Browsing Category Miscellaneous

Star Wars: The Force Awakens – Trailer released!

Today the final Star Wars: The Force Awakens trailer was released on US television and uploaded simultaneously online. Advanced tickets also went on sale a day before. The trailer is 2 minutes and 35 seconds long and gives a lot of insight into content we haven’t seen before. So far, over 5 million people have watched the trailer at the time of writing and it has only been released for a few hours.

This trailer is filled with plot which raises many questions about the story. Who is the red lightsaber wielding Kylo Ren and what is his connection to Darth Vader? Maybe my readers know more about this and can inform us in the comment section. The character of actor John Boyega known as “Finn” is stranded hopeless and without a cause on the infinite sea of sand that is presumably either Tattooine or Jakku.

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The physics of a Lightsaber

We have all seen it. The lightsaber has been deeply embedded in our culture ever since the first Star Wars movie came out in 1977. Since then there’s been a multitude of books, comics, games, animated series, movies, collectables and theme parks. There’s even a religion that spawned out of all of this – Jediism! There’s a lot of fascinating aspects from these movies you could write about and study but for this article I will take on the physics of the lightsaber. Is it possible in the natural world of science to replicate this piece of weaponry?

First we need to figure out what the lightsaber is made of as well as the components and the energy that drives it. The movies so far haven’t revealed much in how lightsabers work (but as mentioned above) there is plenty of material from the extended Star Wars universe to look through.

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*Unable to connect to network*

Integration
ɪntɪˈɡreɪʃ(ə)n/
noun

  1. 1.
    The action or process of integrating.
    “economic and political integration”
    synonyms: combination, amalgamation, incorporation, unification, consolidation,
    merger, fusing, blending, meshing, homogenization, homogenizing, coalescing, assimilation

 

Thursday morning, I arrive at work and have a particularly important scheduling report to compile in time to present to a customer visiting today. I shuffle my hands and think “right, got a few hours to get this done, let’s crack on!”

**Unable to connect to network**

Well that knocked the cheese off my cracker! For almost 3 hours the entire site network is down, for those unfamiliar with ERP/MRP, these are software packages integrated into the functionality of almost all operational systems within a business. Therefore, when the software fails, everything else cannot function. Anyway, while I was sat twiddling my thumbs for a few hours, this whole vocational dilemma got me thinking…

How reliant are we upon the technology we currently have access to?

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Plato’s virtual cave

As gamers we are used to switching between alternate realities by immersing ourselves into the games we play. In my article “Does gaming impact my dreams?” I discussed this subject further while musing over the reasons why gamers more often experience lucid dreaming than their peers. I ended the article by saying:

When we then enter the world of dreaming, do we [as gamers] then recognize the signs of fiction and fantasy more easily than others? It is indeed an intriguing idea and the philosophical implications of this is fascinating to me. But more on that another time.

Well, my friends, it’s “another time”. It’s about to get deep!

When I hit the play button and enter a new game I am very much aware

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Liebster Love

The Liebster love has come to GD, thanks Pixelkaffe! To make this a little easier (and less tedious for the readers out there) I and Mylex will do our answers in the same post! In reality it’s just Mylex being too lazy to make his own post and tag his own victims but whatever.

11 random facts about Noctua:
1. My favourite number is 125 and it changes every year on my birthday (in accordance to a schedule I made when I was 7).
2. People say I think too much. How can someone think too much?? I can see how one could think too little.
3. Money and fame Honesty and transparency are the qualities I value most in people I meet.
4. I name my computers. This one is called Ivy.
5. My wildest and deepest desire as a child was to have a secret room that no one but me knew existed. In the absence of such a room (and since my mum could not be pursueded to hire the workers needed to design such a room for me) I once put a little lamp and a chair in a tiny closet where I would read books for hours while people where looking for me.
6. I’m extremely sensitive to bright colours that don’t match… It’s an unwelcomed legacy from my mother who taught me about complementary colour schemes from a very young age.
7. I’m often openly hypocritical. Take this situation for an example; I love asking other people questions but I am easily unnerved by answering them myself. I’m very cagey by nature and even writing these 11 facts about myself is proving a very long and uncomfortable process!

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LEILANI AMOREY

I would really like to give a shout out to this artist I recently found!

Leilani Amorey is an artist and illustrator, living in the South of England. On Lei’s website she describes herself like this:
“I works hard and try not to take myself too seriously. I am also a hobbit, a blogger, a Tolkien fan, and a LOTRO player. Professionally I am an Online Community Manager and Illustrator , and I have spent the last 10 years working in gaming communities, making art, baking muffins, reading and collecting Tolkien’s books, and gaming (mainly in LOTRO and Landmark).”

If you like me have a weakness for water colours and all things Middle Earth then you should really have a look at the pictures below.

Anduin River

 

Dawn Down The Hill

“Once upon a time there lived a hobbit…just please, remember, what you read here is not the whole story. My life might look sometime like it’s all fairy tales and lovely ‘hobbity’  things, but fairy tales never work without trials, some sadness and a few tears every now and then. Despite that however, I’d rather prefer to show the bright side of things. So this is ‘me’ , a hobbit with the passion for drawing and painting the world of Middle-earth…and a fairy tale or two. – Lei”

The Hill - Hobbiton Across the Water

Here are some pictures from Lei’s “The Hobbit Project” which she is currently working on:

IMG_4876

IMG_5019 IMG_5021IMG_5020

You can find Leilani Amorey on twitter here. Also follow this link to go to the website to check out Leilani’s blog and other work!

collage

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Red pill, blue pill

You take the blue pill, the story ends. You wake up in your bed and believe whatever you want to believe. You take the red pill, you stay in wonderland, and I show you how deep the rabbit hole goes.”

Existentialist Jean-Paul Sarte said “Man is condemned to be free; because once thrown into the world, he is responsible for everything he does.”

Sartre was of the belief that ours is a godless universe. Thus there are no absolute guide or understanding in life, neither is there a moral code for us to follow. Sartre meant that we are all radically free. Free to the point of feeling abandoned and forced to take full responsibility for everything that happens, even though we probably don’t really want to.

He also famously said “Existence precedes essence” meaning one first exists, then invents oneself through the choices we make.

The responsibilities that come attached with this freedom can be quite intimidating.

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