#geological time is terrifying

[swan2swan]

It's very frightening that most deserts are just seas that you missed.

#brrrrrrr #geological time is terrifying #'hi this used to be a beach' #'this was an island' #'this was just a rock with'

[allthebrazilianpolitics]

Brazilian researchers find 'terrifying' plastic rocks on remote island

The geology of Brazil's volcanic Trindade Island has fascinated scientists for years, but the discovery of rocks made from plastic debris in this remote turtle refuge is sparking alarm.

Melted plastic has become intertwined with rocks on the island, located 1,140 km (708 miles) from the southeastern state of Espirito Santo, which researchers say is evidence of humans' growing influence over the earth's geological cycles.

"This is new and terrifying at the same time, because pollution has reached geology," said Fernanda Avelar Santos, a geologist at the Federal University of Parana.

Santos and her team ran chemical tests to find out what kind of plastics are in the rocks called "plastiglomerates" because they are made of a mixture of sedimentary granules and other debris held together by plastic.

"We identified (the pollution) mainly comes from fishing nets, which is very common debris on Trinidade Island's beaches," Santos said. "The (nets) are dragged by the marine currents and accumulate on the beach. When the temperature rises, this plastic melts and becomes embedded with the beach's natural material."

Continue reading.

#brazil #politics #brazilian politics #environmentalism #science #geology #mod nise da silveira #image description in alt

[bokettochild]

Hyrule headcannons because :)

he doesn't actually understand Hylian Sign, he grew up in Calatia and knows their sign, but he's still new to Hylian anything, but since the others don't realize this, he sometimes gets left out of conversations

He's bi-lingual, Calatian and Hylian both, with a small smattering of Labryn

he absolutely loves sweet things, with a preference for sugary items over juicy ones

he tends to save extra non-perishable foods in his bag for a rainy day

he has a favorite type of bug, and yes, it's based off of flavor

he adores butterflies and likes finding out new kinds, because their wings are all so pretty and unique (he will not eat them)

he knows a lot about geology, just not the proper terms. he has his own vernacular for geological happenings, but he has a good grasp on the science of it all outside of that

he's better attuned to magical signatures than the rest of the chain

he likes Wild as a person, but while they share interests and habits, Wild's magic is strongest when he's doing what he loves and because his magic is Very Off-Putting, it makes it hard to be around him for extended periods

he has so many unspoken puns. Pun King. He doesn't think they'd be appreciated by the others, but he's biding his time until they're all comfortable enough with each that it won't matter

his favorite color is yellow because that's how his parents described the sun before Ganon's power corrupted the world

he's very good at weaving, and while art isn't his thing so much, designing new patterns for his fabric is a fun past time when he's very bored

because Hylian culture is new to him, he's been studying it a lot and, unlike the others, has already pieced together a rough timeline

he actually doesn't care much for his fairy form and only uses it when he needs to, mostly because he perfers the freedoms that having a larger body gives him, even if flying is nice

the idea of birds is still very new to him, and he tends to be off-put by bird-song and the sound of wings; the world making noise is still weird to him

while he's okay with having someone treat his wounds, he's very insistent about clean-up afterwards due to his blood being a key to resurrect Ganon. He's not above using Legend's hemophobia as an excuse either, if it gets him out of explaining

a bit of a clean freak in general, he likes to keep his items in perfect condition and organized, even his cave has precise places for everything

while birds are off-putting, he likes feathers, he likes collecting fallen ones to wash and tusk in his bag, not to use on anything particularly, just because they're pretty

he thinks cows are one of the most beautiful creatures in the world (Malon loves it)

he's very particular about gift giving; showing thanks is important, but giving gifts out of the blue feels rude because it makes others feel awkward, still, he'll make sure to return any gift given to him, usually with a particularly pretty feather, rock, or a small woven trinket

during long winters he used to build tiny houses with sticks to entertain himself, and his designs are very intricate at times

his favorite type of food (outside of sweets) is soups, he fully supports food being drinkable and when Wild introduced him to smoothies (sweet and drinkable) he fell in love

he loves art, although he doesn't care to try making it, but legend's sketching and Sky's carving have his full support and awe. Aurora likes to paint as well and he can spend hours just watching her work

he's terrified of babies, he's certain he'd either break them or get them sick or somehow screw them up, so bringing a baby in the room is one of the quickest ways to make him leave

in contrast, he loves cats and handles them like most people do babies

math whizz

#lu hyrule #linked universe #linkeduniverse #headcannons

[church-history]

Geological and Historical Evidence for Jesus’ Crucifixion Account

At Jesus’ crucifixion, Matthew (27:45-54) reported “From noon until three in the afternoon darkness came over all the land. About three in the afternoon Jesus cried out in a loud voice ‘My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?’ (cf., Psalm 22)…And when Jesus had cried out again in a loud voice, he gave up his spirit. At that moment, the curtain of the temple was torn in two from top to bottom. The earth shook, the rocks split and the tombs broke open. The bodies of many holy people who had died were raised to life. They came out of the tombs after Jesus’ resurrection and went into the holy city and appeared to many people. When the centurion and those with him who were guarding Jesus saw the earthquake and all that happened, they were terrified, and exclaimed, ‘Surely he was the son of God!’”

Matthew’s passage includes two events that can be historically and geologically confirmed: (1) Darkness covered the land for three hours (c.f., Matthew 27:45; Mark 15:33; Luke 23:44-45) and (2) An earthquake occurred.

“At that same moment about noontide, the day was withdrawn; and they, who knew not that this was foretold concerning Christ, thought it was an eclipse. But this you have in your archives; you can read it there. Yet nailed upon the cross, Christ exhibited many notable signs, by which his death was distinguished from all others. At his own free-will, he with a word dismissed from him his spirit, anticipating the executioners’ work. In the same hour, too, the light of day was withdrawn, when the sun at the very time was in his meridian blaze. Those who were not aware that this had been predicted about Christ, no doubt thought it was an eclipse.” 

-  Tertullian (197 AD), Jewish Consul

“In the 4th year of the 202nd Olympiad, there was a great eclipse of the sun, greater than had ever been known before, for at the 6th hour the day was changed into night and the stars were seen in the heavens. An earthquake occurred in Bythinia and overthrew a great part of the city of Nicaea.”

- Phlegon (2nd century AD) Greek historian, “Olympiads”

“With regard to the eclipse in the time of Tiberius Caesar, in whose reign Jesus appears to have been crucified, and the great earthquakes which then took place, Phlegon too I think has written in the 13th or 14th book of his Chronicles…Celsus imagines also that both the earthquake and darkness were an invention, but regarding these, we have in the preceding pages made our defense, according to our ability, adducing the testimony of Phlegon, who relates that these events took place at the time when our Savior suffered.” 

- Origen (184 – 253 AD), Greek scholar and early Christian father who confirmed Phlegon’s writings

“Jesus Christ underwent his passion in the 18th year of Tiberius [33 AD]. Also at that time in another Greek compendium we find an event recorded in these words: ‘the sun was eclipsed, Bithynia was struck by an earthquake, and in the city of Nicaea many buildings fell.”

- Eusebius (315 AD), Historian of the Emperor Constantine.

What Caused the Three-hour Period of Darkness?

Before determining that the three-hour period of darkness is due to supernatural causes, we must rule out the natural possibilities. We have experienced natural events that have caused darkness during the daylight hours. These include when volcanoes erupt and emit dark clouds and when storms occur and cover the sky with clouds. Yet no Biblical or secular sources indicate any support for a volcanic explosion or storms, so we can rule out those two natural events.

What about an eclipse? The positioning of the sun and moon is required to answer this question. We have much support for the dating of Jesus’ crucifixion on Friday the 14th of Nissan in the year 33 (April 3, 33). This date was further predicted in the book of Daniel (9). Passovers only occurred during a full moon, so an eclipse would not have been possible due to the moon’s location on the far side of the earth away from the sun. Even if the positioning were conducive to an eclipse, eclipses only darken the earth for short moments, not for three hours, so we have another reason to rule out that natural option.

Is the Best Explanation to Explain this Event a Supernatural Explanation?

I will let readers answer that question for themselves.

Geological Support for the Earthquake                                     

Scholars have reported that devastating earthquakes occurred in Jerusalem during Christ’s death (Mallet, 1853; Rigg, 1941). This occurred in a region that includes the Dead Sea fault, which is a plate boundary that separates the Arabian plate and the Sinai sub-plate (Garfunkel, 1981). This fault has been active since the Miocene (Kagan, Stein, Agnon, & Neuman, 2011) and the fault is still active today (De Liso & Fidani, 2014). The fault extends from the Red Sea in the south to the Taurus Mountains in the north.

Kagan and colleagues (2011) analyzed seismites in the Holocene Dead Sea basin by constructing two age-depth chronological models based on atmospheric radiocarbon ages of short-lived organic debris with a Bayesian model. Seismites are sedimentary beds and structures, which are deformed by seismic shaking. The scholars analyzed seismites in different areas of the basin, finding that several synchronous seismites appeared in all sections during particular years, including 33 AD (+/- 2 sigma; 95% confidence interval). Other years in which earthquakes occurred as evidenced by seismites are (AD unless otherwise noted): 1927, 1293, 1202/1212, 749, 551, 419, 33, 31 BC, and mid-century B.C.

After analyzing laminated sedimentary cores recovered at the shores of the Dead Sea, Migowski, Agnon, Bookman, Negendank, and Stein (2004) also confirmed an earthquake in 33 AD with a magnitude of 5.5. They documented earthquakes around 33 AD in 31 BC and 76 AD. The scholars analyzed seismites using radiocarbon dating.

Ben-Menahem (2014) conducted a literature review of empirical studies over 4,000 years of seismicity along the Dead Sea Rift. The scholar referenced the aforementioned studies along with one by Enzel, Kadan, and Eyal (2000) before concluding that earthquakes occurred in Masada in 31 BC, Jerusalem in 33 AD, and near Nablus in 64 AD.

In summary, the literature on seismicity along the Dead Sea basin supports the assertion that an earthquake occurred either in or very close to the year 33 AD.

We can pinpoint the date even closer – to April 3, 33. A United States government federal agency, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, has documented the major earthquakes throughout history. According to their website (NOAA.gov), in 33 AD, an earthquake occurred at the crucifixion of Jesus Christ in Bithynia and Palestine and Palestine, Jerusalem.

Conclusion

In summary, we have extensive extra-biblical support for the accounts of darkness and the earthquake during Jesus’ crucifixion. Taken together, these events support the historicity of the account of Jesus’ crucifixion.

source: abbreviated from  https://christian-apologist.com/2019/01/05/geological-and-historical-evidence-for-jesus-crucifixion-account/

#church history #catholic #Christian #crucifixion #good friday #geology #origen #eusebius #tertullian #phlegon

[underwaterbanshee]

So, I've been living in a memory from my childhood as I watch my preternatural predators fuck around.

When I was twelve, my family went on vacation to Arches National Park in Moab, Utah. My siblings were nine, six, and two, but all of us hiked up to the picturesque vista with the Delicate Arch at the top with our parents.

What isn't in all the beautiful photographs of this amazing natural geological marvel is the terrifying drop from the cliff behind it. It's clear, when you're up there, that you need to approach the edge, that's just about thirty feet to the right of Delicate Arch, carefully.

Imagine, for a second, that your six year old sibling has the energy of Jaysohn, and loves running and jumping off of rocks. And they bolt. Running as absolutely as fast as they can, towards the edge of a sharp cliff, with a several hundred foot drop.

I'll never forgot the loudest shout in the world in which my dad shouted, "[Jaysohn], STOP!"

My sibling froze literally one foot away from the edge of the cliff as that respected fear jolted through them and my dad scooped them up in the tightest hug possible.

Watching Jaysohn and Lila with Tula has been difficult at times. They love their mother but they don't always respect her. I spent a good five and half episodes waiting for the Delicate Arch to show up, Tula to shout to them to stop, and for her to be ignored. The terror I felt at twelve, watching my sibling race headlong towards danger, all of us shouting their name and being ignored, has sat in my throat as I watch these baby stoats do stupid baby shit while disregarding Tula's efforts to give them advice to keep them safe.

I know why they dismiss her with the arrogance of youth.

Tula lives in and with fear. It informs all of her decisions. The problem, from her children's point of view, is that Mama is afraid of Nothing.

Every situation that could harm them, Mama has knocked out of the way with her Divine Smite. Mama is so capable. Mama, the tooty lil slut, is a goddess who can protect them from all consequences because she has always done that.

Except Tula is finally in a situation where there are just too many people, all of them with power, and none of them care about her or her children.

Tula's relief after Thorn tells Jaysohn that if he sees him jump off another rock--he'll kill him, is that of a mother who hopes that maybe some consequences--some of that respect with the slightest fear, will make her children pause before they open their mouths or run towards the next, shiny thing--is palatable after six episodes.

There was so much delicious in this episode as this family continues to fuck around and break things as they set their beliefs and refine their goals.

#burrow's end #burrow's end spoilers #dimension 20 #dimension 20 spoilers #i feel like i say this with every side quest #but we need more episodes with these stoats #the train is moving too fast on the rails

[snekinnatenk]

Here’s a drawing of one of the flagship monsters of my worldbuilding project, a Vermiform Heron. I never actually finished this one, and this exact design may be outdated soon. Kinda surprised I never posted it.

Herons, named after their passing resemblance to the bird, are without question the most powerful non-unique creatures on all of Kallehast. Their nigh-unique ability to bend gravity, one of the most bloodhungry forms of esotericism, is reflected in their diet. Exclusively feeding on creatures with magic-rich blood, herons are terrifying mage-eaters capable of effortlessly snatching and devouring even a master esotericist like its namesake would a frog. Folk of the rural frontier, however, see herons as a boon- they are of little interest to the beast themselves. Hunting by sight, herons loiter at great altitudes, outpacing their own sound on the attack and striking without warning. They are the reason for the one trait shared by all esoteric beasts of Kallehast- a deep-seated, instinctual fear of open fields, where the sky can see them. This makes the farmlands around rural settlements like a soft barrier for the nastier creatures with a taste for people, which tend to be magical in nature. In ancient times, many cultures saw herons as divine agents, falling like a comet upon the predators of man as though sent by the gods. Those eaten by herons themselves would not have had such fabulous stories to tell. Modern academics know better, now knowing herons not to be angels, but descendants of the cosmic kin of true dragons. These primordial greater herons pierced the Firmament at the height of the Draconic Era millions of years ago, devouring them to the last in what can only be called a geological wink. Our modern herons, unable to grow fat off the same blood their parents so greedily gorged themselves on, are mere echoes of this past era. Despite this, they are monster enough.

#artists on tumblr #art #my art #artwork #drawing #traditional art #illustration #worldbuilding #monster design #cascade

[semperintrepida]

At least for me, every single book I've ever written (12 so far) has seemed so big and monstrous when it only existed inside me that I could not even imagine, at first, how to begin writing it. I have torn my hair out in stages over every book, and with every book there were moments when I thought I'd never finish it, or worse, that I was simply not good enough yet to pull it off (possibly actually true). I genuinely believe that variously-attributed quote: "You never learn how to write a novel, you only learn how to write this novel." I have felt, every time, like I was starting over as a beginner. You learn to live in that space between the perfect and the real. Walking that fence keeps you hungry, keeps you turning over the things you're obsessed with until, like the rock tumblers we geologically inclined children loved, eventually those concepts begin to gleam with clarity and color. But they will never be perfect. They will always have lumps and pockmarks. That's why working writers write [for] their whole lives, chasing that book that says it the way you meant it, a grail that is always in the next castle. We are Lancelots, not Galahads. And it's almost worse if you do come close and write something incredibly good, because that next castle can become terrifying, paralyzing. Doing it again can feel impossible. This is another high-level writer spell I didn't get until I had a big hit: it's far easier to say fuck the haters, I'm gonna knock out the next one like a motherfucking prizefighter than to whisper everyone loved this, and I don't remember how I did it. The point is, the race is long. It is never about only one book, unless you get well and truly paralyzed and only ever write one. What keeps me going in the long dark deadlines of my soul when I think my old professor was right is the hope that someday I will write something as good as I hoped it would be when the idea first landed in my brain. I won't; the rabbit races forever in front of me. But sometimes, just sometimes, I can smell it as I run.

—Catherynne Valente, "Between the Perfect and the Real: On Writing Part 2"

#catherynne valente #on writing #commonplace book

[laundrybiscuits]

I've recently been tagged in a few WIP/"last thing you've written" type games, and…to be completely candid, I haven't been writing any kind of fic lately because I've become a little bit obsessed with analyzing the Broadway revival of Merrily We Roll Along.

Not for any particular purpose, I just saw it at the Hudson a little while back and have a lot of feelings about it! In my tiny scraps of spare time, I've been working on an essay about Merrily and inevitability that will probably end up rotting in my google docs*, because that's how I approach writing as a hobby.

There's just so much there, holy shit. I'm focusing particularly on "Franklin Shepard, Inc." because Radcliffe's Charley brings a frenetic, desperate vulnerability to the performance that reads so, so differently from earlier productions. Throughout the show, I was consistently blown away by the heavy lifting Radcliffe, Mendez, and Groff do in shifting the core tension from "art vs commerce" (fine but basic, and difficult to keep modern) to "how people prioritize different types of relationships in their lives."

In an effort to make this slightly less wildly off-topic for this blog: this has gotten me thinking about the way that platonic relationships are treated in narratives, particularly but not exclusively in fandom.

"Found family" is and has always been a popular trope, but I do think its current incarnation trades a lot on the underlying fantasy of relationship permanence. When we recategorize friendships as familial relationships, we're making a claim—whether or not it's justified—about the indelibility of those relationships.

That's not inherently bad (or, god forbid, problematic). I think it's very very natural, especially for those who don't necessarily have a lot of experience with the way adult friendships change over time. Why wouldn't you want something as precious and unique and amazing as a good friendship to stay with you forever?

Certain people can feel like pillars of your world, and it's fucking terrifying to think about that being yanked out from under you—or even worse, to think about your lives slowly shifting like geologic plates until suddenly you realize it's been weeks, then months, then years since you last really talked.

CHARLEY: We're not that kind of close any more, the way we used to be. And a friendship's like a garden. You have to water it and tend it and care about it. And you know what? I want it back.

It's a peculiar, particular kind of grief when it happens, because even though it's a fairly common human experience, it doesn't get socially acknowledged in the same way as e.g. a romantic breakup.

So yeah, it makes a lot of sense that found family is a popular trope in all kinds of media, not just fandom.

However...at this point, I've developed a knee-jerk wariness to the phrase "found family," because I've found it often correlates with a really flat, simplistic depiction of human relationships. In extreme cases, it simply recontextualizes a relationship within the socially acknowledged/acceptable framework of a stereotypical family unit.

This does a disservice to familial and nonfamilial relationships alike. Every family is different, so why do so many found families in media look the same?

(I was monologuing about this to my very patient girlfriend, and she pointed out that this also sets up a success/failure binary condition in relationships, where permanence is the arbiter of success in both romantic and nonromantic contexts. She is of course both beautiful and correct!)

I have friends with whom I can sometimes share a glance and know exactly what they're thinking. I even have a running joke with one friend about the sheer number of times we've said the same thing in unison over the last 15 years. I still need to be intentional about building those relationships, extending empathy when we differ, and carving out time to reconnect. Truly intimate long-term relationships of any kind involve disagreements, conflicting priorities, and negotiating and renegotiating boundaries.

Being "basically the same person" or "sharing a braincell" actually sounds super fucking lonely to me, personally, and it handily elides the difficult, essential process of keeping people in your life.

FRANK: Old friends let you go your own way. CHARLEY: Help you find your own way. MARY: Let you off when you're wrong. F: If you're wrong. C: When you're wrong. M: Right or wrong, the point is, old friends shouldn't care if you're wrong. F: Should, but not for too long. C: What's too long?

That's a more complicated and much more mature narrative to tell than "friendship will save the day!" Because it's not that common and there's not a deep bank of references to draw from, it takes a lot of effort and skill to depict well, and I don't blame creators for not wanting to let it suck up all the air in the room. However, I think it's important to acknowledge that platonic relationships can also be flanderised and flattened.

In the context of fandom, which has always traded heavily in Romance genre conventions, I would really like to see more thoughtful explorations of complicated nonromantic relationships. I'm not even talking about genfic here! I've actually been thinking about Stobin specifically because that relationship (rightly & understandably) tends to show up in any Steve-centric fic, including the vast ocean of Steddie fics, so it makes the issue slightly more visible than I've seen in other fandoms.

I'm not saying I want to see them fight, or not be friends, or not love each other fiercely and near-obsessively in the way that lonely teenagers can. I'm just saying I want them to be distinct individuals who view the world in very different ways, and choose each other anyway. They already have a complicated past; I know from personal experience that it's possible as a lesbian to be best friends with a guy who once made a little speech about how into you he was, but that little layer of history never quite goes away.

I don't want frictionless relationships in my life. I want people who will challenge me and whom I can challenge, in the context of love and trust. I want people in my life whom I have to work to understand, because my life is richer when I do. And sometimes, I want narratives that will reflect the grief of friendships that are no longer part of my life, despite the best efforts of everyone involved.

In Merrily, Charley sings, "Friendship's something you don't really lose—" but Radcliffe's thready, pleading delivery makes it all too clear: Charley already knows he's lying. The audience just needs to catch up.

*Other essays in that particular graveyard: understanding the cast of Peanuts through the lens of anomie, humor and subversive linguistic nationalism in 00s Singaporean TV, how to fix Miss Saigon. WHY am I this way.

#side note: how fucking good was Radcliffe in that role? what a glow-up from HTSIBWRT #all the casting was brilliant but (Tony winner!) Mendez and (Tony nominated) Groff were less of a dark horse #anyway I think...I might start to get a little less rigid about letting myself dump nonfandom or fandom-adjacent posts here #we'll see if I have more time to post and/or write once this busy period at work dies down #recently is a relative term btw. I have been tagged more recently than the cambrian explosion. so that counts. #I appreciate the tags and it's very nice of y'all to think of me though!

[czascornertfs]

A Defector's Story

[DISCLAIMER: Some anon requested this, and I honestly found the idea pretty interesting to explore outside of the usual sexual stuff I write on here. ALSO this is in no way portraying North Korea in a glorifying way, and the story below is purely for fantasy. I do not condone anything North Korea is doing, and I still wish for their citizens' liberation from tyranny.] ------------------------------------------------------------------------------

"곧 우리 중 하나가 될 것입니다..."

The soldier's tone was firm, his low voice drilling itself into Hans Moretti's ears...along with a cold sharp pain in his neck. Hans had found himself deep in the hermit kingdom's countryside after he answered a call about some "strange geological phenomena". A brilliant geoscientist, he and a few of his associates flew into Pyongyang a week earlier, but Hans was assigned a solo trip to some random forest. As he was mapping the area, a group of soldiers gradually formed a small crowd, curious at the strange sight of survey tools and a man who absolutely did not belong. And Hans was annoyed. Even more so when some of the soldiers began stepping into the survey area and walking past him while making silly faces. He was fine with it, until one of them purposefully made him trip and fall to the ground. In a fit of rage (and a good dose of being absolutely terrified at being watched in a country like North-fucking-Korea), he grabbed the soldier by the collar and threw him to the ground. His comrades rushed to his aide, as two others quickly pulled Hans aside to where he was now. The jab to his neck felt immensely painful, as he felt his vision slowly darken and his knees buckle to the ground. As he stared up, he saw the sneering face of the soldier above him, spitting in his face just before he drifted off to sleep. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------

As he awoke many hours later, he found himself in some strange building. He found himself sleeping on some cold hard wooden bench, as he sat up and shifted his boots on the floor. W-wait, boots? Hans immediately got up as he found himself wearing some sort of uniform, very much like the one the soldiers wore. He looked at his hands trying to see if they did something to him when he noticed how much callus they had. Sure, he worked with the earth, but these felt different, as did his skin color which had now developed a sort of tan. Holding his hand out against the sunlight, he stared in disbelief as he felt his breaths become deeper. He had somehow turned into one of them.

"아-아니... 므-뭐...?" Hans felt his voice tremble as he heard how different he sounded. Gone was his usually higher-pitched tone, replaced with a deeper, gruffier one. He tried speaking English to himself but all that came out were a jumbled series of syllables barely resembling a "This can't be real". "You enjoying yourself?" He heard a voice speak in English from the opposite side of the room as he tilted his head towards it. It was the soldier he pushed to the ground. He knew the sounds, but for some reason it made zero sense to him. Finally the soldier laughed as he repeated himself in Korean, to which Hans responded by shaking his head and slapping himself in the face to see if this was all some nightmare. "동무, 모든 것을 잊어버리라고 명령합니다." (Comrade, I order you to forget everything.")

As soon as the soldier spoke those words, a piercing headache erupted within Hans's head as he literally felt his brain start rewiring itself. Tears flowed down his face as he started forgetting more and more about his past life, now slowly being replaced with memories of growing up in the harsh environment. He remembered the brutal cold of winters gone by, and how he and his comrades remained so close together in the barracks to pass the time trapped indoors by the winds and pelting rain. Soon enough, he started forgetting his own name. Hans...

Han...

Hanj...

Han-jae.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Hans's colleagues were informed that his survey had been completed and had flown back earlier than expected to his home country, and they were none the wiser. Hans was kind of a loner after all. Meanwhile, Han-jae was back at the barracks, standing outside ready to greet whatever tourist was intrepid enough to visit his country.

He scrutinizes every face that passes by, his head filled with nothing but the commands of his superiors and...well nothing else really.

“동무, 혀를 내밀어보세요!” (Comrade, stick your tongue out!) It was spoken in a condescending and mocking tone, yet he was compelled to follow through with it. After all, he was a good soldier, and he certainly didn't want to disappoint his superiors by insubordination.

But deep inside his mind, a piece of the old Hans remained, itching to find it's way out by any means possible. And only a few weeks later, a chance encounter would help him escape.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------

It was when a couple of tourists came to the barracks to take some pictures when he saw it: an iPhone. The image of the phone suddenly materialized itself in Han-jae's mind as slowly but surely, hazy memories of his past self came back.

It had been so long since he thought about such things, and Han-jae simply stared in quiet contemplation. Sure, he still had zero clue who he was, but he sure as hell knew he had to leave. Hans was all but gone, but Han-jae knew he had something to do about these memories as curiosity about the outside world became overwhelming. He had to leave.

And so a day later in the dead of night, he managed to escape his barracks and made a long and dangerous trek up to the Yalu River, managing to avoid suspicion and being spotted by the patrolmen who guarded the border. After crossing it by sunrise, he secretly hopped on some train where he was greeted by a few scared English and French tourists who just had a trip to his country a few hours back. After some failed attempts at communication, Han-jae was locked in one of the roomettes by the authorities, along with the other tourists who stayed to help this defector. One of them was especially fond of Han-jae, giving him some food and water, and a small wipe for the rivers of sweat rolling down his face. After being handed a small tablet, Han-jae stared at it in pure confusion before some of the people on board with him slowly and eagerly taught him how to use it. Opening the translator, he typed out something with shaky fingers before giving it to one of the tourists with a shy smile.

"반갑습니다. 고맙다."

Han-jae was free. Sighing sharply to himself, he laid his head back on the seat and chuckled silently.

"씨발...."

#male tf #reality change #racial change #male transformation

[wingsofhcpe]

Oh tell me about the fifth season I’m intrigued 👀👀

RIGHT OKAY SO real quick rundown from what I remember, after I'm done studying I'll shoot you a DM if you wanna hear more!

The Fifth Season is the first book in the Broken Earth trilogy by NK Jemisin. The main premise is that people live in a continent that's very geologically active (volcanoes, earthquakes, etc etc) and because of that they're just... used to it. Any day they expect a catastrophic geological event that will lead to a post-apocalyptic series of years that will realistically claim thousands of lives every time. These events are called Seasons, and there's already been a bunch of them (records of each at the back of the book!). So people just kinda live with that knowledge and organise their society around it.

Now, the big deal is that some people are born with Earth magic, the ability to control, predict and prevent such disasters. They're called Orogenes, and you'd think they'd be revered... but they're not. They're seen as monsters, exactly because they can also cause those disasters. There's a special school of them and all but it's mostly like a holding pen for them, they're also assigned special human handlers who are equipped to kill them should they go rogue. So it's also very much a social commentary.

The real geological horror element, though, comes from two things: first, the Obelisks, mysterious massice stone structures that just... low-key float around in the sky and are generally horribly ominous, often associated with Seasons. Second, the stone people (who iirc have a name, I just can't recall it rn). Human-like beings that are ...basically stone/gem, though, not organic. They feed exclusively on rock and are actually fuckihg terrifying exactly because not much is known about them. I can't really describe either of these more without massive spoilers though, so I'll avoid it in case you wanna read it.

There's also an ot3 queer storyline somewhere in there but it's not the focus. Pretty cool though!

As for triggers, please be warned for violence, genocide, bigotry, extreme death mostly through natural disasters, possible genocide, and child abuse. Off the top of my head.

....this was supposed to be a quick rundown but I ended up writing down pretty much all I can remember about the books huh! Anyway, I still haven't read the 3rd book but the first two were GREAT and I can't wait to get the final one and see where this story goes. I think I'd put the first book especially among my Top 10 Fave Reads in general. Hope I sold it to you too! :D

#turns out i love talking about books. who could've thought. also now i wanna reread the first book #the fifth season #n k jemisin #staliaofatreides #mar's book rambles

[bestworstcase]

So what sort of stuff do you think Salem has been doing over the millennia (Or millions of years as you've stated on this blog, though I think that the god of Darkness showed up a few years later and either just brought a bunch of people back to life or created some from scratch and that it's been more on the thousands of years scale)? Seems like she could have been rampaging around with an army and letting the grimm naturally find the relics. Maybe she had some vacation years enjoyed the beach.

tangent but the reason i figure millions is this passage in ‘the two brothers:’

With that, the God of Darkness brought forth earthquakes and volcanoes that tore his brother’s continent apart into smaller lands, boiled the oceans, rained fire and ash, and wiped out all the living things.

…which is an unambiguous description of a supercontinent being broken apart via plate tectonics, mixed together with a description of what is clearly the moonfall. this is the creation myth of a religion that has to have been around for at least a couple thousand years and could only have been founded by ozma; so the apocalyptic narrative presumably draws from what salem told him about the end of the world as she witnessed it.

boiling seas, raining fire, and a mass extinction are all accurate to what the immediate aftermath of the moonfall bombardment would have entailed—it follows that the accurate descriptions of plate tectonics are also there because salem lived through the separation of a single contiguous landmass into the present-day continents (and drew a correct conclusion about volcanic and seismic activity being correlated to the movement of the land). using the earth’s geological history as an approximate ruler this would make her somewhere in the neighborhood of two hundred million years old.

regardless, i figure she spent the vast majority of the period between the massacre and ozma’s return just sort of… drifting around in an aimless haze. the way jinn describes her approach to the pool of grimm seems pretty telling: “until fate lead her back to the land of darkness” very much makes it sound like salem had no idea where she was until she saw the dark lake.

(of course, if it had been millions of years, the surrounding lands would have changed quite radically and there wouldn’t be any recognizable landmarks left even if she was paying attention to where she was going; but also, there’s nothing for her to go to anywhere in the world, so why would she care where she ended up?)

after her transformation, but before ozma found her, she… well she inspired stories of a terrifying sorceress deep in the wilderness, but in practice she lived alone in a hovel in the woods at the end of a very nice stone footpath, so she seems to have actually been living within walking distance of the nearest settlement and in regular enough contact with them for somebody to be maintaining that path, and given the state of her house “somebody” probably wasn’t salem. which means it was someone in town, which means that building a nice stone footpath to the witch’s house and keeping it in good condition was considered a worthwhile investment by her neighbors, which says “village witch” pretty plainly. she may have been cranky and antisocial, but she was helpful enough that people paved a road to get to her.

and then after the murderdivorce, well. ozma spooks at every grimm but ozpin is, in V2-3, almost hilariously unprepared for salem to actually deliver an attack, despite seeing the warning signs months in advance—because he expects her to operate in total secrecy, something she very much does not do.

to me, this suggests that ozma has spent quite a long time attributing ordinary conflicts and normal grimm behaviors to salem while salem… ignored him, or at most kept tabs on him from afar and intervened whenever it looked like he might be thinking about ushering in the day of judgment; i think she’s probably spent most of that time painfully aware of the blade hanging over her neck and trying to figure out how to avoid being the sole survivor of the second apocalypse and whatever innovative new methods of torture the gods have cooked up for her in the thousands or millions of years they’ve been nursing their grudge against her.

preventing ozma from fulfilling his mandate by disrupting whatever coalitions he’s able to scrape together is only a temporary stopgap; she has no guarantee that he won’t eventually get tired and apathetic enough to bring the relics together and be done with it.

capturing one or more of the relics would galvanize him to offensive war against her and she would need to devote a great deal of time, effort, and resources to defending it instead of focusing on the larger problem of defeating the gods—and it would probably result in a never-ending cycle of face-to-face confrontations with ozma himself, whom she doesn’t want to be present in her life at all. (“why do you keep coming back?”)

so the best course of action is to hammer out a viable plan for dealing with the gods, or find a way to destroy the relics, or perhaps ideally both, and THEN make her move—kill ozma, flatten his alliance, seize all four relics, and then get rid of the relics or the gods or both, before he has the chance to return and protract the conflict. i think this is probably why her campaign has moved so fast (she’s hit three of the four academies in less than two years!) and why she exploded when she learned that ozma had reincarnated so quickly; she was counting on him being gone until it was over.

as for why she’s moving now, i increasingly don’t think it’s because she has all her dominoes lined up and ready to go; i figure she looked at what ozma did to end the great war and realized she was running out of time.

he used the sword of destruction to lay waste to his enemies and made every leader on that battlefield bend the knee, then used his political and martial power to forge a unified global order. “you said we needed to bring humanity together; in order to do that, we have to spread our word, and destroy those who would deny it.” when salem gave him that advice he recoiled, but she was… not wrong, in the strategic sense; you cannot unite the entire world behind one banner, one creed, except by genocidal tyranny, that is the logical endpoint of ozma’s ideology and salem lays it out for him very plainly.

and he’s spent thousands of years unwilling to countenance it. but the great war pushed him to a breaking point. he didn’t go all the way—he set up a global democracy instead of ruling the world as its emperor—but he took a lurching step in that direction, and it paid off for him. the global coalition lasted for eighty years before the cracks really began to show. this is the closest he has ever been to success, and even if salem were to knock it down or let it run its course until it collapsed under its own weight, he’s going to remember that the sword worked, and he has gotten so, so good at rationalizing each little baby step down the road to tyranny. how long will it take for him to get desperate enough to take the next? how many more of his lifetimes can she trust his fear and diminishing moral scruples to keep him shying away from his inevitable endgame?

and i think that is what salem had gnawing in the back of her mind when she met summer rose and saw an opportunity.

#i have zero doubt that salem believes #1. ozma WILL summon his god eventually #and 2. the world WILL be condemned #and 3. she WILL be left alive and subjected to further punishment #because like why would she think otherwise. lmao

[rebeccathenaturalist]

I recently finished reading Marcia Bjornerud's Timefulness: How Thinking Like a Geologist Can Help Save the World. In it, she explores how geology introduced us to the idea of deep time, where we consider our place in the world not merely in the few thousand years of human civilization, or even the couple hundred thousand years of our own species' existence, but instead the seemingly unfathomable stretch of 4.5 billion years in which the Earth has been spinning.

It's not just a matter of making us humble, though that's certainly a piece of it. More importantly, I think, is the context we find ourselves in when we see ourselves as one young species existing at about two-thirds of the way through the Earth's window of opportunity to support life. That's right: life has existed for a little over four billion years. And in another two billion years, the sun will have expanded enough to evaporate all the water on the planet, rendering life as we know it impossible. Anything that might survive that won't be able to get through the increased greenhouse effect as the Earth's surface heats up dramatically.

Sure, that can be depressing to think about. But it's not two billion years from now. We are in this moment now, with most of us are so finely focused on profit for the now (or just surviving paycheck to paycheck) that the idea of delayed results is practically anathema. Obviously we can't just force everyone to expand their understanding of time. A lot of people have to get over the fear that if they don't acquire and everything they can get right now, they won't have enough in the future. Look at how many argue against investing resources into the collective younger generations because something about “Well, they shouldn't get handouts and nobody gets anything for free”; asking them to look at the cumulative positive effects of a more highly educated population of adults in the future won't break most of them out of their selfishness.

Bjornerud is asking us to step out of our little time bubbles into a scarier, more exhilarating worldview in which we are not the pinnacle of evolution or the chosen species—a timeline that is nearly terrifying in its immensity. But we face that existential fear because just as time has stretched on for billions of years before us, so it will stretch on after us for billions of years, and some of those billions will still feature living beings.

It takes courage to do this. And there's also a certain level of compassion and empathy that is required to really consider and act on the reality that what we do now WILL have repercussions for the future (to say nothing of the impacts today.) The Haudenosaunee (Iroquois) concept of considering how today's decisions will affect those seven generations from now is just one example of people consciously choosing to exercise that empathy for people and other beings who don't even exist yet. It means we have to stop centering ourselves in every choice we make, and make sacrifices not only for those we don't know and aren't related to, but whom we will never get to meet.

We are setting this planet up for massive changes that will have ramifications in the thousands—and in some cases tens of thousands—of years. That's barely a heartbeat in geological time, but still time enough for a mass extinction that could include our own species. Will enough of us find our courage and compassion to fight for a future we won't live long enough to be part of? Will we challenge our stubbornly myopic tendency to sacrifice everything on the altar of Profit Now? I'm ever the optimist, and I think it's still possible. Part of that is rethinking how we think of time and its passing, and Timefulness invites us to do just that.

#climate change #global warming #geology #environment #environmentalism #deep time #deep ecology #ecology #conservation #extinction #prehistoric #prehistory #Earth #planet Earth

[batfossil-fr]

I am taking The Step and being a very brave boy and I am going to start setting up my non fr art account. for REAL this time. no “I say I will do this and oops I don’t” it’s For Real and if it’s not up soon you have permission to kick me. I wrote some introduction post the other day that turned into a million page long essay so i’ve gotta like... actually draw shit, instead of just wall of text worldbuilding infodump lmao. I thought, hey let’s give a little primer into my world. and then I immediately went into a rant about geological history i didn’t even GET to the main species until like 2/3 of the way down lmfao

but I have spent too long letting that account haunt the back of my brain. its posting time!!! (I am utterly terrified to post things you have no idea.) but that’s how it goes. soon. maybe this week once i get some exams out of the way. it WILL happen

#also it's not going to be All worldbuilding. like I will do other stuff. but that's probably the bulk of it at least at the start #put it off long enough!!!!!!!!! #i have decided who cares if nobody likes my little brainworms. they are MY brainworms and i love them so much #they are incredibly self indulgent for me personally and if nobody likes that thats okay. because they are everything i like wrapped up into #one wormy little dweeb. and i love that #plus I just. wanna share worldbuilding ideas like why did I even become a paleontologist to NOT use all that information to make other cool #stuff. right!! right. #so I WILL be ranting about geological history and there's nothing you can do about it. i WILL be ranting about the evolution of these fellas #it is my space to Go Ham instead of just storing it all in my brain like i've always done. now you can come along for the ride #but i can't rant more tonight lol my head is killing me. but i am making a PROMISE. it will be soon. it will be within a couple days #no more stalling!!! #rambles #and please god i will try not to infodump everything i need to actually draw accompanying shit lmao

[lrenvs3000w24]

The World of Volcanoes

For this week’s post we were asked to share what we thought was the most amazing thing about nature. So, this week I am going to be talking about the fascinating world of Volcanoes. 

My interest with volcanoes began to simmer during a volcanic hazard and risk assessments class I took last semester. The course delved into the intricate mechanisms of volcanic activity, from the formation of magma chambers to the eruption dynamics that shape landscapes and lives. Each lesson unfolded like a page from a thrilling novel, revealing the intricate dance of geological forces that govern our planet. Not only did I really enjoy the professor teaching the course but I also enjoyed the content and activities we did. Some of the fun labs we did were observing real magma and rocks from volcanic eruptions and volcanic wine tasting! Although this class taught me a lot about volcanoes I had never really seen one in person. That quickly changed over this reading week. As I got the chance to visit Volcan Ceboruco located in Nayarit, Mexico while visited family there. 

Picture of Volcan Ceboruco I took

It wasn't until I set foot at the bottom of Volcan Ceboruco that my fascination erupted into full-blown awe (like a volcano). Towering over the surrounding landscape, Ceboruco stands as a silent sentinel, a testament to the raw power lurking beneath the Earth's surface. As I walked through the rugged terrain, I couldn't help but marvel at the sheer magnitude of the volcano's last impactful eruption, which occurred in 1870. 

The eruption of Volcan Ceboruco in 1870 was a cataclysmic event that reshaped the surrounding landscape and left a lasting impact on the region. The volcano unleashed a cascade of viscous dacitic lava, which flowed down its slopes like molten rivers of fire, consuming everything in its path. Villages were engulfed, forests decimated, and the very earth trembled beneath the force of nature's fury (Granyia, 2019).

Today, the scars of that eruption are still visible, preserved in the hardened lava flows and leftover magma nearby. You don’t even have to be near the volcano to grasp the seriousness of the eruption and the extent of its impact. As you can see leftover rocks and magma from the eruption along the highway. CHECK IT OUT! As I explored the remains of the eruption, I couldn't help but feel a sense of reverence for the power of nature – a power that is both beautiful and terrifying at the same time.

Video I took on the highway near Volcan Ceboruco

Standing among the remains of Volcan Ceboruco's last eruption, I was reminded of the fragility of our existence and the amazing forces that shape our world. It is a humbling experience, one that fills me with a sense of wonder and curiosity about the mysteries that lie beneath the surface of our planet, the things we cannot see in nature. 

As I reflect on my journey into the heart of Volcan Ceboruco, I am filled with gratitude for the opportunity to witness nature's beauty up close. It is a reminder that, despite our advances in science and technology, there is still so much we have yet to learn about the world around us. And perhaps, in that lies the greatest wonder of all – the endless pursuit of knowledge and understanding in the face of the unknown.

What do you think of volcanoes? Would you ever visit one? How about an active volcano?

Granyia. (2019, December 12). Sent ash around the world – volcán CEBORUCO, Mexico. volcanohotspot.wordpress.com. https://volcanohotspot.wordpress.com/2019/12/12/sent-ash-around-the-world-volcan-ceboruco-mexico/

[bardockarts]

Autobot/Decepticon concepts that got a titch out of hand. Extra notes that wouldn’t fit:

Greenthumb is pleasant enough, though soft spoken and introspective (as befits a covert operative). He is extremely, mind-numbingly patient after countless millennia in a customer service job, and carries out orders with very little spontaneous thinking. He’s a little bit of a known gossip and source of information for the Autobots, as all the world’s plants are his informants (he merely has to seek them out). He indulges in idle speculative chatter because reminds him of better days back on Cybertron, where he would regularly set aside time from his plant nurseries to grind the rumor mill with friends who are now long dead. The occasional low-key kaffeeklatsch with fellow Autobots is a welcome chance to emulate old normalcy in very abnormal times. He cares very much for Earth’s plants, and keeps a modest nursery in his quarters. Some of his greenery is even from Cybertron— precious few remnants of flora from their dead or dying world.

When confronted in open combat, however unlikely, Greenthumb becomes loud and boisterous and nigh-suicidally aggressive. It’s a hysterical tactic to cover the fact that he’s terrified. He would give his Spark for Optimus- fully believing Autobots are the best chance for Cybertron’s restoration- but he’s scared out of his mind at the prospect of dying in a war that he didn’t want to begin with. He’s a reluctant draftee, in a sense, who reluctantly fell into the war after the Decepticons took Polyhex and he became a refugee. Many times on solo information missions he has thought about ditching the war on Earth and hiding as a human vehicle until it all blows over, but he cannot muster the courage or the cowardice to leave his fellow Autobots.

Concrete is a big, tough, smack-talking bruiser. He builds stuff, breaks stuff, that sort of thing— Megatron (or a myriad of other ‘Con officers down the chain of command) points, and Concrete shoots, no questions asked. He isn’t quite fanatically devoted to the cause, but Concrete well and truly believes in Megatron’s goal of a casteless society and is sure that he’s the best hope for Cybertron’s restoration. Concrete was one of the many miners whom Decepticon ideology freed, and Megatron will forever have the allegiance of his Spark for that. Despite his liberation, Concrete does not take very good care of himself- he is usually both dirtstained and rusty- as he never quite fully escaped the idea that he was not born to tirelessly work until he broke apart and then die when he could no longer perform his role.

After arriving on Earth, Concrete developed a penchant for rocks and considers himself something to an amateur geologist. Organic rocks (a la limestone, coal, shale) are something of a curiosity to him, and he has even abandoned missions or gone AWOL to seek out samples or take geological surveys. He is mildly embarrassed about his scientific interest, as his processor ought to be on the destruction of Megatron’s enemies and eradication of humanity, and yet he cannot help his intrigue. Still, he is by no means soft just because he is curious. He will happily blast apart an unwary Autobot for the glory of Megatron and the furtherance of the Decepticon cause.

#Greenthumb (oc) #concrete (oc) #transformers

[quaranmine]

Utah Resident here- I’ve lived p much my whole life in Utah, and nearly every summer here has had one bad fire or another. I have vivid memories of watching smoke billow over the tops of the mountains I lived next to, or driving past massive columns of the stuff while on the way to a trip in southern Utah (we lived in the north, but have a cabin in the south and visited frequently). The Brian Head fire was just over the mountain from our little cabin, and I remember having to leave a trip there a few days early for fear of our whole campground being overtaken by the fire. There were a lot of evacs that year, and a lot of the trees on the north side of the Brian Head Ski Resort are still charred black from where the fire hit the worst.

There was another time a few years later, back in Utah valley this time, where we had to evacuate for a night bc the mountain that was just behind our house caught fire. It was much smaller, and the evac wasn’t official, but it still scared me. The fire had gotten under control before it really took hold thankfully, but it really scared me at the time.

There were another two massive fires that happened at the south end of Utah Valley, near Nephi and on the west side of the lake. They happened on separate years but I have vivid memories of both- even a picture floating around somewhere of my little brother and I watching the west lake one burn from a healthy distance.

Not to mention all the days I’ve seen where the sky was completely clouded over with smoke from massive fires in California. It was terrifying to wake up to the smell of smoke and a gray fog that persisted for days, covering up the sun enough you could look directly at it without hurting your eyes.

I’ve seen…. So much fire, and I’m not even that old (early 20’s). I’m thankful most of these fires were put out within a couple of days/weeks, but I think these kinds of fires always gonna be part of living here tbh.

OUGH i'm so sorry you had these experience but also so many of these experiences. you need a break! that sounds so scary!

anyway i looked up the Brian Head Fire and HELLO??? I DID NOT KNOW THIS WAS A THING????

Unbeknownst to Lyman, the fire he started wasn’t just burning the pile of branches above the surface of the ground, it was also spreading underground, creeping through what’s known as duff, a thin layer of composting organic material just above the mineral soil. Lyman said he noticed the “weird looking” burn, which he described as “kind of a drippy burn, like oil or kerosene.”

(source) i've unlocked a new fear lol. no but seriously, despite doing sort of research on the subject for a few months now, I didn't know until I looked up the fire in your ask that fires could burn underground. Even when I googled it, I got a lot of articles about coal seams burning, which I did know about. But I found this article out of Canada that explains the phenomenon well. Basically: "When this happens, it's because there are just enough tiny spaces in the soil and between pieces of wood material to hold oxygen and keep the combustion going. These fires can smoulder metres below the surface."

Fascinating. Some fires can survive the winter like this and pop back up the next season and keep burning.

Anyway, I'm sorry you've had to experience so many fires. I think you are right, though, that fires are always going to be part of living there. Utah is geologically, geographically, and ecologically part of the region that experiences wildfire as a regular part of its natural life. There's a lot of dry montane forests, basin brushland/plains, etc. Now, humans certainly exacerbate this in more ways than one. Humans can cause out of control wildfires through negligence or arson, and humans can more indirectly impact wildfire prevalence through climate change. As the seasons get hotter and dryer, the more severe and common fires might be. But yeah, fires in general cannot (and should not) be eliminated completely. So fire management is a complex task in order to balance natural ecology with (unnatural/extensive) human impact.

in other news, big fan of your state's geography and nature by the way. utah is devastatingly beautiful and i haven't seen enough of it! i also headcanon utah to be basically the same environment as the badlands biome in minecraft, and therefore base my headcanons about Tumble Town in ESMP2 off of it.

#quara asks #hc_firewatch_au #tagged for research etc etc