site banner
cjet79  1mo ago (text post)   2717 thread views

Maker's Monday

Trying out a new weekly thread idea.

This would be a thread for anyone working on personal projects to share their progress, and hold themselves somewhat accountable to a group of peers. We can coordinate weekly standup type meetings if their is interest.

@ArjinFerman, @Turniper, and myself all had some initial interest.

Post your project, your progress from last week, and what you hope to accomplish this week.

24
Top Bottom Old Controversial Comments
Jump in the discussion.

No email address required.

Nice.

More Peter Watts than Watts himself, combining deep sea and deep space exploration. This is a compliment, I love his writing though I abhorr his congenital pessimism and misanthropy.

I do have a larger tolerance for jargon than most, so I except that much of the feedback you'll receive will be to minimize it, but I feel like it adds to the verisimilitude, something an actual researcher would write to an informed audience.

More Peter Watts than Watts himself, combining deep sea and deep space exploration. This is a compliment, I love his writing though I abhorr his congenital pessimism and misanthropy.

Thank you, that's high praise, and from another writer too. If it wasn't already crystal clear, I'm a gigantic fan of Watts' writing myself, so I'm certainly pleased with the comparison and I'm glad it hits some of these notes (not sure if you'll find less pessimism with where this is going, though). I even have a notes and references section written for it with many articles cited, though that probably won't be included in the story itself.

I'm touched to be called a fellow writer, I just dabble.

In the context of Watts, I follow his blog, and the pessimism is deep seated and personal. Man's just sitting around waiting for the world to explode, and even worse, for the wrong reasons. I'm fine with pessimistic works, hell, I'm sure it's possible to write good scifi that's upbeat, but that eludes me too haha.

I even have a notes and references section written for it with many articles cited, though that probably won't be included in the story itself.

I'd say throw them in, it doesn't hurt, and it does help to flaunt that you've done your research. If you want to be really fancy and make use of electronic media, you could pass them off as diegetic footnotes though that'll be a lot of bother.

What is this place?

This website is a place for people who want to move past shady thinking and test their ideas in a court of people who don't all share the same biases. Our goal is to optimize for light, not heat; this is a group effort, and all commentators are asked to do their part.

The weekly Culture War threads host the most controversial topics and are the most visible aspect of The Motte. However, many other topics are appropriate here. We encourage people to post anything related to science, politics, or philosophy; if in doubt, post!

Check out The Vault for an archive of old quality posts. You are encouraged to crosspost these elsewhere.


Why are you called The Motte?

A motte is a stone keep on a raised earthwork common in early medieval fortifications. More pertinently, it's an element in a rhetorical move called a "Motte-and-Bailey", originally identified by philosopher Nicholas Shackel. It describes the tendency in discourse for people to move from a controversial but high value claim to a defensible but less exciting one upon any resistance to the former. He likens this to the medieval fortification, where a desirable land (the bailey) is abandoned when in danger for the more easily defended motte. In Shackel's words, "The Motte represents the defensible but undesired propositions to which one retreats when hard pressed."

On The Motte, always attempt to remain inside your defensible territory, even if you are not being pressed.


New post guidelines

If you're posting something that isn't related to the culture war, we encourage you to post a thread for it. A submission statement is highly appreciated, but isn't necessary for text posts or links to largely-text posts such as blogs or news articles; if we're unsure of the value of your post, we might remove it until you add a submission statement. A submission statement is required for non-text sources (videos, podcasts, images).

Culture war posts go in the culture war thread; all links must either include a submission statement or significant commentary. Bare links without those will be removed.

If in doubt, please post it!


Rules


Recommended Posts And Communities

Recommended Realtime Chats