Questions you want answered.

I’d guess that it will always be a skeleton. Autonomy decides the second?

No bones, so it can't be a skeleton. It'd be an exoskeleton instead. Zombie bug vs exoskeleton would probably come down to if it retains it's insides to make it move or if it's animated purely through magic. Autonomy-wise, both just follow the will of the necromancer and don't really have any autonomy of their own.

I wonder if the definition of vertebrate and invertebrate indicate whether or not the creature in question requires an spine or just has one. If a zombie has a spine but is animated by magic and so does not require it, is it an invertebrate? The same question goes for a skeleton who is animated by no other means than magic. Or would that fall the other way such that since the spine is animated by magic and has no muscle tissue supporting it, making it an ultra vertebrate? Which also begs the question about skeletal spiders...

A zombie is just an unripe skeleton.

What it does mean when people post the side-eyed emoji on Twitter? I’m seeing it in context where people are posting something about themselves, or something they work on.

IMAGE( https://i.ibb.co/rH4Q8q4/Screenshot-2022-09-06-at-9-20-56-PM.png)

IMAGE(https://i.ibb.co/VVQ6CLV/Screenshot-2022-09-06-at-9-14-55-PM.png )

I always thought it was more of a “hmm” or a “whatever” - more of a negative but it’s clearly not in the above examples. Does it mean “it me!” or literally “look at where the eyes are looking?”

On our company slack that one's used a lot to indicate someone is looking at something.

Here's one for you all.

This isn't really a new phenomenon, but I do feel like it's getting more... acute? I guess?

As I've gotten older, violence in video games, TV, movies, etc., unless it's very easily seen to be ridiculous or over the top has gotten significantly more disturbing to me. I was just watching Locke & Key on Netflix, and in the second episode, one of the evil characters strangles someone. Of course it's television, but the depiction was realistic, and it just sat very, very poorly with me. Upsetting.

I see people talking about feeling these kinds of things especially after they have kids, but it's obviously not isolated to parents - I have no children nor any intent to have any. I've never been a violent person by any measure, but it sure feels like I'm feeling this aversion more strongly these days.

Does anyone else's experience line up with mine?

Maybe. I refuse to watch that show because I find the imagery disturbing in the graphic story. But has run of the mill violence become more explicit? I’m not sure I’d want to back up that claim. Some stories aim to shock, and that keeps them pushing the limits. Others just want to get across what happened.

I think the difference may be whether the show intends to horrify.

NSMike wrote:

Here's one for you all.

This isn't really a new phenomenon, but I do feel like it's getting more... acute? I guess?

As I've gotten older, violence in video games, TV, movies, etc., unless it's very easily seen to be ridiculous or over the top has gotten significantly more disturbing to me. I was just watching Locke & Key on Netflix, and in the second episode, one of the evil characters strangles someone. Of course it's television, but the depiction was realistic, and it just sat very, very poorly with me. Upsetting.

I see people talking about feeling these kinds of things especially after they have kids, but it's obviously not isolated to parents - I have no children nor any intent to have any. I've never been a violent person by any measure, but it sure feels like I'm feeling this aversion more strongly these days.

Does anyone else's experience line up with mine?

just one data point, but I recently learned The Battle of the Five Armies extended edition is rated R. I watched it before learning that and felt that the violence was quite extensive for a not super dark fantasy film.

I do think that a more realistic depiction of these sorts of things is becoming more common. I think one reason might be that with more shows being made for streaming platforms instead of broadcast means fewer instances of pre-emptive self-censorship from studios worried about what the FCC will allow.

Robear wrote:

I think the difference may be whether the show intends to horrify.

I think this is the crux of it. It really depends on how they use their realistic depiction of it. If it's intended for it to be disturbing and hard to watch, it can add to the scene, so long as it's done right. Done wrong, it can seem like it's revelling in the scene rather than being horrified by it. Locke & Key the comic is primarily a horror story with fantasy and family drama elements mixed in, while the Netflix adaptation is more of a fantasy & family drama with horror elements mixed in. I'd say a disturbingly realistic strangulation is just one of the horror elements leaking through, and not out of place being in the show.

I didn't have any problem reading the comic. Actually my biggest issue with the comic was just how ugly everyone was.

I don't know for everyone, but for me, the older I get the lower my tolerance for realistic depictions of violence. unless the violence is against...super bad guys.

My wife and I could watch Taken every night, watching human traffickers getting killed, electrocuted, etc. That said, for most everything else, I'm just getting much more picky about what images I want in my head, and what I want to feel/experience.

If, like me, you have a family history of...really crappy stuff...feeling like you have a choice seems to also get better as I age.

I definitely have to be in the mood for it to be able to watch things with it. I held off watching the latest season of The Boys for months because I knew I wasn't up to handle how it can be, not just because of its over-the-top violence & gore, but because it's usually happening to innocent people, not those in the show that deserve it most.

Yeah, I haven't been watching the latest season of the Boys either, not because the last couple seasons haven't been good, but because I'm not in a place where I want something that bleak in my life right now. Or at least, not bleak in precisely that way.

Anyone have a line on a one-way car rental from Canada to the US?
We are going to PEI, down to Maine and eventually leaving from Bangor.

We have stuck out with all the main rental companies (they seem to like keeping their rental cars on the island), so we a looking at any option to get us across the US border into Maine. Even if we have to leave the island to switch cars. Really don't want to include any more flights though. Train?
Any ideas are appreciated!

I have no advice, but if you're going to PEI, you better visit Green Gables.

mortalgroove wrote:

Anyone have a line on a one-way car rental from Canada to the US?
We are going to PEI, down to Maine and eventually leaving from Bangor.

We have stuck out with all the main rental companies (they seem to like keeping their rental cars on the island), so we a looking at any option to get us across the US border into Maine. Even if we have to leave the island to switch cars. Really don't want to include any more flights though. Train?
Any ideas are appreciated!

For a train you'd have to take the longest way possible and go from Moncton to Montreal first, then down to Boston, and finally back up to Bangor. There's a proposed route between Montreal and Bangor in the works, but it's not even approved yet, so it won't be active anytime soon.

Even bus lines I can't think of any direct method. It used to be possible to go from PEI to Saint John, then get a second bus from Saint John to Bangor, but the Saint John to Bangor leg was shut down quite awhile ago. Maritime Bus can get you close to the border, but they don't cross it and you'd still have to get from the border to Bangor.
IMAGE(https://maritimebus.com/sites/default/files/2022-09/2022%20-%20MB%20Network%20Map.jpg)

One possibility would be to rent one car for while you're on PEI and return it there, then take a bus to a city closer to the US that allows one-way rentals to be dropped off in Bangor.

Thank you! We had exhausted all the avenues and finally figured out that the car rentals on PEI don't care where you go as long as you don't go to Mexico and you return the car to PEI. We adjusted one flight and found a cool place in St. John NB to stay on the way back up.
Thanks again.

@NSMike Green Gables is the main reason we are going. I can't get my wife to Paris yet, but this was second on her list.

Jealous of that trip!!! Have fun!

Anybody know of any arcades on Cape Cod, Massachusetts, that aren't exclusively redemption machines?

Is there a term for the situation in an argument where someone takes a position they clearly don't agree with just to avoid being proven wrong?

Like:

A: They shouldn't have set those protestors on fire.
B: Well, I disagree with that group of protestors, and they shouldn't have been protesting.
A: But your favorite political group was protesting there last week. How would you feel if your preferred group was set on fire?
B: I wouldn't mind.

Clearly B would be angry and complaining about it if they had, but in this case, B takes that opposing position just to save face in the argument. Is there a term for this?

NSMike wrote:

Is there a term for the situation in an argument where someone takes a position they clearly don't agree with just to avoid being proven wrong?

Like:

A: They shouldn't have set those protestors on fire.
B: Well, I disagree with that group of protestors, and they shouldn't have been protesting.
A: But your favorite political group was protesting there last week. How would you feel if your preferred group was set on fire?
B: I wouldn't mind.

Clearly B would be angry and complaining about it if they had, but in this case, B takes that opposing position just to save face in the argument. Is there a term for this?

Dickbag?

Keynsian?

How in the heck do you get from "saving face through hypocrisy" to the most successful school of economic thought ever, Mix? That really came out of left field. I didn't think you were Freshwater or Supply Side inclined...

Seems like arguing in bad faith.

It's obscure, but I think the term "Kettle Logic" fits.

Wikipedia wrote:

Kettle logic (la logique du chaudron in the original French) is a rhetorical device wherein one uses multiple arguments to defend a point, but the arguments are inconsistent with each other.

However, I would reduce that to "You're lying about one or the other statement".

I sometimes feel like some people just don't have Object Permanence about opinions. "Yeah, I think abortion should be illegal. Sure, I had one once. Thank heavens, too, because I definitely wasn't ready for a child. Why are you rolling your eyes like that?"

Robear wrote:

It's obscure, but I think the term "Kettle Logic" fits.

Wikipedia wrote:

Kettle logic (la logique du chaudron in the original French) is a rhetorical device wherein one uses multiple arguments to defend a point, but the arguments are inconsistent with each other.

However, I would reduce that to "You're lying about one or the other statement".

This is the kind of thing that I was looking for. Obviously lying and arguing in bad faith occurred to me, but I wanted a specific, pointed term for it, like a specific logical fallacy. This isn't exactly the same thing, but I'm not sure if anything has been coined for the specific kind of flawed thinking I'm referring to.

I think rather it's motivated thinking, which does not involve logic in every step, but rather substitutes beliefs for logic when a logical conclusion would contradict the belief.