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JosephWongKS posted:You can't just mix two different species together and get viable offspring? Really? Seriously? This keeps coming up for some reason. That statement is true by definition. Two animals who can produce viable offspring together are of the same species. Mules, ligers, and other crossbreeds are not viable because they cannot reproduce. Such animals are sterile and cannot produce children, even with the opposite gender of the same crossbreed. e: Although I guess we don't know whether the professor in question is sterile or not, so it's still a dumb statement. Added Space fucked around with this message at 05:34 on Apr 6, 2015 |
# ? Apr 6, 2015 05:31 |
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# ? May 17, 2024 19:45 |
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There's actually a number of species that can produce fertilize hybrids, my favorite being the cross that produced the Red Factor Canaryquote:First bred in the 1920s, it is the only colour canary that has an element of red as part of its plumage. It was developed as a cross between another type of finch, the now endangered Venezuelan red siskin (Spinus cucullata), and a yellow domestic canary (Serinus canaria). (What Wikipedia does not say is that they were developed in Germany in the 20s & 30s as part of the eugenics movement ) Not only are they different species, they are also different genera. Still made fertile Nazi hybrid birds for the Reich! Another common hybrid is the Bengal cat, which is bred from domestic cats and leopard cats, which are a small species of wild cat. The resulting hybrids can be bred back to their parent species or bred to other Bengal cats. And that's without going into the hosed uppness that is Ring Species--some weird poo poo going on there. Speciation is incredibly complex and just because two animals have fertile babies doesn't mean they're the same species. Hell, with ring species the exact opposite can happen.
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# ? Apr 6, 2015 06:27 |
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Added Space posted:Mules, ligers, and other crossbreeds are not viable because they cannot reproduce. Such animals are sterile and cannot produce children, even with the opposite gender of the same crossbreed. Ahem.
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# ? Apr 6, 2015 06:41 |
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platedlizard posted:There's actually a number of species that can produce fertilize hybrids, my favorite being the cross that produced the Red Factor Canary Yep. Also the best known example, mules, have been known to be fertile on extremely rare occasions since antiquity. From commentary going all the way back to Herodotus, literally the very beginning of the Western history. i81icu812 fucked around with this message at 01:12 on Apr 7, 2015 |
# ? Apr 6, 2015 06:53 |
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Properly defining 'Species' is a great topic to start biologists arguing with each other. Mycologists still have a grudge about the haploid/diploid thing, and two microbiologists will give you three definitions.
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# ? Apr 6, 2015 07:30 |
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I suspect Hermione is being set up as the Educated Stupid character, where her 'conventional' education and scholarly nature exist to show that Harry is vastly smarter because he doesn't need to bother with teachers.
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# ? Apr 6, 2015 07:35 |
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Basically the field of taxonomy is less about being actually useful and more about trying desperately to make us feel like we can make sense of the tremendous nonsense that is terrestrial biology.
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# ? Apr 6, 2015 07:43 |
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And biological systems are remarkably flexible. I mean you can just stick human cells into a mouse brain, and not only will they keep living, they'll make the mouse smarter.
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# ? Apr 6, 2015 07:46 |
JosephWongKS posted:That does make sense – Slytherins are supposed to be “ambitious, shrewd and cunning”, none of which describes Goyle (or Crabbe) in the canon series. Same with Hermione not automatically ending up in Ravenclaw, I suppose.
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# ? Apr 6, 2015 07:48 |
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anilEhilated posted:Not to nitpick, but a pretty big plot point in the books is that the thing that defines sorting more than anything else is your choice. If I remeber correctly, the parents of those two guys ran with Voldemort, so it's perfectly possible they've been brought up in a "Slytherin OR ELSE" manner. It's been said (possibly by Rowling in an interview?) that the hat goes by which traits the person in question values most rather than what they got, which is why Hermione ended up in Gryffindor and why Neville didn't get booted straight to Hufflepuff.
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# ? Apr 6, 2015 09:48 |
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Chapter 9: Title Redacted, Part I Part 3 quote:
I believe this is a reference to the character named “Sally-Anne Perks” who was mentioned during the Sorting Scene in the first book (as the student who was Sorted immediately before Harry Potter) and then never mentioned again for the rest of the series. quote:
Wish I had a job like that. quote:
Not much to comment about. It’s a pretty unobjectionable segment, all in all.
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# ? Apr 7, 2015 03:56 |
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I think the very last selection there is a pretty high point for this fic, but I'm doubting Yudkowsky's going to pick a very interesting resolution. It's really easy here to have the hat just say no because saying yes would derail the plot. Even if it says yes, it'd take a little more boldness than I think this fic has demonstrated to make the hat into its own character with a different motivation from Harry or the teachers, and I'm not sure that opening can go an interesting direction without that.
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# ? Apr 7, 2015 06:54 |
Really? Because the impression I'm getting is that it's there to Bow Before The Mighty Harry Sue.
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# ? Apr 7, 2015 10:40 |
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What happens with the hat is stupider than you could imagine, but we may have to go through a dozen omake snippets before the actual sorting - I can't remember if they're before or afterwards. Either way, it'll hurt.
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# ? Apr 7, 2015 10:50 |
Once again we receive the lesson that the Rationalist thing to do is seek for power and the suppression of your enemies (and the latter is really just a form of power). It would seem that rationally speaking, scientific inquiry is a waste of time, save when it serves the quest for Power.
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# ? Apr 7, 2015 18:40 |
Nietzsche: the greatest rationalist of them all.
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# ? Apr 7, 2015 18:47 |
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Chapter 10: Self Awareness, Part II Part 1 quote:
These are pretty reasonable questions and plausibly within the realm of the Hat’s knowledge as well. At least he’s not trying to probe into his fellow students’ or teachers’ secrets and vulnerabilities. quote:
What a way to humble-brag. Has Eliezer himself claimed to have read Godel, Escher and Bach by the time he was eleven years old? JosephWongKS fucked around with this message at 08:44 on Apr 9, 2015 |
# ? Apr 9, 2015 08:37 |
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So the key to self-awareness is to be asked a bunch of inane questions?
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# ? Apr 9, 2015 15:20 |
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The nerd douche train is only getting started.
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# ? Apr 9, 2015 16:40 |
Truly, Harry is the (rationalist) messiah, granting the gift of life where there was none by power of sheer obnoxiusness.
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# ? Apr 9, 2015 17:58 |
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This doesn't seem rational or scientific.
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# ? Apr 9, 2015 18:28 |
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I'm going to say I like the hat as a character, since this is the only time in the story that this twit gets the verbal pantsing he so richly deserves.
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# ? Apr 9, 2015 19:04 |
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Added Space posted:I'm going to say I like the hat as a character, since this is the only time in the story that this twit gets the verbal pantsing he so richly deserves. That's interesting to think on. I think the Hat is the first character so far to tell Harry to just gently caress off, isn't it?
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# ? Apr 9, 2015 20:05 |
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"House Douche."
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# ? Apr 9, 2015 20:18 |
SSNeoman posted:This doesn't seem rational or scientific. I suppose it might be polite to set the hat up to break after the sorting concludes. That would both hide his tracks and would avoid creating dreadful enemies with everyone whose last name comes after Potter.
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# ? Apr 9, 2015 20:50 |
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"Actually that's Potter-Evans-Verres." Cut to Dumbledore pushing Harry into a locker.
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# ? Apr 9, 2015 22:45 |
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Avalerion posted:It's been said (possibly by Rowling in an interview?) that the hat goes by which traits the person in question values most rather than what they got, which is why Hermione ended up in Gryffindor and why Neville didn't get booted straight to Hufflepuff. neville is a griffindor to the bones, though. he's brave and generous to a fault
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# ? Apr 10, 2015 03:04 |
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V. Illych L. posted:neville is a griffindor to the bones, though. he's brave and generous to a fault A lot of people mistakenly assume you have to be super powerful to be a hero, not just a good person who does their best.
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# ? Apr 10, 2015 03:07 |
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A lot of people also think that Gryffindors are tyrant alpha jocks who bully everybody and should be expunged from the universe. These people are found on Lesswrong and FF.Net.
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# ? Apr 10, 2015 04:43 |
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Krotera posted:I think the very last selection there is a pretty high point for this fic, but I'm doubting Yudkowsky's going to pick a very interesting resolution. It's really easy here to have the hat just say no because saying yes would derail the plot. Even if it says yes, it'd take a little more boldness than I think this fic has demonstrated to make the hat into its own character with a different motivation from Harry or the teachers, and I'm not sure that opening can go an interesting direction without that. AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAG
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# ? Apr 10, 2015 06:51 |
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Wasn't there some review-whoring involved in this chapter as well?
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# ? Apr 10, 2015 07:34 |
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Tunicate posted:Wasn't there some review-whoring involved in this chapter as well? Last one. The author said he'd spill his glorious plot to anyone who could guess the twist of the hat becoming self-aware.
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# ? Apr 10, 2015 11:59 |
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V. Illych L. posted:neville is a griffindor to the bones, though. he's brave and generous to a fault Yeah, from like the second he shows up on the page he is doing what it means to be a Gryffindor - he's searching the train for his toad despite being scared and intimidated because it's what you do. He caps it with standing there covered in ash and blood, wielding a sword and standing alone in defiance against the most powerful wizard in the planet and his army. You do not gently caress with Neville Longbottom. As for Hermione, her actions also greatly outweigh any amount of "being smart". She is the first and most frequent one of the trio to use force, but she never does it on her behalf, it's always for someone else. She set Snape on fire because she thought he was after Harry. She kidnapped Rita Skeeter because of what she did to her friends. She punches Draco not because of what he said about her, but because of Hagrid and Buckbeak. You have to have never read the books to think she isn't Gryffindor.
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# ? Apr 10, 2015 16:45 |
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Fried Chicken posted:You have to have never read the books to think she isn't Gryffindor. Moddington posted:The best part is that he's never actually read Harry Potter, only fanfic of it. Makes sense.
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# ? Apr 10, 2015 17:00 |
I wonder if he's done something snotty to the effect of 'the fanfic is always better than the original anyway'
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# ? Apr 10, 2015 17:37 |
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Added Space posted:Last one. The author said he'd spill his glorious plot to anyone who could guess the twist of the hat becoming self-aware. That's incredibly stupid. Reading the books makes it clear that the hat already is self aware. Why would you guess that the twist is something that is already present?
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# ? Apr 10, 2015 19:46 |
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Fried Chicken posted:He caps it with standing there covered in ash and blood, wielding a sword and standing alone in defiance against the most powerful wizard in the planet and his army. I hadn't realised till I read this just how much Harriezer warps everything around him into a soulless joke. I get that neville is the dopey sadsack who tries, and I think Yudd does too - he just thinks that 'trying despite your limitations' is less valuable/right/worthy than 'can just do everything naturally'. Yudd was the kid who resented the kindergarten teacher giving a gold star to the special kid who managed to tie their shoelaces.
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# ? Apr 10, 2015 23:29 |
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petrol blue posted:Yudd was the kid who bit the second grade teacher for not knowing what logarithms were. Fixed that for you! In other news, the illegal amazon listing of the first 17 chapters of this book has sold 3 copies in the last 20 days, for gross sales of some $24 minus shipping fees and printing costs. I really wonder who the hell is bothering with that. Selling all of their remaining copies may be a whole $20 of profit. http://www.amazon.com/gp/offer-listing/B00E640ZAG i81icu812 fucked around with this message at 03:11 on Apr 11, 2015 |
# ? Apr 10, 2015 23:55 |
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# ? Apr 11, 2015 00:02 |
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# ? May 17, 2024 19:45 |
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What.
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# ? Apr 11, 2015 00:59 |