-
We will be taking the forums down to perform a site upgrade on 26 January 2020 at approximately 8AM CST (14PM UTC). This downtime is estimated to last between 6 and 8 hours.
-
Crusader Kings III Available Now!
The realm rejoices as Paradox Interactive announces the launch of Crusader Kings III, the latest entry in the publisher’s grand strategy role-playing game franchise. Advisors may now jockey for positions of influence and adversaries should save their schemes for another day, because on this day Crusader Kings III can be purchased on Steam, the Paradox Store, and other major online retailers.
This is an utter joy. Been a long time since I’ve seen anything approaching an AAR done in verse, and I’m very very glad to see a new one appear.
What forms we fashion for our tales!
With sounding voice in tuneful key,
A song to banish all travails,
Sung large in joyful prosody!
Glad or we of your interest and entertainment
That is, after all, the point of this arraignment.
Day that will live on
in infamy infinite
More blood to shed still
Anomaly, Epiphany
Anomaly, Epiphany
Wonder
At so many mysteries to discover.
We answer the call to fly
Through these strange skies
And find the charming weirdness of the universe.
Chaos in order, Order in Chaos
Chemistry and Biology
Physics and on occasion sociology
Combine to make a infinite variety
Of Anomalies
Anomaly? What is an anomaly?
Something strange, something unexpected
Something
Often strange but sometimes mundane
Something?
Sometimes nothing. Sometimes everything.
This is the infinite truth about science
Boundless variables, infinite data,
Measure immeasurable slices of the circled spiral
of the Universe
Bring meaning to chaos, Chaos to meaning
Learn, grow, see farther, bigger, smaller, understand more
And come to know and learn that you understand less
Science touches the sublime
Anomaly? Epiphany!
When we find what we do not expect
We learn what we did not expect to find
We find the limits of our knowledge as we learn
We expand our boundaries and become smaller
So much to learn of what we do not know.
Wonder!
Wonder
At so many mysteries to discover.
We answer the call to fly
Through these strange skies
And find the charming weirdness of the universe.
Chaos in order, Order in Chaos
Chemistry and Biology
Physics and on occasion sociology
Combine to make a infinite variety
Of Anomalies
Anomaly? What is an anomaly?
Something strange, something unexpected
Something
Often strange but sometimes mundane
Something?
Sometimes nothing. Sometimes everything.
This is the infinite truth about science
Boundless variables, infinite data,
Measure immeasurable slices of the circled spiral
of the Universe
Bring meaning to chaos, Chaos to meaning
Learn, grow, see farther, bigger, smaller, understand more
And come to know and learn that you understand less
Science touches the sublime
Anomaly? Epiphany!
When we find what we do not expect
We learn what we did not expect to find
We find the limits of our knowledge as we learn
We expand our boundaries and become smaller
So much to learn of what we do not know.
Wonder!
We know that we know nothing
Except that fact
Let us learn of our ignorance
And therefore of our knowledge
Except that fact
Let us learn of our ignorance
And therefore of our knowledge
A Lost Foundling
For time is circular
And not linear
As many know
Might we learn of those
Who proclaim
The union of past and future?
The Ancients
might've worshipped them.
And not linear
As many know
Might we learn of those
Who proclaim
The union of past and future?
The Ancients
might've worshipped them.
What is ancient and what is new assumes that
Time's arrow flows one way and it is flat
It appears to do so, but, questions remain.
Space is empty of
many things among which we note
Kindness is one
Song of Discovery
Song of Discovery
Our people have sung many symphonies,
Sometimes together, sometimes just as one
A kaleidoscope of plumage growing, changing,
But a new harmony is begun
Sing!
Hear the song of scanners scanning in the dark
Hear the song of scientists learning what we do not know
Let us map the stars
And begin anew once more
Back to the start anew from where we began
Our beaks break our egg to discover what’s outside
Our wings demand we find what answers we can
A tradition to discover tested and tried
Tradition? What is tradition?
Can we have a tradition to discover?
Do we destroy the old when we renew?
Does a cell die when it splits into two?
Must we uncover the hidden, recover the old, combine the brand new?
Systems without outside energy maximize entropy
Thus, fundamentally, any entity, that mentally ceases experimentally
to discover
Incidentally.
Dies.
Life demands questions.
Life demands answers.
Let us begin, again.
Our people have sung many symphonies,
Sometimes together, sometimes just as one
A kaleidoscope of plumage growing, changing,
But a new harmony is begun
Sing!
Hear the song of scanners scanning in the dark
Hear the song of scientists learning what we do not know
Let us map the stars
And begin anew once more
Back to the start anew from where we began
Our beaks break our egg to discover what’s outside
Our wings demand we find what answers we can
A tradition to discover tested and tried
Tradition? What is tradition?
Can we have a tradition to discover?
Do we destroy the old when we renew?
Does a cell die when it splits into two?
Must we uncover the hidden, recover the old, combine the brand new?
Systems without outside energy maximize entropy
Thus, fundamentally, any entity, that mentally ceases experimentally
to discover
Incidentally.
Dies.
Life demands questions.
Life demands answers.
Let us begin, again.
Ponder on what is
And what can be
But remember
Answers might beget questions
And not all questions have answers
And what can be
But remember
Answers might beget questions
And not all questions have answers
I’m going to break with tradition here and post a non-original poem, because it’s one of my favourites and it is appropriate. Or at least, I think so. This is “Lightenings viii” by Seamus Heaney (1991)—
The annals say: when the monks of Clonmacnoise
Were all at prayers inside the oratory
A ship appeared above them in the air.
The anchor dragged along behind so deep
It hooked itself into the altar rails
And then, as the big hull rocked to a standstill,
A crewman shinned and grappled down the rope
And struggled to release it. But in vain.
‘This man can’t bear our life here and will drown,’
The abbot said, ‘unless we help him.’ So
They did, the freed ship sailed, and the man climbed back
Out of the marvellous as he had known it.
The annals say: when the monks of Clonmacnoise
Were all at prayers inside the oratory
A ship appeared above them in the air.
The anchor dragged along behind so deep
It hooked itself into the altar rails
And then, as the big hull rocked to a standstill,
A crewman shinned and grappled down the rope
And struggled to release it. But in vain.
‘This man can’t bear our life here and will drown,’
The abbot said, ‘unless we help him.’ So
They did, the freed ship sailed, and the man climbed back
Out of the marvellous as he had known it.
It brings joy to us
questions create new answers,
answers create new questions
The sky has manifold layers
All songs are welcome, and we appreciate that others sing as we do,
But wish to assure you that to speak as you normally would is not taboo.
Sentience
The age old question is answered!
We are not alone.
Yet this is no comfort
For both possibilities were equally terrifying
What might these aliens be like?
Are they friend or foe?
Or, perhaps, we are but ants to them?
And if these aliens have fallen from glory,
what will our fate be?
How long will our ascendance last,
If we even rise at all?
We are not alone.
Yet this is no comfort
For both possibilities were equally terrifying
What might these aliens be like?
Are they friend or foe?
Or, perhaps, we are but ants to them?
And if these aliens have fallen from glory,
what will our fate be?
How long will our ascendance last,
If we even rise at all?
(my rhyme broke down halfway through, unfortunately)
Communication
Will it, once willed, bring illumination
Or consternation?
Extraterrestrial friends? Or foes?
Weaklings or stout hosts?
Data transferring
Numbers tumbling 'cross void, not now empty
But all ending, rest
coming when something is answering, now
All left is reply.
Communication
Will it, once willed, bring illumination
Or consternation?
Extraterrestrial friends? Or foes?
Weaklings or stout hosts?
Data transferring
Numbers tumbling 'cross void, not now empty
But all ending, rest
coming when something is answering, now
All left is reply.
When the second contact came
They shall seek peace
We're not alone anymore!
We must stand and join together!
Together, we must make them as friends
By not being an enemy.
They shall seek peace
We're not alone anymore!
We must stand and join together!
Together, we must make them as friends
By not being an enemy.
Echoes from the Future
Echoes from the Future
We spread our wings
Into space
Search for living things
Ready to face
Whatever we think might be
And what we find is
An Echo of what could be
Pithok!
Studying, measuring, chronicling,
But no longer wondering.
Is this what we could be?
Is this a promise or a warning?
Thousands of years in space, studying, learning
Fallen, Ancient, All Knowing
They have forgotten more than we have learned
But seem to have forgotten how to learn
Is this what we could be?
We cannot imagine meeting
Sentience that has flown through other skies
Eggs so differently hatched from ours
And yawning.
We spread our wings
Into space
Search for living things
Ready to face
Whatever we think might be
And what we find is
An Echo of what could be
Pithok!
Studying, measuring, chronicling,
But no longer wondering.
Is this what we could be?
Is this a promise or a warning?
Thousands of years in space, studying, learning
Fallen, Ancient, All Knowing
They have forgotten more than we have learned
But seem to have forgotten how to learn
Is this what we could be?
We cannot imagine meeting
Sentience that has flown through other skies
Eggs so differently hatched from ours
And yawning.
Contact with another brings
one’s own station into perspective,
more sharply showing fault,
what one lacks and what one is yet to reach;
yet this meeting will not only bring
uncertainty, for onwards from the fault
between one and another, a new perspective
puts the unimaginable within reach.
one’s own station into perspective,
more sharply showing fault,
what one lacks and what one is yet to reach;
yet this meeting will not only bring
uncertainty, for onwards from the fault
between one and another, a new perspective
puts the unimaginable within reach.
STOP! COOKIE TIME