Random Questions Thread

Yeah, the possibility of him becoming a distraction is what I was worried about. Thanks for the advice!

Are there any characters from Japanese mythology famous for defying the gods/spirits? I basically need the Japanese version of Pandora/Prometheus/Arachne.

How can a fresh surgeon become the head of surgery in one year?

Context:

I'm writing a prequel to a story where the surgeon is already the head of surgery. Unusual circumstances are a-okay.

I can't change the timeline.

The hospital is reputable and the surgeon is honest, so no bribery or other forms of cheating.

The surgeon's parents died when the doctor was a young child. No help from them here.

The surgeon is highly intelligent. In the original story, he has made major medical breakthroughs.

Edit: Made changes.

Edited by hellomoto on Oct 6th 2018 at 10:47:24 PM

Make it a research hospital, and the doctor is able to bring significant grant money from his/her graduate studies program to the hospital surgical unit. It will have to be a specialized unit, emphasizing whatever technique the doctor pioneered in medical school.

"We learn from history that we do not learn from history."

Edited by Hotpizza on Nov 27th 2022 at 9:25:00 PM

Say I have a story titled Sir Johnson Chronicles, with the catch that the eponymous character Sir Johnson is actually a woman disguising herself as a man, and the fact is revealed to both the reader and the initial protagonist of the story early on. What do you think of foreshadowing the genderflip in the title itself by replacing the ch in "Chronciles" with X (as in "X chromosome"), i.e. Sir Johnson Xronicles, using the Red Herring that it's "just" a case of Xtreme Kool Letterz to hide the fact that I'm alluding to the chron- part being derived from Greek χρόνος (the Greek letter χ being where Latin x gets its form), compounded with the happy coincidence that the letter r (which comes right after Ch/X in Chronicles/Xronicles) can be represented in leetspeak via the number 2 (and X times 2 is XX, i.e. "female")?

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Quite late for a reply, I know, but...

@De Marquis:

The Shadowrun RPG has the topmost circle of megacorps covertly agree between themselves that they'd rather keep the national governments around for the very reason you cited, thus they just exercise their sovereignty on their private territory (i.e. anything clearly labelled with the megacorp's name and/or official symbols^note which means that their black facilities, undercover agents and the like are deprived of this benefit, as the nature of their operation means they cannot bear anything that unambiguously links them to their parent megacorp, and thus the megacorp cannot legally claim any reparations for them being damaged/destroyed... leaving only extra-legal means, such as retaliating in kind (you kill my spies, I'll kill your spies in turn).) and anywhere where the law of the land does not prevent them from exercising it (e.g. toxic no man's lands that have been forsaken by all governments that could've otherwise claimed them). Even the one megacorp that went as far as to take practically absolute control of an entire country (Aztechnology to Mexico-turned-Aztlan) still keeps the political government of said country as a separate entity, likely for that very reason... although it's noted in-universe that the line between said corp and said government is very blurry.

How about corps with PMC subsidiaries being given a rather free hand in conducting much of several world powers' foreign military operations (i.e. warfare has been privatized), then a global disaster strikes that causes so much chaos in the corps' home countries that the governments successively pass laws that unshackle the corps' ability to wield (para)military force domestically for the sake of restoring order, and by the end of it, a combination of positive PR, pro-corporate propaganda, and corporate bribery/blackmail of politicians ensures that those aforementioned laws are not repealed/weakened?

@peasant:

That's similar to how Shadowrun's megacorps emerged; the government of the USA, under a fictional president that succeeded Michael Dukakis (who became POTUS in 1987 instead of Bush, Sr. due to the latter being indicted over the Iran-Contra affair), did such wonderful things as halving the military budget and selling off both Amtrak and the US Postal Services to the private sector. That, among whatever other domestic and trade policies that this POTUS's administration took (I wouldn't be surprised if a good deal of deregulation was enacted), probably did not do the US economy any good, which would be a plausible reason why food riots happened in 1999... and said food riots directly led to the Seretech Decision that started the whole "corporate extraterritoriality" thing that ultimately gave birth to the setting's megacorps.

Fiat iustitia, et pereat mundus.

unless Extremely Kool Letters is used parodically I tend to avoid works which employ it in the title. So if it's a serious book I personally would be put off but such a title.

Creator of Heroes of Thantopolis: http://heroesofthantopolis.com/

Even if it's a single letter in an otherwise normally spelled title?

Fiat iustitia, et pereat mundus.

@Hotpizza: What you are looking for is called Use of Force Continuum, and I would start your research with the Wikipedia article.

@Marq: Heh, I used to play Shadowrun. I used to have a 1st edition rulebook around somewhere. The fundemental problem with all such scenarios, of course, is that unless the corporations are providing their employees with all the necessities of life on company property, they must depend on the local government to provide their workforce with those services, which due to economies of scale will also include the employees of every other corporation within the territory, with the inevitable result that far more people will feel beholden and loyal to the local government than to the corporate employers. This sets the fundemental balance of power in favor of the government. And that's just local government, state and federal are orders of magnitute more powerful than that. Most corporations will conclude that it's just easier to get what they want indirectly through bribery, which in most cases is sufficient.

PMC's are a different kettle of fish, being corporations in the pay of the government. The issue here is that PMC's have no credibility with the local populace unless they have been contracted by the government, hence they need a government both to cover their expenses as well as provide them with their mandate. Still, they could easily end up as the powerbrokers within a given territory, deciding which officials and candidates to give their support, allowing their official to take power with their backing. That's essentially what happened to the Roman Republic.

"We learn from history that we do not learn from history."

Shadowrun megacorps are depicted as providing such necessities to their employees (and only their employees), though. At least, they do by the 2050s onwards (i.e. the gameplay's time frame).

Note that I said "PMC subsidiaries", i.e. they have parent companies that deal in things other than providing paramilitary forces/services.

... Anything regarding my story titling question?

Fiat iustitia, et pereat mundus.

Xtreme Kool Letterz relies on juvenile humor and yes, it's still this trope even if it's just one letter in the title. 1337 lingo is even more so, since nobody takes it seriously nowadays.

Regarding using it as means of foreshadowing I'd say that the way you describe it is a rather too subtle way of doing it. It could work if you can work it into the narrative somehow.

Also, I find it questionable foreshadowing Samus Is a Girl if the reveal happens early on. And, it's better not to foreshadow things in your title, lest it'll became an artifact. Is Sir Johnson disguising herself as a man the whole point of the story?

Spiral out, keep going.

Well, the fact that Sir Johnson is globally believed to be a man since essentially forever is rather important, insofar as people keep getting shocked when they eventually discover the truth for themselves, which is a source of never-gets-old amusement to Sir Johnson. Bear in mind that the title I provided is merely a generic stand-in for the actual title; the actual character is a multicentenarian immortal who is a relatively famous (and male) figure of real-life history, with an in-universe reason for the Gender Flip (compare the Fate/stay night's franchise's King Arthur, AKA Artoria Pendragon... whose genderflip should be already plenty spoiled by the virtue of Fate/Grand Order's mere existence, where the "secret" isn't a secret anymore).

That said, what alternative approach do you suggest?

Edited by MarqFJA on Oct 9th 2018 at 7:06:30 PM

Fiat iustitia, et pereat mundus.

To foreshadow her true gender? Averting No Periods, Period is the first thing that comes to mind. But you have to do your research well, since there's a danger of turning it into a tasteless joke.

Spiral out, keep going.

I meant regarding the title.

PS: No matter how I look at it, I don't get how Xtreme Kool Letterz is "juvenile humor". Excessive use of it in a single title, yes. But the trope by definition? No.

Edited by MarqFJA on Oct 10th 2018 at 1:49:31 PM

Fiat iustitia, et pereat mundus.

Because it is based on the concept of giving the appearance of "edginess" or "coolness" (or koolness). It is a shallow attempt at making an impression. Note that it's done by, essentially, being illiterate. It's rarely used seriously. It's almost never taken seriously. It's a red flag that you don't have to expect much from the work you're about to read.

Regarding the title, I wouldn't. The title, ideally, should succinctly tell your reader what the story would be about. Using it as the means of foreshadowing a minor reveal seems wasteful. Especially if doing so would give the wrong impression of what the story's tone would be.

Edited by Millership on Oct 10th 2018 at 9:31:18 PM

Spiral out, keep going.

if the reed richard is useless trope was averted, what new forms of tech would come up as a result?

MIA

Anything that sci-fi authors can imagine. I don't even know how to answer the question.

"It's Occam's Shuriken! If the answer is elusive, never rule out ninjas!"

Basically, you'd have to consider the kind of tech the local Reed Richards uses and extrapolate to imagine their every day use. Depending on their tech level, averting the trope means either jumping decades of technologies ahead in a few years times or simply plunging into science-fiction instantly, meaning the world soon loses any resemblance to the original one.

I think that Girl Genius may be a good example of the trope aversion: heavy use of Steampunk (and all various types of Punk before that) means that 19th century Europe does not look like anything we know.

Whatever your favourite work is, there is a Vocal Minority that considers it the Worst. Whatever. Ever!.

a sci fi superhero story does seem interesting.

MIA

That's basically Doctor Who. Sort of.

Doctor Who — Long Way Around: https://www.fanfiction.net/s/13536044/1/Doctor-Who-Long-Way-Around

You solve all of the world's current problems, then create new ones...

"We learn from history that we do not learn from history."

I'm afraid to ask this, but... Is it even remotely anatomically-feasible from a purely non-supernatural POV to have a vampire possess in-out^* retractable fangs for canines/incisors (a la True Blood and World of Darkness) in order for them to be able to easily pass as normal humans (at least visually)?

* I say "in-out" because snakes, for example, have retractable fangs, but they retract in a front-to-back swinging motion, rather than the retraction/extension pulling them into/out of the gums.

Edited by MarqFJA on Oct 20th 2018 at 1:08:33 PM

Fiat iustitia, et pereat mundus.

I'm not an anatomical biologist, but it's not completely impossible that I know of.

"It's Occam's Shuriken! If the answer is elusive, never rule out ninjas!"

The problem is that they need somewhere to retract to, and that would either change the way the skull is configured (changing the appearence of the face) or else weaken the upper and lower jaw area. But no, not impossible.

"We learn from history that we do not learn from history."

Of course, there should also exist some sort of locking mechanism to provide support for the fangs so they wouldn't retract back into their slot when biting.

Spiral out, keep going.