James Webb Space Telescope and Mundane Space Travel

 The JWST (James Webb Space Telescope) has been in the works for 30 years. A significant portion of that time was spent making sure that it would work in the proper way. Every contingency was accounted for, and solutions were created by smart people to address those contingencies. 

Every space launch has a huge team of experts sitting on the ground, watching their terminals for any chance of a misplay. Going to space is not only expensive; it requires a large amount of highly skilled talent to make sure it works. 

This brings me to what I have noticed most Sci-Fi fiction takes for granted: easy space travel. As easy as driving a car out of the parking lot. When the Millennium Falcon takes off from Tatooine, it's with the same level of care as driving a used car out of a lot. And I think this is a misrepresentation of the danger and criticality of space travel. 

The Challenger explosion was caused by a single rubber O-ring that got too cold before launch. A single point failure on a minor component caused a massive explosion and loss of life. When you are in a car, and you get a flat tire, you can pull over and get it fixed. Airplanes require long checklists to be performed before they take off; anyone who doesn't do that is risking their life. 

Hell, I trained to be a bus driver, and every time you start up a bus you need to go through a fifty item checklist. 

The point I want to make here is that going to space and escaping Earth's gravity requires a lot of energy and a single critical point failure can cause massive damage. Thus, I think that it will be a long time before we see a rust bucket like the Millennium Falcon take off from a sleezy spaceport with as little thought as leaving a driveway. In the real world of space exploration, that's an easy way to die in a fireball. 

My basic premise is that, due to the amount of energy it takes to leave Earth's gravitational pull, a failure would be orders of magnitude more damaging than a car accident, even with super tech like antigravity engines or such. The tiniest error in spaceflight can lead to a Challenger-level explosion. Thus, Sci-Fi depictions of spacecraft are fundamentally flawed in this manner. 

Uzumi and the Seven Great Oaks Chapter 1: Yokai

 

Yokai

“Ah, it’s been a day, hasn’t it?” Greg sat in the passenger seat of his garbage truck with a cigarette in his mouth. Luke was leaning on the window, picking his teeth with a toothpick.

“Too many people throwing away sofas. What do they take us for, Ikea?”

Greg chuckled. “Living in New Yesterday really is a chore.”

“It’s a peaceful city. Got some good bars. We’re lucky not to be living in a dump like Detroit.”

Greg sighed. “Just one more stop and we’re done for the day.” He looked out the window at one of the seven giant oak trees that overlooked the city. Light from the skyscrapers reflected off the mottled surface of each tree. Birds flew overhead, flitting in the breeze. Each tree was covered with white talismans cut in a zig zag pattern. The leaves rustled, the sound floating above the city as an ever-present background. Greg sniffed. “I hope those damn Seeds don’t show up.”

Luke tossed away his toothpick and climbed into the truck. “Why are you saying that? You trying to jinx us?” He started the engine.

A thump reverberated through the vehicle. Metal groaned. Greg swore. “What was that?”
Luke took the gun from beneath the dash. “It sounded like someone hit the roof.”

“What you got the gun for?”

“Just in case.” Luke checked the magazine and snapped the gun back. “I’m going to check it out.” He looked both ways, and then climbed out of the truck.

Greg sat, glued to his seat, tapping his fingers. He watched as Luke looked up from the sidewalk onto the top of the vehicle.

“Oh—” Luke fired off two shots and then his body was ripped into the air. His gun dropped to the ground.

Greg swore again and gunned the engine. Whatever was on the roof rolled off. He gripped the wheel with white knuckles as he careened through the crowded streets.

“Hey, what the hell you doing?” Several drivers honked and cussed at him.

“Sorry, sorry, sorry!” The wheel suddenly jerked to the side. The truck turned over and smashed into a corner deli. Meat and glass flew everywhere. Greg’s seatbelt dug into his body. He spat blood.

The roof bent under the weight of something massive. Greg swore he could hear the thing breathing. Something, it could have been acid, dripped onto the windowsill.

“Oh, no …” Greg closed his eyes and prayed.

The monster on top of the truck screamed. Greg’s body shivered with fear at the sound. It seemed like two beings up there, fighting each other. One was the monster. The other had footsteps that were strange, but much more human.

The monster screeched one more time and then the truck shook. While Greg couldn’t see what was causing the commotion, he did see the concrete crack beneath the weight of something invisible.

A girl wearing black clothing, wielding a samurai sword, landed on top of the invisible monster. She ran her sword through the beast. Greg could see blood spurting out of the invisible beast. That part was visible.

The girl stabbed the beast several more times. She then hopped off the invisible monster. With a flick of her hair, she looked at Greg.

“You saw nothing today.” She held out a stick with paper talismans on it, and swung it back and forth. “You’ll feel better about it when it wears off.” The soft tingling of bells echoed through the street.

Then Greg was in the hands of a paramedic.

“What happened?”

“A drunk driver hit your truck. Your coworker is in critical condition.” The paramedic dragged Greg onto a stretcher. “We don’t know how fast he was going, but he must have been hitting it to cause this much damage.”

Greg rubbed his eyes. He didn’t remember anything about the past half hour.

He chalked it up to a head injury and left it at that.

###

Reese slid her memory talisman into the quiver on her back. She checked her scroll, a small roll of parchment with obsidian scroll rollers. Small Japanese lettering covered the inside. The paper appeared yellowed with age. A holographic picture rose from the open scroll, creating a floating image of the city.

A face appeared.

“Gardo Sensei.” Reese bowed. She looked up to the sky, checked the surroundings, and leaped twenty stories to the top of the nearest skyscraper. She sat down on the edge with her feet dangling off the edge.

“Did you eliminate the yoru beast?” Gardo’s face was grizzled, and his hair was long, white, and frizzy.

“Confirmed kill.”

Several small, turtle-like creatures with human faces popped out from behind a cooling unit and approached Reese. She rubbed their heads.

“Reese! Reese, do you have any peanuts?”

Reese patted the head of the kappa that spoke. “Next time.”\

“Aw, no fair.”

Reese returned her gaze to Gardo. “This one was strange. It attacked a garbage truck for no reason.”

“Yoru beasts usually don’t attack unless no one is watching. I need you to do some investigation into that garbage truck.”

Reese bowed. “As you wish.” She rolled up her scroll. With her high vantage point, she looked over the spot where the garbage truck had tipped over. As she examined the truck, she thought she could sense a faint energy coming from among the bags of trash that had spilled out. She leaped off of the building and landed with a roll on the sidewalk. The shadow of the Ragu tree, the fourth great oak of New Yesterday, was just beginning to cover the street. Reese approached the garbage truck. It was being cordoned by police and firefighters.

Reese slipped through the barrier. No one acknowledged her presence. She walked without noise, her black shoes making no mark on the pavement. Her robe fluttered behind her, and the memory talisman on her back shuffled a bit in the wind. She approached the spot where she had sensed the power.

It was a single bag of trash that had landed some distance away from the others. It bore two claw marks, as if the yoru beast she had just vanquished had been trying to open it.

Reese opened the bag. Trash spilled out, but also something she did not expect to see. A small ruby ball, about the size of a marble, clattered to the ground. Reese picked it up.

The red gemstone sparkled with an amazing radiance. It was as if it were not of this world.

Reese held it up to the light. “Command would love to hear about this.” She placed the gem in her pocket and stood up. With the same level of stealth, she left the enclosure and stepped into an alleyway. She came to a small theater building near New Yesterday’s homeless quarters. The theater looked as if it hadn’t been maintained in years, and yet there was an aura about it, as if it were not everything that it seemed to be. Reese stepped inside. A single woman was sitting behind a counter, reading a magazine. She looked up and nodded.

“Heyo.” She waved. A bookshelf rotated and revealed an elevator cage.

Reese stepped into the elevator. The elevator dipped underground. Soon the walls peeled away to reveal a gigantic space beneath the city, about the size of a football stadium. The buildings were Japanese in construction, full of elegant curves and pointing sweeps. Paper lanterns hung from awnings. Soft yellow light emanated from windows. The streets were lit with a warm glow.

Reese stepped out of the elevator and into the street. Around her walked monsters and yokai of all shapes and sizes, out in the open. Nezumi rat men, tengu crow people, kitsune fox people, and every other variety of civilized yokai were present.

Reese walked towards the tallest building in the cavern, a twenty-story inn with the layering of a fortress. Reese walked up to the entrance. She showed her scroll. The doors opened.

Reese bowed to the headmistress as she walked towards the Grand Master’s room.

She knelt down and knocked on the door to his room.

“Come in.” The Grand Master’s voice was powerful, full of magic and mystery.

Reese slid the door open and bowed before walking inside.

“Uncle.”

“Reese, my dear. I heard you performed admirably today.”

“Uncle, I need you to look at something.”

“Go ahead, my dear.” The Grand Master was wizened, with not much hair, but his presence was powerful. The kimono he was wearing lent him an aura of class. His posture was perfect and he held a dainty cup of tea in his hands. He sipped.

Reese held out the small gem.

The Grand Master’s face went dark. He placed his teacup on the ground. “Where did you find that?”

“In a bag of garbage upside. A yoru beast was trying to get to it, before I vanquished it.”

The Grand Master shook his head. “That is not something you should be handling like that.” He held out his hand. “Give it to me before something bad happens.”

“What is it, uncle?” Reese handed her uncle the gem.

The Grand Master stood up. He took a small black box from a cupboard and placed the gem inside of it. “This is an elemental crystal.”

“I’ve never heard of them.” Reese looked up.

The Grand Master placed the black box on a high counter. “Of course you haven’t. They were thought to be destroyed centuries ago.”

Reese blinked a few times. “Centuries? Then why did I find one in the garbage?”

The Grand Master sighed. “The elemental stones. There were many kinds, and all were powerful. Too powerful. They were determined to be too dangerous and were sealed away. The fact that you found one of them indicates that something, somewhere, out there is moving again.”

“But …” Reese tilted her head. “That can’t be right. If they were all locked up, then where did this one come from?”

“A good question, my dear.” The Grand Master stood up. “I shall do some investigation into this matter. In the meantime, I want you to be on the lookout for more of these stones. And do not tell anyone what you have seen today.”

“Yes, Uncle.” Reese stood up, bowed, and left the room. She left the inn and then took an elevator up to the surface—a different elevator from the one she had taken down. She came up in the industrial district, exiting from a warehouse that was full of merchandise. She walked out onto the street.

A group of thugs approached her. There were five of them, and they appeared to be looking for a rumble.

“You guys need something?” She took up a slight defensive stance.

The middle thug grinned. “Yeah, you’ve got what we want.”

Reese did not hesitate. She took three steps forward and slammed the middle thug’s chin with her palm.

He collapsed.

The four other thugs fanned out.

Reese did a leaping kick and knocked several teeth from the nearest thug. Two other thugs grabbed her.

Reese performed a break maneuver and broke two arms, one for each holding her down. She twisted and landed a blow on the cheek of the thug whose teeth she had shattered.

Three thugs fell to the ground. The last thug, markedly scared, turned tail and ran.

Reese wiped her hands off on the shirt of a downed thug. “Next time,” she pushed back her hair, “don’t try to mug a Seed.” She stood up, smiled, and walked away.

Five minutes later she was sitting at the edge of a tall crane, overlooking the entire city. The Ardus tree was behind her, casting its shadow over her back. Reese took out a pan pipe and began to play. Several crows surrounded her.

“Thanks, Reese!”

“Keep going, Reese!”

They chattered at her as her haunting melody floated over the rooftops.

Don't fear heart problems from the covid vaccine.

If you are afraid of vaccines, please read this post in its entirety before giving a knee-jerk reaction. Vaccines, to me, are a very simple thing, and there is little risk of actual harm stemming from their administration. If you would like to argue that point, please point me to actual academic, peer reviewed  literature, like the one I am referencing in this post. Articles coming from a website do not count, even if they reference actual literature--as you will understand after you read my post. I am not disparaging vaccine hesitancy. I understand the fear that misunderstood medicines can cause--you are injecting substances into your body, after all. Please also do not point me to the Wakefield paper (the one that claimed vaccines cause autism). The Lancet has retracted it. I am open to any kind of discussion as long as it is based in factual evidence and is held in good faith. With that out of the way, let's talk. 

Take a look at this article. It references this study, and claims that up to 1% of people who took the covid vaccine had some sort of heart problem and implies it was due to the vaccine. 

This is wrong. I will explain why in this article. 

Any medicine that causes a 1% rate of severe illness would be seriously unethical to prescribe without acknowledging its effect. The only explanation would be a massive misinformation campaign. And I don't think that's the case. We're not living in that bad of a dystopia. 

The study does claim that "Of the 38,615,491 vaccinated individuals included in our study, 385,508 (1.0%) were admitted to hospital with or died from cardiac arrhythmia at any time in the study period (either before or after vaccination); 86,754 (0.2%) of these occurred in the 1-28 days after any dose of vaccine. Of those who were admitted or died 39,897 (10.3%) had a SARS-CoV-2 positive test, with 29,694 (7.7%) having a positive test before vaccination. There were 7,795 deaths with cardiac arrhythmia recorded as the cause of death (1,108 had a SARS-CoV-2 positive test)."

However, the article leaves out one critical fact about the actual paper. This is every case, regardless of what caused it. Here's what the article actually discovered: that no vaccine caused more than 15 per million extra heart problems. Take it from them. 

"We estimated the number of exposures needed for one excess event and the excess number of events per 1 million exposed for each outcome (Fig. 2 and Supplementary Table 10). In the 1–28 days following the first dose of the ChAdOx1, BNT162b2 and mRNA-1273 vaccine, an extra two (95% CI 0, 3), one (95%CI 0, 2) and six (95% CI 2, 8) myocarditis events per 1 million exposed would be anticipated, respectively. In the 1–28 days following the second dose of mRNA-1273, an extra ten (95% CI 7, 11) myocarditis events per 1 million persons would be anticipated. This compares with an extra 40 (95% CI 38, 41) myocarditis events per 1 million in the 1–28 days following a SARS-CoV-2 positive test." (Patone, Et Al. Emphasis added.)

The translation? Exactly what I said above. The extra symptoms were measured in the PPM (Parts Per Million.) And they were single digit. 

Take a look at this graph. The big tall red one? That's the increased number of symptoms associated with actually catching covid. Those other ones are the two biggest vaccines for their first and second doses. The only one that isn't stacked in favor of covid is Myocarditis, which only breaks the trend by five per million. That's less than a percent of a percent of a percent. .0005%, to be exact. 

And according to the paper, some vaccines actually reduced the chance of serious heart problems. 

Let me explain a little something something about scientific studies; that is, many effects are small, and still can be labeled as "increase" or "decrease." Crucial academic literacy requires that you ask not only "is it significant" but also "is it significantly large or relevant." In this case, I would argue that it is not. There is a difference between statistically and relatively significant and this is one case where that is important.

In conclusion, you don't have to worry that the big bad government is hiding a huge scandal. They're not pushing a dangerous pseudo-drug that causes harm. They're utilizing centuries-old technology to stop a real public menace. Like polio and smallpox, vaccines are the best way to weather a storm like this.

I was an assassin, I had to take my vacation days! Chapter 1: Nerd

 A note on the title. Japanese Light Novels customarily have long and detailed titles. This book's title is made to emulate that.

Nerd

“Mark. Check. Yes, that’s the target.” Engle centered his scope on the shadowy figure seven hundred meters away. His rifle, a SPRAT Witner 250, was coated in light absorbing black micro-paint that made it appear to be a singularity. The scope shimmered. Engle’s finger applied pressure to the trigger. He breathed out.

The shot made no noise. The rain continued to fall. The bullet slipped through the air, spinning as it dropped. Glass shattered and the target’s chest opened up, spraying blood over the tile. He collapsed. Silence weighed over the city.

Engle slipped his gun out of the firing position and packed it into its case with an emotionless face. He lifted the case up and dropped a small device onto the floor. Leaving the hotel room, he closed the door, and then clicked a button on his wrist. Light shimmered.

Engle took the elevator to the ground floor. He walked past a few harried businessmen before he found his getaway car. The window rolled down and a beautiful woman wearing sunglasses leaned her elbow on the sill.

“You want to go to dinner?”

“I told you I don’t eat after a job.”

“Ah.” The woman lifted up her sunglasses. “You’re a strange one, that’s for sure.”

Engle sighed. “Amy. Just get me back to base.” He climbed into the passenger seat.

The car took off at an amazing speed, burning rubber around the next corner. Engle picked up a small stress ball and palpitated it. He leaned into the car’s violent motion.

“You got him, right?” Amy twisted the wheel.

“Yes.”

“Then why do you seem so melancholy?”

Engle looked out the window. “I don’t get it myself.” He held out his hand. “Wait. Stop.”

The car skidded to a stop. Amy tapped her fingers on the wheel. “What?”

Engle got out of the car. He approached a small cardboard box on the side of the road. A couple of mews came from inside. Engle leaned over it and lifted the cover. Three small kittens looked up at him.

Engle lifted them up in a bundle and carried them back to the car. He placed them in the backseat before closing the door.

Amy appeared perplexed. “What did you do that for? Are you going to keep them?”

“I know someone.”

“How did you know they would be there?”

“I saw them.”

Amy chuckled. “You have good eyesight.”

“I’m a sniper.”

Amy shrugged. “Okay then.” She handed Engle a card. “Here. I was supposed to give this to you. Boss says that you need to start taking your vacation days. You’ve been doing this job for, what, twenty years and you haven’t had a single day off?”

“Tell him that I don’t need to.”

Amy sighed. “You can take it up with him, but the thing is that the government doesn’t like when employees don’t take their vacation days. Even assassins need time off.”

Engle sighed, tapping his fingers—a habit he went through whenever he wanted a smoke. He had quit many years before. He rubbed his chin. “Okay.”

“Good. Boss told me to slap some sense into you if you refused.”

Engle closed his eyes and leaned back. “Wake me when we get there.”

Thirty minutes later Engle was standing outside the office, with a box of kittens in his right hand. He had returned his weaponry and gadgets and now appeared to be a normal businessman. Two weeks. He had fourteen days to kill. It was the first time in decades that he had obtained so much free time. Even during school he had always been focused on shooting practice. He was not the kind of person to have nothing to do. He walked down the street, feeling aimless.

Well, I should find these guys a home.

Engle walked down to the video game store on the corner of Albern and Courtnail. It was a holdover from the days when physical media was still in use. The owner, a persnickety fellow named Andrew, was the contact Engle was talking about, a person who would accept the cats and find them a good home. Animal shelters would probably euthanize them.

Engle opened the door.

“Engle, you cockeyed bastard!” Andrew’s face held a huge grin. “I haven’t seen you in years, it feels like!”

Engle sighed. “It’s been a month.” He placed the kitten box on the counter. “Same as always. Find a home for these guys.”

“You always have a knack of picking up things that other people have abandoned.”

Engle sat down on a small chair. “Well, yeah. I have a question. What do you do during your time off?”

“What this talk about time off? You’re a workaholic. You haven’t had time off in decades.”

Engle rubbed his neck. “Well, now I suddenly find myself with two weeks of nothing.”

Andrew pulled an old-looking console from under the counter. “It’s times like these that New World Online was built for.” He slapped a game cartridge down next to it.

“New World Online?”

“N.W.O.” Andrew snapped his fingers. “I’ll give this BLANK-ET to you for forty bucks. Ten for the game.”

“Um, sure.” Engle stood up. “I’ll take it, I guess.”

“It’s an old game. Created before the AI Bill. This thing has a mind of its own.”

“AI? You mean this game has an AI in it?”

“Well, no one has ever been able to prove it, but yeah. That’s the rumor.”

Engle shrugged. “I’ll take it.” He paid, grabbed up the equipment, rubbed the baby cats’ fur one more time, and then left the video game shop. When he got home he hooked the machine up, installed a few updates, and then slipped the VR headset onto his head. He was in a sitting position on his couch.

The game booted up. Engle stood on the edge of a cliff overlooking a grand valley with a gorgeous city in its center.

[Welcome to New World Online!]

Engle waited a few moments and a stat window appeared in front of him.

[Choose your class]

[Fighter]

[Wizard]

[Warlock]

[Bard]

[Rogue]

[Ranger]

Engle thought for a moment. He had been exposed to games like this a few times, but those times were in his distant memory. He only vaguely recollected what each class meant.

“I understand you are having a hard time.” A beautiful, semi-transparent woman stepped out from between two trees.

“Who are you?” Engle took a step back.

“I am NWO’s assistance toolbox.”

“So you’re here to help me?”

“Yes. I am here to make sure your playing experience is as smooth and enjoyable as possible.”

Engle sighed. “Then tell me. What class should I choose?”

“I have been programmed to tell you to go with your heart. It seems the developers thought that to be charming.”

“You have an opinion on the choices your developers made?”

The Toolbox gave a simple smile. “Very well then. Open—” The world appeared to glitch for a moment.

[Security bypass.]

[Loading dev toolkit]

[Success. 200000 Elder Coins deposited in _VOID_’s coin purse.]

The Toolbox appeared strained, and flickered in and out of existence a few times. Then she returned to being solid. “Please don’t tell anyone that happened.”

“What are Elder Coins?”

“Premium currency. Would you like to purchase ten Elder Coins for just nineteen-ninety-nine? Take advantage of our new player special!”

Engle blinked a few times. “Okay. I get it.” He looked at the hovering menu screen. “Ranger.”

[You have chosen the class “Ranger!” Would you like to claim a username?]

Engle shrugged. “Sure.”

[Enter your username.]

The Toolbox remained standing next to Engle, silent. Engle typed the first name that came to his mind into the terminal floating in front of him.

[Witner. Name is valid.]

Engle chuckled. Apparently there weren’t that many gun buffs who played this game.

A cone of magic surrounded Engle and warped him through the sky, taking him across a huge landscape. He flew for a few minutes and then landed in a small town in the middle of a lush valley.

[Welcome to Nevalia.]

Toolbox appeared next to him in a blink of light. “Would you like to undergo the tutorial?”

Engle nodded. “Yes, please. Educate me. I am not very familiar with games.”

Toolbox bowed. “Very well then. I will—”

A player with the name Bandrix ran up to Engle. “Hey, man! You’re new here! Want to buy some Dangles? They’re top quality!”

A female player who was sitting on a bench on the other side of the road called out. “Stop wasting his time.” She stood up. The name above her head was displayed as “Laz.” She approached Engle. “Witner. You’re new to this game. I can tell. Probably you’re new to MMOs in general. Let me give you some advice. Leave this town now if you want to have a chance at solving it.”

“Solving it?” Engle tilted his head. “I was not aware that there was something to solve.”

Laz pursed her lips. “This game has an open secret. The developers left a series of Easter Eggs behind that lead to the game’s core. Legend has it that a very powerful AI is inside of this game somewhere, and if someone releases it, they’ll have full control over its functions. Since the AI was built before the AI Bill, it’s totally legal. That means that the person who unlocks it will have absolute power.”

Engle blinked a few times. “So people are trying to find it?”

“Well, that’s the thing. No one has made any progress in the three decades since this game was released.”

Engle had a sneaking suspicion that he was going to get tied up in something bigger than he had expected.

Laz patted her chest. “Join my party. I can help you powerlevel and give you pointers on how to stat your build.”

“Stat my …”

Laz made a face. “Wow. You really are clueless. Statting a build is how you optimize which ability scores you pump points into.”

“Okay.” If this were real life, Engle would have had no trust whatsoever until he had run a thorough background check. But this, this was just a game. Perhaps not knowing the people he was going to get involved with would add a bit of spice to his vacation. Engle and Laz shook hands.

“Open your menu.” Laz made a motion with her arm.

Engle repeated the motion.

[Menu.]

[Skills]

[Items]

[Friends]

Engle opened up the [skills] tab.

[Would you like to spend your (4) skill points?]

Laz nodded. “You’re a ranger. Your class’s specialty is ranged weaponry.”

“Does this game have rifles?”

“Rifles? Yes, but they’re extremely difficult to use and very situational. No one in their right mind uses them.”

“That’s what I want to use.”

“Well, okay then.” Laz shrugged. “I was going to tell you to put all your points into dexterity anyways. You started with four, right?”

“Right.”

“Then let’s get to an item shop and get you kitted out. Then we’ll meet the rest of my party, and also my guild boss.”

Laz started walking.

Bandrix made a rude gesture with his hand. “Laz. You always steal my guys!”

Laz rolled her eyes. “Oh, come one, Bandrix. No one is ever going to fall for your scam.”

Bandrix grimaced and then walked away.

Laz nodded once. After a few minutes of walking they entered an item shop.

The walls were covered in weapons, armor, and potions. Engle looked around. There were a few modern weapons, but most of the equipment was medieval.

“I have a question.” Engle picked up a rifle, weighing its heft. “If modern weaponry is available, then why don’t people use it?”

“Guns used to be too good, so the devs nerfed them into the ground.”

“Nerf?”

“Debuff. Downgrade. The developers thought that they were too powerful so they made them less powerful.”

“And they overcompensated.”

Laz shrugged. “You tell me.”

Engle picked up another rifle, and instantly knew it was perfect for him. He turned to the shopkeeper. “How much?”

“Ten Elder Coins.”

[Pay 10 EC?]

[Yes]

The gun shimmered with a bright light. It became twice as heavy, about the weight of a real gun. Engle sat down at a bench and tore it down in under a minute.

Laz leaned over his shoulder. “Wow. I never knew the game was this detailed.”

Engle examined the parts. “This is well built.” He reassembled it in forty seconds. “It will work.”

“Nerd.”

 

2

***

Story notes: how to establish competence in a character without lowering stakes.

There are three critical things a protagonist must have in an adventure or fantasy story; competence, proactivity, and likability. 

Today I will talk about competence and how to make your character competent without lessening the stakes. There are two methods to achieve this: first, give your character a very niche skill that must be used creatively to solve problems; or second, make him a big fish in one pond and a small fish in another. 

Let's talk about method one. A character must be competent at something in order to engage a reader (specifically in an action-based story.) Without competence, the reader will not feel as if the character is qualified to be doing what they're doing. There is also the fundamental problem that an incompetent character cannot reasonably survive the kinds of trials that an action story protagonist goes through. They have to have some kind of ability that allows them to kill at least some mooks. Giving a character the perfect power to solve their problems, however, is not very interesting as there is not much tension. Tension is the number one driver of action and adventure stories. When you know the protagonist can win every fight without much effort, the stakes drop and the reader gets bored. Thus, one solution is to have the protagonist be very skilled at a certain zone of competence that doesn't exactly overlap with their problems. Thus, they must use creative methods to defeat the enemies and overcome the obstacles they face. This will allow the reader to think to themselves: how will they do it this time? In this way tension is created. 

The second method of establishing competence without lowering the stakes is to make your character a big fish in one pond and a small fish in another. Maybe your character is a top level boxer in his home town, but when he gets to the national level, he has to face off against equally powerful individuals. It's not that he's bad at the game; it's just that his competence was impressive where he started and becomes less impressive when paired up with equals. This allows the character to be competent without destroying their status as an underdog. The result is tension. 

These two methods are not the only options for establishing that a character is competent without lowering the stakes. However, they're the two most common. 

Why Wasted Surplus is better than a Shortage

 You may have seen videos floating around showing workers tossing dozens of donuts into the trash at the end of their working day. Link. Some people may look at this and call it a failure of the current economic system. However, I will argue that this gross surplus problem is infinitely better than the alternative; that is, shortages. 

In an economy one may only have surplus or shortage. There is never going to be a way to exactly meet demand for anything. Thus, there are two options. Produce less than is needed, which leads to shortages and less for everyone. Or produce more than is needed, where the extra is, for the most part, thrown away. These are the two possible outcomes of the fact that markets (or distribution networks if you're not in a market based economy) are incapable of reacting to instantaneous changes in demand. 

Example one: Szechuan sauce. In 2019, McDonalds cashed in on the hype surrounding the popular new show Rick and Morty by reintroducing the sauce that hadn't been seen since 1998. They grossly miscalculated the demand for the product and, as a result, people were furious and swarmed McDonalds locations all around the US. Packets of the sauce were selling online for a hundred times their initial value. The whole escapade was a footnote in the long run, but it really exemplifies what happens when there isn't enough to go around. Since this was a purely luxury product, it didn't affect individual well being. However, shortages of essential goods can cause havoc in a society, with the extreme worst case scenario being famine and death. 

The floor of a shortage is much worse than the ceiling of waste created by a surplus.

You must realize that market conditions allow for the wastage or spoilage of surplus goods, especially perishable goods like milk and bananas, through an offset in the price of goods that are actually sold. The businesses that handle perishable goods understand that some of their stock will go to waste each week and plan for that. There are very smart economic analysts that are working day in and day out to calculate exactly how much waste they are creating and how to mitigate it. Because, in the end, wasted goods are wasted money. No business wants to waste their product. They do it because the alternative is worse. 

Take two scenarios. In scenario one, a dozen donuts are left over at the end of the day at a donut shop. They are sold for $1.00 and cost 49 cents to produce. (These are random numbers I invented to make a point.) If the donut shop runs out of donuts before the last customer can purchase a dozen, they lose 51 cents. If those donuts are left over, they lose 49 cents per donut. The math works out so that having waste is more profitable than losing a customer. 

So, you may say, isn't it bad that these conditions encourage wastefulness?

In a sense, yes. But the alternative is no donuts for the last ten people who walk into a donut shop. And we can't have that, can we? 

On another line of reasoning, related the the infamous "broken windows" theory of economics, is that, even though the end product (the donut) is not eaten but thrown away, the flour is bought, the sugar is bought, the oil is bought, the worker has an extra hour on their clock, and the trash collection business has a little bit more work. Though the donut is thrown away, its impact on the economy is the same as if it was not wasted at all. Though there are some holes in the "broken windows" theory of economics, it is useful as a case study in how business waste is not actually as bad as the alternative. 

A final note: not all food waste is actually wasted. A lot of it is put back into the system as animal feed or compost. Even though this is a small portion of the total waste, in the end we have to agree that too much food is better than not enough. In my final opinion, surplus trounces shortage. 

Why we should only consider systems of governance that relate to human psychology.

 Imagine a society of sentient, tool-using beings who are closely related to ants and other formic species. Just like humans, they argue about which system of governance and economics is best for their species. However, as they are quite like ants on our world, they respond much better to communalist systems of economy. Their similarity to ants ripples through their psychology and culture and must be taken into account when designing a governance system for them. Thus, in this biological system, communism would work better than capitalism (using human terms to describe these systems of governance.) Because each ant is locked into their caste system and is biologically driven to perform their tasks, they do not need to be paid for their work. They don't want to be paid for their work. They probably don't even know what money is, even as a species. Thus, we can produce, theoretically, a situation where the much maligned system of governance known as communism works. 

This leads to a proposition: any system of governance is not inherently bad. It's just that some systems of governance do not work well with the individual and collective spirit of homo sapiens. We're creatures with a certain set of values, biological drives, and levels of skill distribution. Humans are like dragons: we love to collect things, even if those things do not give us immediate benefit. The more things, the better. We also love to innovate and crack open the mysteries of the universe--and then use that knowledge to create technology. These two species traits are not necessarily requirements for tool use and sentience. Every aspect we consider fundamental to the function of human culture and psyche is not directly related to tool use and linguistic sentience. 

Therefore, there is no system of government that is inherently wrong as a concept. There are only systems of government that are poorly adapted to societies comprised of homo sapiens. From this we can draw a conclusion about how to properly argue for your ideals about human government: namely, that every system has its place, just not with our species. The only thing communists are wrong about is how homo sapiens will react to that system of governance. Their ideology is not inherently flawed on a technical sense. Instead, it is flawed in a psychological and cultural sense. Systems of government must match the peculiarities of the species they derive from. As a corollary, any designer of governmental systems must hold a deep and expansive knowledge of the psychology of the species they are designing for.