Destiny & Free Will, #6 [Period 1, Monday, August 11th]

[raspberryturk]

When the students walked into the danger shop today, they might notice the distinct lack of a Ghanima. Instead, taking up the front of the room, were the lovable teacher's assistants.

"Determinism and causality?" Reno squinted at the notes that Ghanima had left behind for them to use in the lecture. "Okay. We're teachin' determination and casualties. Er." This was going to require a good deal more squinting. One moment.

Dawn peeked at the notes over his shoulder. "So, according to our apparently fearless leader, determinism (also called antiserendipity) is the philosophical proposition that every event, including human cognition and behaviour, decision and action, is causally determined by an unbroken chain of prior occurrences. With numerous historical debates, many varieties and philosophical positions on the subject of determinism exist from traditions throughout the world.

"It is a popular misconception that determinism necessarily entails that humanity or individual humans have no influence on the future and its events (a position known as fatalism); however, determinists believe that the level to which human beings have influence over their future is itself dependent on present and past. Causal determinism is associated with, and relies upon, the ideas of materialism and causality."

She looked up from the notes, blinked, and hoped Reno had a translation.

Reno... really didn't. So he stared blankly at the notes, and then shrugged his shoulders, shook his head, gave them a bit of a flick with one finger, and straightened them out again. "Some hold that, were determinism true, it would negate human morals an' ethics. Counter to this argument, some would say that determinism is simply the sum of emp-empir-empirical scientific findin's, makin' it devoid of subjectivism... Man, I don't got a clue what half these words mean, yo." He tapped at the paper. "Uh. I think they're goin' on to say that by even existin', morals and ethics can't be avoided, even though they're not... natural like magnets. Or somethin'."

Magnets? "Magnets?" She looked at Reno as if he'd grown another head. Dawn scanned the notes again and saw (maybe) where he'd gone wrong. "Ohhhh, okay. So, she's kinda saying that morals and ethics are fluid, and kinda annoying and not at all like concrete, since it doesn't have little stones in it, I guess, but that they're not that permanent. Except for how things still happen and would have happened anyway, which is proved when they happen, no matter what happens. I think? Oh, and there's also something here about chicken and eggs, which makes me think I should have had breakfast."

Reno squinted for a few more moments, and then decided maybe it was best to just move on to discussing causality, instead. "Says here that causalism ain't to be confused with causation. Which is great if you know what that other one is, I guess. Never would'a occured to me to confuse the two, yo. But it's a little easier, it's all about cause and effect, and how they gotta be related to one another. And then... the notes break down into... uh. Philosophy." Crap. "You know what? Uh. I say we play Twister." A pause. "Destiny Twister."

Dawn beamed at Reno. "You so get pie for that." Not that he would probably want to eat any pie she came up with, but whatever. "Okay, everybody move the desks out of the way." Once everyone had, she nodded and went to work setting up a makeshift board and spinner. Then she grinned at the class. If people who knew her well saw evil in the grin, well. "Everyone has to take their shoes off, and we're going to hit the spinner. If anyone doesn't know how to play, get an Earth buddy to explain. Whoever falls isn't just out, but you get whatever destiny Reno or I come up with. Sometime this week, you have to act like you're living with it in front of other people." Oh, Sam was going to kiiiiiill her. She glanced over at Reno for approval. "Sound good?"

Reno? Reno was grinning broadly. "I'm likin' what I'm hearin'." A thoughtful pause. "Pictures or it didn't happen, zoto." He stretched his arms, dropped the notes onto Ghanima's desk with a heavy thud, and then smirked almost wickedly at the class. "Get spinnin', yo."

[OCD is up! Have at thee! Preplayed with lilpunkinbelly who had the winning idea for Twister, notes provided by atreideslioness.]

Comments

Sign In!

[raspberryturk]

All twisty-like.

Re: Sign In!

[missed-the-gate.livejournal.com]

John Sheppard

The Lecture!

[raspberryturk]

Yes, you may boggle. They have no idea what they're talking about, anyhow.

Re: The Lecture!

[missed-the-gate.livejournal.com]

Dawn and Reno in charge was kinda hilarious, really. Was it wrong that he was almost following their lecture?

Re: The Lecture!

[solo_sword]

Considering her week, Jaina had at first been glad to have a no-pressure class. After a minute, though, she started wondering if she could sneak out.

Re: The Lecture!

[imcalledandros.livejournal.com]

Andros stared.

He had actually never played Twister before though, that might also account for the staring.

Re: The Lecture!

[likethegun]

Sam wasn't going to kill Dawn. He was merely going to give her a very strong look, along with the hopefully telepathic thought that she and Reno had better give him an easy destiny to deal with.

Re: The Lecture!

[ihaveniceteeth.livejournal.com]

Oh, there were times Gwen wished she'd been in Torchwood briefings that made this much sense.

Re: The Lecture!

[elephantgadget.livejournal.com]

Helen pretty much just stared.

Re: The Lecture!

[withoutverona]

Romeo almost followed this. Sort of. Kind of.

It helped that he was sleep-deprived.

Yurika, meanwhile, curled up at his feet and napped.

Re: The Lecture!

[time-flyer-5.livejournal.com]

You know, considering Twister -- and this lecture -- made about as much sense as the past couple of years of her life, Jen just gave a resigned sigh.

Re: The Lecture!

[key-of-heart.livejournal.com]

Sora's eyes glazed over about halfway through. He was with Reno on this one, there were words he totally didn't understand in there.

Destiny Twister!

[raspberryturk]

Mod your spins, mod your spectacular flops, and then wait for one of your loving TAs to hand you your destiny.

Dun dun dun...

Re: Destiny Twister!

[missed-the-gate.livejournal.com]

It wasn't until he had to stretch his legs diagonally across the board with his hands crossed behind him that John fell. He felt very uncoordinated about it, too.

Brushing himself off, he looked to the TAs. "What's the damage?"

Re: Destiny Twister!

[solo_sword]

Jaina frowned at the game and said, "Can you just give me my destiny now?"

Re: Destiny Twister!

[futureclone]

Once he got someone to handwavily explain Twister to him, it turned out Alex wasn't too bad at it. He was strong, and actually pretty flexible from all that martial arts training. It wasn't until he was required to have both hands on one circle, one foot on the circle behind that, and the other allllll the way across the board that he gave up and fell on his butt. "Let's have it," he said reluctantly.

Re: Destiny Twister!

[ihaveniceteeth.livejournal.com]

Gwen didn't take an early dive, really. That would have been wrong.

Re: Destiny Twister!

[cheminthehead.livejournal.com]

Gladys had a problem. If she fell on anyone, she'd probably squish them to death. And that wasn't allowed (plus, it would be messy).

After a moment's thought, she balanced on one foot on a spot near the edge and then fell over at the next spin. It was graceful, in the way an avalanche is graceful, and nearly as ground rattling. "I Have Fallen Over," she said. "And No One Was Hurt. May I Have My Destiny Now?"

Re: Destiny Twister!

[elephantgadget.livejournal.com]

Helen found the whole idea of this most unsettling. Still she played, doing her best not to touch anyone, which eventually led to her slipping right off the playing field, just managing to catch herself before she fell. "I believe I am out," she said grimly.

Re: Destiny Twister!

[withoutverona]

Romeo shrugged, then set the rabbit to the side and Twistered his little heart out.

At least, until he ended up with feet that should have been underneath his head, and it turned out he didn't bend that way and landed on his ass.

He rolled off the board. "Destiny me, please."

Re: Destiny Twister!

[likethegun]

Sam was tall. Sam was fairly bendy. Sam was not, however, skilled enough to keep from stretching out and falling on his face. With a little grunt, he picked himself up and looked at Dawn and Reno. "I'm almost afraid to ask."

Re: Destiny Twister!

[time-flyer-5.livejournal.com]

Jen had pretty decent height and pretty good flexibility to boot, so she gamely (*rimshot*) Twistered and contorted away until she got to the point where, you know, joints just wouldn't bend that way, not when other joints were bending this way and this other way at the same time.

It wasn't her most graceful fall, but compared to getting thrown into a freeway overpass and then dropping onto the roof of a car, infinitely preferable painwise, if far less dignified.

"Okay, give me the verdict," she said as she picked herself up and tried to look businesslike about it. (It wasn't the same without her uniform all torn up and a burning car or two in the vicinity, somehow.)

Re: Destiny Twister!

[shyest-eyes.livejournal.com]

The idea of Twister wasn't particularly hard to grasp, and for that she was glad. And the bending and twisting didn't pose much difficulty to her either. It was, in the end, the reaches that had her falling over.

It was really, after all, quite difficult to reach from one end of the board to the next when you were short.

Hinata gave the board a mild frown as she picked herself up and waited, well, for her 'destiny'.

The TAs!

[raspberryturk]

When we ping in, of course.

Re: The TAs!

[raspberryturk]

Reno was there. Of course.

And he was enjoying this class entirely too much.

OOC!

[raspberryturk]

Don't worry, they won't tell you to end the world this week.

Promise.

Re: OOC!

[raspberryturk]

I'm going to hold off on doling out more destinies for a little while, so that my partner in crime can have a crack at handing them out when she gets home from work, too.

If you need to play out your destiny today and you're just waiting on getting one, feel free to ping me here or on aim at TheMaskedWaiter and I'll be happy to ping in and hand you one. :)