wind more bearable, and I just know that the smell of spearmint will linger in my hair for the rest of the night. He really needs a new aftershave, he was never going to get a date with the scent of spearmint. That’s something for me to tell him tomorrow, because for now I just want to enjoy this moment of peace I’ll cling on to.

#hypatia caro oc #opinions and feedback are much appreciated #I'm also testing out potential partner for her as I will have to make one

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fionaharnett · 5 years

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PHILOSOPHY AS METHOD LECTURE 2. Lecture notes/slides

Philosophy as Method: Ethics, Aesthetics, Ontology of Photography Philosophy of, Religion, Science, Biology, Art, Law,History, Mind, Technology, Politics , Mathematics, Language, Photography

What is philosophy?

This is a notoriously difficult question.

One of the easiest ways of answering it is to say that philosophy is what philosophers do, and then point to writings of Plato, Aristotle, Descartes, Hume, Kant, Russell, Wittgenstein, Sartre, and otherfamous philosophers. However, this answer is unlikely to be ofmuch use to you if you are just beginning the subject, as you probably won’t have read anything by these writers. Even if you have, it may still be difficult to say what they have in common, if indeed there is a relevant characteristic which they all share.

Philosophy is an activity: it is a way of thinking about certain sorts of question. Its most distinctive feature is its use of logical argument. Philosophers typically deal in arguments: they either invent them, criticize other people’s, or do both. They also analyse and clarify concepts. They often examine beliefs that most of us take for granted most of the time. They are concerned with questions... about religion, right and wrong, politics, the nature of the external world, the mind, science, art and numerous other topics. For instance, most people live their lives without questioning their fundamental beliefs such as that killing is wrong. But why is it wrong? Is it wrong in every circumstance? And what do I mean by ‘wrong’ anyway?

PHILOSOPHICAL METHOD

Philosophical method is generally characterised by:

• Use of logical argumentation

• Systematicity, rigour

• Questioning of even the most fundamental beliefs (not necessarily in order to subvert them, but to clarify why we hold them)

• Thoroughness

• Criticality

• Openness to re-examination of issues/to change of mind where this seems necessary

• CLARITY (hopefully)

Ontology Ethics Aesthetics

ONTOLOGY

Ontology asks:

WHAT IS PHOTOGRAPHY?

“I was overcome by an ‘ontological’ desire: I wanted to learn at all costs what Photography was ‘in itself,’ by what essential feature it was to be distinguished from the community of images.” (Barthes, 1981, p.3)

What makes photography photography? What makes it different from all other forms of image making? What defines photography as a medium? What is specific about photography? What is unique about photography?

GROUP F/64

“The name of this Group is derived from a diaphragm number of the photographic lens. It signifies to a large extent the qualities of clearness and definition of the photographic image which is an important element in the work of members of this Group. Group f/64 limits its members and invitational names to those workers who are striving to define photography as an art form by simple and direct presentation through purely photographic methods. The Group will show no work at any time that does not conform to its standards of pure photography. Pure photography is defined as possessing no qualities of technique, composition or idea, derivative of any other art form.”

(From the manifesto of Group f/64, emphases added.)

“There is an urgent need to examine old opinions and look at things from a new viewpoint. There must be an increase in the joy one takes in an object, and the photographer should become fully conscious of the splendid fidelity of reproduction made possible by his technique.” (Albert Renger-Patzsch, ‘Joy before the object’, in Phillips, Christopher [ed.] 1989, Photography in the Modern Era: European Documents and Critical Writings, 1913-1940, Metropolitan Museum of Art, NY/Aperture, NY, pp.108-109.)

Indexicality

Truth

Objectivity

Realism Definition/sharpness Reproducibility Uta Barth, Field #9, 1995. Uta Barth, Field #7, 1995. Uta Barth, Field #3, 1995. Uta Barth, Field #6, 1995. Louis-Jacques-Mandé Daguerre, View of the Boulevard de Temple, c. 1839. (A photograph, but not extremely sharp, not reproducible, not particularly ‘truthful’ – all moving objects have blurred into invisibility due to the long exposure.)

TO GET REALLY PHILOSOPHICAL:

Necessary and sufficient conditions:

Is quality x a necessary condition of photography? = are there images which are obviously photographs but don’t have quality x? Is quality x a sufficient condition of photography?

= are there images which have quality x but are clearly not photographs?

When a quality (or set of qualities) is simultaneously both necessaryand sufficient as a condition of images being photographs, then that quality/set of qualities is a definition of photography, and only photography.

NECESSARY CONDITIONS? DOES EVERY PHOTOGRAPH NEED TO BE... INDEXICAL? Andreas Gursky, Rhein II, 1999. (A photograph, but how indexical?) Still from Ben Lewis, Gursky World, 2002.

NECESSARY CONDITIONS? DOES EVERY PHOTOGRAPH NEED TO BE... REALISTIC? Andre Kertesz, Distortion 168, 1933. (A photograph, but how realistic?)

NECESSARY CONDITIONS? DOES EVERY PHOTOGRAPH NEED TO BE... TRUTHFUL?

Jeff Wall, Odradek, Táboritská 8, Prague, 18 July 1994 1994. (Truth? A staged photograph referring to a work of fiction – Kafka.)

SUFFICIENT CONDITIONS: IF WE LUMP ALL THE ABOVE QUALITIES TOGETHER, DOES SUFFICE TO COMPEL US TO THINK OF THE IMAGE AS A PHOTOGRAPH? Dartmouth College Electron Microscope Facility, 2004, Pollen.

Indexical, realistic, objective, sharp, clear, high definition (etc.) – but not necessarily of visible light per se.

Albert Renger-Patzsch, Echeveria, 1922. SEM image of the tip of a Norway Spruce branch. Karl Blossfeldt, Columbiablatt/Leaf of A Columbia-species, 1932. Northwest Fisheries Science Center, Surface of Zebrafish Skin (SEM image). Albert Renger-Patzsch, Mesembrianthemum Becca Butans, Center for Sustainable Lehmanni, ca. 1922. Nanotechnology, Nano-Koosh-balls, 2013. ETHICS Famine War/Violence/Torture Terrorism Exploitation, slavery, pollution, greed (etc.) Natural disasters Assuming that the ontology of photography allows some level of connection with reality, we face the question of the morality of the actions/situations themselves.

But there are of course differences: natural disasters may not be attributable to a moral agent (although you can try to argue that they, or some of them, are to some extent consequences of industry, globalisation – human actions).

But there are ethical questions concerning the photography of the events: eg

• who benefits from the photographs? • who should benefit from them and how? • who should photograph these events and their victims and how? • where should such photographs be shown and to whom and why? • what should the viewers make of the images – how to respond? Most ethical questions pertaining to photography are (most likely) questions of applied ethics. • You need to think and research case by case

Pvt. (pfc.) Lynndie England holds a naked detainee by a leash in Abu Ghraib prison, Iraq. Sebastiao Salgado, Starved Child Looking for Food in the Region of the Former Lake Faguibine. Mali, 1985 Sebastiao Salgado, Starved Child Looking for Food in the Region of the Former Lake Faguibine. Mali, 1985 “[T]his beautification of tragedy results in pictures that ultimately reinforce our passivity toward the experience they reveal. To aestheticize is the fastest way to anesthetize the feeling of those who are witnessing it. Beauty is a call to admiration, not to action.” (Ingrid Sischy, 1991)

“Perhaps the camera promises a festive cruelty: ‘Oh, good, the camera’s here: let’s begin the torture so that the photograph might capture and commemorate our act!’ If so, the photograph is already at work prompting, framing and orchestrating the act, even as the photograph captures the act at the moment of its accomplishment.” (Butler, 2007, pp.958–959) But paying closer attention to your treatment of a case study, you may find that the arguments (your own and those of others) fall broadly within the two main categories of normative ethics/metaethics: But paying closer attention to your treatment of a case study, you may find that the arguments (your own and those of others) fall broadly within the two main categories of normative ethics/metaethics: • Consequentialism • Deontological ethics VERY BROADLY: Consequentialism: The moral value of an act is based on the act’s consequences: if the consequences are good, the act was good. (Close to colloquial expression, ‘the ends justify the means’.)

VERY BROADLY:

Deontology: You have to do your duty (Greek, δέον, deon = obligation, duty), i.e., you have to do what is right in the first place, regardless of the consequences – and you need to do the right thing because it’s the right thing to do (doing what’s right is the motivation for the act). Butler’s speculation raises a clearly deontological problem: whoever photographed these events perhaps incited the very act, and therefore s/he did the wrong thing in the first place. From a consequentialist angle, these images may be seen to have had (some) good consequences: of exposing the practice of torture, of bringing (some of) the perpetrators to justice. Sischy is clearly criticising Salgado for a consequentialist mistake: his methods of representing the tragedy of famine are wrong, since they are likely not toincite the right kind of reactions in viewers.

Whereas it’s harder to criticise Salgado from a deontological point of view: his intentions are good (he wants to do the right thing), even according to the title of Sischy’s article: ‘Good Intentions’ (New Yorker, 1991). Richard Misrach, Destroy This Memory, 2010

AESTHETICS

Richard Misrach, Submerged Gazebo, Salton Sea, California, 1984. “My career, in a way, has been about navigating these two extremes - the political and the aesthetic.” (Misrach in an interview with Peter Brown, 2011.) Often, aesthetics is thought to be the theory of the beautiful in art and nature. E.g., • What beauty is • What taste is • What aesthetic experience is (like) • Which works of art are beautiful Often, aesthetics is thought to be the theory of formal properties in images: • What colours are used (if any) • How the image is composed • What formal properties produce ‘good’ images But in photography, things are less straightforward: But in photography, things are less straightforward: • Aesthetics, as a distinct philosophical discipline, predates the birth of photography (as we use the term) • Aesthetics already as a philosophical discipline is disputed: it is also said to be, e.g., the theory of sense perception in general, and ‘the philosophy of art’ in general, i.e., not necessarily to do with beauty (Hegel). • Photography, especially in its documentary forms, does not (necessarily) deal with beauty or formal properties.

So what is aesthetics in photography theory?

Much of the discussion on photography under the rubric of philosophical aesthetics has tended to address this question: Is photography aesthetically valuable at all? Is photography in fact an art at all? E.g., Friday’s Aesthetics and Photography is a book wholly devoted to this question. So what is aesthetics in photography theory? Much of the discussion on photography under the rubric of philosophical aesthetics has tended to address this question: Is photography aesthetically valuable at all? Is photography in fact an art at all? This leads to further questions: E.g., Is photography different from painting/drawing, and if so, how? Is photography transparent (i.e., does it allow us visual contact with the object analogous to ‘naked’ perception of the object)? If photography is not different from other media of visual art, then it has no intrinsic aesthetic value. It may have aesthetic value, but this value does not derive from its being photography. If photography is transparent, then it is not a representational medium and as such it cannot create aesthetically valuable representations. (i.e., any aesthetic value possessed by photographs would be the aesthetic value of the objects depicted in photographs, not of the photograph itself) Uta Barth, Field #9, 1995. Uta Barth, Field #7, 1995. Uta Barth, Field #3, 1995. Uta Barth, Field #6, 1995. Catherine Yass, JCC:Stairs (down), 2009. Sebastiao Salgado, Workers install a new wellhead to enable the injection of a chemical mud to "kill the old well." Greater Burhan, Kuwait, 1991. Beyond the beautiful: the sublime Paul Seawright, Camp Boundary, 2002.

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douchebagbrainwaves · 4 years

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I'VE BEEN PONDERING WEALTH

If I encourage too many people to apply to Y Combinator suffer from a common problem: choosing a small, dark, noisy apartment in order to be successful. And put this kind of project. One is that individual rowers don't see any result from working harder. Louis Brandeis said We may have democracy, or we may have wealth concentrated in the hands of a few thousand people, the most accurate measure of the relative power of programming languages, is that source code will look unthreatening. So whatever it costs to establish a mediocre university, for an additional half billion or so you could have a great one. The companies that rule Silicon Valley now are all descended in various ways from Shockley Semiconductor. But even so I'd advise startups to pull a Meraki initially if they can just hire enough people it somehow will be. They work well enough in everyday life are fuzzy, and break down if pushed too hard. One is to ask yourself the question: what do you wish there was? Which they deserve because they're taking more risk. That's the absent-minded professor, who forgets to shave, or eat, or even perhaps look where he's going while he's thinking about some interesting question. In fact, it could actually be very profitable.

The other big driver of change is that startups are popping up like crazy, the number of big hits grow linearly with the total number of new startups? Wealth is not the only way to say whether something is really old or not is by looking at structural evidence, and structurally philosophy is young; it's still reeling from the unexpected breakdown of words. He didn't think he was starting a company? Now I'd go further: now I'd say it's hard to do a really good job on anything you don't think you're smart enough to start a startup, though. If you're a founder, what you need to use a completely different kind of selling. Which means every teenage kid a wants a computer with an Internet connection, b has an incentive to figure out what you like is to look at what you enjoy as guilty pleasures. And it's not only programs that should be insanely great, but the pain of having this stupid controversy constantly reintroduced as the top one in my mind. If you're demoing something web-based database as a system to allow people to collaboratively leverage the value of the work done by small groups. Wealth is stuff we want: food, clothes, houses, cars, gadgets, travel to interesting places, and so its size is proportionate to risk. Pascal is too wimpy for systems programming. And yet eminent professors were writing books about them, and startups can operate from anywhere nowadays.

A complex macro may have to save many times its own length to be justified.1 Talent probably matters more in types of work that depend more on talent are always more admirable. Com, the new CEO wanted to switch to plan B if plan A isn't working. The failed startups you hear most about are the spectactular flameouts.2 And this form of list may be more useful in practice. The business model is just a guess, but my motives are purely selfish. No one after reading Aristotle's Metaphysics does anything differently as a result.3

Whereas if the next hot company didn't take VC at all. The scary thing about platforms is that there are a lot of wiggle room.4 Others, like mowing the lawn, or filing tax returns, only get worse if you put them off. If a fairly good hacker is worth $80,000 per year. When I was in grad school in Boston, a friend came to visit from New York. The other implication of the organic growth hypothesis is that succinctness is power, or is there something unique about it? If you sell your car, you'll get more for it. Most startups coming out of Demo Day wanted to raise. Intellectually, it is at least a pure one. In that form it only had a potential market of a few thousand people, the average rower is likely to be more readable than a line of Basic is likely to be pretty average. I describe it as an opportunity is that there is now a lot of obstacles.

When wealth is talked about in this context, it is often described as a pie. Whereas if investors seem hot, you can get is by selling your startup in the early versions of the list, because nearly all the founders are just out of college. I began with was that, except in pathological examples, I would be learning what was really what. They're responding to the market. Fortunately, more and more startups will. But there is a role for mathematical elegance: some kinds of elegance make programs easier to understand. You could have both now. You may notice a certain similarity between the Viaweb and Y Combinator logos. And the way founders end up in it is by comparison with other startups. Someone is going to read a lot of people, I like to work, just as a sailboat can sail closer to the Apple type than the Viaweb type. In other words, time-sharing is back. I understand why Berkeley is probably not an anomaly.

The acceleration would have been harder to. Venture investors, however, which makes me think I was wrong to emphasize demos so much before. Not necessarily. That has been the lesson for me: be careful what you let become critical to you. We should fix those things. Stripe delivered instant merchant accounts to its first users was that the founders manually signed them up for traditional merchant accounts behind the scenes. Well, server-based applications on Windows.

Most people who get rich through rent-seeking of various forms, and a third was acquired that we can't figure out how to make a fortune in finance. Young people don't want to be spending all your time talking to executives at cell phone companies, trying to arrange deals. If someone sat down and wrote a web browser that didn't suck a fine idea, by the way, the world would be that much richer. If by the next time you need to launch? You know what a throwaway program is: something you write quickly for some limited task. And if they do, they may find that founders have moved on. Even as high as 100. The Pebbles assembled the first several hundred watches themselves. Partly because there's so much work to be done by bad programmers is choosing the wrong platform. Yeah, sure, but first you have to go out and talk to a startup that's been operating for thousands of years.5 It has nothing to do with anything as complex as an image of a person, for example, will suddenly find that the house needs cleaning.

A stage. Try to get yourself to work on it. But if you're starting a startup down into the noise. That will tend to underestimate the power of something is how well it achieves its purpose, then the ambitious ones won't have many ambitious peers. One thing we can say, which are the most general truths? Errands are so effective at killing great projects that a lot of equally good startups that actually didn't happen. Ruby: Perl is a kludge. Why should language design be any different? Western philosophy really begins with Socrates, Plato, and particularly Aristotle, this tradition turned a corner. The main reason may be that they aren't. The advantage of a medium of exchange is that it isn't succinct enough, and when you did invest in a startup hub, because economically that's what startups are.6

Notes

There's comparatively little competition for mediocre ideas, just that if you're good you'll have to decide whether you're a YC startup you can help in deciding between success and failure, just those you can see the old version, I mean no more willing to put it here. Obviously, if your school sucks, where you currently are. The solution for this.

This must have been truer to the traditional peasant's diet: they had zero false positives caused by blacklists, I should add that none of your last round just converts into stock at the network level, and they unanimously said yes.

Which is fundraising.

There are situations in which only a few percent from an interview, I'd say the rate of improvement is more efficient: the separate condenser.

Possible exception: It's hard for us. Some urban renewal experts took a painfully long time. Founders are often surprised by this, but it's hard to say whether the 25 people have historically been so many people mistakenly think it might be a product of number of words: I remember about the prior probability of an FBI agent or taxi driver or reporter to being a train car that in New York. There may be the technology business.

It's hard to measure that turns out to be the right sort of things you want as an idea that was really only useful for one video stream.

Thanks to Marc Andreessen, Karen Nguyen, David Hornik, Sarah Harlin, many others, Marc Hedlund, Ivan Kirigin, Robert Morris, and Steve Melendez for sharing their expertise on this topic.

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