[IC] Lost in Dreams [Graham]

[ericthered]

The words twist themselves again, and Graham realizes that "flat" means euclidean. the Elves find the idea that gravity can hold an entire universe together to be quite novel, going so far as to ask if gravity powered the sun or stars.

One of them asks "So... what do you do then, if you' can't use magic?"

[momothefiddler]

"Actually, yeah. In a way, gravity does power the stars, including the sun. Maybe it is flat. I'm sorry, I'm having a hard time with the words; they're not always translating quite right.
Instead of magic we just do what we can to exploit... physics? Is that a word? Like how the stars work without magic - we've figured out how to reproduce that, sort of, as a weapon. Scary. And we use fire - You know fire, right? - we harness that to fly."

[ericthered]

"I meant you personally. what do you do?"

[momothefiddler]

"Oh. I'm a teacher. I teach math."

How does math come out?

[ericthered]

How does math come out?[/QUOTE]

'The philosophy/art of numbers'


They are mystified by this "isn't that... quite specific? do you teach other philosophies?"

[momothefiddler]

"It can get really quite complex. I'd be happy to go into it. It includes shapes as well as numbers, too. I also teach a literature class, but that's temporary."

[ericthered]

"And what do you use these things for? literature is for enriching the soul, but counting...."

[momothefiddler]

He grins slightly. "Well I mentioned flying and making stars and so on. Since we don't have magic, we basically use numbers to do that. The difference between nuclear power plant - a device that will fill the city with warmth and light and music - and a fission bomb - a device that will destroy half the city, kill the rest, and poison the surrounding countryside - is just a matter of numbers. It's a very important field in my world."

[ericthered]

Originally Posted by momothefiddler

He grins slightly. "Well I mentioned flying and making stars and so on. Since we don't have magic, we basically use numbers to do that. The difference between nuclear power plant - a device that will fill the city with warmth and light and music - and a fission bomb - a device that will destroy half the city, kill the rest, and poison the surrounding countryside - is just a matter of numbers. It's a very important field in my world."

"So you are a magician, you just use numbers to control the world."

[momothefiddler]

"I suppose if you want to put it that way. And we regularly conduct long, multi-person enchantment rituals using metal to make things that do almost everything: fly, kill each other, travel to the bottom of the oceans, travel quickly... The biggest difference I can think of is that in all the fiction I've read, giant multi-participant rituals are based on knowledge of the ritual, while in my world nobody knows the entire ritual. Each person knows a small part and does it and they don't even have to know the rest exists for it to work. We even have rituals for making casting devices. All of our cars - devices for traveling quickly on land - are made largely by robots - devices that act on their own and have no purpose but making cars."