Random Questions Thread

It has to be low latitude because the northern Atlantic Ocean has been even in the middle ages well trafficked. The Sargasso Sea was known already to Romans, presumably from sailors who went far out into the Atlantic. Such an island would almost certainly be known, if only fragmentarily so and it might not be populated.

As for the size limit, you could get around it by making a flat and large island west-northwest of the Cape Verde islands - the desert climate at that latitude would render it only barely habitable if at all.

I thought my post made it clear that I am contemplating doing away with the "never known by colonial powers" angle, and instead replacing it with "never had an indigenous population, didn't receive more than minimal attention by colonial powers".

edited 22nd May '16 11:49:02 AM by MarqFJA

Do people associate a "golden tan" with any race?

Not as far as I know.

Assuming "golden tan"s are not associated with any race, what are they typically associated with?

The few times I've read someone described with words "golden tan", it usually referred to a Latino or mixed-ancestry woman.

Oh yeah, that's right. They also use "bronze" as a color descriptor for Latinos/Latinas whose multiethnic ancestry has people of White and Black/Brown skin colors, too.

edited 23rd May '16 6:33:20 AM by MarqFJA

Hey, Marq - I think you could do something based on one of the phantom islands of the North Atlantic. I went to check on Hy-Breasil or Frisland at first, but I found something better.

Jacquet Island was supposedly sighted in the Flemish Cap (shallows in international waters east of Newfoundland, where a couple of major currents meet and produce excellent fishing grounds). Interestingly, it continued to appear on maps into the 1800s, when it was considered as a possible waypoint for the laying of the trans-Atlantic telegraph cable in spite of its complete nonexistence. You could pretend that in this alternate history it did exist, at the size you need it to be, and was basically just a tiny fishing colony until the telegraph cable was laid. Then it developed an infrastructure, the telegraph was replaced with telephone and eventually fiber optics, and now it's a fairly important independent Commonwealth nationstate with a trade- and communications-based economy.

Any idea on what the likely legal position would be on summons? That is a creature or person that could be brought into our world and controlled by it summoner?

In this example the summon may have near human intelligence but no free will, following orders from their master without thought of themselves. Would there be differences if the 'master' didn't want a summon but ended up with one anyway?

For examples look at the ElderScrolls series or anything based on Dungeons & Dragons

edited 27th May '16 9:43:59 AM by MCE

I'm no lawyer, so take this with a huge dose of salt, but if the summons had free will in their homeworld, and this free will is overridden in the summoning, then there might be claims of slavery made against the practice. This might be mitigated if the summons return to their homeworlds exactly as they left, regardless of what happens to them during the period of summoning (death included).

What would it take to get human societies to adopt "Terra" as the name for their planet within the next 100-200 years?

The existence of other inhabited planets, for a start.

That is already one of the names of earth. But it will take far more than just the existence of other races to cause this name to be officially adopted as a universal political designation. Earth is at the head of the pack, currently.

@summons: Under a modern government, summons would probably be illegal if the summoned creatures have human-level intelligence without a preexisting contract. Depending on how dangerous summons are, they would probably also be a controlled magic, comparable to controlled substances, like plutonium or controlled products like firearms.

Obviously, the summoner will be considered directly responsible for everything the summon does.

"More than just the existence of other races" like what?

pretty sure they meant aliens (sapient life not from earth) by "other races"

I was referring to the "more than just" part, actually.

Astronomers already use Terra. But for a political body to adopt the use of the word officially, there would have to be two things at least: (1) A reason to do so. (2) It be the most popular name.

OK, then what possible reasons for a name change and possible causes for the "Terra" name's popularity would you suggest?

edited 27th May '16 4:51:58 PM by MarqFJA

The only reason Terra is on the list of possible names is because it is the de facto scientific designation. In order to become more popular than Earth, there would have to be petitions, advertising campaigns, political machinations and backroom deals, that sort of thing.

Possible reasons to make an official selection is: (1) There is a global government and it needs to know what to put on the stationery. (2) There are multiple inhabited worlds and people want to know the legal mailing address. There might be more, but those are the ones I can think of.

I could actually more easily imagine a science fiction scenario where "Terrans" becomes the official name, at least, for humans than I could Earth being more commonly known among humans as "Terra".

People with tattoos, especially those of strong personal significance to them: how traumatizing would you find it if someone carved it out of your skin with a knife? (over doing an equal amount of damage to your body somewhere else). Like, would the fact that they took out the tattoo be super upsetting in and of itself?

I strongly suspect that's going to come down to the individual and his/her sense of significance.

If, that is, we are talking about emotional trauma above and beyond that caused by literally gouging out a person's flesh.

The fact that someone was crazy enough to gouge out my flesh (even an untattooed piece) is already rather upsetting.

Tattoos tend to be of great personal significance, so that's salt in the wound, pun not intended. How exactly the trauma manifests would depend on stuff such as why the victim obtained the tattoo, as well as the circumstances under which the tattoo was gouged out. For example, maybe a pair of sisters obtained tattoos to represent their close kinship. However, over the course of a story, the sisters fall out, and the elder sister gouges out her younger sister's tattoo, sending the message "I am no longer your sister, I am no longer protecting you".

Like tearing off a section of a family photo, or that scene from Brave where Merida slices her mother's embroidery, but with far more visceral horror.

So yes, traumatizing, and to be honest I like your creativity.

edited 28th May '16 5:25:05 AM by hellomoto

I did think that would likely be the case. Things might get a bit tricky with things like places that charge for entry. Yes, it would be a body, it might even been human shaped, but if it has no will other than yours, does it count as a person? If it can feel pain, would laws be written to protect it from harm? from abuse? Considering many countries give animals certain rights it would seem logical (to me) to extend them to summons as well.

If they are capable of speech, they would probably get human level rights, after comprehensive suffrage movements. Otherwise, they would definitely get rights comparable to animals. The preexisting contract law would be an example of a human level right.