  
 
The idea behind ClubFloyd is that each week at a pre-arranged time, a group of people meet online to cooperatively play a game of interactive fiction. Below is a transcript of The Chinese Room, written by Joey Jones and Harry Giles. The Chinese Room was released as part of the 2007 Interactive Fiction Competition, where it took fifth place. It was nominated for Xyzzies for Best Writing, Best Puzzles, and Best NPCs. You can learn more about the game, including how to download it, by visiting the ifWiki.WARNING! Below you will find a transcript of people playing this game, and it goes without saying that the transcript is full of spoilers. So, if you've never played this game, and think you might like to at some point, I do not recommend reading any further. Instead, you might want to return to the interactive fiction page. |
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Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | The Chinese Room Floyd | by H Giles and J Jones Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Never stay up in the barren heights of cleverness Floyd | But come down into the green valleys of silliness Floyd | Floyd | -- Ludwig Wittgenstein Floyd | Floyd | Instructions and Info : M Floyd | Start the story - from the beginning : (SPACE) Floyd | - from a saved position : R Floyd | Quit : Q | DavidW says, "Instructions please" | |||
| inky says (to Floyd), "m" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | > 1. Argh, I'm lost and have no idea WHAT'S GOING ON Floyd | 2. A pox on long-winded menus: give me the ESSENTIALS Floyd | 3. Please tell me lots of information ABOUT your lovely game Floyd | 4. I need HELP: things like tutorials, hints and verb lists | DavidW says, "3, perhaps." | |||
| inky says (to Floyd), "n" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | 1. Argh, I'm lost and have no idea WHAT'S GOING ON Floyd | > 2. A pox on long-winded menus: give me the ESSENTIALS Floyd | 3. Please tell me lots of information ABOUT your lovely game Floyd | 4. I need HELP: things like tutorials, hints and verb lists Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | 1. Argh, I'm lost and have no idea WHAT'S GOING ON Floyd | > 2. A pox on long-winded menus: give me the ESSENTIALS Floyd | 3. Please tell me lots of information ABOUT your lovely game Floyd | 4. I need HELP: things like tutorials, hints and verb lists | ||||
| inky says (to Floyd), "n" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | 1. Argh, I'm lost and have no idea WHAT'S GOING ON Floyd | 2. A pox on long-winded menus: give me the ESSENTIALS Floyd | > 3. Please tell me lots of information ABOUT your lovely game Floyd | 4. I need HELP: things like tutorials, hints and verb lists Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | 1. Argh, I'm lost and have no idea WHAT'S GOING ON Floyd | 2. A pox on long-winded menus: give me the ESSENTIALS Floyd | > 3. Please tell me lots of information ABOUT your lovely game Floyd | 4. I need HELP: things like tutorials, hints and verb lists | ||||
| inky presses the yellow enter button. | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | > About the Game Floyd | About the Authors Floyd | About Interactive Fiction Floyd | Acknowledgements Floyd | Licensing Information | ||||
| inky presses the yellow enter button. | ||||
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Floyd | The Chinese Room began as an idle thought passing through an idle
Floyd | mind. Giles, recently become interested in the world of contemporary
Floyd | text adventures, restyled as the far classier "interactive fiction",
Floyd | was toying with the idea of his writing his own, and suddenly realised
Floyd | that some of the staples of genre IF -- escaping from a locked room,
Floyd | artificial intelligences, zombies -- were also the staples of the
Floyd | thought experiments of his chosen discipline, philosophy. Suddenly, a
Floyd | concept arrived fully-formed in his head: a text adventure in which
Floyd | the protagonist explored the rich, bizarre and often pointlessly
Floyd | stupid world of philosophy thought experiments.
Floyd |
Floyd | And that's what this game is. You, a philosophy student, after a night
Floyd | imbibing vast quantities of alcohol, wake up trapped in a malevolent
Floyd | fantasy universe. You must escape. (Assuming you want to, of course.
Floyd | You could just doodle around complaining about the bad jokes.)
Floyd | Essentially, the game is just a vehicle for a lot of jokes, but,
Floyd | taking its insipiration from the revolutionary philosopher Ludwig
Floyd | Wittgenstein ("a serious and good philosophical work could be written
Floyd | entirely of jokes"), it's also designed to serve as a sort of
Floyd | none-too-serious introduction to the world of philosophy. You'll
Floyd | encounter some of the key problems of philosophy in various odd ways,
Floyd | and might even be encouraged to explore them a bit further.
Floyd |
Floyd | The game was begun in the summer of 06, and then shelved for a frantic
Floyd | academic year in which, amongst other things, Giles discovered he
Floyd | didn't like studying philosophy that much after all. Somewhat more
Floyd | cynical, he returned to IF and the game with an embittered sense of
Floyd | humour. He contacted Jones, an erstwhile beta-tester of the original
Floyd | version of The Chinese Room and asked if he'd be interested in
Floyd | co-authoring. Happily accepting, Jones proceeded to drive the writing
Floyd | forward with surrealistic pace, and after a summer of furious writing,
Floyd | redrafting and testing, the game was completed at the end of summer
Floyd | 07, just in time for the annual Interactive Fiction Competition. Now
Floyd | it's on your screen for you to play. Gosh.
Floyd |
Floyd | A note about the style of gameplay. This is a very big game, and will
Floyd | probably take a long time to complete. It is possible to die in this
Floyd | game, sometimes suddenly, but usually with warning, and, similarly,
Floyd | while it's possible to trap the game in an unwinnable state, you'll
Floyd | probably be warned you're about to do it. In terms of style, it's
Floyd | heavily-inspired not just by text adventures but also by the LucasArts
Floyd | school of point-and-click adventure games -- irreverent, full of
Floyd | arcane object puzzle quests, and driven forward by a large cast of
Floyd | inane characters. Drawing on early text adventures, it is
Floyd | puzzle-driven rather than plot-driven, so suits being dipped in and
Floyd | out of. This is not a subtle game. This is a silly game. We hope you
Floyd | like it.
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Floyd | Please press SPACE to continue.
| smartgenes says, "that used to be the back story of an adventure game: "Argh, I'm lost and have no idea what's going on."" | |||
| inky says, "whoops, huge" | ||||
| inky says, "my recollection is this is the sort of the game we can just dive into if folks want" | ||||
| Lionheart says, "Oh goody, philosophy jokes." | ||||
| DavidW says, "Comedy, philosophy, AND zombies. cool." | ||||
| inky says, "though maybe we should look at the essentials on the previous menu" | ||||
| inky asks, "can I continue?" | ||||
| DavidW says, "yeah, please do." | ||||
| inky pushes the green 'space' button. | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | > About the Game Floyd | About the Authors Floyd | About Interactive Fiction Floyd | Acknowledgements Floyd | Licensing Information Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | > About the Game Floyd | About the Authors Floyd | About Interactive Fiction Floyd | Acknowledgements Floyd | Licensing Information | ||||
| inky says (to Floyd), "q" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | 1. Argh, I'm lost and have no idea WHAT'S GOING ON Floyd | 2. A pox on long-winded menus: give me the ESSENTIALS Floyd | > 3. Please tell me lots of information ABOUT your lovely game Floyd | 4. I need HELP: things like tutorials, hints and verb lists | ||||
| inky says (to Floyd), "p" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | 1. Argh, I'm lost and have no idea WHAT'S GOING ON Floyd | > 2. A pox on long-winded menus: give me the ESSENTIALS Floyd | 3. Please tell me lots of information ABOUT your lovely game Floyd | 4. I need HELP: things like tutorials, hints and verb lists Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | 1. Argh, I'm lost and have no idea WHAT'S GOING ON Floyd | > 2. A pox on long-winded menus: give me the ESSENTIALS Floyd | 3. Please tell me lots of information ABOUT your lovely game Floyd | 4. I need HELP: things like tutorials, hints and verb lists | ||||
| inky presses the yellow enter button. | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Hey, folks. How's it going? Floyd | Floyd | This game has extensive informative menus. Feel free to read them. If Floyd | you want to cut the chase and play the game, here's the essential Floyd | stuff you need to know about what kind of game it is and how it works. Floyd | Floyd | This is a comic adventure set in the fantasy world of philosophy Floyd | thought experiments. It is designed both as a humorous and enjoyable Floyd | text adventure in a reasonably traditional style and as an Floyd | introduction to some of philosophy's key issues, intended to be Floyd | accessible not only to experienced IF players and experienced Floyd | philosophers looking for a bit of fun, but also people with very Floyd | little grounding in either. It is joke- and puzzle-driven, both of Floyd | which range from the accessible to the tough and in-jokey. Floyd | Floyd | This is a fairly long game, and so may take several play sessions and Floyd | a number of hours to complete. If for some reason, possibly Floyd | judging-related, you've got to evaluate it after two hours of play Floyd | only -- well, that's the way it goes for us over-amibitous writers, Floyd | sadly. You'll likely not have finished it by then. Sorry about that. Floyd | We hope you enjoy finishing it later on, when you do have time, Floyd | though. Floyd | Floyd | It is possible to die, though only if you make a mistake, which will Floyd | usually be clued. Death is often for comic effect, and can be easily Floyd | undone. In addition, there is a way to trap the game in an unwinnable Floyd | state, and while you can do this only by being a bit foolhardy, it's Floyd | probably a good idea to save before doing anything that looks Floyd | irreversible. Floyd | Floyd | Conversation is menu-based, initiated by the TALK TO command. The one Floyd | special command is THINK ABOUT <a topic>, which will print some short Floyd | thoughts on the philosophical topic of your choice. This is designed Floyd | both to give philosophical background to the jokes and puzzles of the Floyd | game, and to be a sort of hint system: while none of the game's Floyd | puzzles require philosophical knowledge, a bit of background might Floyd | help to jog your intuitions towards the correct solution. You should Floyd | expect to use THINK ABOUT often, and a complete list of topics is Floyd | available from the menus. Floyd | Floyd | In addition, there is both a hint system proper, which you should Floyd | stumble on in your searches in the game (more information in menus), Floyd | and a Tutorial for play, which walks through the game's opening Floyd | puzzle. Finally, a walkthrough is available for the length of the Floyd | IFComp 2007 judging period only: it can be found at Floyd | www.danglercomic.com/chineseroom.html. We're doing it this roundabout Floyd | way because neither of us like walkthroughs for various curmudgeonly Floyd | ideological reasons. If you're using the walkthrough because you're a Floyd | judge and want to see a lot of the game, that's cool, you're the Floyd | reason we provided the walkthrough, you may ignore the sarky comments. Floyd | If you're anybody else, then we hold nothing against you personally, Floyd | but we seriously suggest you reconsider your policy on walkthroughs. Floyd | You smelly people. Floyd | Floyd | Right, that's it. Get playing. Hope you enjoy it. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Please press SPACE to continue. | Ellison says, "carry on, my wayward inky" | |||
| inky says, "argh, more text" | ||||
| smartgenes says, "that's quite a hype-up in the blurb" | ||||
| Lionheart says, "So I guess these will be Dennett-style philosophical zombies." | ||||
| inky says, "I guess the summary is TALK TO <npc> and THINK ABOUT <topic>" | ||||
| DavidW says, "okay." | ||||
| inky pushes the green 'space' button. | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | 1. Argh, I'm lost and have no idea WHAT'S GOING ON Floyd | > 2. A pox on long-winded menus: give me the ESSENTIALS Floyd | 3. Please tell me lots of information ABOUT your lovely game Floyd | 4. I need HELP: things like tutorials, hints and verb lists Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | 1. Argh, I'm lost and have no idea WHAT'S GOING ON Floyd | > 2. A pox on long-winded menus: give me the ESSENTIALS Floyd | 3. Please tell me lots of information ABOUT your lovely game Floyd | 4. I need HELP: things like tutorials, hints and verb lists | ||||
| inky says (to Floyd), "q" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Please press SPACE to continue. | ||||
| inky pushes the green 'space' button. | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | The Chinese Room Floyd | by H Giles and J Jones Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Never stay up in the barren heights of cleverness Floyd | But come down into the green valleys of silliness Floyd | Floyd | -- Ludwig Wittgenstein Floyd | Floyd | Instructions and Info : M Floyd | Start the story - from the beginning : (SPACE) Floyd | - from a saved position : R Floyd | Quit : Q | Ellison asks, "who would have thought that a game about philosophy jokes would blabber on?" | |||
| inky pushes the green 'space' button. | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Celebrations seem so obscene when a year's been as bad as this one's Floyd | been. Still, hard drinking was the order of the night, and Floyd | obliterating the last vestiges of exam stress was the function it well Floyd | fulfilled. Ethics, aesthetics, logic and metaphysics -- all vanish as Floyd | sense-data succumb to paralytics. Floyd | Floyd | A few of your lecturers dropped by the Cellar Bar to toast the year Floyd | with their beleaguered students. Even a couple of the more reclusive Floyd | Arch? metaphysicians took a break from exploring possible worlds to Floyd | explore the possibility of getting truly plastered. Floyd | Floyd | Staggering home blind drunk is one of the little-recognised pleasures Floyd | of the philosopher. You take only a few tumbles, as sodium Floyd | street-lighting carefully guides you to your flat. Floyd | Floyd | You fumble with the loose doorknob and slump inside, gingerly pulling Floyd | yourself along the grubby carpet to your room, wary of waking a Floyd | flatmate. Collapsing into bed, you wait for the spinning world to Floyd | dissolve around you as you fall into relieved sleep. | inky says, "ha ha" | |||
| inky pushes the green 'space' button. | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | The Chinese Room Floyd | A philosophical text adventure into the green valleys of silliness, by Floyd | H Giles and J Jones Floyd | Release 1 / Serial number 070930 / Inform 7 build 4U65 (I6/v6.31 lib Floyd | 6/11N) Floyd | Floyd | The Chinese Room Floyd | (Note to all first-time players: inexperienced players may wish to Floyd | spend some time reading the About and Help menus, accessible by Floyd | entering the HELP command. All players should absolutely at the least Floyd | read the ESSENTIALS available from the opening menu.) Floyd | Floyd | You wake up, body aching and head split in two by a hangover. Blinking Floyd | the sleep from your eyes, you roll over, cracking your bones on the Floyd | concrete. Floyd | Floyd | Concrete? You realise something is very wrong. Pushing yourself to Floyd | your knees, you look around you. Floyd | Floyd | You find yourself in a strange room. It's a plain concrete box, Floyd | equipped only with desk and chair. A computer sits on the desk, Floyd | casting an insipid electronic glow over a stack of cards sitting by Floyd | the keyboard. There's a slow drip from a damp patch up on the ceiling. Floyd | Some grubby light seeps through a high window across onto the poster Floyd | that dominates an entire wall. Across the top of the poster huge bold Floyd | letters read "THE CHINESE ROOM". Underneath -- a string of Chinese Floyd | characters. Floyd | Floyd | You have never seen this room before in your life, and the whole Floyd | scenario is entirely beyond your understanding. Floyd | | Ellison says, "I hope that isn't bladder relieved sleep" | |||
| inky pushes the green 'space' button. | ||||
Floyd | Whereof you cannot speak, thereof you must remain silent, you suppose. Floyd | | inky asks, "hmm, no prompt?" | |||
| inky says (to Floyd), "look" | ||||
Floyd | The Chinese Room Floyd | It's a plain concrete box, equipped only with desk and chair. A Floyd | computer sits on the desk, casting an insipid electronic glow over a Floyd | stack of cards sitting by the keyboard. There's a slow drip from a Floyd | damp patch up on the ceiling. Some grubby light seeps through a high Floyd | window across onto the poster that dominates an entire wall. Across Floyd | the top of the poster huge bold letters read "THE CHINESE ROOM". Floyd | Underneath -- a string of Chinese characters. Floyd | | ||||
| inky says (to Floyd), "think about chinese room" | ||||
Floyd | The Chinese Room argument is a thought experiment originally devised Floyd | by John Searle, designed to answer the question (in the negative): Floyd | "Can a computer ever understand language?" Floyd | Floyd | Imagine a computer that has so complete a set of rules for providing Floyd | Chinese output to Chinese input that it behaves exactly as a human who Floyd | understands Chinese would. Ask it a question in Chinese, and it will Floyd | give an appropriate response in Chinese. It appears do "understand" Floyd | Chinese. But does it? Floyd | Floyd | Imagine now a human living in a small room, who is given a book Floyd | consisting of a vast set of rules for providing a response in Chinese Floyd | characters for any information ey receive in Chinese characters. Like Floyd | a computer ey will provide appropriate Chinese output to Chinese Floyd | input. The person is analogous to a computer, but does the person Floyd | understand Chinese? It would seem, intuitively, that ey don't. Floyd | Floyd | The meat of the argument here is to distinguish between syntax, the Floyd | rules by which language is constructed and manipulated, and semantics, Floyd | what language actually means, and then claim that even incredibly Floyd | in-depth knowledge of syntax is not sufficient for semantics -- only Floyd | human-type minds, and not an artificial intelligence, have the Floyd | capability to understand meaning. Floyd | Floyd | This leads into the debate about what "meaning" actually means. What Floyd | can it be that only human-type minds have? What makes us special? Some Floyd | philosophers, including, perhaps, the creators of the world you now Floyd | find yourself in, would argue that actually all that the mind's Floyd | ability to respond to input actually comprises is an incredibly Floyd | complex set of learned syntactical rules, and that "meaning" separate Floyd | from this is illusory -- so that if one were to learn all the rules Floyd | for Chinese language-manipulation, one would understand that language. Floyd | | DavidW asks, "'ey'?" | |||
| DavidW asks, "It that a gender neutral 'they'?" | ||||
| inky says, "it would seem, intuitively, that they don't, ey" | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "think about big bang" | ||||
Floyd | Your philosophical studies don't seem to have taught you anything Floyd | about that. Floyd | | Jizaboz asks, "I assume we can't look at anything?" | |||
| zarf says, "I suppose it is" | ||||
| inky says (to Floyd), "look" | ||||
Floyd | The Chinese Room Floyd | It's a plain concrete box, equipped only with desk and chair. A Floyd | computer sits on the desk, casting an insipid electronic glow over a Floyd | stack of cards sitting by the keyboard. There's a slow drip from a Floyd | damp patch up on the ceiling. Some grubby light seeps through a high Floyd | window across onto the poster that dominates an entire wall. Across Floyd | the top of the poster huge bold letters read "THE CHINESE ROOM". Floyd | Underneath -- a string of Chinese characters. Floyd | | ||||
| inky says (to Floyd), "x poster" | ||||
Floyd | Underneath the title there is a string of Chinese characters. Floyd | | ||||
| inky says (to Floyd), "x characters" | ||||
Floyd | Chinese, if you please. Floyd | | DavidW says (to inky), "A bit slower please." | |||
| inky says (to Floyd), "read characters" | ||||
Floyd | Chinese, if you please. Floyd | | Jizaboz says, "hmm." | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "think about cartesian duality" | ||||
Floyd | Your philosophical studies don't seem to have taught you anything Floyd | about that. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "x drip" | ||||
Floyd | There's a damp patch spreading across the ceiling from the hatch at Floyd | one end. Floyd | | Ellison says, "I like how Floyd has a green space bar. it's like he's from some One Floyd Per Child program." | |||
| inky says, "ha ha" | ||||
| Lionheart says, "Heh, so think about gives annotations? Good use of it, I suppose." | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "x hatch" | ||||
Floyd | It's too high to reach without standing on something, and it's locked. Floyd | | Lionheart says, "Less obtrusive than a footnote command" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x desk" | ||||
Floyd | A simple affair, with black steel legs and a woodgrain formica Floyd | surface. A drawer is stuck on underneath as an afterthought, like Floyd | chewing-gum. What is interesting is what is on the desk. Floyd | | Ellison says, "I'd agree with that" | |||
| DavidW says, "open ze drawer" | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "think about zombies" | ||||
Floyd | Philosophical zombies, or pzombies, are another common thought Floyd | experiment in philosophy of mind. They are creations which look and Floyd | behave in every way like people, but which have no conscious Floyd | experience. They raise a huge number of questions: are they possible? Floyd | What is conscious experience? Could a zombie behave like a human Floyd | without conscious experience? Is conscious experience a physical or Floyd | non-physical phenomenon? Floyd | Floyd | These questions lead into what is known as "the hard problem of Floyd | consciousness", which is: how do we explain subjective (or Floyd | "phenomenal") conscious experience in terms of its neurological basis? Floyd | Is the mind separate from the brain, like a free-floating soul? Is the Floyd | mind a function of the brain, with mental activity caused by brain Floyd | activity? Is the mind and conscious experience as we understand it an Floyd | illusion, with the brain no more than the physical? If the mind is Floyd | caused by the brain, how is it caused, and what is it about the brain Floyd | that causes it? Floyd | Floyd | The hard problem of consciousness is one of the most perennial Floyd | problems in philosophy, and in the two decades since it was first Floyd | formulated by Richard Chalmers we have made little progress. This had Floyd | led some philosophers, especially postmodern philosophers or followers Floyd | of Wittgenstein, to wonder whether the problem itself arises only from Floyd | a sort of language-game, a particular linguistic conception of the Floyd | mind that has developed over time, especially in the West. Maybe it is Floyd | not consciousness which is illusory, but rather the existence of the Floyd | problem of consciousness! Floyd | | zarf says, "let's not get ahead of our zombies" | |||
| inky says (to Floyd), "open drawer" | ||||
Floyd | Inside the drawer sits a squat, leather-bound manual. It looks even Floyd | more daunting than The Phenomenology of Spirit. Floyd | | ||||
| inky says (to Floyd), "read manual" | ||||
Floyd | The manual is a thick, leather-bound tome with THE RULES embossed in Floyd | gold on the cover. Inside, you find hundreds and hundreds of rules, Floyd | written in English, for transforming sets of incomprehensible Chinese Floyd | characters into other sets of incomprehensible Chinese characters. You Floyd | can't imagine why. Floyd | | ||||
| inky says (to Floyd), "get manual" | ||||
Floyd | Taken. Floyd | | Jizaboz says (to zarf), "haha" | |||
| inky says (to Floyd), "look up characters in manual" | ||||
Floyd | You discover nothing of interest in the manual. Floyd | | ||||
| inky says (to Floyd), "transform characters" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | zarf says, "the cards are the other important thing" | |||
| inky says (to Floyd), "x cards" | ||||
Floyd | You flick through the cards. Each of them features a number and a set Floyd | of incomprehensible Chinese characters. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "look on desk" | ||||
Floyd | A stack of strange rectangular cards is on the desk. The uppermost one Floyd | features a number and a string of Chinese characters. Floyd | | ||||
| inky says (to Floyd), "get cards" | ||||
Floyd | What do you want with a bunch of cards like that? Leave them be, Floyd | unless you want to CONSULT something ABOUT them. Floyd | | ||||
| inky says (to Floyd), "consult manual about cards" | ||||
Floyd | You pick a card and then slowly, meticulously use the rules in the Floyd | manual to generate a new set of chinese characters from the set on the Floyd | card, typing it into the computer. What it all means you can't begin Floyd | to guess, but it passes the time with some harmless mental exercise, Floyd | like a Sudoku puzzle. Floyd | | ||||
| inky says (to Floyd), "x computer" | ||||
Floyd | The computer screen displays the set of Chinese characters you just Floyd | typed in, while each of the keyboard buttons features a Chinese Floyd | character, apart from one big one at the bottom marked SEND. Floyd | | Lionheart says, "That sounds pretty darn daunting." | |||
| inky says (to Floyd), "x banner" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | Binder says, "how sad, to characterize Sudoku as harmless" | |||
| inky says (to Floyd), "x poster" | ||||
Floyd | Underneath the title there is a string of Chinese characters. Floyd | | ||||
| inky says (to Floyd), "type characters" | ||||
Floyd | You'd better deal with the set you already typed in first. Floyd | | ||||
| inky says (to Floyd), "push send" | ||||
Floyd | The Chinese characters vanish from the screen, and a message saying Floyd | "CORRECT!" flashes up before abruptly vanishing again. Floyd | Floyd | Well, this is all pretty pointless, and it's not helping you learn Floyd | Chinese. Floyd | | DavidW asks, "Do we push send?" | |||
| Jizaboz says, "x send" | ||||
| Jizaboz says, "doh" | ||||
| inky says (to Floyd), "type characters" | ||||
Floyd | You press a few random keys, watching the Chinese appear on the Floyd | screen, and then hit SEND. A message flashes up saying "INCORRECT!" Floyd | before promptly vanishing again. Perhaps you ought to approach this Floyd | more systematically. Floyd | | ||||
| Jizaboz says (to clubfloyd), "x send" | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "translate poster" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "consult manual about poster" | ||||
Floyd | You discover nothing of interest in the manual. Floyd | | ||||
| inky says (to Floyd), "consult cards about characters" | ||||
Floyd | Just a load of random Chinese symbols | inky says, "uh" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "consult cards about future" | ||||
Floyd | Just a load of random Chinese symbols | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "consult manual about characters" | ||||
Floyd | You discover nothing of interest in the manual. Floyd | | ||||
| inky says (to Floyd), "consult cards about poster" | ||||
Floyd | Just a load of random Chinese symbols | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "x me" | ||||
Floyd | As good-looking as ever. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "i" | ||||
Floyd | You are carrying: Floyd | a manual Floyd | | zarf says, "maybe it's just we have to do it several times" | |||
| DavidW says, "perhaps" | ||||
| inky says (to Floyd), "type characters" | ||||
Floyd | You press a few random keys, watching the Chinese appear on the Floyd | screen, and then hit SEND. A message flashes up saying "INCORRECT!" Floyd | before promptly vanishing again. Perhaps you ought to approach this Floyd | more systematically. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "consult manual about cards" | ||||
Floyd | You pick a card and then slowly, meticulously use the rules in the Floyd | manual to generate a new set of chinese characters from the set on the Floyd | card, typing it into the computer. What it all means you can't begin Floyd | to guess, but it passes the time with some harmless mental exercise, Floyd | like a Sudoku puzzle. Floyd | | inky says, "hmm" | |||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "push send" | ||||
Floyd | The Chinese characters vanish from the screen, and a message saying Floyd | "CORRECT!" flashes up before abruptly vanishing again. Floyd | Floyd | You wish you had a nice book to settle down with, like a Camus novel Floyd | or something. Floyd | | ||||
| inky says (to Floyd), "consult cards about poster" | ||||
Floyd | Just a load of random Chinese symbols | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "search cards" | ||||
Floyd | You find nothing of interest. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "take poster" | ||||
Floyd | It would tear! Floyd | | ||||
| Binder says (to Floyd), "think about camus" | ||||
Floyd | Your philosophical studies don't seem to have taught you anything Floyd | about that. Floyd | | ||||
| inky says (to Floyd), "x poster" | ||||
Floyd | Underneath the title there is a string of Chinese characters. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "x window" | ||||
Floyd | It's high in the wall and far too small to fit through. Floyd | | ||||
| inky says (to Floyd), "x string" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "think about descartes" | ||||
Floyd | Ren? Descartes (1596 - 1650) has become known as the Father of Modern Floyd | Philosopher. A French thinker, his philosophy was founded on sceptical Floyd | rationalism -- he sought to determine what could be rationally proved, Floyd | using a method of extreme scepticism in order to test his beliefs. He Floyd | as attempting to write "as if no-one had written on these matters Floyd | before", and so his philosophy framed a great deal of what came after Floyd | him, ushering in an era of ahistorical analytic philosophy which Floyd | sought to determine the truth of the world. Floyd | | Lionheart asks, "Where's a thousand monkeys when you need em?" | |||
| DavidW says, "In the toyshop." | ||||
| inky says (to Floyd), "look" | ||||
Floyd | The Chinese Room Floyd | It's a plain concrete box, equipped only with desk and chair. A Floyd | computer sits on the desk, casting an insipid electronic glow over a Floyd | stack of cards sitting by the keyboard. There's a slow drip from a Floyd | damp patch up on the ceiling. Some grubby light seeps through a high Floyd | window across onto the poster that dominates an entire wall. Across Floyd | the top of the poster huge bold letters read "THE CHINESE ROOM". Floyd | Underneath -- a string of Chinese characters. Floyd | | ||||
| inky says (to Floyd), "x window" | ||||
Floyd | It's high in the wall and far too small to fit through. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "x keyboard" | Binder says, "hm, looks like some missing characters in the text in places. 'He as attempting'" | |||
Floyd | You wish you understood Chinese -- as it is, these are just pretty Floyd | squiggles. Floyd | | ||||
| inky says (to Floyd), "x chair" | ||||
Floyd | The kind of grey plastic chair you find in schoolrooms. It sits by the Floyd | desk. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x drip" | ||||
Floyd | There's a damp patch spreading across the ceiling from the hatch at Floyd | one end. Floyd | | ||||
| inky says (to Floyd), "look under chair" | ||||
Floyd | You find nothing of interest. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "push chair to hatch" | ||||
Floyd | You push the chair underneath the hatch. Cunning. Floyd | | DavidW says, "uh-oh" | |||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "stand on chair" | ||||
Floyd | You stand on the chair. You can see your house from here! Well, you Floyd | can't really, but you can reach the hatch. Floyd | | zarf says, "that's not a philosophical thing to do!" | |||
| inky says (to Floyd), "x hatch" | ||||
Floyd | You can reach the hatch now, and it's locked. Floyd | | DavidW says, "If you flood the room with tank water, we will die." | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "say open sesame" | ||||
Floyd | (to yourself) Floyd | Just TALK TO them. Floyd | | ||||
| Jizaboz says (to floyd), "x chair" | ||||
Floyd | The kind of grey plastic chair you find in schoolrooms. It sits under Floyd | the hatch. Floyd | | ||||
| inky says (to Floyd), "x cards" | ||||
Floyd | You flick through the cards. Each of them features a number and a set Floyd | of incomprehensible Chinese characters. Floyd | | zarf says, "new theory: if we run the cards enough times, we will learn to understand the poster" | |||
| inky says, "IIRC we do have to solve the card puzzle before proceeding" | ||||
| inky says (to Floyd), "consult manual about card" | ||||
Floyd | You pick a card and then slowly, meticulously use the rules in the Floyd | manual to generate a new set of chinese characters from the set on the Floyd | card, typing it into the computer. What it all means you can't begin Floyd | to guess, but it passes the time with some harmless mental exercise, Floyd | like a Sudoku puzzle. Floyd | | Jizaboz says, "OK" | |||
| Binder says, "mmm rote" | ||||
| inky says (to Floyd), "push send" | ||||
Floyd | The Chinese characters vanish from the screen, and a message saying Floyd | "CORRECT!" flashes up before abruptly vanishing again. Floyd | Floyd | In fact, you reckon if you had a book you could learn it off by heart. Floyd | | ||||
| inky says (to Floyd), "read manual" | ||||
Floyd | The manual is a thick, leather-bound tome with THE RULES embossed in Floyd | gold on the cover. Inside, you find hundreds and hundreds of rules, Floyd | written in English, for transforming sets of incomprehensible Chinese Floyd | characters into other sets of incomprehensible Chinese characters. You Floyd | can't imagine why. Floyd | | Lionheart says, "My guess is the Chinese print under "THE CHINESE ROOM" is just the Chinese for "The Chinese Room"" | |||
| inky says (to Floyd), "memorize manual" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | ||||
| zarf says (to floyd), "learn manual" | ||||
Floyd | You set to work learning the entire manual off by heart. After all, Floyd | what else is there to do? Time passes like treacle -- but before you Floyd | know it you have reached the final page. Syntax piles up on syntax in Floyd | your mind, and action potentials blaze new neuronal trails. You feel a Floyd | seismic change has occurred. Glancing at the cards, you realise you Floyd | understand exactly what they mean! Floyd | Floyd | The only drawback to your newfound powers is that you begin to hear a Floyd | slow whirring growling sound coming up through the floor. You presume Floyd | it is John Searle turning in his grave. You hit upon the bright idea Floyd | of hooking his body up to a generator to solve the world energy Floyd | crisis, but think better of it and set your mind to escaping. Floyd | | smartgenes says, "hey Inky don't eat the clues" | |||
| inky says, "argh" | ||||
| inky says (to Floyd), "x poster" | ||||
Floyd | You can read the poster now! It says "Look in the drawer". Eh? Floyd | | zarf says, "okay, needs some more beta-testing" | |||
| inky says (to Floyd), "look in the drawer" | ||||
Floyd | There's a key in here! Floyd | | Lionheart says, "I guess not" | |||
| inky says, "hmmmm" | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "take key" | ||||
Floyd | What the -- ? It was in here all along? Floyd | | ||||
| Jizaboz says (to floyd), "think about John Searle" | ||||
Floyd | The Chinese Room argument is a thought experiment originally devised Floyd | by John Searle, designed to answer the question (in the negative): Floyd | "Can a computer ever understand language?" Floyd | Floyd | Imagine a computer that has so complete a set of rules for providing Floyd | Chinese output to Chinese input that it behaves exactly as a human who Floyd | understands Chinese would. Ask it a question in Chinese, and it will Floyd | give an appropriate response in Chinese. It appears do "understand" Floyd | Chinese. But does it? Floyd | Floyd | Imagine now a human living in a small room, who is given a book Floyd | consisting of a vast set of rules for providing a response in Chinese Floyd | characters for any information ey receive in Chinese characters. Like Floyd | a computer ey will provide appropriate Chinese output to Chinese Floyd | input. The person is analogous to a computer, but does the person Floyd | understand Chinese? It would seem, intuitively, that ey don't. Floyd | Floyd | The meat of the argument here is to distinguish between syntax, the Floyd | rules by which language is constructed and manipulated, and semantics, Floyd | what language actually means, and then claim that even incredibly Floyd | in-depth knowledge of syntax is not sufficient for semantics -- only Floyd | human-type minds, and not an artificial intelligence, have the Floyd | capability to understand meaning. Floyd | Floyd | This leads into the debate about what "meaning" actually means. What Floyd | can it be that only human-type minds have? What makes us special? Some Floyd | philosophers, including, perhaps, the creators of the world you now Floyd | find yourself in, would argue that actually all that the mind's Floyd | ability to respond to input actually comprises is an incredibly Floyd | complex set of learned syntactical rules, and that "meaning" separate Floyd | from this is illusory -- so that if one were to learn all the rules Floyd | for Chinese language-manipulation, one would understand that language. Floyd | | Binder exclaims, "well that's handy!" | |||
| Doug asks, "how did we decide on this game to play?" | ||||
| smartgenes says, "if only learning a language was so quick" | ||||
| inky says, "DavidW suggested it" | ||||
| DavidW says (to Doug), "I suggested it." | ||||
| Doug says, "cool" | ||||
| DavidW says, "There was a recent review on ifdb." | ||||
| Doug says, "ah" | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "ask computer about life" | ||||
Floyd | You can only do that to something animate. Floyd | | DavidW asks, "um, shouldn't we unlock the hatch now. with the key?" | |||
| Binder says (to Floyd), "climb chair" | ||||
Floyd | You're positively climbing up the walls. Floyd | | ||||
| Jizaboz says (to floyd), "stand on chair" | ||||
Floyd | You're already on it! Floyd | | Jizaboz says, "Heh." | |||
| Binder says, "I guess we have long arms. And eyes." | ||||
| inky says (to Floyd), "unlock hatch" | ||||
Floyd | What do you want to unlock the hatch with? Floyd | | DavidW says, "You know it." | |||
| inky says (to Floyd), "key" | ||||
Floyd | Balancing precariously on the chair, you reach up and unlock the Floyd | hatch. It swings open, and fresh air and clean light flood the room. Floyd | Freedom beckons! Floyd | | smartgenes says, "must be a cramped chinese room" | |||
| inky says (to Floyd), "up" | ||||
Floyd | You haul yourself up through the hatch and scramble onto the roof of Floyd | the Chinese Room, the hatch thudding shut behind you. Escape! Floyd | Floyd | Getting to your feet, you are conscious of your jaw dropping wide Floyd | open. A fantastical landscape spreads out around you in every Floyd | direction. You turn around and around, taking in the astonishing Floyd | sights around you -- to the north, a pretty little rural town clambers Floyd | up the wooded hillside; on the east side wide grassy plains spread off Floyd | into the distance, on the west side the sea does likewise, while to Floyd | the south . . . to the south an enormous granite crag towers on the Floyd | countryside, topped by a castle of medieval extravagance. Floyd | Floyd | A bright sun and blue sky blaze over everything -- in fact, all of the Floyd | colours in this extraordinary vista have a zealous intensity. It all Floyd | feels too, too unreal for words. Floyd | Floyd | Slowly, as if it were about to vanish into nothingness beneath you, Floyd | you sit down on the roof and raise your exhausted eyes to the sky. You Floyd | let out a small whimper. For above you, flitting happily among the Floyd | fluffy clouds, a flock of enormous flying beasts streaming spaghetti Floyd | soar. Floyd | Floyd | Roof Floyd | The roof of the Chinese Room is flat and covered with pitch, hot under Floyd | the sun. On the east side of the building, a ladder leads down to the Floyd | road. Floyd | Floyd | [Your score has just gone up by five points.] Floyd | | Lionheart says (to smartgenes), "Well, if you assume an ideal, spherical language..." | |||
| DavidW clears the save counter. | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "SAVE" | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "cf1" | ||||
Floyd | Enter saved game to store: Ok. Floyd | | ||||
| inky says (to Floyd), "x roof" | ||||
Floyd | It's a bit sticky, and not, as it turns out, particularly black. Floyd | | ||||
| inky says (to Floyd), "get pitch" | ||||
Floyd | Philosophers are not yet supermen. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "x spaghetti" | ||||
Floyd | Huge, noodly and terrifying, the flock of Flying Spaghetti Monsters Floyd | are playing a game of aerial volleyball with their meatballs. Floyd | | ||||
| Jizaboz says (to floyd), "l" | ||||
Floyd | Roof Floyd | The Chinese Room, you have discovered, is in the centre of a Floyd | fantastical world, on a road leading north to woods and a hillside Floyd | village and south to a cragtop castle. Wide plains spread out to the Floyd | east, grassy dunes and a strip of sand border an ocean to the west, Floyd | and above you Flying Spaghetti Monsters gambol in the updrafts. The Floyd | roof of the Chinese Room is flat and covered with pitch, hot under the Floyd | sun. On the east side of the building, a ladder leads down to the Floyd | road. Floyd | | Binder says, "ha" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "pray" | ||||
Floyd | God is dead. Floyd | | Lionheart says, "Heh" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "think about nietzsche" | ||||
Floyd | Friedrich Nietzsche (1844 - 1900) was a German critical philosopher. Floyd | Using highly artistic prose and an aphrositic style, he wrote Floyd | critiques of the religion, morality, philosophy and society of the Floyd | time, developing over the years a distinctive set of positions which Floyd | helped pave the way for later post-modern critical philosophies. Floyd | | inky says, "ha ha" | |||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "pray to fsm" | ||||
Floyd | I only understood you as far as wanting to pray. Floyd | | ||||
| Jizaboz says (to floyd), "think" | ||||
Floyd | What is it you want to THINK ABOUT? Floyd | | ||||
| Binder says (to Floyd), "think about thinking" | ||||
Floyd | Your philosophical studies don't seem to have taught you anything Floyd | about that. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "think about thinking" | ||||
Floyd | Your philosophical studies don't seem to have taught you anything Floyd | about that. Floyd | | inky says, "how true" | |||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "think about monstes" | ||||
Floyd | Your philosophical studies don't seem to have taught you anything Floyd | about that. Floyd | | ||||
| inky says (to Floyd), "d" | ||||
Floyd | You shimmy down the ladder onto the road. Floyd | Floyd | Black Tarmac Road Floyd | You're on a road by the squat concrete hut that contains the Chinese Floyd | Room. In smooth black tarmac, neatly painted with white lines, the Floyd | road stretches north to the village in peculiarly perfect tapering Floyd | perspective. Behind you, to the south, you see the road lead towards Floyd | some queer-looking hedgerows at the base of the crag. To the east, as Floyd | before, stretch the plains to the horizon, with the ocean, behind sand Floyd | dunes, doing likewise to the west. Floyd | Floyd | Well, you can only be thankful that there aren't two legs sticking out Floyd | from under the hut, and that the crowds of tiny people appear to have Floyd | neglected to lay on a welcome party. Floyd | Floyd | There is, however, a scarecrow. Floyd | | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "think about monsters" | ||||
Floyd | The Invisible Pink Unicorn, like the Flying Spaghetti Monster, is a Floyd | popular satirical religious entity. While their use has now expanded Floyd | to encompass all manner of religious satire, the original purpose was Floyd | to point out a common fallacy regarding religious belief and burden of Floyd | proof. Floyd | Floyd | It has been argued that atheism is an untenable philosophical Floyd | position, as one cannot give a watertight proof for the non-existence Floyd | of a religious entity: how would it be possible to prove that a god Floyd | does not exist? One can only give incomplete arguments in favour of a Floyd | god's non-existence, and so certain atheism is impossible. Floyd | Floyd | The question asked by the IPU is then, "Well, does that mean that it's Floyd | perfectly justifiable for me to believe in an invisible pink unicorn Floyd | orbiting Saturn? No-one's ever seen it, but I believe in it, and it's Floyd | impossible for you to definitively disprove its existence." Given the Floyd | intuitive ridiculousness of believing in the IPU without evidence, Floyd | this response serves to shift the ground of the debate away from Floyd | requiring atheists to prove an entity's existence with certainty. One Floyd | implication is that we ought not to be looking for certainty, but Floyd | rather for good arguments for likely beliefs; another stronger Floyd | atheistic response is to use this thought experiment to claim that the Floyd | burden of proof for religious entities lies not with the atheist for Floyd | disproving existence but rather the believer for proving existence. Floyd | The question of who holds the burden of proof has become a thorny Floyd | debate. Floyd | | ||||
| Binder says (to Floyd), "x scarecrow" | ||||
Floyd | Gawky, stuffed, adorned with a fixed expression and with a broom Floyd | handle rammed up its backside. You'd think it were a member of the Floyd | Royal Family if it weren't for the silly hat and cast-off clothing. Floyd | No, wait, hang on . . . Floyd | Floyd | In any case, you rather wish all that sacking had been put to better Floyd | use than as a body for this wretched thing. Floyd | Floyd | You jump back as the scarecrow rustles its arms and says, "Aren't you Floyd | going to say hello then?" Floyd | | Lionheart says, "Kind of conflating the IPU with the celestial teapot there." | |||
| smartgenes asks, "the crowds of tiny people?" | ||||
| inky says (to Floyd), "talk to scarecrow" | ||||
Floyd | "Er . . . hello," you say. "I'm sorry, it's just I, um --" Floyd | Floyd | "Well I'll just bet you ain't never seen a talking scarecrow before? Floyd | Ain't that right? Well dang me if I ain't right. Now tell me, what can Floyd | I do y'for?" Floyd | Floyd | [1] Um, where am I? Floyd | | ||||
| inky says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | "You just come out of that little room there, ain't you?" asks the Floyd | scarecrow, as if that settled everything. Floyd | Floyd | [1] Er, yes. Floyd | [2] Yes, but where am I? Floyd | | ||||
| inky says (to Floyd), "2" | ||||
Floyd | "Well you're outta the liddle room, ain'tcha? And now, what do you Floyd | think of this liddle land?" The scarecrow looks at you as if he's Floyd | about to hang on your words like a condemned criminal from the Floyd | gallows. Floyd | Floyd | [1] I don't know, really. Floyd | [2] Well, I don't know, as you won't tell me where it is and it's Floyd | totally weird and I'm really freaked out, actually. Floyd | [3] It's nice. Floyd | | DavidW says, "slower please" | |||
| Jizaboz says, "2" | ||||
| DavidW says, "yeah, 2" | ||||
| inky says (to Floyd), "2" | ||||
Floyd | "Now don't you be gettin' all cranky now," says the scarecrow, like an Floyd | ornery old farmer dispensing invaluable wisdom, "cause it ain't Floyd | healthy for a nice young adventurer like you. Now, I'll tell you, I'm Floyd | something like the tour guide, as y'say, round these here parts, and Floyd | if you got any questions for me, you just ask me and I'll answer best Floyd | as this little scarecrow can." Floyd | Floyd | [1] Where the hell am I? Floyd | [2] What's that castle over there? Floyd | [3] What lies north, yonder? Floyd | [4] What lies east? Floyd | [5] What lies west? Floyd | [6] You're not going to start singing about whiling away the hours, Floyd | conferring with the flowers, are you? Floyd | [7] I think I'll just go, actually. Floyd | | ||||
| inky says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | "I told you that already! Outside-a the liddle room. Anything else?" Floyd | Floyd | [1] What's that castle over there? Floyd | [2] What lies north, yonder? Floyd | [3] What lies east? Floyd | [4] What lies west? Floyd | [5] You're not going to start singing about whiling away the hours, Floyd | conferring with the flowers, are you? Floyd | [6] I think I'll just go, actually. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | The scarecrow's straw-stuffed arms snap out of in front of him, and Floyd | his earthy (and deeply irritating) Kansas vowels are replaced by Floyd | ringing, hollow tones saying "I do not know any thing about the Floyd | castle." Floyd | Floyd | Then his arms relax again and, seemingly oblivious, he says "I do most Floyd | humbly beg your pardon, there, what was that question agin?" Floyd | Floyd | [1] What lies north, yonder? Floyd | [2] What lies east? Floyd | [3] What lies west? Floyd | [4] You're not going to start singing about whiling away the hours, Floyd | conferring with the flowers, are you? Floyd | [5] I think I'll just go, actually. Floyd | | DavidW says, "yay tour guide" | |||
| DavidW says, "useless tour guide" | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | (Because you've always wanted a chance to justifiably say "yonder", Floyd | and if this isn't it then by Godot nothing ever will be.) Floyd | Floyd | "Now that's just a little village," says the scarecrow. "Now, I've Floyd | never been there, but I do hear it's a pretty exciting place, with all Floyd | sorts for a young adventurer like yourself to do. But is there Floyd | anything else you want to know before you go?" Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | [1] What lies east? Floyd | [2] What lies west? Floyd | [3] You're not going to start singing about whiling away the hours, Floyd | conferring with the flowers, are you? Floyd | [4] I think I'll just go, actually. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "2" | ||||
Floyd | "Nothing but the wide, wide ocean, so far as I know. But I don't know Floyd | much!" The scarecrow swallows an unctuous guffaw. "Anything else?" Floyd | Floyd | [1] What lies east? Floyd | [2] You're not going to start singing about whiling away the hours, Floyd | conferring with the flowers, are you? Floyd | [3] I think I'll just go, actually. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | "Now them's the wide, wide plains, where they do say the unicorns Floyd | roam." The scarecrow waves his arms about vaguely, the two Floyd | badly-stuffed sackcloth sticks not really up to the task of describing Floyd | the expanse. "But I'm willing to wager that a nice young adventurer Floyd | like you don't believe in unicorns, so I guess you'll be wanting to Floyd | ask about something else." Floyd | Floyd | [1] No, what was that about unicorns? Floyd | [2] You're not going to start singing about whiling away the hours, Floyd | conferring with the flowers, are you? Floyd | [3] I think I'll just go, actually. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | "Well I don't know nothing about them, excepting that they's both pink Floyd | and invisible, so I hear, but it's bad luck to talk about them so you Floyd | just ask me something else," says the scarecrow sharply. Floyd | Floyd | [1] You're not going to start singing about whiling away the hours, Floyd | conferring with the flowers, are you? Floyd | [2] I think I'll just go, actually. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | "Now I'm sure I don't know what you're talking about, though I do Floyd | flatter myself I have a splendid singing voice. You like to hear?" Floyd | Floyd | Without waiting for a response, the scarecrow bursts into a raucous Floyd | rendition of "I Will Survive". One of you at least certainly won't Floyd | unless you interrupt him quickly. Floyd | Floyd | [1] Shut up! Floyd | [2] No, I think I'll just go, actually! Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | The scarecrow stops singing abruptly, looking quite hurt. "Oh," he Floyd | says. "A question, then?" Floyd | Floyd | [1] I think I'll just go, actually. Floyd | | smartgenes says, "it is very LucasArts" | |||
| smartgenes says, "*is*" | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | "Right you are, then! You just come back if you want to know anything Floyd | else." He starts to hum quietly to himself, which is only slightly Floyd | less irritating than his talking. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "ask scarecrow about dorothy" | ||||
Floyd | Just TALK TO them. Floyd | | Jizaboz says (to smartgenes), "you fight like a dairy-farmer." | |||
| DavidW says, "moo-ving on" | ||||
| smartgenes says, "don't milk it" | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "think about scarecrow" | ||||
Floyd | Examining the scarecrow reveals two rather odd things about it: while Floyd | acting with at least the appearance a conscious entity, it appears to Floyd | be operated internally by a horde of homunculi, and operated Floyd | externally by radio signals from China. Floyd | Floyd | It thus seems to be conflating two thought experiments in philosophy Floyd | of mind: both Homunculi-Man and China-Brain. Homunculi-Man behaves Floyd | like an ordinary person, but his brain consists of a huge operating Floyd | station operated by millions of tiny people replicating the processes Floyd | of a brain. China-Brain is controlled externally by the entire nation Floyd | of China, which has organised its people to replicate the functions of Floyd | the brain: instead of neurones firing, the people of China carry Floyd | messages to each other and manipulate data, relaying the results in Floyd | radio signals to the person whose brain is being operated. Floyd | Floyd | Both arguments seek to debunk a position known as "functionalism" Floyd | which holds that if two things hold the same function, or function in Floyd | exactly the same way, then they are to all purposes the same thing. In Floyd | philosophy of mind, this means that if something operates like a mind Floyd | -- turns the same inputs into the same outputs, then it really is a Floyd | mind. Homunculi-Man and China-Brain seem to show that something is Floyd | missing from this picture -- this is usually argued to be Floyd | "consciousness". Floyd | Floyd | "Consciousness" can come to be thought of as what is missing from Floyd | China-Brain. What could that be? What is it that we think of the mind Floyd | as having that we think China-Brain -- or, less wildly, a robot with Floyd | artificial intelligence -- lacks? The ability to feel? The ability to Floyd | actually experience the senses subjectively (having "qualia"), rather Floyd | than simply responding to sensory input? Or is consciousness in this Floyd | sense illusory? Or is it something else that's missing from the Floyd | picture of China-Brain? Floyd | | DavidW says, "I'm thinking south to the castle would be my first choice." | |||
| Jizaboz says, "Sounds good." | ||||
| inky says (to Floyd), "x scarecrow" | ||||
Floyd | Gawky, stuffed, adorned with a fixed expression and with a broom Floyd | handle rammed up its backside. You'd think it were a member of the Floyd | Royal Family if it weren't for the silly hat and cast-off clothing. Floyd | No, wait, hang on . . . Floyd | Floyd | In any case, you rather wish all that sacking had been put to better Floyd | use than as a body for this wretched thing. Floyd | | ||||
| inky says (to Floyd), "x hat" | ||||
Floyd | It looks like someone took a bunch of straw with em on an LSD trip and Floyd | then threw the result under an elephant. Floyd | | ||||
| inky says (to Floyd), "get hat" | ||||
Floyd | That's not the part of the scarecrow you're interested in. Floyd | | ||||
| inky says (to Floyd), "get sacking" | ||||
Floyd | You're about to wrench the scarecrow's pole from the ground to take Floyd | him with you when it starts humming, and you suddenly think better of Floyd | it. Floyd | | ||||
| inky says (to Floyd), "get clothing" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | ||||
| inky says (to Floyd), "s" | ||||
Floyd | "Now hey there, I wouldn't be doing that," says the scarecrow. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "take hat" | ||||
Floyd | That's not the part of the scarecrow you're interested in. Floyd | | ||||
| inky says (to Floyd), "s" | ||||
Floyd | Ignoring the scarecrow's warning, you confidently stride southward -- Floyd | or make to, because instead of confidently striding southward you fall Floyd | flat on your face, cracking your nose off the tarmac. Floyd | Floyd | Grimacing with pain and spitting grit from your teeth, you try to Floyd | crawl to your feet but find yourself strangely incapacitated. Rolling Floyd | onto your back, you see why -- a tiny little woman, now sitting on Floyd | your knee, has tied your shoelaces together. Reaching down to undo her Floyd | handiwork, you find that, with near invisible speed, she has jumped Floyd | onto your aching nose and nutted you right between the eyes. You fall Floyd | back with a resigned oof. Floyd | Floyd | "I did warn you now," says the scarecrow. "I reckon it's safe for you Floyd | to untie those shoes, now, Anjeline." Floyd | Floyd | As you get gingerly to your feet, you catch a flash of Anjeline's Floyd | underskirts as she scrambles up the scarecrow's pole and into his Floyd | stuffing. Floyd | | inky says, "buh" | |||
| inky says (to Floyd), "s" | ||||
Floyd | You're not going to be able to go south just yet, not while Anjeline's Floyd | eyeing you suspiciously from under the scarecrow's hat. Floyd | | ||||
| inky says (to Floyd), "n" | ||||
Floyd | You walk along the road towards the village. It's only a short Floyd | distance, but this direct and precise road makes it seem like quite a Floyd | trek, with the sight of the village always straight ahead of you, Floyd | getting bigger by excruciating degrees. Floyd | Floyd | Eventually, though, you reach the first few village houses. Floyd | Yellow-thatched and cross-timbered, they cluster around the road like Floyd | groups of schoolchildren on a picnic day. And, indeed, there are Floyd | children playing games outside, -- the girls in pink blouses and the Floyd | boys in blue britches -- laughing and clapping and throwing hoops at Floyd | each other. You try not to listen to the actual words of the games Floyd | which, where children are concerned, you find, tend to be more truly Floyd | horrifying than anything the best gothic authors could dream up. Floyd | Floyd | Something strange, you realise, has happened to the road. Without you Floyd | noticing, it's switched from that black tarmac to a rutted country Floyd | cartway. Then, looking up at the buildings as you walk further into Floyd | the village, you see no more quaint cross-timbering but rather -- a Floyd | modern pavement caf?? A bar, the word "drink" etched in fashionable Floyd | lower-case letters on the window glass? Looking down, you see the road Floyd | has changed again into a paved street. Looking up -- there's a maid in Floyd | a peasant blouse pulling at a water pump! The bar has become a Floyd | ramshackle country tavern! Floyd | Floyd | Blink. A medieval market village. Blink. A modern cosmpolitan town. Floyd | Blink. Both at once? Floyd | Floyd | Your mind can't fix on a single image of the village. It seems to be Floyd | every different thing at once, as and when needed. The maid, now in a Floyd | crisp business suit, carries her wooden water pail into a barber shop, Floyd | whose red and white striped pole sticks straight out of a dry stone Floyd | wall. A man in peasant garb emerges from a building with the words Floyd | "Cartesian Theatre" emblazoned above the door in neon letters. And the Floyd | church's spire oscillates between a stone tower, a verdigris spire, Floyd | and a concrete minaret. Floyd | Floyd | You shake your head furiously, as if this will make reality fix Floyd | itself. You feel terribly ill. Floyd | Floyd | Village Street Floyd | A church, a theatre, a tavern, a barbershop, a pavement caf? -- their Floyd | various changing forms clutter around, entrances facing out onto what Floyd | seems (most of the time) to be an ordinary village street. Passers-by Floyd | duck in and out of the buildings, stop by the water pump, or carry on Floyd | to a square to the north. No-one, you notice, takes the road south -- Floyd | or heads along the routes east towards the storybook hills or west Floyd | into the fairytale woods. Floyd | | DavidW says, "slower" | |||
| Binder says, "it's so very very texty" | ||||
| DavidW asks, "Who was Anjeline?" | ||||
| Binder says, "an accomplice of the Scarecrow" | ||||
| inky says, "she is apparently one of the homunculi living in the scarecrow" | ||||
| zarf says, "a component of the scarecrow" | ||||
| DavidW asks, "Was she someone inside the scarecrow?" | ||||
| DavidW asks, "Can we take her?" | ||||
| DavidW asks, "Or talk to her directly?" | ||||
| inky says (to Floyd), "s" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Black Tarmac Road Floyd | By the road stands a scarecrow. Floyd | | ||||
| inky says (to Floyd), "talk to angejeline" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | ||||
| inky says (to Floyd), "talk to Anjeline" | ||||
Floyd | You don't really have anything to say to her. Floyd | | ||||
| inky says (to Floyd), "get Anjeline" | ||||
Floyd | No, she's not your type. Floyd | | inky says, "maybe I like short women" | |||
| Ellison says, "heh" | ||||
| DavidW says, "You're tall. You therefore like all women." | ||||
| Binder says, "yeah, but nobody likes a lace knotter" | ||||
| smartgenes says, "i got the impression she was someone who appeared from the south" | ||||
| DavidW says, "I'm confused what happened, but perhaps I'm supposed to be." | ||||
| smartgenes says, "but then again i was trying to read all that stuff at lightning speed" | ||||
| DavidW says, "yeah, I missed a lot." | ||||
| DavidW asks, "Why couldn't we go south?" | ||||
| smartgenes says, "she headbutted us and we saw up her skirt" | ||||
| Jizaboz says (to DavidW), "same here, but whatever," | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "x anjeline" | ||||
Floyd | Anjeline lurks beneath the scarecrow's hat. Actually, looking more Floyd | closely, you see several more pairs of little eyes alongside her. With Floyd | the scarecrow grinning at you, you walk around him, suspicious, Floyd | noticing a tiny pair of eyes in each sackcloth nostril, several in his Floyd | sackcloth mouth, and a horde beneath his straw hat. As you come behind Floyd | him you see that what you originally thought was a piece of straw Floyd | poking out from behind is, in fact, a radio aerial. And there's a Floyd | stamp on the sackcloth: "Made in China". Floyd | | inky says, "we tried to go south and the scarecrow told us not to" | |||
| inky says, "then we tried again and fell over because she had tied our shoelaces together" | ||||
| inky says (to Floyd), "get aerial" | ||||
Floyd | You reach round the back of the scarecrow and snap his aerial in two. Floyd | His singing winds down in an electronic slur, and his whole body Floyd | droops on the pole. There's a moment of silence, and then, one by one, Floyd | the homunculi tumble out of his stuffing, gathering into a comatose Floyd | heap on the ground. Floyd | Floyd | [Your score has just gone up by two points.] Floyd | | inky says, "ha ha, suckers" | |||
| Lionheart says, "Heh" | ||||
| inky says (to Floyd), "get sacking" | ||||
Floyd | You grab a handful of sackcloth and give it a yank, pulling it free Floyd | from the pole. When you empty it of straw what results is a fairly Floyd | serviceable sack, which you fling nonchalantly over your shoulder. Floyd | | Ellison says, "my homunculus girlfriend's in a coma" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "dismantle scarecrow" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | DavidW asks, "We have a sack now?" | |||
| smartgenes says, "that was the command in a game i played years ago.. DISMANTLE SCARECROW.. the only one it accepted" | ||||
| DavidW asks, "Have you played this before?" | ||||
| DavidW says, "(to inky)" | ||||
| inky says, "yeah, although it's been a while" | ||||
| inky says, "I played it in whatever comp it was in" | ||||
| smartgenes says, "TIE INKY'S MOUTH WITH SACKCLOTH" | ||||
| DavidW says, "I'm finding it hard to keep up. You've been referring to items I haven't noticed yet." | ||||
| inky says, "sorry, if you want to take over, feel free" | ||||
| inky says, "I don't think I've referred to anything that hasn't been mentioned earlier but there is a lot of text going by" | ||||
| Lionheart can see a dream in your dance. Lionheart can see tomorrow in your dance. We can call it, "our hope"! | DavidW says, "I hope the text rate settles down a bit." | |||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "x heap" | ||||
Floyd | A pile of tiny unconscious people, who presumably have been acting as Floyd | the scarecrow's brain on radio instructions from China. Presumably. It Floyd | takes a special kind of mind to presume something like that, but a Floyd | philosophy undergraduate certainly has one. Floyd | | zarf says, "I am doubtful :)" | |||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "x scarecrow" | ||||
Floyd | The scarecrow, now totally inanimate, and with his sacking torn away, Floyd | droops folornly on his pole, while his comatose homunculi lie in a Floyd | heap beneath him. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "x sack" | ||||
Floyd | (the sack) Floyd | A very large sack, still with a few strands of straw stuck in the Floyd | bottom. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "get sack" | ||||
Floyd | (the sack) Floyd | You already have that. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "wear sack" | ||||
Floyd | (the sack) Floyd | You can't wear that! Floyd | | DavidW says, "I suppose we could go south now, but there's probably a reason why we shouldn't." | |||
| Ellison asks, "put the homunculi in the sack?" | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "think about argument from design" | ||||
Floyd | Your philosophical studies don't seem to have taught you anything Floyd | about that. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "think about anselm" | ||||
Floyd | Your philosophical studies don't seem to have taught you anything Floyd | about that. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "search heap" | ||||
Floyd | You find nothing of interest. Floyd | | inky says, "I assume the sack is just a holdall" | |||
| inky says, "but I dunno" | ||||
| Lionheart arrives, full of fun, but no funk. | DavidW says, "well, let's go back to the village." | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "get strands" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | inky says, "okey doke" | |||
| inky says (to Floyd), "n" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Village Street Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "get straw" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | ||||
| inky says (to Floyd), "look" | ||||
Floyd | Village Street Floyd | A church, a theatre, a tavern, a barbershop, a pavement caf? -- their Floyd | various changing forms clutter around, entrances facing out onto what Floyd | seems (most of the time) to be an ordinary village street. Passers-by Floyd | duck in and out of the buildings, stop by the water pump, or carry on Floyd | to a square to the north. No-one, you notice, takes the road south -- Floyd | or heads along the routes east towards the storybook hills or west Floyd | into the fairytale woods. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "verbose" | ||||
Floyd | The Chinese Room is now in its "verbose" mode, which always gives long Floyd | descriptions of locations (even if you've been there before). Floyd | | ||||
| inky says (to Floyd), "x pump" | ||||
Floyd | You walk up to the water pump in the middle of the street. As you Floyd | approach, the gaggles of carters and fishwives clustered around it Floyd | look at you and start gossipping furiously. Floyd | Floyd | The pump itself is made of polished and riveted steel, with a gleaming Floyd | handle. There is a brass plaque on it which reads "Intuition Pump Floyd | 3000". Floyd | | smartgenes says, "the maid went into the barber shop" | |||
| smartgenes says, "with a bucket" | ||||
| inky says (to Floyd), "think about pump" | ||||
Floyd | "Intuition Pump" is a term popularised by the philospher Daniel Floyd | Dennett to describe, somewhat pejoratively, philosophy thought Floyd | experiments. All thought experiments, claims Dennett, are written in Floyd | order to get us to pump out a particular intuition, to get us to think Floyd | a particular thing determined by the set-up of the experiment. They're Floyd | not true experiments, where what's interesting is to find out what Floyd | result we'll get from the set-up, but rather rhetorical devices. Floyd | Sometimes they can provide useful analogies, but it's always Floyd | important, says Dennett, to look at the set-up of the intuition pump Floyd | and make sure it's a good analogy, and that we're not being Floyd | manipulated into pumping out an intuition we would't otherwise agree Floyd | with. Floyd | | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "pump pump" | ||||
Floyd | You must supply a second noun. Floyd | | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "pump pump with hands" | ||||
Floyd | I only understood you as far as wanting to pump the water pump. Floyd | | ||||
| inky says (to Floyd), "x carter" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | ||||
| inky says (to Floyd), "x carters" | ||||
Floyd | You wonder what the collective noun for fishwives and carters is. Floyd | Whatever it may be, this is certainly one of them. Floyd | | ||||
| zarf says (to floyd), "pump pump pump" | ||||
Floyd | You must supply a second noun. Floyd | | zarf says, "heh" | |||
| Binder says, ">pump pump revolution" | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "pump up the jam" | ||||
Floyd | I only understood you as far as wanting to pump the up. Floyd | | DavidW says, "pump pump into sack" | |||
| inky says, "as ebert would say, rumpy-pumpy" | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "pump intuition" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | ||||
| inky says (to Floyd), "pump sack" | ||||
Floyd | You must supply a second noun. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "pump pump into sack" | ||||
Floyd | I only understood you as far as wanting to pump the water pump. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "think about rationalism" | ||||
Floyd | Your philosophical studies don't seem to have taught you anything Floyd | about that. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "pump pump with sack" | ||||
Floyd | I only understood you as far as wanting to pump the water pump. Floyd | | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "pump me up" | ||||
Floyd | I only understood you as far as wanting to pump yourself. Floyd | | DavidW says, "smartgenes may be right; maybe we need a bucket" | |||
| Jizaboz says (to floyd), "i" | ||||
Floyd | You are carrying: Floyd | a sack (open but empty) Floyd | a Chinese key Floyd | a manual Floyd | | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "talk to fishwife" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | smartgenes says, "we could pull handle and let all the water out" | |||
| inky says (to Floyd), "x church" | ||||
Floyd | It's as if the designer had aimed the architecture at quaint, Floyd | overshot, and gone straight through and out the other side into a Floyd | strange uncharted territory beyond twee. Cherubs feature. Floyd | | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "talk to gossip" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | ||||
| inky says (to Floyd), "enter church" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Church Floyd | You step inside the church and are hit by a blast of pure serenity. Floyd | The church appears to have made up its mind about its own interior, Floyd | plumping for a simple majesty in stone and wood. As the door creaks Floyd | gracefully closed behind you, you survey your surroundings: the oak Floyd | pews lining the nave, the beautiful arched stone roof, the carved Floyd | pulpit at the head of the church and, behind it, an enormous tapestry Floyd | depicting -- nothing? Floyd | Floyd | In one of the pews a woman in full bridal gear sits, weeping to Floyd | herself. The priest, standing by the pulpit, is looking at her very Floyd | awkwardly. Floyd | | inky says, "this game is pretty big" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "pray" | ||||
Floyd | God is dead. Floyd | | inky says, "if there are these four rooms off this room, plus the four rooms off the scarecrow room" | |||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "x tapestry" | ||||
Floyd | A monumental effort. It must have taken weeks of work to weave such a Floyd | weight of white. Floyd | | ||||
| inky says (to Floyd), " x priest" | ||||
Floyd | He's dressed in severe black lightened only by a peculiar pink collar. Floyd | There's an evangelical zeal in his eyes and a furry caterpillar on his Floyd | top lip. It might be a moustache. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "remove tapestry" | ||||
Floyd | (first taking the tapestry) Floyd | Philosophers are not yet supermen. Floyd | | ||||
| inky says (to Floyd), "x woman" | ||||
Floyd | She's like a very damp pile of meringues, and she's getting damper by Floyd | the second. She wipes her nose and eyes with a sodden veil. Floyd | Floyd | A man steps into the church, removes his cycle clips in awkward Floyd | reverence, and walks up the centre of the aisle. He sinks to his knees Floyd | in front of the tapestry, and brings a clenched hand up to his brow. Floyd | Loosening the fist, he draws his hand forward and up, fully extending Floyd | his arm, as if tracing the outline of something extending from his Floyd | forehead. He brings his hand up and down the length several times, Floyd | getting more and more rapid, before letting out a small cry, dropping Floyd | his arms, standing up, bowing and hurriedly leaving the building, the Floyd | oak doors swinging to behind him. Floyd | | inky says, "I guess that is an IPU worshipper" | |||
| smartgenes says, "nice random event" | ||||
| DavidW asks, "a what?" | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "get clips" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | inky says, "invisible pink unicorn" | |||
| Lionheart says, "The tapestry would be a picture of the IPU then" | ||||
| DavidW asks, "how... how are you extrapolating that?" | ||||
| smartgenes asks, "what's an IPU?" | ||||
| Lionheart says, "Invisible Pink Unicorn, I thought we explained that" | ||||
| Binder says, "it was an infodump from thinking about monsters" | ||||
| smartgenes says, "i didn't see that" | ||||
| inky says (to DavidW), "well, we know the IPU exists in the world" | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "get unicorn" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | inky says, "and it said the guy was pretending to trace something extending forth from his forehead" | |||
| Jizaboz says (to floyd), "get all" | ||||
Floyd | That's a bit greedy. Try taking specific things. Floyd | | inky says, "so I am theorizing that it is an invisible horn" | |||
| DavidW says (to smartgenes), "They're claiming the blank tapestry depicts the Invisible Pink Unicorn." | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "confess sins to priest" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | ||||
| inky says (to Floyd), "talk to priest" | ||||
Floyd | The priest notices you standing in the aisle and shouts, "Welcome, Floyd | adventurer! Has the invisible pink unicorn made herself known to you Floyd | as your equestrian saviour?" Floyd | Floyd | [1] No, I don't think so. Floyd | [2] Ye-es . . . Floyd | [3] Invisible pink unicorn? Floyd | | inky says, "huzzah" | |||
| inky says (to Floyd), "3" | ||||
Floyd | "The Invisible Pink Unicorn (Blessed Be Her Holy Hooves) is the Floyd | supreme deity, mistress of all in heaven and earth, creator of time Floyd | and space, and trotter along the High Plains!" His arms raise up to Floyd | the ceiling and his whole body vibrates with a sing-song zeal. Floyd | Floyd | [1] Er . . . right . . . And you believe that, do you? Floyd | [2] That's the most ridiculous thing I've ever heard. Floyd | | Lionheart says, "Um, Equine savior" | |||
| Lionheart says, "She doesn't ride unicorns, she is a unicorn" | ||||
| Jizaboz asks, "1?" | ||||
| DavidW says, "you guys jumped ahead. I haven't played this game before, y'know." | ||||
| inky says, "maybe she is an equestrian savior because the saved get to ride her" | ||||
| inky says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | "I believe, for only She can protect me from the Purple Oyster (Of Floyd | Doom)," he says, sounding the final word like a foghorn on an iceberg. Floyd | Floyd | [1] You are truly insane. Floyd | [2] Um, OK. Look, I'm struggling a bit here. What evidence do you base Floyd | your faith on? Floyd | | Lionheart says, "Oh yeah, maybe she saves equestrians." | |||
| smartgenes says, "no i kinda got that too.. with the spaghetti monster and stufff earlier" | ||||
| inky says (to Floyd), "2" | ||||
Floyd | "No, unbeliever, you don't understand! Have you proved that She does Floyd | not exist? No, no, thrice no! The burden of proof, my young friend, is Floyd | on you." Floyd | Floyd | As he speaks you suddenly feel a heavy weight drag your neck down. Floyd | Grappling at your throat, you loop over your head a lengthy leather Floyd | thong at the end of which hangs a mysterious weight. The priest grins Floyd | broadly at you, and suddenly the candlelit church appears dark and Floyd | threatening. You hear thunder rumble outside, and with a backward Floyd | glance stumble out of the doors. Floyd | | DavidW asks, "uh, did we get a literal 'burden' in our inventory, there?" | |||
| smartgenes says, "i studied philosophy, it's a real position, which it talked about earlier, if you managed to read it during all the blurb" | ||||
| Jizaboz says (to floyd), "i" | ||||
Floyd | You are carrying: Floyd | a Burden of Proof Floyd | a sack (open but empty) Floyd | a Chinese key Floyd | a manual Floyd | | ||||
| Binder says (to Floyd), "i" | ||||
Floyd | You are carrying: Floyd | a Burden of Proof Floyd | a sack (open but empty) Floyd | a Chinese key Floyd | a manual Floyd | | ||||
| inky says (to Floyd), "x burden" | ||||
Floyd | A weighty matter, made of weighty matter. It hangs about your neck on Floyd | a leather thong, but you wish it would hang about somewhere else, like Floyd | a nice bar or a street corner. Whenever you speak it hangs on your Floyd | every word, lusting after some token of truth, but, similarly, you Floyd | wish it would just hang on something else. It can go hang itself, Floyd | basically. Floyd | | Binder says, "evidently" | |||
| DavidW says, "(I remember something similar in Pilgrim's Progress.)" | ||||
| DavidW says, "(except there it was our sins burdening us, I think)" | ||||
| Lionheart says, "Hah, cute" | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "ride unicorn" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "put burden on itself" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "put burden on burden" | ||||
Floyd | You can't put something on top of itself. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "remove burden" | ||||
Floyd | You're not wearing that. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "put burden on nothing" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "drop burden" | ||||
Floyd | Dropped. Floyd | | ||||
| Binder says (to Floyd), "drop burden" | ||||
Floyd | The Burden of Proof is already here. Floyd | | smartgenes says, "hmm" | |||
| inky says, "well, that was easy" | ||||
| DavidW says, "huh" | ||||
| DavidW says, "I didn't think that would work." | ||||
| djfletch asks, "can we go and hang it on the priest?" | ||||
| Lionheart says, "Huh, I didn't think it would be that easy to dispose of" | ||||
| smartgenes says, "lol" | ||||
| DavidW says (to djf), "oh, I like that idea." | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "kick burden" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | ||||
| Jizaboz says (to clubfloyd), "Yeah I thought of that" | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "take burden" | ||||
Floyd | (putting the manual into the sack to make room) Floyd | Taken. Floyd | | DavidW says (to djf), "please enter the church and try it." | |||
| smartgenes says, "hmm intelligent inventory-control" | ||||
| djfletch says (to Floyd), "enter church" | ||||
Floyd | There's no way you're going back in there just now. Besides, every Floyd | time you go near a massive rumble of thunder breaks across the sky, Floyd | despite there not being a cloud in sight. If that's not the world Floyd | trying to give you a hint then nothing is. Floyd | | smartgenes asks, "is that a plugin?" | |||
| djfletch says, "bah" | ||||
| djfletch says, "maybe we can use it on someone else sometime" | ||||
| Jizaboz says, "Oh well." | ||||
| DavidW says (to smartgenes), "It's a player's holdall; standard." | ||||
| Lionheart says, "That thunder is just the IPUs stampeding in the clouds." | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "climb church" | ||||
Floyd | You're positively climbing up the walls. Floyd | | DavidW asks, "What other buildings can we enter?" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "think about sartre" | ||||
Floyd | Jean Paul Sartre (1905 - 1980) was a pioneering French existentialist, Floyd | socialist, public intellectual and literary writer, and has since Floyd | become an icon of philosophy and black coffee. His thought centred Floyd | around concepts of free will and life-defining choice -- he claimed Floyd | that individuals create the meaning of their own lives. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "think about kant" | ||||
Floyd | Immanuel Kant (1724 - 1804) was one of the most influential thinkers Floyd | writing towards the end of the Enlightenment. Writing on metaphysics, Floyd | ethics, aesthetics and politics, he ushered in a new critical way of Floyd | approaching philosophy, founded not only on rigorous rationalism, but Floyd | also, most importantly, on the division of the discursively-produced Floyd | "world of appearances" (as it appears to consciousness) and the "world Floyd | in itself (as it is independent of consciosuness). His philosophy Floyd | defined the terms of the debate which has followed ever since. It's Floyd | also famed for being some of the densest and most impenetrably-written Floyd | of philosophy -- which probably only serves to enhance its reputation Floyd | due to the small number of people who actually understand it. Floyd | | DavidW says, "This isn't how Monty Python described them." | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "think about monty python" | ||||
Floyd | Your philosophical studies don't seem to have taught you anything Floyd | about that. Floyd | | ||||
| djfletch says (to Floyd), "l" | ||||
Floyd | Village Street Floyd | A church, a theatre, a tavern, a barbershop, a pavement caf? -- their Floyd | various changing forms clutter around, entrances facing out onto what Floyd | seems (most of the time) to be an ordinary village street. Passers-by Floyd | duck in and out of the buildings, stop by the water pump, or carry on Floyd | to a square to the north. No-one, you notice, takes the road south -- Floyd | or heads along the routes east towards the storybook hills or west Floyd | into the fairytale woods. Floyd | | smartgenes asks, "the philosophy football sketch?" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "think about socrates" | ||||
Floyd | Socrates (c. 470 BC - c. 399 BC) was an early Greek philosopher, the Floyd | teacher of Aristotle, who founded many of the subjects and methods of Floyd | Western philosophy. The Socratic method of constant and persistent Floyd | questioning of assumptions remains a driving force of philosophy. He Floyd | wrote down none of his own philosophy, and so his works and (highly Floyd | dramatic) life are known to us only through his pupils, especially Floyd | Plato, his contemporaries, and historians. Floyd | | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "think about hegel" | ||||
Floyd | Georg Hegel (1770 - 1831) was one of the most important of the German Floyd | idealists. Writing on culture and politics, he developed a particular Floyd | dialectical philosophy, a philosophy of progress, with influential Floyd | thoughts on freedom, art, history and morality. Floyd | | ||||
| inky says (to Floyd), "enter theatre" | ||||
Floyd | You try the theatre doors, but they're fastened shut. Floyd | Floyd | "Nah mate," says the man leaning by the entrance. "We've been closed Floyd | down, innit?" Floyd | Floyd | [1] Oh, I'm terribly sorry to hear that. Why? Floyd | [2] Typical. Trapped inside a vindictive fantasy world and I can't Floyd | even watch some life-affirming theatre. Floyd | | ||||
| inky says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | "Him in there," he says, indicating the church with a grubby thumb. Floyd | "Sez the performing arts is an insult unto Her name." Floyd | Floyd | [1] Whose name? Floyd | [2] Ouch, tough break. Stupid religion, isn't it? Floyd | [3] And he had the power to close you down? Floyd | | ||||
| inky says (to Floyd), "3" | ||||
Floyd | "Nah, but soon as he says something everyone listens, know what I Floyd | mean? Wouldn't a soul dare come in here." Floyd | Floyd | [1] Ouch, tough break. Stupid religion, isn't it? Floyd | [2] That sucks. There's no way to convince everyone how daft the Floyd | religion is? Floyd | [3] And isn't there anyone who could help? Floyd | [4] Well, that's rough, mate, but I'd best be getting on. Floyd | | smartgenes asks, "her is the Unicorn?" | |||
| DavidW says, "yes" | ||||
| inky says (to Floyd), "3" | ||||
Floyd | "Nah," he says sadly. "Unless you's offering." Floyd | Floyd | [1] Alright, you're on. I'll prove She doesn't exist. Then we'll get Floyd | you going again. Floyd | [2] Guess you're right. I'd best be getting on, then. Floyd | | ||||
| inky says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | He looks at you askance, cynically. "Give it yer best shot then," he Floyd | says. "See you round." Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "think about inception" | ||||
Floyd | Your philosophical studies don't seem to have taught you anything Floyd | about that. Floyd | | DavidW asks, "uh, How the heckie will we proof something doesn't exist?" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "think about microsoft" | ||||
Floyd | Your philosophical studies don't seem to have taught you anything Floyd | about that. Floyd | | Lionheart says, "Well, logically, you can't be both invisible and pink" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "think about plato" | ||||
Floyd | Plato (428 - 348 BC) was an ancient Greek philosopher, who began Floyd | relaying the philosophy of his teacher, Socrates, in a series of Floyd | written dialogues, before developing his own. A founder of idealism Floyd | (in politics, metaphysics, ethics, aesthetics and just about Floyd | everything else), he taught in his turn Aristotle, whose reputation Floyd | eventually grew to eclipse his own during the Middle Ages, before a Floyd | Renaissance rediscovery of Plato. Floyd | | Lionheart says, "Therefore, the IPU cannot exist, QED" | |||
| inky says, "I imagine we will have to shift the burden of proof onto someone else" | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "think about god" | ||||
Floyd | Your philosophical studies don't seem to have taught you anything Floyd | about that. Floyd | | ||||
| inky says (to Floyd), "enter cafe" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Pavement Caf? Floyd | The caf? spills out into the street. Steel chairs are scattered around Floyd | the serving kiosk, apparently chaotically, though you suspect there's Floyd | a cynical art to it. Most of the customers are buried in books, Floyd | thimble-sized cups of black coffee steaming by them and handmade Floyd | cigarettes rolling around the corners of their mouths. Some of them, Floyd | though, are intense young couples clasping hands across their plates, Floyd | boring into each other's eyes as if looking for some flaw, breaking Floyd | the gaze only to toss hair or adjust a beret. Sitting in the corner, Floyd | Jean-Paul Sartre surveys the caf? around him and smiles in a satisfied Floyd | yet enigmatic way. Floyd | Floyd | A willowy young server stands behind the kiosk, smiling in a way that Floyd | makes you want to know her better. Floyd | | DavidW says (to Lionheart), "Surely that depends. The Invisible Woman is a blonde." | |||
| inky says (to Floyd), "talk to server" | ||||
Floyd | You smile at the server and say, "Hello". Floyd | Floyd | "Hello," she replies. Floyd | Floyd | Well, that's that off to a good start. Floyd | Floyd | [1] Do you serve here often? Floyd | [2] What time do you finish? Floyd | [3] Can I have your phone number? Floyd | [4] What's for lunch? Floyd | | djfletch says, "if the IPU puts the burden of proof about god onto the believer, then logically we have to think of something more ridiculous than the IPU and tell the priest about that" | |||
| inky says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | She giggles coyly and swings from side to side. "That depends," she Floyd | says. Floyd | Floyd | [1] Oh, really? On what? Floyd | [2] Actually, on second thoughts, I'm starving. What's for lunch? Floyd | | smartgenes says, "wow jean paul sartre himself" | |||
| inky says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | She leans in close to you, opens her lips a little, and says, "On Floyd | whether you stop staring down my dress and order some goddamn food." Floyd | Floyd | [1] Er . . . sorry . . . what's on the menu? Floyd | [2] Ah. I suppose that means "No" then, does it? You wouldn't Floyd | reconsider? Floyd | | Lionheart says, "Well, we could talk about the Flying Spaghetti Monster, since the game knows about His Noodliness too" | |||
| Binder says, "oooh, shut DOWN" | ||||
| smartgenes asks, "i guess we can only type in numbers whilst inthe menu system?" | ||||
| Lionheart says, "And when he declares that a heresy, whoosh goes the burden back to him" | ||||
| DavidW says, "only if it's offered as a menu item." | ||||
| inky says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | Lighting a cigarette, she mutters at you bitterly, "Fresh summer Floyd | sorbet of pre-phyllorexa claret, plovers" egg omelet with a Floyd | side-platter of seasonal vegetables, oven-roasted black swan on a bed Floyd | of couscous with a thyme and fennel garnish, or eggs, soss, an' Floyd | beans." Floyd | Floyd | [1] Could I have the sorbet? Floyd | [2] Could I have the omelet? Floyd | [3] Could I have the swan? Floyd | [4] Er, eggs, soss, and beans? Floyd | | smartgenes says, "swan is very philosophical" | |||
| smartgenes says, "it's black swan" | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "think about swan" | ||||
Floyd | [I need some kind of reaction from you to continue the scene. Enter a Floyd | number, or say REPEAT to reacquaint yourself with your options.] Floyd | | smartgenes asks, "is this natalie portman serving?" | |||
| inky says (to Floyd), "3" | ||||
Floyd | "Actually, no-one's ever seen a black swan round these parts," she Floyd | admits abruptly. "Though I hear some Australians have been spinning a Floyd | few yarns. Something else?" Floyd | Floyd | [1] Could I have the sorbet? Floyd | [2] Could I have the omelet? Floyd | [3] Er, eggs, soss, and beans? Floyd | | ||||
| inky says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | "Nah, sorry, fridge is broken. Something else?" she says curtly. Floyd | Floyd | [1] Could I have the omelet? Floyd | [2] Er, eggs, soss, and beans? Floyd | | ||||
| inky says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | "Fresh out of plover's eggs, I'm afraid. Actually," she says, thinking Floyd | aloud, "if you could get some of those little seaside ovulations, I Floyd | might just do something nice for you. Meanwhile, something else?" Floyd | Floyd | [1] Er, eggs, soss, and beans? Floyd | | inky says, "hmm, I guess that means we have to go find some eggs" | |||
| smartgenes says, "lol typical caff" | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | "Right-o. That'll be fifty pence" Floyd | Floyd | Ah. Paying. Yes, you'd forgotten about that. You give the server a Floyd | sheepish look, to which she only replies, "No cash, no beans." Floyd | | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "x server" | ||||
Floyd | She glares back at you as you admire her. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "think about natalie portman" | ||||
Floyd | Your philosophical studies don't seem to have taught you anything Floyd | about that. Floyd | | ||||
| inky says (to Floyd), "talk to sartre" | ||||
Floyd | The philosopher looks heavily at you and says, "Everything is Floyd | meaningless. We create our own meaning." Floyd | Floyd | [1] No, we don't. Floyd | [2] Ah oui, c'est vrai. Floyd | | DavidW says, "I guess she can't make an omelet without breaking some eggs." | |||
| inky says (to Floyd), "2" | ||||
Floyd | If he is pleased at your answer, he doesn't show it. "Tell me," he Floyd | demands, "What has value?" Floyd | Floyd | [1] Nothing. Floyd | [2] Ta m?re. Floyd | [3] What is chosen. Floyd | [4] Black coffee and cigarettes. Floyd | | ||||
| inky says (to Floyd), "2" | ||||
Floyd | He huffs sharply at you and turns dismissively to his coffee. Floyd | | smartgenes says, "1" | |||
| inky says, "oops" | ||||
| inky says (to Floyd), "talk to sartre" | ||||
Floyd | "Do you know yet, what has value?" asks Sartre heavily. Floyd | Floyd | [1] Nothing. Floyd | [2] Ta m?re. Floyd | [3] What is chosen. Floyd | [4] Black coffee and cigarettes. Floyd | | ||||
| inky says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | He huffs sharply at you and turns dismissively to his coffee. Floyd | | DavidW says, "4 , silly" | |||
| smartgenes asks, "existence and nothingness.. no?" | ||||
| inky says (to Floyd), "talk to sartre" | ||||
Floyd | "Do you know yet, what has value?" asks Sartre heavily. Floyd | Floyd | [1] Nothing. Floyd | [2] Ta m?re. Floyd | [3] What is chosen. Floyd | [4] Black coffee and cigarettes. Floyd | | ||||
| inky says (to Floyd), "4" | ||||
Floyd | He looks a little wistfully at his black coffee and cigarettes, sighs, Floyd | and says "No, not even them," before sinking into an intractable Floyd | melancholy. Floyd | | smartgenes says, "lol" | |||
| inky says (to Floyd), "talk to sartre" | ||||
Floyd | "Do you know yet, what has value?" asks Sartre heavily. Floyd | Floyd | [1] Nothing. Floyd | [2] Ta m?re. Floyd | [3] What is chosen. Floyd | [4] Black coffee and cigarettes. Floyd | | ||||
| inky says (to Floyd), "3" | ||||
Floyd | "Exactly! There is no objective value in anything." Floyd | Floyd | [1] Even in money? Floyd | [2] Even in love? Floyd | [3] Even in black coffee and cigarettes? Floyd | | smartgenes says, "helps if you speak French i guess" | |||
| Lionheart says, "Ha" | ||||
| inky says (to Floyd), "3" | ||||
Floyd | He looks a little wistfully at his black coffee and cigarettes, sighs, Floyd | and says "No, not even them," before sinking into an intractable Floyd | melancholy. Floyd | | Lionheart says, "That was a LucasArtsy option." | |||
| smartgenes says, "well-researched on Sartre" | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "talk to sartre" | ||||
Floyd | "Do you know yet, what has value?" asks Sartre heavily. Floyd | Floyd | [1] Nothing. Floyd | [2] Ta m?re. Floyd | [3] What is chosen. Floyd | [4] Black coffee and cigarettes. Floyd | | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "3" | ||||
Floyd | "Exactly! There is no objective value in anything." Floyd | Floyd | [1] Even in money? Floyd | [2] Even in love? Floyd | [3] Even in black coffee and cigarettes? Floyd | | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | He seems animated. "Even in money!" he cries. Floyd | Floyd | [1] Wow. My whole life has been a lie. Floyd | [2] Excellent. You won't mind if I take yours then. Floyd | | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "2" | ||||
Floyd | "I suppose not," he says, surprised, and before he realises what's Floyd | going on you whip his wallet from the table. Floyd | Floyd | [Your score has just gone up by two points.] Floyd | | smartgenes says, "lol" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x wallet" | ||||
Floyd | It contains only one pound coin and a lighter. You remove them both Floyd | and discard it in disgust at the poverty of unemployed philosophers. Floyd | | inky says, "ha ha" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "think about existence" | ||||
Floyd | Your philosophical studies don't seem to have taught you anything Floyd | about that. Floyd | | Lionheart says, "Okay, let's order some eggs, soss and whatsit" | |||
| inky has had his fill of playing for now, and goes back to the Lounge. | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "talk to server" | ||||
Floyd | You'd rather just give her her money when you've got it, rather than Floyd | face her wrath. Floyd | | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "give coin to server" | ||||
Floyd | You hand over your money abashedly, at which, after thrusting your Floyd | change at you, the server vanishes into the kitchen in a huff. Floyd | Peculiar clanky, sweary sounds come from within. Floyd | | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "undo" | ||||
Floyd | Pavement Caf? Floyd | [Previous turn undone.] Floyd | | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "x coin" | ||||
Floyd | Golden and round, it's a shiny pound! Floyd | | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "flip coin" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | DavidW says, "The change might be useful after ordering." | |||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "give coin to server" | ||||
Floyd | You hand over your money abashedly, at which, after thrusting your Floyd | change at you, the server vanishes into the kitchen in a huff. Floyd | Peculiar clanky, sweary sounds come from within. Floyd | | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "i" | ||||
Floyd | You are carrying: Floyd | a fifty pence piece Floyd | a lighter Floyd | a Burden of Proof Floyd | a sack (open) Floyd | a manual Floyd | a Chinese key Floyd | | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "piece" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "x piece" | ||||
Floyd | Neither so shiny nor so round as the pound, yet money nonetheless. Floyd | | ||||
| djfletch says (to Floyd), "give burden to sartre" | ||||
Floyd | Jean-Paul Sartre doesn't seem interested. Floyd | | josh_g asks, "what's being played today?" | |||
| djfletch says (to Floyd), "put burden on sartre" | ||||
Floyd | Putting things on Jean-Paul Sartre would achieve nothing. Floyd | | Lionheart says, "The Chinese Room" | |||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "version" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | The Chinese Room Floyd | A philosophical text adventure into the green valleys of silliness, by Floyd | H Giles and J Jones Floyd | Release 1 / Serial number 070930 / Inform 7 build 4U65 (I6/v6.31 lib Floyd | 6/11N) Floyd | Identification number: //2A684CAD-6B5E-4D2A-92FC-D6C6E80E35B6// Floyd | Interpreter version 0.4.2 / VM 3.1.0 / Library serial number 060709 Floyd | Standard Rules version 1/061217 by Graham Nelson Floyd | Reactable Quips version 4 by Michael Martin Floyd | Title Page by Jon Ingold Floyd | Default Messages version 7/070824 by David Fisher Floyd | Menus version 2 by Emily Short Floyd | Basic Screen Effects version 3 by Emily Short Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "think about burden" | ||||
Floyd | The Invisible Pink Unicorn, like the Flying Spaghetti Monster, is a Floyd | popular satirical religious entity. While their use has now expanded Floyd | to encompass all manner of religious satire, the original purpose was Floyd | to point out a common fallacy regarding religious belief and burden of Floyd | proof. Floyd | Floyd | It has been argued that atheism is an untenable philosophical Floyd | position, as one cannot give a watertight proof for the non-existence Floyd | of a religious entity: how would it be possible to prove that a god Floyd | does not exist? One can only give incomplete arguments in favour of a Floyd | god's non-existence, and so certain atheism is impossible. Floyd | Floyd | The question asked by the IPU is then, "Well, does that mean that it's Floyd | perfectly justifiable for me to believe in an invisible pink unicorn Floyd | orbiting Saturn? No-one's ever seen it, but I believe in it, and it's Floyd | impossible for you to definitively disprove its existence." Given the Floyd | intuitive ridiculousness of believing in the IPU without evidence, Floyd | this response serves to shift the ground of the debate away from Floyd | requiring atheists to prove an entity's existence with certainty. One Floyd | implication is that we ought not to be looking for certainty, but Floyd | rather for good arguments for likely beliefs; another stronger Floyd | atheistic response is to use this thought experiment to claim that the Floyd | burden of proof for religious entities lies not with the atheist for Floyd | disproving existence but rather the believer for proving existence. Floyd | The question of who holds the burden of proof has become a thorny Floyd | debate. Floyd | | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "prove ipu" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | smartgenes says, "two authors" | |||
| Binder says, "hm, thorny debate" | ||||
| djfletch says (to Floyd), "z" | ||||
Floyd | Time passes. Or at least, loiters around for a while longer. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "think about philosophy of religion" | ||||
Floyd | Your philosophical studies don't seem to have taught you anything Floyd | about that. Floyd | | Lionheart says, "Yeah, I hmmed at that as well, it's not thorny at all" | |||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "l" | ||||
Floyd | Pavement Caf? Floyd | The caf? spills out into the street. Steel chairs are scattered around Floyd | the serving kiosk, apparently chaotically, though you suspect there's Floyd | a cynical art to it. Most of the customers are buried in books, Floyd | thimble-sized cups of black coffee steaming by them and handmade Floyd | cigarettes rolling around the corners of their mouths. Some of them, Floyd | though, are intense young couples clasping hands across their plates, Floyd | boring into each other's eyes as if looking for some flaw, breaking Floyd | the gaze only to toss hair or adjust a beret. Sitting in the corner, Floyd | Jean-Paul Sartre surveys the caf? around him and smiles in a satisfied Floyd | yet enigmatic way. Floyd | Floyd | The server is clattering away in the kitchen behind the kiosk, making Floyd | loud sweary noises. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "x kiosk" | ||||
Floyd | It's built from the same simple-yet-elegant brushed steel as the Floyd | chairs, and it stands outside a building which presumably houses the Floyd | kitchen and espresso machine. There's a menu tacked on the counter. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "x menu" | ||||
Floyd | In minimalist letters it lists the available fare: Floyd | - Fresh summer sorbet of pre-phyllorexa claret Floyd | - Plovers" egg omelet with a side-platter of seasonal vegetables Floyd | - Oven-roasted black swan on a bed of couscous with a thyme and Floyd | fennel garnish Floyd | - Eggs, soss, beans Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "talk to customers" | ||||
Floyd | You can't. They're too intense. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "x machine" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "drink coffee" | ||||
Floyd | There's nothing suitable to drink here. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "in" | ||||
Floyd | You channel your will to power to summon a path in that direction. Floyd | Sadly, nothing happens: you can't go that way. Floyd | | djfletch says, "not sure if we will get the food or not" | |||
| Lionheart says, "ask waiter about food" | ||||
| DavidW says, "Wait a bit more, I guess." | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "ask sartre for cigarette" | ||||
Floyd | Your command falls on deaf ears. Perhaps you should TALK TO them about Floyd | it? Floyd | | ||||
| djfletch says (to Floyd), "z" | ||||
Floyd | Time passes. Or at least, loiters around for a while longer. Floyd | | DavidW asks, "Didn't our server leave?" | |||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "ask waiter for food" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "go kitchen" | ||||
Floyd | That's not something you can enter. Floyd | | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "call waiter" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | DavidW says, "server, not waiter" | |||
| djfletch says, "she's busy cooking the food" | ||||
| Lionheart says, "Same diff, it probably has the synonym" | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "z" | ||||
Floyd | Time passes. Or at least, loiters around for a while longer. Floyd | | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "l" | ||||
Floyd | Pavement Caf? Floyd | The caf? spills out into the street. Steel chairs are scattered around Floyd | the serving kiosk, apparently chaotically, though you suspect there's Floyd | a cynical art to it. Most of the customers are buried in books, Floyd | thimble-sized cups of black coffee steaming by them and handmade Floyd | cigarettes rolling around the corners of their mouths. Some of them, Floyd | though, are intense young couples clasping hands across their plates, Floyd | boring into each other's eyes as if looking for some flaw, breaking Floyd | the gaze only to toss hair or adjust a beret. Sitting in the corner, Floyd | Jean-Paul Sartre surveys the caf? around him and smiles in a satisfied Floyd | yet enigmatic way. Floyd | Floyd | The server is clattering away in the kitchen behind the kiosk, making Floyd | loud sweary noises. Floyd | | DavidW asks, "Do we want to try leaving and returning?" | |||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "go behind kiosk" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "x kiosk" | ||||
Floyd | It's built from the same simple-yet-elegant brushed steel as the Floyd | chairs, and it stands outside a building which presumably houses the Floyd | kitchen and espresso machine. There's a menu tacked on the counter. Floyd | | djfletch says, "yeah, try somewhere else and come back later" | |||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "enter kitchen" | ||||
Floyd | That's not something you can enter. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "sit on chair" | ||||
Floyd | You can sit upon your situpon, but not that. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "sit on situpon" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | Lionheart asks, "Uh, what?" | |||
| DavidW says, "situpon = ass" | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "x situpon" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "think about andrew plotkin" | ||||
Floyd | Your philosophical studies don't seem to have taught you anything Floyd | about that. Floyd | | Lionheart asks, "Is that Brit or Aussie slang?" | |||
| DavidW says, "I think so." | ||||
| Doug says (to Floyd), "think about the brain" | ||||
Floyd | Your philosophical studies don't seem to have taught you anything Floyd | about that. Floyd | | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "think about thought" | ||||
Floyd | Your philosophical studies don't seem to have taught you anything Floyd | about that. Floyd | | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "think about ideas" | ||||
Floyd | Your philosophical studies don't seem to have taught you anything Floyd | about that. Floyd | | DavidW asks, "Shall we try leaving and returning?" | |||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "think about proof" | ||||
Floyd | Your philosophical studies don't seem to have taught you anything Floyd | about that. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "think about leaving" | ||||
Floyd | Your philosophical studies don't seem to have taught you anything Floyd | about that. Floyd | | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "think about heidegger" | ||||
Floyd | Martin Heidegger (1889 - 1976) was one of the founders of Floyd | phenomenology, the critical philosophy which, roughly speaking, Floyd | explores the holistically-located meaning and being of things, rather Floyd | than the analytically-defined nature of things. Whatever that means. Floyd | He helped usher in the academic divide between "Continental" and Floyd | "Anglo-American" philosophy which, based on that difference, still Floyd | exists today. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "think about phenomenology" | ||||
Floyd | Your philosophical studies don't seem to have taught you anything Floyd | about that. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "think about david hume" | ||||
Floyd | David Hume (1711 - 1776) was the foremost philosopher of the Scottish Floyd | Enlightenment. Following fellow British philosophers Locke and Floyd | Berkeley, he popularised philosophical empiricism (as opposed to the Floyd | rationalism of Descartes and Spinoza), and was also influential in Floyd | thought on free will and ethics. He was an important influence on the Floyd | thought of Immanuel Kant, whom he "woke from his dogmatic slumber" -- Floyd | Kant's work can be seen as overturning the divide between the Floyd | rationalists and empiricists. Floyd | | Lionheart says (to smartgene), "Heh, nice try. Maybe we could then have asked the priest how he knows he exists." | |||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "wake" | ||||
Floyd | If only it were that simple. Floyd | | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "xyzzy" | ||||
Floyd | A hollow voice says, "There are no obligatory Adventure references in Floyd | this game." Floyd | Floyd | There is a long pause. Floyd | Floyd | "Oh, bugger." Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "think about categorical imperative" | ||||
Floyd | The Categorical Imperative is to "Act only according to that maxim Floyd | whereby you can at the same time will that it should become a Floyd | universal law." It is the key principle of Kant's deontological Floyd | ethics, which can't really be summed up, but if they can be, they can Floyd | be summed up as follows: Floyd | Floyd | In order for acts to be judged on ethical grounds, they must be freely Floyd | chosen. In order for an act to be freely chosen, it must be rationally Floyd | chosen, as only rationality liberates us from the brute chains of Floyd | natural causality. But in order for a choice to be rational, it must Floyd | be universalisable -- we must be able to imagine that choice being Floyd | made by everyone in the same situation, without undermining its own Floyd | foundations. Thus, for example, to put it roughly, we must never Floyd | steal, because is everyone stole no-one would be able to steal, so the Floyd | act cannot be rationally undertaken -- it always undermines itself. Floyd | Floyd | That may not be entirely clear. Like much of Kant's philosophy, Floyd | deontological ethics are hard to understand, and you're not sure Floyd | you've remembered your studies properly. One thing sticks in your Floyd | mind, though: according to Kant, there are no moral dilemmas in Floyd | deontological ethics as, without having to make any calculations, the Floyd | proper application of the Categorical Imperative will always determine Floyd | definitively what is ethical and what is not. Floyd | | smartgenes says, "wow didnt expect that 1" | |||
| DavidW says, "I don't know all these people and terms that are being thrown around, but I imagine it'll all be useful eventually." | ||||
| smartgenes says, "literally just reeling off all the people i studied" | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "think about dennett" | ||||
Floyd | Your philosophical studies don't seem to have taught you anything Floyd | about that. Floyd | | ||||
| Ellison goes back to Squeamhurst.. | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "out" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Village Street Floyd | A church, a theatre, a tavern, a barbershop, a pavement caf? -- their Floyd | various changing forms clutter around, entrances facing out onto what Floyd | seems (most of the time) to be an ordinary village street. Passers-by Floyd | duck in and out of the buildings, stop by the water pump, or carry on Floyd | to a square to the north. No-one, you notice, takes the road south -- Floyd | or heads along the routes east towards the storybook hills or west Floyd | into the fairytale woods. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "enter cafe" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Pavement Caf? Floyd | The caf? spills out into the street. Steel chairs are scattered around Floyd | the serving kiosk, apparently chaotically, though you suspect there's Floyd | a cynical art to it. Most of the customers are buried in books, Floyd | thimble-sized cups of black coffee steaming by them and handmade Floyd | cigarettes rolling around the corners of their mouths. Some of them, Floyd | though, are intense young couples clasping hands across their plates, Floyd | boring into each other's eyes as if looking for some flaw, breaking Floyd | the gaze only to toss hair or adjust a beret. Sitting in the corner, Floyd | Jean-Paul Sartre surveys the caf? around him and smiles in a satisfied Floyd | yet enigmatic way. Floyd | Floyd | The server is clattering away in the kitchen behind the kiosk, making Floyd | loud sweary noises. Floyd | | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "think about schopenhauer" | ||||
Floyd | Your philosophical studies don't seem to have taught you anything Floyd | about that. Floyd | | DavidW says, "hm. That didn't trigger her reappearance." | |||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "think about descartes" | ||||
Floyd | Ren? Descartes (1596 - 1650) has become known as the Father of Modern Floyd | Philosopher. A French thinker, his philosophy was founded on sceptical Floyd | rationalism -- he sought to determine what could be rationally proved, Floyd | using a method of extreme scepticism in order to test his beliefs. He Floyd | as attempting to write "as if no-one had written on these matters Floyd | before", and so his philosophy framed a great deal of what came after Floyd | him, ushering in an era of ahistorical analytic philosophy which Floyd | sought to determine the truth of the world. Floyd | | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "think about pure reason" | ||||
Floyd | Your philosophical studies don't seem to have taught you anything Floyd | about that. Floyd | | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "think about scepticism" | ||||
Floyd | Your philosophical studies don't seem to have taught you anything Floyd | about that. Floyd | | DavidW asks, "Is any of this helping us?" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "think about cave" | ||||
Floyd | The analogy of the cave is one of the earliest and most elegant of Floyd | philosophical analogies. In it, Plato compares humans to prisoners Floyd | trapped in a cave, behind whom is an enormous fire, between them and Floyd | which is a walkway on which pass various people, animals and other Floyd | things of the world. All the prisoners ever see is the shadow of those Floyd | things passing along the walkway. The prisoners come to name these Floyd | shadows, and judge each other by the quality of their naming. Floyd | Floyd | What Plato is trying to imply is that everything we as humans perceive Floyd | is a representation -- and that all our reasoning is reasoning about Floyd | these representations. Plato imagines that beyond the world of Floyd | representations is the world of forms -- ideals of objects. Thus, for Floyd | example, every philosopher is a pale reflection of the ideal Floyd | philosopher in the world of forms. Thi idea of the relationship Floyd | between ideal and representation extends into every discipline of Floyd | philosophy for Plato -- in aesthetics, for example, we can see the pot Floyd | a potter makes as a representation of the pot he imagined, which is Floyd | itself a representation of the ideal pot, and which itself might be Floyd | represented by a painting of a pot -- each step, for Plato, is a step Floyd | away from the ideal, and for Plato philosophy became, in a sense, a Floyd | question for the ideal forms of ideas. Floyd | Floyd | The analogy of the cave continues, however. Imagine a prisoner who is Floyd | freed and who sees the light of the fire, the sun. He would be blinded Floyd | by it, completely overcome by his enlightenment. Imagine then that he Floyd | were forcibly chained down with the rest of the prisoners again. How Floyd | would he fare in the naming game? Plato suggests that he'd no longer Floyd | be able to play -- his enlightenment was such that the darkness of the Floyd | cave would now blind him as well; enlightened, he could no longer Floyd | dully represent the representation by naming the shadow. Floyd | Floyd | Platonic idealism reverberates throughout Western philosophy -- but Floyd | this touch on ideas of enlightenment exists also in Eastern Floyd | philosophy. How are the enlightened to reveal their knowledge to us? Floyd | How can the enlightened represent the truth? This, perhaps, is the Floyd | deepest question of philosophy. Floyd | | Lionheart says, "Not really, though it does give us clues what might be featured in this game" | |||
| djfletch says, "I say try the tavern or the barbershop" | ||||
| DavidW says, "Perhaps we ought to explore more, yes." | ||||
| djfletch says (to Floyd), "out" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Village Street Floyd | A church, a theatre, a tavern, a barbershop, a pavement caf? -- their Floyd | various changing forms clutter around, entrances facing out onto what Floyd | seems (most of the time) to be an ordinary village street. Passers-by Floyd | duck in and out of the buildings, stop by the water pump, or carry on Floyd | to a square to the north. No-one, you notice, takes the road south -- Floyd | or heads along the routes east towards the storybook hills or west Floyd | into the fairytale woods. Floyd | | ||||
| djfletch says (to Floyd), "enter tavern" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Tavern Floyd | You duck as you enter the smoky tavern (evidently smoking bans do not Floyd | exist in thought experiments), and are greeted by an astonishing Floyd | sight: Floyd | Floyd | A raucous rabble of eminent philosophers line the tables and bar, Floyd | discussing matters squifflily with slurred syllables and questionable Floyd | eloquence. You overhear Plato and Socrates quietly discussing Floyd | anarchists in Victorian literature. The only one not joining in seems Floyd | to be Aristotle, who is sitting glumly in the corner. You also suspect Floyd | that that was John Stuart Mill you glimpsed running east through the Floyd | back door, clutching his stomach. Floyd | Floyd | Somewhat incongruously, you spot an electronic games machine sitting Floyd | against the wall next to a rather glum looking booth, being rather Floyd | neglected by the roistering philosophers. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "open cellar door" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | smartgenes says, "is it the cellar bar mentioned earlier/" | |||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "play fruit machine" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | canadianpuzzler says, "Any talk-to-able philosopher should be talked to in this game. I suggest aristotle here." | |||
| djfletch says (to Floyd), "x machine" | ||||
Floyd | It's a brightly covered cabinet with "Karl Popper's FALSIFICATION Floyd | ADVENTURE" emblazoned on it above the screen. There's a joystick, a Floyd | button marked FIRE and a button marked START. You wonder what they Floyd | could possibly be for. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "play adventure" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "hit start" | ||||
Floyd | You consider taking all your frustration out on the innocent, but your Floyd | anger soon subsides. Floyd | | Lionheart says, "Now I have the Monty Python Philosopher" | |||
| djfletch says (to Floyd), "press start" | ||||
Floyd | The game machine springs into life. You are controlling a Floyd | falsification gun, moving left and right across the bottom of the Floyd | screen, protecting the collective conscious from a marauding band of Floyd | theories. The theories -- rendered as implausible pixelated blobs -- Floyd | are advancing slowly down the screen in. Floyd | Floyd | Yanking the joystick to and fro, you fire off a volley of pixelated Floyd | falsifiers. A pixelated bullet representing the measurement of Floyd | Mercury's orbit hits the pixelated blob representing Newtonian Floyd | Physics, and it explodes in a shower of pixelated sparks! Reflexes Floyd | burning, you quickly dispatch the pixelated blob representing gender Floyd | essentialism with pixelated bullet representing a well-aimed copy of Floyd | Foucault's History of Sexuality, while a pixelated bullet representing Floyd | Heisenberg's Uncertainty Principle does for the pixelated blob Floyd | representing General Relativity. Suddenly the machine emits a warbling Floyd | siren, and a pixelated missile representing dialectical materialism Floyd | appears at the top of the screen! You fire volley after volley of Floyd | pixelated bullets at it, but it simply absorbs your attacks as part of Floyd | its pixelated interpretive schema. At the last moment you take cover Floyd | behind a pixelated wall of healthy scepticism, which is sorely Floyd | damaged, but destroys the pixelated missile! As you breathe a sigh of Floyd | relief, taking your eyes off the screen for a moment, a second Floyd | pixelated missile representing Freudian psychodynamic theory Floyd | penetrates through your pixelated defences and obliterates you Floyd | entirely. Floyd | Floyd | You didn't even make the high score table. Floyd | | Lionheart says, "'s Song running through my head" | |||
| smartgenes says, "oh i thought "frustration on innocent" referred to the contents of the game" | ||||
| Lionheart says, "Hee, longwinded but amusing" | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "think about cat in a box" | ||||
Floyd | Your philosophical studies don't seem to have taught you anything Floyd | about that. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "think about uncertainty principle" | ||||
Floyd | Your philosophical studies don't seem to have taught you anything Floyd | about that. Floyd | | DavidW says, "Schroedinger" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "think about heisenberg" | ||||
Floyd | Your philosophical studies don't seem to have taught you anything Floyd | about that. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "think about schroedinger" | ||||
Floyd | Your philosophical studies don't seem to have taught you anything Floyd | about that. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "think about schrodinger" | ||||
Floyd | Your philosophical studies don't seem to have taught you anything Floyd | about that. Floyd | | ||||
| djfletch says (to Floyd), "x booth" | ||||
Floyd | It's a dark and lonely corner of the tavern -- and you realise that, Floyd | while you'd previously thought it was empty, there's actually a group Floyd | of women sitting in it, staring melancholically into their drinks. One Floyd | of them, whom you suddenly recognise to be Elizabeth Anscombe, is Floyd | wearing a comic headband with two antennae on springs attached. Next Floyd | to her sits Emma Goldman, glaring fiercely across the table at an Floyd | equally glaring Ayn Rand, while the quartet is completed by Judith Floyd | Butler, who surveys the roistering men, making small tutting noises. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "chat up emma" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "kiss emma" | ||||
Floyd | Some would consider that an invasion of personal space. Floyd | | ||||
| ParserGirl goes home. | DavidW says, "please talk to Aristotle." | |||
| Lionheart says, "This is the land of philsophy thought experiments, not physics thought experiments." | ||||
| DavidW says, "I'd like to know why he's glum." | ||||
| smartgenes says, "because of Alexander the Great" | ||||
| djfletch says (to Floyd), "talk to aristotle" | ||||
Floyd | You saunter over to the corner of the room where Aristotle sits, and Floyd | he glances up at you, a hopeful look passing over his bearded Floyd | features. When he speaks you expect it to be all Greek to you, but in Floyd | fact he sounds more like a lower-upper-middle-class English gentleman. Floyd | "Good day to you," he says impeccably. "Perhaps you might be able to Floyd | help me with some small trouble?" Floyd | Floyd | [1] Actually, no. I'm fed up with running errands for strange men. Floyd | [2] It would be my pleasure. Floyd | [3] Hmm, what do I get out of it? Floyd | | zarf says, "I am looking back to the mud window about once every ten minutes. I don't get the impression that I'm missing much continuity" | |||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "3" | ||||
Floyd | "Well, I suppose I could see my way to parting with a rather fine Floyd | first edition of the complete works of my mentor, Plato," he offers, Floyd | with a tone of slight regret. "After all, if material gain is on your Floyd | mind, then it is best to accompany it with the higher pleasures of the Floyd | intellect." Floyd | Floyd | [1] Sounds lovely. I'll help you out Floyd | [2] Actually, I think I'll pass. Floyd | | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | "Good show, old thing," he says, smiling broadly. "Now listen Floyd | carefully: to put it quite frankly, I'm buggered for a bottle." Floyd | Floyd | [1] Did I understand you right . . . Floyd | [2] Surely, they serve bottles here? Floyd | [3] I'm having no more of this sort of thing. Floyd | | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | "What I mean is that I'm after a good quality wine. More precisely, my Floyd | tastes are such that I really can't stand anything other than a bottle Floyd | of pre-phylloxera claret." Floyd | Floyd | [1] Won't a normal claret do? Floyd | [2] That's impossible. I'm going to leave you to your vain quest. Floyd | | Lionheart says, "Ah." | |||
| canadianpuzzler says, "Not really, Zarf. there is a lot of lateral movement here, in part due to the challenge of the game and in part due to the urges of several to check the depth of the game's philosophical knowledge." | ||||
| smartgenes says, "yes indeed" | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | "No!" he states emphatically, "I won't have any of the paltry excuse Floyd | for claret they serve here. It's pre-phylloxera claret or nothing." Floyd | Floyd | [1] Then it's going to have to be nothing . . . Floyd | [2] Alright, then. I'll go find a bottle, shall I? There's nothing I Floyd | like more than going on obscure object quests, after all. Floyd | | DavidW says, "I think one of the cafe options mentioned that claret." | |||
| Lionheart says, "pre-phylloxera is not a word you forget seeing before" | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "2" | ||||
Floyd | "Capital!" he exclaims enthusiastically. "Well then, what I'm after is Floyd | a bottle of the finest pre-phylloxera claret. Only the best for the Floyd | old tastebuds, eh?" Floyd | Floyd | You stare at the old philosopher, wondering several things, most Floyd | prominently of which is what phylloxera are, and whether they involve Floyd | sex in any way. But Aristotle merely smiles beningly at you. "Chop Floyd | chop!" he says, and you take your leave. Floyd | | Lionheart says, "And that word was mentioned by the server" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "think about aristotle" | ||||
Floyd | Aristotle (384 BC - 322 BC) was an ancient Greek philosopher, taught Floyd | by Plato. He wrote on a huge range of philosophical subjects, Floyd | including disciplines like physics and biology which later grew into Floyd | their own sciences. Preserved for centuries, mainly by Muslim Floyd | scholars, his work later exercised so much influence over the Floyd | Medieveal Christian philosophers who helped found the European Floyd | tradition of thought that he simply became known as the Philosopher. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "think about pre-phylloxera" | ||||
Floyd | Your philosophical studies don't seem to have taught you anything Floyd | about that. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "think about phylloxera" | ||||
Floyd | Your philosophical studies don't seem to have taught you anything Floyd | about that. Floyd | | Binder says, "yeah a sorbet made of that claret" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "think about jesus" | ||||
Floyd | Your philosophical studies don't seem to have taught you anything Floyd | about that. Floyd | | DavidW asks, "And the back room, where Mill ran to, should we check in on him?" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "think about mill" | ||||
Floyd | John Stuart Mill (1806 - 1873) was a British ethical and political Floyd | philosopher, and a public intellectual. He was the foremost proponent Floyd | of utlitarianism, and also an early and formative theoriser of the Floyd | liberal social state. Floyd | | Lionheart says, "Phylloxera are apparently bugs: [LINK]" | |||
| smartgenes says, "utilitarianism that should say" | ||||
| smartgenes says, "that's doing things so the most people benefit" | ||||
| djfletch says, "yeah let's check if east goes somewhere" | ||||
| djfletch says (to Floyd), "e" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Logicians' Alleyway Floyd | You wander through the back door into an alleyway and there amidst a Floyd | pile of broken truth tables and discarded copies of the Principia Floyd | Mathematica sit a sequiter of logicians, playing illegal logic games. Floyd | W.V.O. Quine seems to be the ring leader. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "think aboutnewton" | ||||
Floyd | I only understood you as far as wanting to think. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "think about newton" | ||||
Floyd | Your philosophical studies don't seem to have taught you anything Floyd | about that. Floyd | | DavidW says, "oh, I have a book of Quine's." | |||
| djfletch says (to Floyd), "x principia" | ||||
Floyd | The copies of the Principia Mathematica are stacked in neat piles Floyd | --they are being put to use as make-shift seats. Floyd | Floyd | You notice Boole slip a few extra beads into the game from his sleeve. Floyd | How naughty. Floyd | | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "think about quine" | ||||
Floyd | Willard Van Orman Quine (1908 - 2000), as well as having the coolest Floyd | name in the history of philosophy, was an important logician and Floyd | linguistic philosopher of the 20th century. Attacking many of the Floyd | dogmas of analytic philosophy, he forged new ground in the theory of Floyd | knowledge, as well as defining crucial approaches to logical problems. Floyd | | smartgenes says, "hmmm i never heard of quine" | |||
| Lionheart says, "I know of him from GEB." | ||||
| Doug asks, "does Quine's book write a copy of itself when read?" | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Doug), "Heh, yeah." | ||||
| djfletch says (to Floyd), "x logicians" | ||||
Floyd | Playing games with coloured beads and cups amidst the truth tables sit Floyd | a shifty-looking bunch of logicians. You think you notice Boole and Floyd | Frege pondering over vagueness, while Kripke raises the stakes. Floyd | | ||||
| djfletch says (to Floyd), "talk to quine" | ||||
Floyd | Quine's eyes dart to and fro in a manner most shifty. "Psst!" he Floyd | whispers. Floyd | Floyd | [1] Yes, can I help you? Floyd | [2] What's going on here? Floyd | [3] I'm sorry, I really don't have the time. Floyd | [4] Psst off. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "4" | ||||
Floyd | You sense some disappointment in his eyes as he turns back to the Floyd | truth tables and formulae. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "undo" | ||||
Floyd | Logicians' Alleyway Floyd | [Previous turn undone.] Floyd | | smartgenes says, "had to do it lol" | |||
| DavidW says, "no you didn't" | ||||
| djfletch says (to Floyd), "talk to quine" | ||||
Floyd | [I need some kind of reaction from you to continue the scene. Enter a Floyd | number, or say REPEAT to reacquaint yourself with your options.] Floyd | | smartgenes says, "oh yes i did" | |||
| djfletch says (to Floyd), "2" | ||||
Floyd | Before you can get a word in Quine says, "Hey kid -- yeah you -- you Floyd | lookin' to earn some prizes?" Floyd | Floyd | [1] Wait a second. Didn't you teach at Harvard? What's with the Floyd | implausible seedy low-life routine? Floyd | [2] Is a finite whole greater than any of its parts? Floyd | [3] Has prog-rock had its day? Floyd | [4] Is Derrida an obscurantist? Floyd | [5] Um . . . yes? Floyd | [6] No thanks, I'm good in the prizes department. Floyd | | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | "Shh . . ." he whispers, "This is an illegal racket we got going here Floyd | -- how am I supposed to talk?" Before you can answer he says, Floyd | "Actually, forget that. Do you want to earn some prizes or not?" Floyd | Floyd | [1] Oh, okay. Floyd | [2] Not right now. Floyd | | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "undo" | ||||
Floyd | Logicians' Alleyway Floyd | [Previous turn undone.] Floyd | | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "2" | ||||
Floyd | "That's what I wanted to hear. Now listen close, here's how it works: Floyd | Floyd | "This is a logic game, okay -- so here's how it works: I got two beads Floyd | in this cup -- you payin' attention? -- they might be both red, both Floyd | blue or one of each. Under this second cup," he points to another Floyd | upturned cup on the ground, "I got one bead which could be red, could Floyd | be blue. Floyd | Floyd | "With me so far?" Floyd | Floyd | [1] Yes, please continue. Floyd | [2] Could you go over that again? Floyd | | smartgenes says, "hmm i vaguely remembe this thought experiment" | |||
| Lionheart says, "Oh, this IS shifty." | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | "So, kid, it's your job to figure out what colour the beads are. Floyd | Floyd | "Now this a logic game, not a guessing game, so we got ourselves some Floyd | rules. First: not all the beads are blue. Second: whatever the bead is Floyd | in the second cup, there must be at least one of the same colour in Floyd | the first cup. Third: no red bead can be in the same cup as a blue Floyd | bead. Floyd | Floyd | "So what's your bet, kid? What's in the cups?" Floyd | Floyd | [1] Cup one: two blues. Cup two: one blue. Floyd | [2] Cup one: two blues. Cup two: one red. Floyd | [3] Cup one: one red, one blue. Cup two: one red. Floyd | [4] Cup one: one red, one blue. Cup two: one blue. Floyd | [5] Cup one: two reds. Cup two: one red. Floyd | [6] Cup one: two reds. Cup two: one blue. Floyd | | smartgenes says, "oh dear" | |||
| Binder says, "all red" | ||||
| smartgenes says, "undo or save makes it a bit easy" | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "5" | ||||
Floyd | "Hey, you got it right, kid!. Now . . . what would you like? We got Floyd | an invitation to a state of naturist camp, a bottle post-phylloxera Floyd | claret, or some cruise tickets for the ship of Neurath." Floyd | Floyd | [1] I'll go for the invitation. Floyd | [2] It's the bottle of claret for me. Floyd | [3] Hit me with those tickets. Floyd | | smartgenes says, "clever git" | |||
| Lionheart says, "Yeah, that's not the claret we want, but it might be interesting to save and take it to see what happens" | ||||
| DavidW says, "uh, I like naturism." | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "2" | ||||
Floyd | Quine hands you a bottle of cheap red wine. "Enjoy," he says. Floyd | | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "undo" | ||||
Floyd | Logicians' Alleyway Floyd | [Previous turn undone.] Floyd | | DavidW asks, "Did you want to save first?" | |||
| smartgenes says, "would be interesting if you were given the wrong object due to wrong answer" | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "save" | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "SAVE" | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "cf2" | ||||
Floyd | Enter saved game to store: Ok. Floyd | Floyd | I didn't understand that number. Floyd | | djfletch says, "hmm, is the philosophical thing about pre-phyllox claret going to be that nobody knows if it was actually different or not" | |||
| DavidW says, "oops" | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "2" | ||||
Floyd | Quine hands you a bottle of cheap red wine. "Enjoy," he says. Floyd | | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "x bottle" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "x wine" | ||||
Floyd | The label says: "Consume within three months". This doesn't bode well Floyd | as far as quality is concerned. Floyd | Floyd | A discussion between Frege and Kripke over the proper interpretation Floyd | of the Sorites paradox becomes rather heated, but G?del soon calms Floyd | them down. Floyd | | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "w" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Tavern Floyd | A raucous rabble of eminent philosophers line the tables and bar, Floyd | discussing matters squifflily with slurred syllables and questionable Floyd | eloquence. You overhear Plato and Socrates sensibly tackling Jungian Floyd | personality types. The only one not joining in seems to be Aristotle, Floyd | who is sitting glumly in the corner. In the eastern wall is the back Floyd | door through which Mill threw himself earlier. Floyd | Floyd | Somewhat incongruously, you spot an electronic games machine sitting Floyd | against the wall next to a rather glum looking booth, being rather Floyd | neglected by the roistering philosophers. Floyd | | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "give bottle to aristotle" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "give bottle to socrates" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | DavidW says, "Can't call it 'bottle'" | |||
| smartgenes asks, "what's the situation with the missed diacritics?" | ||||
| DavidW says, "Call it 'wine'." | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "talk to aristotle" | ||||
Floyd | "Haven't you the bottle to give me?" he asks. "Come now, hop to it!" Floyd | | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "give wine to aristotle" | ||||
Floyd | (the post-phylloxera claret to Aristotle) Floyd | "You dare insult me so!" Aristotle cries, "This is post-phylloxera Floyd | claret, I want pre-phylloxera claret! Now snap to it." Floyd | Floyd | You make to leave, and Aristotle snatches the bottle of cheap red wine Floyd | from you. Floyd | Floyd | "I didn't say I wouldn't drink it. Still . . . get me some Floyd | pre-phylloxera claret, and you'll be rewarded." Floyd | | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "restore" | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "cf2" | ||||
Floyd | Enter saved game to load: Restore failed. Floyd | | DavidW says, "The save file is called 'save'." | |||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "restore" | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "save" | ||||
Floyd | Enter saved game to load: Restore failed. Floyd | | Lionheart says, "Uh oh" | |||
| smartgenes says, "lol epic fail" | ||||
| DavidW says, "When we both tried to save at the same time, we confused Floyd." | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "restore" | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "SAVE" | ||||
Floyd | Enter saved game to load: Ok. Floyd | | Lionheart says, "Ah, case sensitive" | |||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | Quine hands you a scrap of paper. "Don't know what you lot see in it, Floyd | but enjoy yourself," he says. Floyd | | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "x paper" | ||||
Floyd | Scrawled upon a scrap of paper is: "COME TO THE STATE OF NATURIST CAMP Floyd | -- NASTY BRUTISH FUN FOR ALL!!!" Floyd | Floyd | A discussion between Frege and Kripke over the proper interpretation Floyd | of the Sorites paradox becomes rather heated, but G?del soon calms Floyd | them down. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "think about infocom" | ||||
Floyd | Your philosophical studies don't seem to have taught you anything Floyd | about that. Floyd | | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "think about godel" | ||||
Floyd | Kurt G?del (1906 - 1978) was an Austrian-American mathematician whose Floyd | work on self-reference the limits of knowledge broke new ground in Floyd | philosophy. G?del developed sound and sophisticated mathematical Floyd | proofs that for any sufficiently complicated epistemological system, Floyd | there would always be certain undecidable propositions -- Floyd | demonstrating effectively that knowledge is inherently self-limiting. Floyd | His conclusions have huge repurcussions we are still struggling with Floyd | today. Floyd | | djfletch says, "try talking to the other people" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "talk to godel" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "talk to kripke" | ||||
Floyd | He seems too engrossed in his game to pay any attention. Floyd | | DavidW says, "I wonder where Mill disappeared to." | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "talk to frege" | ||||
Floyd | He seems too engrossed in his game to pay any attention. Floyd | | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "think about neurath" | ||||
Floyd | The Ship of Neurath is the term used by W.V.O. Quine in his decription Floyd | of an analogy by Otto Neurath for his view of the holistic nature of Floyd | language and scientific verification. Quine wrote, "We are like Floyd | sailors who on the open sea must reconstruct their ship but are never Floyd | able to start afresh from the bottom. Where a beam is taken away a new Floyd | one must at once be put therre, and for this the rest of the ship is Floyd | used as support. In this way, by using the old beams and driftwood the Floyd | ship can be shaped entirely anew, but only by gradual reconstruction." Floyd | Floyd | The point being made is that we are never able to start a new system Floyd | of knowledge (and thus a system of language) from the beginning -- Floyd | what we instead do is replace old known principles which we no longer Floyd | agree with with new principles, insofar as those new principles can be Floyd | supported by the rest of the system of knowledge. Perhaps those new Floyd | principles will weaken another part of the system, which must then Floyd | itself be removed and replaced. This is Quine's view of how knowledge Floyd | progresses and language changes -- gradually, by replacing parts of Floyd | the holistic system, rather than in huge revolutions. One of the most Floyd | important aspects of this view is its characterisation of knowledge as Floyd | a holistic system, rather than as a set of disconnected principles. Floyd | Floyd | It may or may not be complete coincidence that a strikingly similar Floyd | analogy, known as the Ship of Theseus, is used for a completely Floyd | different philosophical problem: that of identity. That's definitely Floyd | worth thinking about. Floyd | | djfletch asks, "hmm, do we have to type Godel's umlaut to talk to him?" | |||
| Lionheart says, "I didn't have to to think about him" | ||||
| djfletch says (to Floyd), "talk to kurt" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | smartgenes says, "oh yeah i have heard of Quine after all.. that's why i didn't get a better grade i guess" | |||
| djfletch says (to Floyd), "talk to godel" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | ||||
| Doug says (to Floyd), "talk to G?del" | ||||
Floyd | He seems too engrossed in his game to pay any attention. Floyd | | DavidW says, "eep" | |||
| DavidW says, "That looks like G?del to me." | ||||
| smartgenes says, "think about diacritical disillusionment" | ||||
| Lionheart says, "This conversation cannot be engaged under the rules of formal logic." | ||||
| DavidW says, "I've never been able to get my mud client to understand accented chars." | ||||
| Lionheart says, "I see question marks here" | ||||
| djfletch says (to Floyd), "x logicians" | ||||
Floyd | Playing games with coloured beads and cups amidst the truth tables sit Floyd | a shifty-looking bunch of logicians. You think you notice Boole and Floyd | Frege investigating supervaluation, while Kripke claims the jackpot. Floyd | | smartgenes says, "hmm mine is not using the normal shortcuts ! is normally an accented e" | |||
| djfletch says (to Floyd), "talk to frege" | ||||
Floyd | He seems too engrossed in his game to pay any attention. Floyd | | ||||
| djfletch says (to Floyd), "talk to boole" | ||||
Floyd | He seems too engrossed in his game to pay any attention. Floyd | | ||||
| djfletch says (to Floyd), "talk to kripke" | ||||
Floyd | He seems too engrossed in his game to pay any attention. Floyd | | smartgenes asks, "can we play the game again?" | |||
| DavidW says, "Let's explore elsewhere." | ||||
| DavidW asks (of smartgenes), "The bead game?" | ||||
| Lionheart says (to smartgenes), "I didn't think to try, but that might be a way to make the game unlosable, allow replays" | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "talk to quine" | ||||
Floyd | "You want to give it another shot?" asks Quine. Floyd | Floyd | [1] Does E equal M times the square of C? Floyd | [2] Is the holy ghost the underdog of the trinity? Floyd | [3] Does a mobius strip have only one side? Floyd | [4] No -- I've had enough disappointment for one adventure. Floyd | | Lionheart says, "Aha" | |||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "2" | ||||
Floyd | "You've probably got the formulae by now," says Quine. "So I got three Floyd | cups this time. One on the left, one in the middle and one on the Floyd | right. There's one bead in each of them. Each bead is either red or Floyd | blue. And we got us some rules again: Floyd | Floyd | "Rule one: no red bead can be to the left of a blue bead. Floyd | Floyd | "Rule two: no blue bead can be in a cup next to a cup with another Floyd | blue bead. Floyd | Floyd | "Rule three: there is at least one blue bead and one red bead. Floyd | Floyd | "So, what colour beads are in what cup? Floyd | Floyd | [1] Left cup: red; middle cup: red; right cup: red. Floyd | [2] Left cup: red; middle cup: red; right cup: blue. Floyd | [3] Left cup: red; middle cup: blue; right cup: red. Floyd | [4] Left cup: red; middle cup: blue; right cup: blue. Floyd | [5] Left cup: blue; middle cup: blue; right cup: blue. Floyd | [6] Left cup: blue; middle cup: blue; right cup: red. Floyd | [7] Left cup: blue; middle cup: red; right cup: red. Floyd | [8] Left cup: blue; middle cup: red; right cup: blue. Floyd | | smartgenes asks, "what do the mobius strip etc conversation threads end up with? just red herrings?" | |||
| djfletch asks, "blue red red?" | ||||
| DavidW says, "7" | ||||
| Binder says, "yes, 7." | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "7" | ||||
Floyd | "Nice!" Quine pats you on the back. "Now, my friend," he says, "you Floyd | got a tricky and potentially angst-ridden decision to make. Will it be Floyd | a file of Platonic forms, cruise tickets for the ship of Neurath, or a Floyd | straw dog?" Floyd | Floyd | [1] I fancy the file of forms. Floyd | [2] The cruise tickets sound good. Floyd | [3] You can't go wrong with a straw dog. Floyd | | smartgenes says, "lol" | |||
| Lionheart says, "Ha, new ones" | ||||
| Binder says, "oh, different prizes." | ||||
| DavidW says, "Cruise tickets please" | ||||
| smartgenes says, "the file of forms sounds great though" | ||||
| Lionheart says, "I dunno, straw dog sounds puzzly" | ||||
| djfletch asks, "was Plato inside? would he want his forms?" | ||||
| DavidW says, "well, pick one." | ||||
| djfletch asks, "or was it just Socrates?" | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "save" | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "cf3" | ||||
Floyd | Enter saved game to store: Ok. Floyd | | DavidW says, "It seems the game can be played over again anyway." | |||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | Quine hands you a file of forms. "Prime forms," he says. "Prime Floyd | forms." Floyd | | smartgenes says, "well the game only mentioned the cruise so far" | |||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "x forms" | ||||
Floyd | This a file of administrative forms that have reached the highest Floyd | level of bureaucratic perfection. In order to complete them they must Floyd | be signed by the relevant officials, who will only sign the form if Floyd | they are presented with the very same form already signed. Floyd | Floyd | A loud cheer comes from the game as Turing elegantly solves a Floyd | particularly difficult problem. Floyd | | Lionheart says, "Heh." | |||
| djfletch says (to Floyd), "talk to turing" | ||||
Floyd | He seems too engrossed in his game to pay any attention. Floyd | | Binder LAUGHS at the form description | |||
| smartgenes says, "form of forms" | ||||
| djfletch asks, "shall we try talking to the other people inside?" | ||||
| DavidW says, "sure" | ||||
| djfletch says (to Floyd), "w" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Tavern Floyd | A raucous rabble of eminent philosophers line the tables and bar, Floyd | discussing matters squifflily with slurred syllables and questionable Floyd | eloquence. You overhear Plato and Socrates childishly pondering over Floyd | Da Vinci Code conspiracy theories. The only one not joining in seems Floyd | to be Aristotle, who is sitting glumly in the corner. In the eastern Floyd | wall is the back door through which Mill threw himself earlier. Floyd | Floyd | Somewhat incongruously, you spot an electronic games machine sitting Floyd | against the wall next to a rather glum looking booth, being rather Floyd | neglected by the roistering philosophers. Floyd | | Lionheart says, "Let's collect as many prizes as we vcan" | |||
| DavidW says, "Although, I'd like cruise tickets too, eventually." | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "talk to plato" | ||||
Floyd | Plato beckons you closer, his breathe steeped in whisky. "I have Floyd | hardly ever known a mathematician who was capable of reasoning," he Floyd | confides, before staggering off, apparently forgetting who you are. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "follow plato" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "give forms to plato" | ||||
Floyd | Plato doesn't seem interested. Floyd | | ||||
| djfletch says (to Floyd), "talk to socrates" | ||||
Floyd | Raising his glass up high, Socrates toasts, "Bad men live that they Floyd | may eat and drink, whereas good men eat and drink that they may live." Floyd | This is greeted with a hearty chorus of "I'll drink to that!" Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "x socrates" | ||||
Floyd | Socrates seems to be drinking a little too much novelty hemlock Floyd | flavoured liquour, and is a few stages beyond squiffy. Floyd | | ||||
| djfletch says (to Floyd), "x women" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | ||||
| djfletch says (to Floyd), "x booth" | ||||
Floyd | It's a dark and lonely corner of the tavern -- and you realise that, Floyd | while you'd previously thought it was empty, there's actually a group Floyd | of women sitting in it, staring melancholically into their drinks. One Floyd | of them, whom you suddenly recognise to be Elizabeth Anscombe, is Floyd | wearing a comic headband with two antennae on springs attached. Next Floyd | to her sits Emma Goldman, glaring fiercely across the table at an Floyd | equally glaring Ayn Rand, while the quartet is completed by Judith Floyd | Butler, who surveys the roistering men, making small tutting noises. Floyd | | ||||
| djfletch says (to Floyd), "talk to anscombe" | ||||
Floyd | The women look at you. "Hello," says Anscombe. "We were having a Floyd | girls" night out." Never before has the phrase been delivered with Floyd | such implacable mourning. Floyd | Floyd | [1] Were? What happened? Floyd | [2] Well, you lot are glum. Why aren't you joining the fun? Floyd | [3] Mind if I join you ladies for a drink? Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | Rand perks up at this point, eyes flaring. "Emma here," she says, Floyd | snering, "couldn't keep her big mouth shut." Floyd | Floyd | "Don't you go curtailing my freedom of speech again, Ayn," spits Floyd | Goldman in reply. Floyd | Floyd | [1] Bit of a fight, was there? Floyd | [2] Now girls, don't go being all unbecoming. Floyd | | smartgenes asks, "1?" | |||
| DavidW says, "I dunno." | ||||
| Lionheart says, "Yeah, let's not be an ass" | ||||
| Binder says, "1." | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | "They have entrenched themselves within a political binary through Floyd | which they define themselves by opposition to the Other," chips in Floyd | Butler. Floyd | Floyd | "They had a punch-up," adds Anscombe. Floyd | Floyd | [1] Ooh, a bitch fight. Who won? Floyd | [2] What about? Floyd | [3] So why didn't you just leave them to it and join the rest of the Floyd | party here? Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "2" | ||||
Floyd | "She started spouting off about the dynamism of the revolution --" Floyd | starts Rand. Floyd | Floyd | "-- It is easier to condemn than to think," Goldman butts in. Floyd | Floyd | "Shut up and finish your drinks before I clunk your heads together," Floyd | concludes Anscombe. Floyd | Floyd | [1] Why didn't you just leave them to it and join the rest of the Floyd | party here? Floyd | [2] Oh dear. I think I'll just leave now. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | "They wouldn't let us join in," says Anscombe. Floyd | Floyd | "They wouldn't let me dance," says Goldman. Floyd | Floyd | "Men!" spits Butler. Floyd | Floyd | [1] Why wouldn't they let you join in? Floyd | [2] Did you want to dance? Floyd | [3] What's wrong with men? Floyd | [4] Why are you still here? Floyd | [5] Oh dear. I think I'll just leave now. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "3" | ||||
Floyd | "The promise of the phallus," says Butler, stealing Goldman's glass Floyd | and downing it, "is always disappointing." Floyd | Floyd | [1] Er . . . so why does that mean they wouldn't they let you join in? Floyd | [2] Indeed. So did you want to dance? Floyd | [3] Right. So why are you still here? Floyd | [4] OK . . . I think that's my cue to leave. Floyd | | smartgenes says, "lol indeed" | |||
| DavidW says, "No one ever promised me a phallus garden." | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "2" | ||||
Floyd | "If I can't dance . . ." begins Goldman, in a rather loud voice, Floyd | before being rapidly gagged by the other three women until she stops Floyd | struggling. Floyd | Floyd | [1] Thanks, sisters. So why wouldn't they let you join in? Floyd | [2] Phew. So why are you still here? Floyd | [3] Oh dear. I think I'll just leave now. Floyd | | Doug asks, "is this turning into a Stiffy Makane game?" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | "We were excluded from the discourse," says Butler. All four women nod Floyd | in rare agreement, Anscombe's pink antennae bobbing folornly up and Floyd | down. Floyd | Floyd | [1] Too true, sisters. So why are you still here? Floyd | [2] Ooh, sorry. Well, good luck; I'm off. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | "Why ask useless questions?" asks Rand. "How deep is the ocean? How Floyd | high is the sky? Who is John Galt?" Floyd | Floyd | [1] OK . . . I think that's my cue to leave. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | "And take your binary with you!" cries Butler drunkenly as you take Floyd | your leave. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x antennae" | ||||
Floyd | The kind of thing you'd expect people to wear onto a hen-night. Floyd | | ||||
| Binder says (to Floyd), "i" | ||||
Floyd | You are carrying: Floyd | file of Platonic forms Floyd | the invitation to the state of naturist camp Floyd | a fifty pence piece Floyd | a lighter Floyd | a Burden of Proof Floyd | a sack (open) Floyd | a manual Floyd | a Chinese key Floyd | | Binder exclaims, "aw, we didn't get a binary!" | |||
| DavidW says, "I suspect that convo could've gone better." | ||||
| smartgenes says, "i don't think so" | ||||
| smartgenes says, "just a joke about their political philosophy i think" | ||||
| djfletch says (to Floyd), "talk to anscombe" | ||||
Floyd | You approach the women, but Butler's critical gaze warns you off. Floyd | | Lionheart says, "The tone of the answers not taken, I do not think would have gone over wel" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "give burden to women" | ||||
Floyd | Elizabeth Anscombe doesn't seem interested. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "take binary" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "think about binary" | ||||
Floyd | Your philosophical studies don't seem to have taught you anything Floyd | about that. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "talk to quine" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | Lionheart says, "If we were going to give the burden to anyone, it would be one of the logicians" | |||
| Lionheart says, "Anyone here, I mean" | ||||
| smartgenes asks, "quine has gone?" | ||||
| DavidW says, "Quine is east." | ||||
| smartgenes says, "ok" | ||||
| Lionheart says, "I'm amused by the idea of giving it to Godel now" | ||||
| DavidW says, "There's the main tavern and an alley out back." | ||||
| smartgenes says, "i think we needed the cruise thingamyjig" | ||||
| djfletch says, "we've talked to everyone in here I think - go back east if you like" | ||||
| DavidW says, "There's also the barbershop and forest and so on." | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "exits" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | smartgenes says, "go get the maid" | |||
| DavidW says, "feel free to play the game again and get another prize" | ||||
| smartgenes says, "and then go back and eat cold beans" | ||||
| DavidW says, "Or explore." | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "e" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Logicians' Alleyway Floyd | You wander through the back door into an alleyway and there amidst a Floyd | pile of broken truth tables and discarded copies of the Principia Floyd | Mathematica sit a sequiter of logicians, playing illegal logic games. Floyd | W.V.O. Quine seems to be the ring leader. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "talk to quine" | ||||
Floyd | "Want to pit your wits against my beads again? Floyd | Floyd | [1] Is Plato's Republic an elitist handbook? Floyd | [2] Does Nietzsche rhyme with preacher? Floyd | [3] Is Darth Vader Lukes father? Floyd | [4] Actually, I'm all prized out. Floyd | | DavidW says, "oh yeah, our food might be ready" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | "Yes indeedy," he replies keenly. "This time I got four cups arranged Floyd | in a line. Same shtick: cups either contain a red bead or a blue bead. Floyd | But this time one of the cups has two beads. You gots to guess which Floyd | one. Rules are: Floyd | Floyd | "Rule one: the cup with two beads is immediately to the left of a cup Floyd | containing a red bead. Floyd | Floyd | "Rule two: no cup containing one blue bead is immediately adjacent to Floyd | a cup containing one blue bead. Floyd | Floyd | "Rule three: there is only one red bead. Floyd | Floyd | [1] The leftmost cup. Floyd | [2] The cup left of centre. Floyd | [3] The cup right of centre. Floyd | [4] The rightmost cup. Floyd | | smartgenes says, "ok i did the philosophy, someone do the crazy game" | |||
| Lionheart asks, "so #3?" | ||||
| djfletch says, "I think blue, 2 blues, red, blue so #2" | ||||
| Lionheart says (to dj), "That's what I was thinking, so #3." | ||||
| Binder says, "2." | ||||
| DavidW says, "You'rechoosing the cup with 2 beads" | ||||
| Lionheart says, "Oh right" | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "2" | ||||
Floyd | "Amazing! Unfortunately, I only got one prize left -- the cruise Floyd | tickets for the Ship of Neurath." Floyd | Floyd | [Your score has just gone up by two points.] Floyd | | Binder says, "yay points" | |||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "SAVE" | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "cf3" | ||||
Floyd | Enter saved game to store: Ok. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "score" | ||||
Floyd | You have scored 11 out of a possible 100 in 254 turns. Jolly well Floyd | done. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "x tickets" | ||||
Floyd | These tickets appear to have already been used! Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "complain about tickets" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | Lionheart says, "Heh" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "talk to quine" | ||||
Floyd | "Sorry, kid," Quine says, with a modicum of sincerity. "I'm fresh out Floyd | of prizes." Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "show tickets to quine" | ||||
Floyd | Quine seems to take no notice. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "give burden to quine" | ||||
Floyd | Quine doesn't seem interested. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "tell quine about categorical imperative" | ||||
Floyd | Just TALK TO them. Floyd | | DavidW says, "If he's out of prizes, let's leave him." | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "explain to quine about ethics" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | smartgenes says, "leave this p-p-place" | |||
| djfletch says, "I'll check the cafe again" | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "l" | ||||
Floyd | Logicians' Alleyway Floyd | You wander through the back door into an alleyway and there amidst a Floyd | pile of broken truth tables and discarded copies of the Principia Floyd | Mathematica sit a sequiter of logicians, playing illegal logic games. Floyd | W.V.O. Quine seems to be the ring leader. Floyd | | ||||
| djfletch says (to Floyd), "w" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Tavern Floyd | A raucous rabble of eminent philosophers line the tables and bar, Floyd | discussing matters squifflily with slurred syllables and questionable Floyd | eloquence. You overhear Plato and Socrates drunkenly investigating Floyd | several meanings of the word Kafkaesque. The only one not joining in Floyd | seems to be Aristotle, who is sitting glumly in the corner. In the Floyd | eastern wall is the back door through which Mill threw himself Floyd | earlier. Floyd | Floyd | Somewhat incongruously, you spot an electronic games machine sitting Floyd | against the wall next to a rather glum looking booth, being rather Floyd | neglected by the roistering philosophers. Floyd | | ||||
| djfletch says (to Floyd), "out" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Village Street Floyd | A church, a theatre, a tavern, a barbershop, a pavement caf? -- their Floyd | various changing forms clutter around, entrances facing out onto what Floyd | seems (most of the time) to be an ordinary village street. Passers-by Floyd | duck in and out of the buildings, stop by the water pump, or carry on Floyd | to a square to the north. No-one, you notice, takes the road south -- Floyd | or heads along the routes east towards the storybook hills or west Floyd | into the fairytale woods. Floyd | | ||||
| djfletch says (to Floyd), "enter cafe" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Pavement Caf? Floyd | The caf? spills out into the street. Steel chairs are scattered around Floyd | the serving kiosk, apparently chaotically, though you suspect there's Floyd | a cynical art to it. Most of the customers are buried in books, Floyd | thimble-sized cups of black coffee steaming by them and handmade Floyd | cigarettes rolling around the corners of their mouths. Some of them, Floyd | though, are intense young couples clasping hands across their plates, Floyd | boring into each other's eyes as if looking for some flaw, breaking Floyd | the gaze only to toss hair or adjust a beret. Sitting in the corner, Floyd | Jean-Paul Sartre surveys the caf? around him and smiles in a satisfied Floyd | yet enigmatic way. Floyd | Floyd | The server is clattering away in the kitchen behind the kiosk, making Floyd | loud sweary noises. Floyd | | Lionheart says, "Didn't the scarecrow tells us that ipus are out east of him? If we go there, perhaps we can prove or disprove them" | |||
| DavidW says, "Or get gored by them." | ||||
| djfletch says, "hah" | ||||
| djfletch says, "worth a try though" | ||||
| Lionheart says, "Well, the theater person is waiting for us to disprove em" | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "think about kafka" | ||||
Floyd | Your philosophical studies don't seem to have taught you anything Floyd | about that. Floyd | | ||||
| djfletch says (to Floyd), "x server" | ||||
Floyd | You could pop your head into the kitchen and admire her from behind as Floyd | she cooks, but you rather fear what would happen if she spotted you. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "w" | ||||
Floyd | You channel your will to power to summon a path in that direction. Floyd | Sadly, nothing happens: you can't go that way. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "e" | ||||
Floyd | You channel your will to power to summon a path in that direction. Floyd | Sadly, nothing happens: you can't go that way. Floyd | | Binder says, "ah, fear trumping temptation." | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "out" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Village Street Floyd | A church, a theatre, a tavern, a barbershop, a pavement caf? -- their Floyd | various changing forms clutter around, entrances facing out onto what Floyd | seems (most of the time) to be an ordinary village street. Passers-by Floyd | duck in and out of the buildings, stop by the water pump, or carry on Floyd | to a square to the north. No-one, you notice, takes the road south -- Floyd | or heads along the routes east towards the storybook hills or west Floyd | into the fairytale woods. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "go barbershop" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Barbershop Floyd | Inside, the barbershop is clean, and smells pleasantly of cloves and Floyd | soap. As you enter, the barber turns to you, brandishing magnificent Floyd | moustachios, and beams. "Have a seat!" he cries, "Have a seat! I shall Floyd | be with you in two snips of a flea's whiskers!" Floyd | Floyd | You sit down on a wooden bench, somewhat overcome, and look around Floyd | you. A small stand by the bench has complimentary phials of dye. The Floyd | walls are covered with pictures of extraordinarily-coiffured models of Floyd | all ages and genders, while the floor in places is ankledeep in hair. Floyd | The room itself is spacious, and the barber is snipping away happily Floyd | at his client -- who, you suddenly realise, is stunningly, shiningly Floyd | bald. Floyd | | ||||
| Binder says (to Floyd), "x client" | ||||
Floyd | Baldier than a coot and an egg combines, he sits solemnly staring at Floyd | himself in the mirror. Floyd | | Binder says, "BALDIER" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "get hair" | ||||
Floyd | Mmm, silky. But you'd feel a bit weird carrying around people's hair. Floyd | | DavidW asks, "So who barber's the barber?" | |||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "x dye" | ||||
Floyd | Which do you mean, the phial of black dye, the phial of red dye or the Floyd | phial of white dye? Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "talk to client" | ||||
Floyd | You make to talk to the bald man, but the barber spins round and Floyd | shushes in your ear, "Ssh, signor! Don' you know who this is?" Floyd | Floyd | [1] No, who? Floyd | [2] The captain of the Starship Enterprise? Floyd | | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "2" | ||||
Floyd | "The present King of France!" he hisses lispily. Or possibly lisps Floyd | hissily. Floyd | Floyd | [1] Oh, my! I am sorry. Floyd | [2] Well, I'm a republican, so I couldn't care less. Floyd | [3] Wait . . . wasn't there, you know, some sort of revolution in Floyd | France? Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "3" | ||||
Floyd | He splutters wildly. "Jus' don" you let him hear you say that! Or-a Floyd | mention that Russell character, either. You're-a new in town, I can Floyd | tell." Floyd | Floyd | [1] Yes. What is this place? Floyd | [2] No, you just don't recognise me with this haircut. Floyd | | smartgenes says, "lol i really want to pick the outlandish options" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | "Oh, jus' a humble little village in the middle of nowhere. But I know Floyd | all about you, my friend!" he says Floyd | Floyd | [1] What, how? Floyd | [2] I might have guessed. But can't you tell me something interesting Floyd | about this place? Floyd | [3] Oh, really. Well, you won't mind if I just sod off then. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | "Jus' some gossip down the village water pump," he explains. "Which is Floyd | always worth a visit if you need some advice, by the way." Floyd | Floyd | [1] I'll bear that in mind. But can't you tell me something Floyd | interesting about this place? Floyd | [2] Hmm, thanks. I might just go there now then. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | "There's-a nothing to tell! But what would you like to know?" Floyd | Floyd | [1] Why did I just wake up in this bizarre fantasy world? Floyd | [2] Why does no-one seem to leave by the village road? Floyd | [3] What's that enormous castle, south of here? Floyd | [4] Actually, I think I'll just leave. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | The barber looks at you slyly. "That's-a for me not to know and you to Floyd | find out," he says, winking. "But it's-a probably been caused by the Floyd | hyperreal causality of narrative metaphor propelling you through a Floyd | tear in the fabric of the space-time continuum, caused either by a Floyd | ladder in the tights of time or the overconsumption of psychoactive Floyd | substances. Anything else-a you want to know?" Floyd | Floyd | [1] Why does no-one seem to leave by the village road? Floyd | [2] What's that enormous castle, south of here? Floyd | [3] Actually, I think I'll just leave. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "2" | ||||
Floyd | The barber's arms shoot out in front of him (narrowly avoiding Floyd | snipping the king's ear off) and he intones, "I do not know any thing Floyd | about the castle." Floyd | Floyd | There's a moment of potent silence as the king looks pointedly at the Floyd | scissors, and the barber resumes his snipping, muttering under his Floyd | breath. You can barely make it out, but it sounds like a dire warning, Floyd | and something about . . . a thing? A thing in itself? Enigmatic in the Floyd | extreme Floyd | Floyd | [1] OK . . . I think it's time for me to go now. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "undo" | ||||
Floyd | Barbershop Floyd | [Previous turn undone.] Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | The barber looks terrified for a moment. "South? Whadda we want to go Floyd | south for?" he blusters, before composing himself. "Ask-a me about Floyd | something else." Floyd | Floyd | [1] What's that enormous castle, south of here? Floyd | [2] Actually, I think I'll just leave. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | The barber's arms shoot out in front of him (narrowly avoiding Floyd | snipping the king's ear off) and he intones, "I do not know any thing Floyd | about the castle." Floyd | Floyd | There's a moment of potent silence as the king looks pointedly at the Floyd | scissors, and the barber resumes his snipping, muttering under his Floyd | breath. You can barely make it out, but it sounds like a dire warning, Floyd | and something about . . . a thing? A thing in itself? Enigmatic in the Floyd | extreme Floyd | Floyd | [1] OK . . . I think it's time for me to go now. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | The barber hums loudly at your departure. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "take all dye" | ||||
Floyd | phial of black dye: (putting the Chinese key into the sack to make Floyd | room) Floyd | You've got your hands a bit full. You're going to have to find a sack Floyd | or something if you want to carry any more. Floyd | phial of red dye: (putting the Burden of Proof into the sack to make Floyd | room) Floyd | You've got your hands a bit full. You're going to have to find a sack Floyd | or something if you want to carry any more. Floyd | phial of white dye: (putting the lighter into the sack to make room) Floyd | You've got your hands a bit full. You're going to have to find a sack Floyd | or something if you want to carry any more. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "i" | ||||
Floyd | You are carrying: Floyd | an informative leaflet Floyd | cruise tickets for the Ship of Neurath Floyd | file of Platonic forms Floyd | the invitation to the state of naturist camp Floyd | a fifty pence piece Floyd | a sack (open) Floyd | a lighter Floyd | a Burden of Proof Floyd | a Chinese key Floyd | a manual Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "drop burden" | ||||
Floyd | (first taking the Burden of Proof from the sack) Floyd | (putting the fifty pence piece into the sack to make room) Floyd | You've got your hands a bit full. You're going to have to find a sack Floyd | or something if you want to carry any more. Floyd | | Lionheart says, "So I suppose the castle is where people are getting zombified" | |||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "put all in sack" | ||||
Floyd | informative leaflet: You put the informative leaflet into the sack. Floyd | cruise tickets for the Ship of Neurath: You put the cruise tickets for Floyd | the Ship of Neurath into the sack. Floyd | file of Platonic forms: You put the file of Platonic forms into the Floyd | sack. Floyd | invitation to the state of naturist camp: You put the invitation to Floyd | the state of naturist camp into the sack. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "take all" | ||||
Floyd | That's a bit greedy. Try taking specific things. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "take all dye" | ||||
Floyd | phial of black dye: Taken. Floyd | phial of red dye: The barber winks at you, "One per customer. If you Floyd | change your mind put one back on the stand and take another. Floyd | phial of white dye: The barber winks at you, "One per customer. If you Floyd | change your mind put one back on the stand and take another. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "think about russell" | ||||
Floyd | Bertrand Russell (1872 - 1970) was for much of the 20th century one of Floyd | Britain's most prominent public intellectuals, made in 1950 a Nobel Floyd | Laureate in Literature. He was hugely important in mathematics and Floyd | logic, was a populariser of philosopher, and was a prominent agnostic Floyd | and pacifist. He is also notable for being the discoverer and early Floyd | teacher of Ludwig Wittgenstein. Floyd | | DavidW says, "hm. Only one dye at a time." | |||
| djfletch says (to Floyd), "shave barber" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | Lionheart says, "Keep the black dye, in case we find a white swan" | |||
| DavidW says, "we might be able to mix pink as well." | ||||
| Lionheart says, "Oh, hm" | ||||
| smartgenes says, "could leave it and come back" | ||||
| DavidW says, "Sure, dye's a swan black sounds plausible here." | ||||
| DavidW says, "er dyeing" | ||||
| Limax asks, "Have I missed most of it?" | ||||
| DavidW says (to Limax), "I don't think so." | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "score" | ||||
Floyd | You have scored 11 out of a possible 100 in 279 turns. Jolly well Floyd | done. Floyd | | DavidW says, "We're at 11 out of 100." | |||
| DavidW says, "We're not progressing quickly." | ||||
| smartgenes says, "we are in a fantasy world filled with philosophers" | ||||
| djfletch says (to Floyd), "barber, shave me" | ||||
Floyd | Just TALK TO them. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "shave barber" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "l" | ||||
Floyd | Barbershop Floyd | The barber is still here, snipping away happily at his bald client. Floyd | You sit on the bench next to the stand of dye, waiting. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "get scissors" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "look under bench" | ||||
Floyd | You find nothing of interest. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "read magazine" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | DavidW says, "I think we should leave and go elsewhere." | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "out" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Village Street Floyd | A church, a theatre, a tavern, a barbershop, a pavement caf? -- their Floyd | various changing forms clutter around, entrances facing out onto what Floyd | seems (most of the time) to be an ordinary village street. Passers-by Floyd | duck in and out of the buildings, stop by the water pump, or carry on Floyd | to a square to the north. No-one, you notice, takes the road south -- Floyd | or heads along the routes east towards the storybook hills or west Floyd | into the fairytale woods. Floyd | | smartgenes says, "what happened to the maid though" | |||
| DavidW says, "dunno" | ||||
| smartgenes says, "she went into the barbers" | ||||
| smartgenes asks, "didnt she?" | ||||
| DavidW says, "Didn't see her." | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "w" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Fairytale Woods Floyd | Heading out on a track west from the village street, you soon come Floyd | across the picturesque fairytale woods that had seemed so pleasant Floyd | from a distance. Up close the uniformity of colour and the crude blobs Floyd | of green on brown are somewhat unsettling. Floyd | Floyd | In the midst of the woods stand a Buddhist monk and a lumberjack Floyd | engaged in a heated discussion as to whether a tree falling down in a Floyd | forest makes a sound if nobody is around to hear it. Their debate is Floyd | punctuated by the occasional felling of a tree at the blade of the Floyd | lumberjack's axe. Floyd | Floyd | The woods become more sinister looking to the west and the village Floyd | street is back to the east. Floyd | | DavidW says, "damn." | |||
| DavidW says, "I wanted to listen for gossip." | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "think about koan" | ||||
Floyd | Your philosophical studies don't seem to have taught you anything Floyd | about that. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "talk to monk" | ||||
Floyd | ". . . now listen here, don't be a dosh-garned fool," the lumberjack Floyd | is saying as you approach, "-- of course the tree makes a sound when Floyd | it falls down. Why, the sound permatriculates no matter who is Floyd | listening." Floyd | Floyd | "I am afraid," says the Buddhist monk, evidently not at all afraid, Floyd | "that you haven't thought this over enough. After all, how do you know Floyd | it makes a sound if no one is there to hear it?" Floyd | Floyd | [1] Can my philosophical know-how help you resolve this tricky issue? Floyd | [2] Do you mind if I borrow that axe, Ms Lumberjack, sir? Floyd | [3] I'm not going to get involved in further silliness. . . Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | "I do not believe so," the monk says bowing his head slightly, "the Floyd | logical net you seek to cast across the world, neither of us care for Floyd | it -- though for different reasons I do assure you." Floyd | Floyd | [1] What reasons are these? Floyd | [2] Look, I know the answer -- I can resolve this straight away. Floyd | [3] Oh, never mind. . . Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | "I'll tell you one good reason," the lumberjack offers, "no kind of Floyd | philosophistrical trap-clap will convince me that a falling tree don't Floyd | make no sound. Now let me tell you one thing," she says, preceding to Floyd | tell you two things, "I've seen more trees fall down than you've had Floyd | hot dinners and they all make a 'creak . . . creak . . . creaaaakkk! . Floyd | . . whumph!! . . . thud!!!' sound as they go." Floyd | Floyd | The Buddhist looks unconvinced. Floyd | Floyd | [1] I agree with you, Ms Lumberjack -- the tree does make a sound. Floyd | [2] Nonsense. The tree makes no such sound if no one's there. Floyd | [3] I don't think it's something we can really know. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "3" | ||||
Floyd | You explain that it is perpetually undetermined -- it is only decided Floyd | one way or the other when there is an observer. You can only tell if Floyd | the tree is making a sound if you are present, and you being present Floyd | decides the fact that it makes a sound. Before you are there the sound Floyd | exists only in potential. Floyd | Floyd | "That's what I've been trying to explain to my wood-cutting associate Floyd | here," says the Buddhist, "but she simply will not listen." Floyd | Floyd | The lumberjack shakes her head in dismay, saying, "That's the biggest Floyd | load of nonsensication that I ever did hear." Floyd | Floyd | [1] Is there not some way I might convince you of this? Floyd | [2] I'll just leave you two too it, shall I? Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | The Buddhist monk seems to think on the matter for a few moments. Floyd | Finally, he begins: "My tree-felling friend's chief argument seems to Floyd | rest upon the supposed fact that a sound is always made whenever a Floyd | tree is felled. If this premise were undermined then perhaps we would Floyd | come to some resolution." Floyd | Floyd | Before you ask him how this might be achieved he continues: "Perhaps Floyd | you could create a situation in which a tree is felled and she does Floyd | not hear a sound. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "talk to lumberjack" | ||||
Floyd | You decide to leave the pair to their discussion until you can find a Floyd | way to resolve their argument. Floyd | | smartgenes says, "i guess it wasn't possible to get the axe" | |||
| canadianpuzzler asks, "Pick one and give the burden?" | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "get axe" | ||||
Floyd | That seems to belong to the lumberjack. Floyd | | DavidW says, "Sounds like we need earplugs for the lumberjack." | |||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "give burden to lumberjack" | ||||
Floyd | (first taking the Burden of Proof) Floyd | The lumberjack doesn't seem interested. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "climb tree" | ||||
Floyd | You're positively climbing up the walls. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "w" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Spooky Part of the Woods Floyd | You head further to the west until you reach a dead-end of brambles, Floyd | bracken and blackened lightning-struck trees. You hear a raven caw Floyd | malevolently in the middle distance and a damp shiver sneaks down your Floyd | spine. Floyd | Floyd | Turning east you can just about make out happier looking trees. All Floyd | that you can see in this part of the woods is a mess of brambles. Floyd | Floyd | You swear you just heard one of the trees stifle a cough. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "talk to tree" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "listen" | ||||
Floyd | You nearly jump out of your skin as a tree behind you makes spooky Floyd | ghost noises. Floyd | Floyd | Something seems to be laughing under its breath -- but there are only Floyd | trees here. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "listen" | ||||
Floyd | "Oi! Over here!" shouts someone behind you. You look around -- but Floyd | there's nothing but trees. Floyd | Floyd | You nearly jump out of your skin as a tree behind you makes spooky Floyd | ghost noises. Floyd | | smartgenes exclaims, "hmmm useful 2x listen!" | |||
| djfletch says (to Floyd), "x brambles" | ||||
Floyd | The brambles spiral in a spiky and heavily-stylised manner around the Floyd | base of the lightning-struck trees, surrounded by cloying bracken. Floyd | Peering closely, you can just about make out a rocky formation beyond Floyd | the brambles. Floyd | Floyd | Was that a tree you just heard mumble under its breath? It seemed Floyd | terribly rude. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "listen" | ||||
Floyd | Was that a tree you just heard mumble under its breath? It seemed Floyd | terribly rude. Floyd | Floyd | Something seems to be laughing under its breath -- but there are only Floyd | trees here. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "listen" | ||||
Floyd | You swear you just heard one of the trees stifle a cough. Floyd | Floyd | You swear you just heard one of the trees stifle a cough. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "search trees" | ||||
Floyd | You find nothing of interest. Floyd | Floyd | Something seems to be laughing under its breath -- but there are only Floyd | trees here. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "x formation" | ||||
Floyd | There seems to be some sort of collection of rocks, perhaps even a Floyd | small cave, beyond the brambles to the west. Floyd | Floyd | Something seems to be laughing under its breath -- but there are only Floyd | trees here. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "touch tree" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | ||||
| djfletch says (to Floyd), "i" | ||||
Floyd | You are carrying: Floyd | a Burden of Proof Floyd | a phial of black dye Floyd | a sack (open) Floyd | the invitation to the state of naturist camp Floyd | file of Platonic forms Floyd | cruise tickets for the Ship of Neurath Floyd | an informative leaflet Floyd | a fifty pence piece Floyd | a lighter Floyd | a Chinese key Floyd | a manual Floyd | Floyd | You nearly jump out of your skin as a tree behind you makes spooky Floyd | ghost noises. Floyd | | ||||
| djfletch says (to Floyd), "burn brambles" | ||||
Floyd | This dangerous act would achieve little. Floyd | Floyd | You nearly jump out of your skin as a tree behind you makes spooky Floyd | ghost noises. Floyd | | ||||
| djfletch says (to Floyd), "light brambles with lighter" | ||||
Floyd | You consider indulging your subconscious pyromaniac for a moment, but Floyd | decide to repress the urge instead on the grounds that it would do no Floyd | good. No doubt this will cost a fortune in future psychoanalysis Floyd | bills. Floyd | Floyd | "Oi! Over here!" shouts someone behind you. You look around -- but Floyd | there's nothing but trees. Floyd | | DavidW says, "I don't remember the leaflet." | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "talk to tree" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | ||||
| djfletch says (to Floyd), "read leaflet" | ||||
Floyd | THE SHIP OF NEURATH Floyd | Floyd | Take a cruise upon the fabulous Ship of Neurath. Let your sense-data Floyd | be amazed as the ship is reconstructed before your very eyes. In the Floyd | words of V.W.O. Quine: Floyd | Floyd | "Where a beam is taken away a new one must at once be put there, and Floyd | for this the rest of the ship is used as support. In this way, by Floyd | using the old beams and driftwood the ship can be shaped entirely Floyd | anew, but only by gradual reconstruction." Floyd | Floyd | The ship sails annually across the dark ocean without shores or Floyd | lighthouses, strewn with many a philosophic wreck. Floyd | Floyd | You nearly jump out of your skin as a tree behind you makes spooky Floyd | ghost noises. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "scream" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "w" | ||||
Floyd | Getting ripped to shreds by malicious-looking herbage isn't your idea Floyd | of a good plan. Floyd | Floyd | "Oi! Over here!" shouts someone behind you. You look around -- but Floyd | there's nothing but trees. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "n" | ||||
Floyd | You channel your will to power to summon a path in that direction. Floyd | Sadly, nothing happens: you can't go that way. Floyd | Floyd | You swear you just heard one of the trees stifle a cough. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "s" | ||||
Floyd | You channel your will to power to summon a path in that direction. Floyd | Sadly, nothing happens: you can't go that way. Floyd | Floyd | "Oi! Over here!" shouts someone behind you. You look around -- but Floyd | there's nothing but trees. Floyd | | djfletch says, "hmm, if we can't burn the brambles maybe we need the axe to cut them" | |||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "x trees" | ||||
Floyd | Although they are mere lumps of carbon they seem ill-meaning and Floyd | twisted. Indeed, their knots and gnarls, from particular angles, seem Floyd | to form faces, complete with eyes, noses and mouths. You swear one of Floyd | them just winked at you. Floyd | Floyd | You nearly jump out of your skin as a tree behind you makes spooky Floyd | ghost noises. Floyd | | ||||
| Binder says (to Floyd), "talk to trees" | ||||
Floyd | You look at the trees with suspicion. Floyd | Floyd | [1] Hello? Floyd | [2] (leave the tree alone) Floyd | | Binder says, "I gather tree is not a synonym for trees." | |||
| smartgenes says, "hmmm should have implemented tree" | ||||
| DavidW says (to Binder), "I guess not." | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | "You know, talking to trees is probably a sign of madness," say the Floyd | trees, conversationally. Floyd | Floyd | [1] I don't think that applies when the tree talks back. Floyd | [2] Talking trees? What's next? Lichen that whistle show tunes? Floyd | | DavidW says, "The game seems poor with synonyms." | |||
| Lionheart says, "Thiiiiiis is the forest of no returrrrn" | ||||
| Lionheart says (to DavidW), "Aye" | ||||
| smartgenes says, "the dialogue is great in this game" | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | "You know, trees don't actually talk," the trees reply. The voice is Floyd | rather high-pitched. Floyd | Floyd | [1] I think that the evidence shows that they do. Floyd | [2] You're probably right. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | "A bloody empiricist are you now?" the trees say, with a little cawing Floyd | sound. Floyd | Floyd | [1] Hey! What have you got against empiricists? Floyd | [2] That's rich coming from a group of trees. Floyd | [3] Well it's true -- apparently some trees can talk. Floyd | [4] Unless my senses deceive me . . . Floyd | [5] Was that a caw I just heard? Floyd | [6] You're just bitter because you haven't got eyes. Floyd | [7] Actually, I'm a level seven phenomenologist with a plus two blade Floyd | of Obfuscation. Floyd | | Lionheart says, "Hee I like 7" | |||
| smartgenes says, "lol at option 7" | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "7" | ||||
Floyd | The trees are silent and suddenly you feel very silly. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | *** Run-time problem P10: Since the fairytale trees is not allowed the Floyd | property "greeting", it is against the rules to try to use it. Floyd | Floyd | You swear you just heard one of the trees stifle a cough. Floyd | | DavidW says, "idgi" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "undo" | ||||
Floyd | Spooky Part of the Woods Floyd | [Previous turn undone.] Floyd | | Lionheart says, "Aw, buggy dialogue" | |||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "6" | ||||
Floyd | The trees are silent and suddenly you feel very silly. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | *** Run-time problem P10: Since the fairytale trees is not allowed the Floyd | property "greeting", it is against the rules to try to use it. Floyd | Floyd | Something seems to be laughing under its breath -- but there are only Floyd | trees here. Floyd | | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "undo" | ||||
Floyd | Spooky Part of the Woods Floyd | [Previous turn undone.] Floyd | | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "5" | ||||
Floyd | "No," the trees say with what sounds like a ruffle of feathers. Floyd | Floyd | [1] Trees don't caw or ruffle feathers. You're no tree at all, are Floyd | you?! Floyd | [2] Are you some sort of bird hiding amidst the trees? Floyd | [3] Your smooth-talking ways don't fool me, Sen?r Tree! Floyd | | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "3" | ||||
Floyd | "Oh alright," says a voice from amidst the trees, "you've got me, I'm Floyd | not a tree, or several trees for that matter." Floyd | Floyd | From behind the trees hops a curious looking raven. The raven is Floyd | strange in two ways. Firstly, it has a rainbow plumage. Secondly, it Floyd | can talk. Floyd | Floyd | [1] So, do you come here often? Floyd | [2] Like the plumage -- very colourful. Floyd | [3] Do ravens often talk? Floyd | [4] Do you know anyway past all this bramble? Floyd | | smartgenes says, "if we's chosen the right option we never would've known :-D" | |||
| Lionheart says, "He reminds me of a writing-desk." | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "2" | ||||
Floyd | "Do you?" the raven implores, "I hate it. Hate it. Hate it. Hate it. Floyd | None of the other ravens will go near me. I wish I could be rid of it Floyd | once and for all." Floyd | Floyd | [1] So, do you come here often? Floyd | [2] Do ravens often talk? Floyd | [3] Do you know any way past all this bramble? Floyd | | Lionheart says, "And we can fix that, can't ew" | |||
| DavidW says, "hm. Our black dye may help." | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "2" | ||||
Floyd | The non-black raven hops to another branch, saying, "When they've got Floyd | something to say, of course they talk." Floyd | Floyd | [1] So, do you come here often? Floyd | [2] Do you know anyway past all this bramble? Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | "Lately, I've been coming here a little more often than I used to," Floyd | says the non-black raven. Floyd | Floyd | [1] Do you know any way past all this bramble? Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | The raven cocks its head to one side, "Maybe . . ." Floyd | Floyd | [1] Maybe? Maybe you could tell me then? Floyd | | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | The raven cocks its head to the other side, "Maybe . . ." Floyd | Floyd | [1] Maybe if I go on some inane quest for you? Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | "Maybe if you find me some way of turning my plumage black like the Floyd | other ravens?" Floyd | Floyd | [1] Super! That's exactly what I wanted to do with my day. Floyd | [2] Oh alright. It's probably inevitable anyway. Floyd | [3] No way, Jos?. Why don't you help me first? Floyd | | smartgenes says, "a-ha well done on the black dye" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "3" | ||||
Floyd | "How abouts I peck your eyes out first, then you help me?" Floyd | Floyd | [1] Oh alright. Floyd | [2] No, I refuse. I've had enough. No more stupid quests. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | "Caw! Try and hurry though, I ain't gots all day." Floyd | | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "dye ravebn" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "dye raven" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "pour dye on raven" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "give dye to raven" | ||||
Floyd | "Not bad. Not bad. But you're forgetting one thing-- I don't gots Floyd | hair," the raven swoops down and takes the bottle off of you. "Until Floyd | you get something better, I'll take it as down payment." Floyd | | Binder asks, "barbershop hair?" | |||
| DavidW asks, "huh. So he takes the dye anyway?" | ||||
| Lionheart says, "Heh, how like the wine and Aristotle" | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "think about hair" | ||||
Floyd | Your philosophical studies don't seem to have taught you anything Floyd | about that. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "think about adventures" | ||||
Floyd | Your philosophical studies don't seem to have taught you anything Floyd | about that. Floyd | | smartgenes says, "east then" | |||
| Lionheart says, "Well, the raven has hair like the bald customer has hair" | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "e" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Fairytale Woods Floyd | In the midst of the woods stand a Buddhist monk and a lumberjack Floyd | engaged in a heated discussion as to whether a tree falling down in a Floyd | forest makes a sound if nobody is around to hear it. Their debate is Floyd | punctuated by the occasional felling of a tree at the blade of the Floyd | lumberjack's axe. Floyd | Floyd | The woods become more sinister looking to the west and the village Floyd | street is back to the east. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "ask lumberjack for axe" | ||||
Floyd | Your command falls on deaf ears. Perhaps you should TALK TO them about Floyd | it? Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "e" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Village Street Floyd | A church, a theatre, a tavern, a barbershop, a pavement caf? -- their Floyd | various changing forms clutter around, entrances facing out onto what Floyd | seems (most of the time) to be an ordinary village street. Passers-by Floyd | duck in and out of the buildings, stop by the water pump, or carry on Floyd | to a square to the north. No-one, you notice, takes the road south -- Floyd | or heads along the routes east towards the storybook hills or west Floyd | into the fairytale woods. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "go theatre" | ||||
Floyd | You try the theatre doors, but they're fastened shut. Floyd | | DavidW asks, "If a player asks about a topic, does an NPC hear it?" | |||
| smartgenes says, "good koan" | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "listen to gossip" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "listen" | ||||
Floyd | The babble and gossip of a busy market town. Floyd | | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "gossip" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x doors" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "listen to passers-by" | ||||
Floyd | The babble and gossip of a busy market town. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "open doors" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "x gossip" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "pull handle" | ||||
Floyd | A tinny voice speaks from the mouth of the pump! "Welcome to the Floyd | Intuition Pump 3000! Thank you for choosing the Intuition Pump for all Floyd | your intuiting needs. Got a tricky problem you can't solve, or an Floyd | object you don't know what to do with? Simply hold the puzzler in your Floyd | mind's eye and pull my handle -- which is to say, PUMP ABOUT the Floyd | topic! Be amazed as intuitions flow through your mind about the Floyd | puzzles, objects and people that are bothering you. Happy intuiting!" Floyd | Floyd | How extraordinary. Could be useful, though -- better remember to come Floyd | here and PUMP ABOUT a problem when you're stuck. Floyd | | djfletch says, "ah, it does do something" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "pump about hair" | ||||
Floyd | You pull the pump's handle, but no intuition is forthcoming. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "pump about maid" | ||||
Floyd | You pull the pump's handle, but no intuition is forthcoming. Floyd | | DavidW says, "We have to be HOLDing the item." | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "pump about theatre" | ||||
Floyd | You pull the pump's handle, but no intuition is forthcoming. Floyd | | smartgenes says, "it says mind's eye" | |||
| Binder asks, "is this the built in hint thing?" | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "pump about wine" | ||||
Floyd | You pull the pump's handle, but no intuition is forthcoming. Floyd | | smartgenes says, "unless mind's eye needs to be held" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "pump about bucket" | ||||
Floyd | You pull the pump's handle, concentrating furiously. You realise that Floyd | pitch can be used for making things look black, as well as as a Floyd | sealant. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "x eye" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | smartgenes says, "so that maid with the bucket is somewhere" | |||
| smartgenes says, "the pitch path" | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "pump about burden" | ||||
Floyd | You pull the pump's handle, concentrating furiously. In a flash of Floyd | inspiration, you wonder what would happen if you could do something Floyd | like give a burden of proof to the invisible pink unicorn. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "give burden to unicorn" | ||||
Floyd | You can only do that to something animate. Floyd | | Lionheart says, "Tch, that wasn't very subtle" | |||
| Lionheart says, "I'd mind more if I hadn" | ||||
| DavidW says, "The unicorns are in the field out east of the original room." | ||||
| Lionheart says, "I'd mind more if I hadnt planned to do just that" | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "e" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Hill Floyd | You make your way along the cobbled path leading east of the village Floyd | to the hills beyond. The path begins winding up the hill steeply, but Floyd | just as you find yourself out of breath from the climb, you find the Floyd | path levelling out. Then, just as you start finding the leisurely walk Floyd | a little dull, the path steepens again into a challenging climb. Floyd | Finally, just as you wish you could reach wherever it is you're headed Floyd | next in this disconcerting fantasy world, you crest the hill. In the Floyd | way that happens too often here, you are met by a complete Floyd | non-sequiteur of a situation. Floyd | Floyd | There's a great pyre here very slowly catching alight. Tied to a stake Floyd | in the centre of the fire is a handsome woman looking deeply Floyd | determined, though you suppose she'd look less composed if the fire Floyd | wasn't so pitifully poor. At the base of the pyre, an imposing, Floyd | bushy-bearded man in an ornate uniform is interrogating her intensely, Floyd | in a way that appears to be making her all the more resolute. Floyd | Floyd | From here, you could head west, back to the village, or further into Floyd | the hills to the north. Floyd | | DavidW says, "I didn't mean *this* east." | |||
| smartgenes says, "never mind, a woman to rescue" | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "talk to man" | ||||
Floyd | "Who the devil are you, and what are you doing to that poor woman?" Floyd | you greet the man forcefully. Floyd | Floyd | He turns to you and declaims, with the light of madness in his eyes, Floyd | "I be the Zombiefinder General!" Floyd | Floyd | [1] Right. And what are you doing to that poor woman? Floyd | [2] Right. And what exactly is a Zombiefinder General? Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | "What, her?" he asks, gesticulating furiously at the bored-looking Floyd | woman. "She be no woman! She be a zombie -- and she will not confess! Floyd | Floyd | [1] Perhaps she bain't, sorry, isn't a zombie. Floyd | [2] Fair cop. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | He cuts you off saying, "That be exactly what a zombie would say!" Floyd | Floyd | [1] Surely, if she confesses to being a zombie you will kill her. Floyd | [2] You're probably right. I'll just leave you to it then... Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | "Of course!" he says with relish. "But I'd do it humanely -- Splash Floyd | her with some holy sauce, no problem." Floyd | Floyd | [1] Would that harm a non-zombie? Floyd | [2] Not holy sauce! You fiend! Floyd | [3] Sounds reasonable. I'll be sidling off now. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | "It might be harming their best dinner jacket," he muses. "And perhaps Floyd | their wallet when they get the dry cleaning bill. Other than that, Floyd | no." Floyd | Floyd | [1] Then why don't you just do that to her anyway? Floyd | [2] I can understand now why it would be a cruel and unusual to Floyd | subject someone to that. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | "That be defeating the whole point of a fair interrogation!" he says Floyd | with exasperation. "I can't just go about applying punishment all over Floyd | the place without proof, no matter the benefit. The whole institution Floyd | of justice would break down -- and such an institution be generally Floyd | maximisin' well-bein' more than the well-bein' caused by breakin' the Floyd | rules in particular instances." Floyd | Floyd | [1] I don't think breaking the rule this time will erode the Floyd | principles of justice. Floyd | [2] Ah, you are of course absolutely correct. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | He looks at you scornfully, "It starts off with a few people sayin' Floyd | 'Oh, Justice won't suddenly break down if you pour some Arrabbiata Floyd | sauce on some girl that may otherwise burn to death' -- but it's a Floyd | slippery slope! Soon you'll be wantin' to routinely sauce people up Floyd | before they get on flights, or shake a little holy parmesan at them Floyd | when they go to the library. I may be a Zombiefinder General, but even Floyd | I wouldn't want an erosion of civil liberties to come about through Floyd | the war against zombies." Floyd | Floyd | [1] (give up) Floyd | [2] You've convinced me! I'll be off now. Floyd | [3] Surely burning at the stake is an erosion of civil liberties? Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "3" | ||||
Floyd | He seems to have already thought long and hard about this issue, and Floyd | replies instantly, "Burning at the stake is already an erosion of Floyd | civil liberties and I be going to try as hard as I can to prevent Floyd | future erosions. Now, please be on your way." He shoos you along, Floyd | having tired of the conversation. Floyd | Floyd | [1] (leave) Floyd | | Lionheart says, "Ha" | |||
| smartgenes says, "did i miss something" | ||||
| Binder says, "i think we lost the war on terror" | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | The Zombiehunter glares at you from beneath his orange eyebrows. Floyd | Floyd | [1] Incidentally, what exactly is a Zombiehunter General? Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | "It means," he growls, "That I find zombies. Have you seen any Floyd | zombies, perchance?" Floyd | Floyd | [1] No, I don't think so. Floyd | [2] Why do you ask? Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "2" | ||||
Floyd | "That village down there is crawling with the buggers," he replies Floyd | gruffly. "Zombieing all over the place, them and their qualia-free Floyd | brains." Floyd | Floyd | [1] What do you want me to do about it? Floyd | [2] Let me guess -- you want me to find the zombies? Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | "I would like you to retire the zombies," he says. "You know, remove Floyd | them from action." Floyd | Floyd | [1] How would I go about doing that? Floyd | [2] Sounds like a plan. I'll get right to it. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | "Give it a good hacking over the head with a sharp implement," he Floyd | explains, gesturing violently in a way that makes you take a step Floyd | back. "That should do the trick. I'd recommend holy sauce, but it be a Floyd | tad expensive and goes off quickly." Floyd | Floyd | [1] I'll get right on it. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | "Do not tarry!" he shouts, "Go retire some zombies!" Floyd | | smartgenes asks, "did i mess up by not asking for the axe?" | |||
| DavidW says, "I doubt we could get the axe anyway unless the argument about sound was solved first." | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "talk to woman" | ||||
Floyd | You stare up at the woman tied to the stake. She is dressed in white, Floyd | below her torso is wreathed in smoke like some melodramatic rendition Floyd | of a vengeful god. Floyd | Floyd | [1] Are you alright, love? Floyd | [2] You know, smoking is an awful habit. Floyd | [3] Is this some sort of new-age skin treatment? Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "3" | ||||
Floyd | "No," she replies, shaking her head, "it's actually quite a Floyd | traditional method of treatment. It's good both for the skin and also Floyd | for confessions. It was once quite popular with Catholics in Spain and Floyd | has celebrity endorsement from Joan of Arc." Floyd | Floyd | [1] You're taking this all remarkably well. Floyd | [2] So, why exactly are you burning away here? Floyd | [3] Now that you've tried it, would you recommend it to a friend? Floyd | | smartgenes says, "lol" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "3" | ||||
Floyd | She seems to give the issue some thought. "It certainly has its Floyd | benefits, but I'm not sure I would have opted for this particular Floyd | treatment were it offered as optional." Floyd | Floyd | [1] I suppose your skin is good already. It's one of your many Floyd | qualities... Floyd | [2] So, how did this situation come about? Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | Her face takes on a look that can be found on thumb-twiddlers, Floyd | hair-fiddlers and feet-shufflers everywhere. "Um . . ." she begins, "I Floyd | don't so much possess qualities, as act in a wholly consistent Floyd | manner." Floyd | Floyd | [1] That's nice. So, how did you get here? Floyd | [2] On a slightly different note -- why are you burning on this stake? Floyd | | smartgenes says, "lol maybe it's worth pursuing the weird threads sometimes" | |||
| DavidW says, "The qualia/qualities thing was weird." | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | "That's a good question. It all started three weeks ago when . . ." Floyd | Two long hours pass. ". . . and then he tied me up here and now he's Floyd | trying to make me confess to being a zombie." Floyd | Floyd | [1] Are you a zombie? Floyd | [2] What happens if you confess? Floyd | [3] And it wouldn't be consistent to lie and confess to something you Floyd | hadn't done? Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | She looks about herself and says, "Not last time I checked." Floyd | Floyd | [1] So what would happen if you confessed? Floyd | [2] Oh. I was excited there for a moment... Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "2" | ||||
Floyd | "I'm sorry to disappoint you . . ." she starts, but you've heard the Floyd | condolence speech too many times to pay attention to the rest. All you Floyd | pick up on is the word "consistent" peppered liberally throughout. Floyd | Floyd | [1] So . . . what would happen if you wanted to leave? Floyd | [2] Is this all about consistency? Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "2" | ||||
Floyd | "As a point of consistency, I'd rather die than lie. If I'm honest, Floyd | which I always am, I'm a bit of a martyr for truth. I shall not admit Floyd | to being a zombie, as I am not a zombie." Floyd | Floyd | [1] That's a tad extreme. Looks like you need proving right. Floyd | [2] How very odd you are. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "2" | ||||
Floyd | "It'll be difficult to prove that I'm not a zombie," she says with Floyd | finality, "but hopefully history will vindicate me if you do not." You Floyd | think it a good time to leave, given that she will soon be burning Floyd | alive. Floyd | | smartgenes says, "west then" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "w" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Village Street Floyd | A church, a theatre, a tavern, a barbershop, a pavement caf? -- their Floyd | various changing forms clutter around, entrances facing out onto what Floyd | seems (most of the time) to be an ordinary village street. Passers-by Floyd | duck in and out of the buildings, stop by the water pump, or carry on Floyd | to a square to the north. No-one, you notice, takes the road south -- Floyd | or heads along the routes east towards the storybook hills or west Floyd | into the fairytale woods. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "s" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Black Tarmac Road Floyd | You're on a road by the squat concrete hut that contains the Chinese Floyd | Room. In smooth black tarmac, neatly painted with white lines, the Floyd | road stretches north to the village in peculiarly perfect tapering Floyd | perspective. Behind you, to the south, you see the road lead towards Floyd | some queer-looking hedgerows at the base of the crag. To the east, as Floyd | before, stretch the plains to the horizon, with the ocean, behind sand Floyd | dunes, doing likewise to the west. Floyd | Floyd | The remains of a scarecrow droop on a pole here. Floyd | | ||||
| zarf walks off through the wall; vivid gold light flares briefly around him. | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x pitch" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "e" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | On the Edge of the Plains Floyd | The plains are a grassy expanse extending to the east as far as the Floyd | eye can see, and probably further. Here, just a short distance east of Floyd | the road, a small crowd has gathered, silently gazing out onto the Floyd | wilderness. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "e" | ||||
Floyd | Ignoring the disapproving glares of the unicornists, you strike out Floyd | onto the plains purposefully. Then you trip over a rabbit hole, fall Floyd | flat on your face, pick yourself up, woefully brush the resulting Floyd | grass strains, and then strike out again, equally purposefully, if now Floyd | a little humbly. Floyd | Floyd | Wide Plains Floyd | You make your way out into the wide plains. They're an extraordinary Floyd | expanse of grass so green it hurts your eyes. No matter how far you Floyd | walk into them -- so far that the crowd at the roadside becomes a mere Floyd | speck, like a squashed fly on a motorway windscreen -- they remain as Floyd | boundless as ever, stretching out in seemingly every direction. Floyd | Floyd | There is a peculiar juddering noise in the distance. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "listen" | ||||
Floyd | You listen closely to the sound, and discern the direction of Floyd | approach. You wait, tense, as the sound approaches, and then -- just Floyd | as you fear you're about to be crushed beneath invisible hooves -- you Floyd | launch yourself into the air and land, with a dramatic thud, on the Floyd | heavy, pulsing, pink and invisible mound of the unicorn's back. Floyd | Floyd | The unicorn tries to buck you, but you lurch forward and grab wildly Floyd | -- successfully hooking an arm round the invisible pink horn on Her Floyd | invisible pink head. Floyd | | DavidW says, "Put burden on it!" | |||
| Binder says (to Floyd), "put burden on horn" | ||||
Floyd | Putting things on the horn would achieve nothing. Floyd | Floyd | As the unicorn gallops onwards She whinnies madly and continues to Floyd | buck her body furiously in an effort to throw you. Floyd | | Binder says, "hrmph" | |||
| Lionheart says, "Yee ha" | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "put burden on unicorn" | ||||
Floyd | Putting things on the unicorn would achieve nothing. Floyd | Floyd | Unless you do something to stop the unicorn soon, you'll be thrown to Floyd | the ground and crushed beneath her mighty invisible pink hooves -- and Floyd | no doubt cast down to the Pastures of Short Grass and High Manure. Floyd | | DavidW says, "on the unicorn itself, not the horn." | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "getr burden" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "get burden" | ||||
Floyd | You already have that. Floyd | Floyd | Your body's weight is clearly causing the unicorn great distress -- Floyd | but it's not enough to totally incapacitate her. You're losing your Floyd | grip on her horn. Floyd | | ||||
| djfletch says (to Floyd), "hang burden on unicorn" | ||||
Floyd | You grip Her flanks tightly with your thighs, feeling the enormous Floyd | pink muscles pulse beneath her invisible skin, and lurch forward, Floyd | strecthing out your arms to loops the burden's thong over the end of Floyd | Her horn. There's a trembling equine scream and she stumbles; you feel Floyd | Her front legs buckle beneath her as you're thrown into a somersault Floyd | over Her head. Floyd | Floyd | Picking yourself up from the ground, you turn around and feel your Floyd | breath snatched out from your lungs by the vision before you like a Floyd | baby fox from its set by a hunter's hound. The unicorn is weeping and Floyd | singing, Her broken legs flailing in the air -- in her last moments Floyd | she has appeared. Her skin shimmers with a mega-pinkness truly beyond Floyd | your understanding; her mighty silver horn is bent in two by the Floyd | enormous burden of proof. Floyd | Floyd | The earth cracks around Her and She seems to shrink from your sight Floyd | while simultaneously expanding to encompass the entire breadth of the Floyd | plain. There's a might boom and sucking of air and she vanishes, Floyd | triumphantly, in a puff of logic, leaving behind her a whiff of greasy Floyd | pink smoke. Floyd | Floyd | The plains seem terribly small now, and the crowd terribly close. They Floyd | are whimpering at your approach. Before you reach them, there's a Floyd | collective roar, and the sprint as one down the road, ripping their Floyd | Unicornist badges from their clothes and casting them aside. Floyd | Floyd | On the Edge of the Plains Floyd | The plains seem folornly empty now that the unicorn's non-existence Floyd | has been firmly proven. There is nothing here for you. Floyd | Floyd | [Your score has just gone up by five points.] Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "SAVE" | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "cf4" | ||||
Floyd | Enter saved game to store: Ok. Floyd | | Lionheart says, "Ladies and gentleman, that is how you kill a god." | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "cry" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | DavidW says, "I wouldn't've guessed 'hang' there. good job." | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "e" | ||||
Floyd | The plains are too vast and empty for that to be a pleasurable walk. Floyd | | DavidW says, "We might be able to enter the church again and the theater now." | |||
| smartgenes says, "i thought the horn idea was the best solution" | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "w" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Black Tarmac Road Floyd | You're on a road by the squat concrete hut that contains the Chinese Floyd | Room. In smooth black tarmac, neatly painted with white lines, the Floyd | road stretches north to the village in peculiarly perfect tapering Floyd | perspective. Behind you, to the south, you see the road lead towards Floyd | some queer-looking hedgerows at the base of the crag. To the east, as Floyd | before, stretch the plains to the horizon, with the ocean, behind sand Floyd | dunes, doing likewise to the west. Floyd | Floyd | The remains of a scarecrow droop on a pole here. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "get pole" | ||||
Floyd | That's not the part of the scarecrow you're interested in. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x scarecrow" | ||||
Floyd | The scarecrow, now totally inanimate, and with his sacking torn away, Floyd | droops folornly on his pole, while his comatose homunculi lie in a Floyd | heap beneath him. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "get homunculi" | ||||
Floyd | Philosophers are not yet supermen. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "s" | ||||
Floyd | Striking out south towards the castle, you soon realise what it is Floyd | that lurks so strangely at the base of the crag. As the rock looms Floyd | over you like ten tonne weight over a hapless clown, the road becomes Floyd | a pebbly path leading into what is clearly an enormous maze. Floyd | Floyd | Outside the Maze Floyd | You're standing at the entrance to a vast maze built of hedges that Floyd | tower six feet above you. The path seems extravagantly narrow, as if Floyd | the designer wanted to prepare the unwary adventurer from the outside. Floyd | Above the entrance is a painted wooden sign. It looks important. Floyd | | Lionheart says, "Darn the author's lack of synonyms" | |||
| DavidW says, "I suspect we're not ready for a maze yet." | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "x sign" | ||||
Floyd | Attention, Adventurer! This MAZE is not for the FAINTHEARTED, nor for Floyd | the CORRUPT. This is the MORAL MAZE, where only the truly ETHICAL Floyd | shall pass. Should you find yourself LOST forever -- what can you do Floyd | but PRAY? Floyd | | smartgenes says, "oh sheet a maze" | |||
| djfletch says, "yeah, try the theatre first maybe" | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "pray" | ||||
Floyd | God is dead. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "n" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Black Tarmac Road Floyd | You're on a road by the squat concrete hut that contains the Chinese Floyd | Room. In smooth black tarmac, neatly painted with white lines, the Floyd | road stretches north to the village in peculiarly perfect tapering Floyd | perspective. Behind you, to the south, you see the road lead towards Floyd | some queer-looking hedgerows at the base of the crag. To the east, as Floyd | before, stretch the plains to the horizon, with the ocean, behind sand Floyd | dunes, doing likewise to the west. Floyd | Floyd | The remains of a scarecrow droop on a pole here. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "climb pole" | ||||
Floyd | You're positively climbing up the walls. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "n" | ||||
Floyd | As you approach the village, you see that the crowd of unicornist has Floyd | gathered outside the church, baying for blood. They charge the doors, Floyd | which burst open, and they flood into the building. There's a moment Floyd | of confused stillness, and then they come thundering out of the Floyd | church, carrying the priest along bodily like a rock star at a Floyd | open-air festival, only much more threateningly. You dive for cover as Floyd | the crowd streams past you and mob off down the road, the priest's Floyd | plaintiff cries drowned beneath their righteous anger. Floyd | Floyd | As they vanish into the distance they leave nothing behind them but a Floyd | cloud of dust and a single dazed unicornist. Hairy and bedraggled, he Floyd | looks at you in utter confusion, says "Nice day for it", and wanders Floyd | off. Floyd | Floyd | Village Street Floyd | A church, a theatre, a tavern, a barbershop, a pavement caf? -- their Floyd | various changing forms clutter around, entrances facing out onto what Floyd | seems (most of the time) to be an ordinary village street. Passers-by Floyd | duck in and out of the buildings, stop by the water pump, or carry on Floyd | to a square to the north. No-one, you notice, takes the road south -- Floyd | or heads along the routes east towards the storybook hills or west Floyd | into the fairytale woods. Floyd | Floyd | The theatre's director is here, jumping around declaiming his joy to Floyd | a skull held tenderly in his hand. Floyd | | DavidW asks, "skull?" | |||
| Lionheart says, "Plaintiff? Who's he gonna sue" | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "talk to director" | ||||
Floyd | When the director spots you, he runs up to meet you, scuffing the hems Floyd | of his trousers. "You, mate," he says, "Are a bloody marvel. I heard Floyd | all about it! You and the unicorn, proving She doesn't exist! Floyd | S'changed everyfing round here, I tell you. Look, I really owe you Floyd | one. I've got this fing my grandfather passed on to me. Haven't a clue Floyd | what it does, but he called it a qualiascope and sed it was the most Floyd | valuable fing he owned. Looks bloody beautiful, anyway." Floyd | Floyd | "Listen, I've gotta get on. Got a show to produce! Catch you later, Floyd | comrade." Floyd | Floyd | He shambles off back into the theatre, slamming the door behind him. Floyd | You're left holding the arcane device in your hands. Floyd | | smartgenes says, "it'll be Yoric" | |||
| DavidW asks, "'qualiascope'?" | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x qualiascope" | ||||
Floyd | It's covered in a hundred nozzles, dials and buttons; you daren't Floyd | press a single one of them. There's a bit that looks like it's Floyd | definitely meant to be an eyepiece, though. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "look through eyepiece" | ||||
Floyd | You find nothing of interest. Floyd | | Lionheart says, "It's a zombie detector" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x etepiece" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "look in qualiascope" | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x eyepiece" | ||||
Floyd | Look through it at what? Floyd | Floyd | You hold the eyepiece to your eye and look through it. The scenery is Floyd | rendered in black and white, but here and there are extraordinary Floyd | flashes of color, and smells and tastes and sounds and feelings and Floyd | emotions and . . . You put down the qualiascope, feeling queasy. You Floyd | realise that what it allows you to do is see directly into other Floyd | people's consciousness. Whatever they sense, you sense. Whatever they Floyd | feel, you feel. It's more than you could possibly imagine. Or, indeed, Floyd | would want to. Floyd | | Binder says, "hotttt" | |||
| DavidW says, "I think this would help the burning woman." | ||||
| smartgenes says, "wonder if dinner is served yet" | ||||
| canadianpuzzler says, "By the way, if it's pitch you want, you have to go to the room with ex scarecrow and climb the ladder. You probably also want the pail to put it in." | ||||
| Lionheart says, "Right, we can prove she's not a qualia-less zombie with it" | ||||
| DavidW says (to canad), "No spoilers please." | ||||
| smartgenes says, "um less spoilers please" | ||||
| smartgenes says, "but we knew about the pail anyway" | ||||
| smartgenes says, "don't recall any ladder, only a pole" | ||||
| DavidW says, "There was a ladder down from the roof." | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "e" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Hill Floyd | There's a great pyre here very slowly catching alight. Tied to a stake Floyd | in the centre of the fire is a handsome woman looking deeply Floyd | determined, though you suppose she'd look less composed if the fire Floyd | wasn't so pitifully poor. At the base of the pyre, an imposing, Floyd | bushy-bearded man in an ornate uniform is interrogating her intensely, Floyd | in a way that appears to be making her all the more resolute. Floyd | Floyd | From here, you could head west, back to the village, or further into Floyd | the hills to the north. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "e" | ||||
Floyd | The hill's too steep to descend in that direction. Floyd | | canadianpuzzler says, "I've never played the game, actually. I just remembered where the pitch was, and that there was a ladder." | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "give qualiascope to man" | ||||
Floyd | The Zombiefinder General doesn't seem interested. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "look at general" | ||||
Floyd | A brutish-looking man, with green eyes and orange eyebrows. He's Floyd | wearing a uniform covered in silver brocade, with three purple Floyd | chevrons on each shoulder. It's as if he's trying to assert the Floyd | vibrancy of his colourful personality through the medium of military Floyd | vestments. Floyd | Floyd | He's determinedly interrogating the equally determined woman on the Floyd | pyre. Floyd | Floyd | The interrogator gesticulates manically at the woman, crying Floyd | "Confess!" But she merely juts out her jaw determinedly. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "look through qualiascope at woman" | ||||
Floyd | You suddenly become awash with the person's unique and irreducible Floyd | subjective sensations. Floyd | | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "use scope on woman" | ||||
Floyd | I only understood you as far as wanting to use the qualiascope. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "look through qualiascope at man" | ||||
Floyd | You are surprised to see the Zombiefinder General appear in black and Floyd | white. According to the qualiascope he is not conscious -- he is a Floyd | zombie! Floyd | | DavidW says, "eep" | |||
| smartgenes says, "wow.." | ||||
| Lionheart says, "Figures." | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "talk to zombiefinder" | ||||
Floyd | "Yes?" he says, abruptly. Floyd | Floyd | [1] Ah... nothing. Floyd | | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | "Do not tarry!" he shouts, "Go retire some zombies!" Floyd | | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "retire zombiefinder" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | smartgenes says, "we kill zombies with xes" | |||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "kill zombiefinder" | ||||
Floyd | Now that you know he's truly a zombie, dispatching him as quickly as Floyd | possible seems like a plan, but you'll need something sharp . . . Floyd | | smartgenes says, "axes" | |||
| djfletch says, "or sauce" | ||||
| canadianpuzzler says, ">X out zombie" | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "ask zombiefinder for sauce" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | DavidW says, "Axe is good choice, sure." | |||
| smartgenes says, "dinner then" | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "w" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Village Street Floyd | A church, a theatre, a tavern, a barbershop, a pavement caf? -- their Floyd | various changing forms clutter around, entrances facing out onto what Floyd | seems (most of the time) to be an ordinary village street. Passers-by Floyd | duck in and out of the buildings, stop by the water pump, or carry on Floyd | to a square to the north. No-one, you notice, takes the road south -- Floyd | or heads along the routes east towards the storybook hills or west Floyd | into the fairytale woods. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "n" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Square Floyd | You alight upon a square, around which runs someone who looks like a Floyd | madman, grasping a lantern lit bright in the morning hours, and crying Floyd | incessantly.This appears to be the academic quarter of the village, Floyd | and so may in fact be a quadrangle, which is awfully exciting. You Floyd | know it's the academic quarter, because the grass is covered with Floyd | sprawling young people wearing brightly coloured clothes, dreadlocks, Floyd | and organic deodorant, around whom the madman runs, crying, while they Floyd | yell and laugh at him. Architecturally and geographically speaking, Floyd | the buildings look like they were placed there by a commitee of Floyd | village planners whose equipment budget stretched only so far as a Floyd | compass. Three sides of the square are complemented by a museum, Floyd | research institute and a library, to the west, north and east Floyd | respectively. Floyd | | smartgenes says, "hmm lucky i mapped wrong in my mind" | |||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "x madman" | ||||
Floyd | He has a bushy moustache and looks like the sort of guy who likes to Floyd | hike. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "talk to madman" | ||||
Floyd | You approach the madman, who is crying, "I seek God! I seek God!" Floyd | Floyd | [1] (laugh) Floyd | [2] Are you lost? Floyd | [3] Did you lose your way like a child? Floyd | [4] (leave) Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "3" | ||||
Floyd | The madman jumps into your midst and pierces you with his eyes. Floyd | "Whither is God?" he cries; "I will tell you. We have killed him---you Floyd | and I. All of us are his murderers. But how did we do this? Floyd | Floyd | [1] With the Nietzsche book, in the ballroom? Floyd | [2] (listen patiently) Floyd | [3] (leave) Floyd | | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | Your comment causes the madman to lose his thread, and like a record Floyd | player rudely jolted he starts his spiel anew. Floyd | Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "undo" | ||||
Floyd | Square Floyd | [Previous turn undone.] Floyd | | smartgenes says, "hmm well it was from nietzche" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "2" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "undo" | ||||
Floyd | Square Floyd | [Previous turn undone.] Floyd | | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "talk to madman" | ||||
Floyd | The madman jumps into your midst and pierces you with his eyes. Floyd | "Whither is God?" he cries; "I will tell you. We have killed him---you Floyd | and I. All of us are his murderers. But how did we do this? Floyd | Floyd | [1] With the Nietzsche book, in the ballroom? Floyd | [2] (listen patiently) Floyd | [3] (leave) Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "reminf" | ||||
Floyd | I didn't understand that number. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "2" | ||||
Floyd | "How could we drink up the sea? Who gave us the sponge to wipe away Floyd | the entire horizon? What were we doing when we unchained this earth Floyd | from its sun?" Floyd | Floyd | [1] Perhaps we were very thirsty. Floyd | [2] Um . . . the really big sponge merchant? That is to say -- the Floyd | merhant who sells really big sponges. Floyd | [3] We were unchaining. That's what people do when they unchain stuff. Floyd | [4] Hey! One question at a time. Floyd | [5] (listen patiently) Floyd | [6] (leave) Floyd | | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "2" | ||||
Floyd | Your comment causes the madman to lose his thread, and like a record Floyd | player rudely jolted he starts his spiel anew. Floyd | | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "undo" | ||||
Floyd | Square Floyd | [Previous turn undone.] Floyd | | DavidW says, "5" | |||
| smartgenes says, "haha the big sponge merchant" | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | Your comment causes the madman to lose his thread, and like a record Floyd | player rudely jolted he starts his spiel anew. Floyd | | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "undo" | ||||
Floyd | Square Floyd | [Previous turn undone.] Floyd | | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "5" | ||||
Floyd | "Whither is it moving now? Whither are we moving? Away from all suns? Floyd | Are we not plunging continually? Backward, sideward, forward, in all Floyd | directions? Is there still any up or down? Are we not straying, as Floyd | through an infinite nothing?" Floyd | Floyd | [1] Stop it! You're making me dizzy. Floyd | [2] Don't worry, I often feel that way too after a few drinks. Floyd | [3] (listen patiently) Floyd | [4] (leave) Floyd | | DavidW says, "I think we need to let the madman gibber and we just listen." | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "lol" | ||||
Floyd | I didn't understand that number. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "3" | ||||
Floyd | "Do we not feel the breath of empty space? Has it not become colder? Floyd | Is not night continually closing in on us? Do we not need to light Floyd | lanterns in the morning?" Floyd | Floyd | [1] No, it's just you. Floyd | [2] Do you ever say anything that isn't a question? Floyd | [3] (listen patiently) Floyd | [4] (leave) Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "3" | ||||
Floyd | "Do we hear nothing as yet of the noise of the gravediggers who are Floyd | burying God? Do we smell nothing as yet of the divine decomposition? Floyd | Gods, too, decompose. God is dead. God remains dead. And we have Floyd | killed him." Floyd | Floyd | [1] We? What do you mean we? Leave me out of this: I'm not going to be Floyd | accessory to this murder. Floyd | [2] Sorry about the smell; I think I stepped in some unicorn muck back Floyd | there. Floyd | [3] (listen patiently) Floyd | [4] (leave) Floyd | | smartgenes says, "lol this is great" | |||
| Lionheart says, "Ha ha ha" | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "3" | ||||
Floyd | "How shall we comfort ourselves, the murderers of all murderers? What Floyd | was holiest and mightiest of all that the world has yet owned has bled Floyd | to death under our knives: who will wipe this blood off us?" Floyd | Floyd | [1] I always find a nice cup of tea comforting at times like this. Floyd | [2] A hot shower should do the trick. Shall we...? Floyd | [3] (listen patiently) Floyd | [4] (leave) Floyd | | DavidW says, "ha 2" | |||
| canadianpuzzler says, "As per the game world, it is too late not be an accessory..." | ||||
| DavidW says, "but choose listen" | ||||
| smartgenes asks, "Norman Bates?" | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "3" | ||||
Floyd | "What water is there for us to clean ourselves? What festivals of Floyd | atonement, what sacred games shall we have to invent? Is not the Floyd | greatness of this deed too great for us? Must we ourselves not become Floyd | gods simply to appear worthy of it?" Floyd | Floyd | [1] Festival of atonement? Is that some sort of Gregorian chant gig? Floyd | [2] If we're going to be inventing games, I suggest a dynamic cross Floyd | between spelunking and curling. Floyd | [3] On the greatness scale, I think it falls somewhere between Floyd | juggling with chainsaws and licking one's own elbow. Floyd | [4] Become Gods, eh? That sounds like a super plan fit for a Superman Floyd | (and/or non-gender-specific Superbeing). Floyd | [5] (listen patiently) Floyd | [6] (leave) Floyd | | smartgenes says, "hahaha the dialogue gets better & better" | |||
| DavidW says, "So bizarre." | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "5" | ||||
Floyd | "There has never been a greater deed; and whoever is born after Floyd | us---for the sake of this deed he will belong to a higher history than Floyd | all history hitherto." Floyd | Floyd | [1] Pah! I reject your patriarchal meta-narrative! Floyd | [2] A higher history? That doesn't sound too bad. Floyd | [3] (listen patiently) Floyd | [4] (leave) Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "3" | ||||
Floyd | Here the madman falls silent and looks again at you, his listener; and Floyd | you, too, are silent and stare at him in astonishment. At last he Floyd | throw his lantern on the ground, where it breaks into pieces and goes Floyd | out. "I have come too early," he says; "my time is not yet. This Floyd | tremendous event is still on its way, still wandering; it has not yet Floyd | reached the ears of men. Lightning and thunder require time; the light Floyd | of the stars requires time; deeds, though done, still require time to Floyd | be seen and heard. This deed is still more distant from them than most Floyd | distant stars---and yet they have done it themselves." Floyd | Floyd | With these final words the madman leaves the square. You see him Floyd | heading in the direction of the church, and from that direction you Floyd | soon hear the words, "What after all are these churches now if they Floyd | are not the tombs and sepulchers of God?". You feel like you've Floyd | overslept and woken up in a 1970"s Kaufmann translation of The Gay Floyd | Science. I mean, who uses the word "sepulchers", anyway? Floyd | Floyd | [Your score has just gone up by two points.] Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "SAVE" | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "cf5" | ||||
Floyd | Enter saved game to store: Ok. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "x lantern" | ||||
Floyd | (the broken lantern) Floyd | The glass part of the lantern is broken, so that the feeblest of winds Floyd | would soon extinguish the fire within. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "think about kaufmann" | ||||
Floyd | Your philosophical studies don't seem to have taught you anything Floyd | about that. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "take lantern" | ||||
Floyd | (the broken lantern) Floyd | Taken. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "think about diogenes" | ||||
Floyd | Your philosophical studies don't seem to have taught you anything Floyd | about that. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "light lantern" | ||||
Floyd | (the broken lantern) Floyd | This dangerous act would achieve little. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "w" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Museum Floyd | The Odditorium is filled with a crazy array of philosophical exhibits. Floyd | You wander past a brain suspended in a vat of colourless liquid and Floyd | wired to some complicated electronics, and then pause to examine an Floyd | old-fashioned tachyon telephone. You could spend hours in here, but Floyd | your attention is alerted by a furious argument taking place at the Floyd | far end of the room, beneath the hulking hull of a ship that protrudes Floyd | from the wall in a most unexpected manner. There, a man in extremely Floyd | piratical clothing is giving a woman in a steward's uniform a piece of Floyd | his mind. Floyd | | DavidW clicks "Like" on "Odditorium". | |||
| smartgenes says, "i thought he was giving her something more than his mind then" | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "look at pirate through quiddithingimajig" | ||||
Floyd | I only understood you as far as wanting to look at the pirate. Floyd | | Lionheart asks, "Pastafarians?" | |||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "x pirate" | ||||
Floyd | Bandana, frock-coat, dreadlocks, eyeliner -- the lot. He's either a Floyd | pirate or a glam rock refugee. Floyd | Floyd | "Arr!" says the pirate, with a sense of obligation. "Theseus be the Floyd | name o' my ship! This be just a shoddy replica!" Floyd | Floyd | "No, I think you'll find that this is the original Theseus, and your Floyd | ship is but a pale remake," replies the steward camly. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "look at pirate through qualiascope" | ||||
Floyd | I only understood you as far as wanting to look at the pirate. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "examine pirate with qualiascope" | ||||
Floyd | I only understood you as far as wanting to examine the pirate. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "look through qualiascope at pirate" | ||||
Floyd | You suddenly become awash with the person's unique and irreducible Floyd | subjective sensations. Floyd | | Lionheart says, "Heh" | |||
| DavidW says, "Gotta phrase it just so." | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "x ship" | ||||
Floyd | (the Ship of Theseus) Floyd | The business end of a great ship is poking through the wall of the Floyd | museum, with a surprised-looking mermaid stuck on the pointy bit. It Floyd | might be a figurehead. The name on the prow is "Theseus". Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x woman" | ||||
Floyd | "Honestly, this is constructed entirely from the original abandoned Floyd | timbers," says the steward. Floyd | Floyd | "Shiver your timbers!" replies the pirate, in the manner of a grave Floyd | insult. Floyd | Floyd | She sports a uniform and a badge that declares her to be called Floyd | "HallomynameisTracyhowmayIhelpyou". Floyd | Floyd | "You be takin' my livelihood away!" cries the pirate, his mascara Floyd | running. The steward simply crosses her arms and tuts at this display. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "talk to pirate" | ||||
Floyd | "What seems to be the trouble here?" you ask, approaching the arguing Floyd | pair. Floyd | Floyd | "She be stealin' my ship!" exclaims the pirate. Floyd | Floyd | "He be -- sorry, is -- kicking up a fuss in my museum over a silly Floyd | little name." Floyd | Floyd | [1] So what exactly happened? Floyd | [2] How does one steal a ship, exactly? Floyd | [3] And what name seems to be causing the trouble? Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | "It's quite simple," says the steward. "Mr Starling --" Floyd | Floyd | "Cap'n Starling," corrects the pirate. Floyd | Floyd | " -- Captain Starling here owned a rather famous ship, the Theseus. Floyd | Over the years he's had to replace its timbers one by one, casting the Floyd | old ones aside as he goes. We at Reichenbach's Believe-It-or-Not Ltd Floyd | simply gathered the timbers together and rebuilt the original ship for Floyd | display here." Floyd | Floyd | "Scurvy dogs that you arrr! And now the Shippin' Board be on my back Floyd | about name licensin', not lettin' me an' my mates sail the seas agin Floyd | 'til we can either prove Theseus be our ship an' not this Floyd | barnacle-bottomed bucket or come up with another name!" Floyd | Floyd | "Well, splice my mainbrace," you say. Floyd | Floyd | [1] Why don't you just rename your ship, then? Floyd | [2] Why don't you just keelhaul her? Floyd | [3] Couldn't you take up macrame instead? Floyd | [4] Couldn't the museum set up some sort of licensing agreement? Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "3" | ||||
Floyd | "And give up a lifetime's piratin'? Never! Besides, I can never do Floyd | fiddly little knots like that properly." Floyd | Floyd | [1] Why don't you just rename your ship, then? Floyd | [2] Why don't you just keelhaul her? Floyd | [3] Couldn't the museum set up some sort of licensing agreement? Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "2" | ||||
Floyd | "A fine suggestion!" replies the pirate, before looking askance at Floyd | steward, who has placed her hands on her hips in a very pointed Floyd | fashion. "Only, er, me poor ole back is achin' somewhat today, what Floyd | with the Westerly breeze an' all." Floyd | Floyd | [1] Why don't you just rename your ship, then? Floyd | [2] Couldn't the museum set up some sort of licensing agreement? Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "2" | ||||
Floyd | "Certainly not," says the steward. "The ship -- and it's name -- Floyd | belong solely to us, and we're not going to waste money, on, er, Floyd | scurvy sea-dogs like this gentleman here." Floyd | Floyd | The pirate seems to take this rather ineffectual insult as a Floyd | compliment, and swaggers a little. Floyd | Floyd | [1] Why don't you just rename your ship, then? Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | "Theseus be the finest name ever to grace a ship on the high seas," Floyd | growls the pirate. "Lessen you can find a better unused name, I'm not Floyd | budgin'." Floyd | Floyd | [1] Right. A better ship name. Fine. I'll see what I can do. Floyd | | DavidW says, "This is the identity puzzle." | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | "Aye-aye!" says the steward, rather getting into the swing of things. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "enter ship" | ||||
Floyd | (the Ship of Theseus) Floyd | That's not something you can enter. Floyd | | smartgenes says, "which philsopher was that related to" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "e" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Square Floyd | The square seems somehow madder now the madman has left. Floyd | Floyd | This appears to be the academic quarter of the village, and so may in Floyd | fact be a quadrangle, which is awfully exciting. You know it's the Floyd | academic quarter, because the grass is covered with sprawling young Floyd | people wearing brightly coloured clothes, dreadlocks, and organic Floyd | deodorant. Architecturally and geographically speaking, the buildings Floyd | look like they were placed there by a commitee of village planners Floyd | whose equipment budget stretched only so far as a compass. Three sides Floyd | of the square are complemented by a museum, research institute and a Floyd | library, to the west, north and east respectively. Floyd | | djfletch asks, "what was the cruise ship called?" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "n" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Research Institute Floyd | Inside, the Institute is as a marvel of the limits of both modernist Floyd | architecture and the persuasiveness of funding applications. The floor Floyd | of the entrance corridor is covered in sticky linoleum and the walls, Floyd | painted an unpleasant shade of grue, with damp health and safety Floyd | posters. Three doors lead off the corridor, to the north, east and Floyd | west, each with a hand-written notice. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x paper" | ||||
Floyd | Scrawled upon a scrap of paper is: "COME TO THE STATE OF NATURIST CAMP Floyd | -- NASTY BRUTISH FUN FOR ALL!!!" Floyd | | DavidW asks, "Do our tickets help?" | |||
| inky arrives, full of funk, but no fun. | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x ticket" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | DavidW says, "That's not the tickets." | |||
| djfletch says, "yeah, maybe we can just give the pirate the ticket" | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "x brochure" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "i" | ||||
Floyd | You are carrying: Floyd | a broken lantern Floyd | a qualiascope Floyd | a sack (open) Floyd | a useless scrap of paper Floyd | file of Platonic forms Floyd | cruise tickets for the Ship of Neurath Floyd | an informative leaflet Floyd | a fifty pence piece Floyd | a lighter Floyd | a Chinese key Floyd | a manual Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "x leaflet" | ||||
Floyd | THE SHIP OF NEURATH Floyd | Floyd | Take a cruise upon the fabulous Ship of Neurath. Let your sense-data Floyd | be amazed as the ship is reconstructed before your very eyes. In the Floyd | words of V.W.O. Quine: Floyd | Floyd | "Where a beam is taken away a new one must at once be put there, and Floyd | for this the rest of the ship is used as support. In this way, by Floyd | using the old beams and driftwood the ship can be shaped entirely Floyd | anew, but only by gradual reconstruction." Floyd | Floyd | The ship sails annually across the dark ocean without shores or Floyd | lighthouses, strewn with many a philosophic wreck. Floyd | | smartgenes says, "maybe just tell him neurath or give the leaflet" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "s" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Square Floyd | The square seems somehow madder now the madman has left. Floyd | Floyd | This appears to be the academic quarter of the village, and so may in Floyd | fact be a quadrangle, which is awfully exciting. You know it's the Floyd | academic quarter, because the grass is covered with sprawling young Floyd | people wearing brightly coloured clothes, dreadlocks, and organic Floyd | deodorant. Architecturally and geographically speaking, the buildings Floyd | look like they were placed there by a commitee of village planners Floyd | whose equipment budget stretched only so far as a compass. Three sides Floyd | of the square are complemented by a museum, research institute and a Floyd | library, to the west, north and east respectively. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "w" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Museum Floyd | The Odditorium is filled with a crazy array of philosophical exhibits. Floyd | The argument between the steward and the pirate still rages beneath Floyd | the ship. Floyd | | DavidW says, "yeah, give leaflet." | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "give leaflet to pirate" | ||||
Floyd | (first taking the informative leaflet) Floyd | (putting the qualiascope into the sack to make room) Floyd | "Listen," you say to the pirate, "I've just heard about this cruise. Floyd | It's no longer running, so the name of the boat's free -- it's Floyd | "Neurath". I thought that that was pretty good. And it's being Floyd | constantly remade as well, just like yours, What do you say?" Floyd | Floyd | "Arr," says the pirate. "You be sure this be a proper ship an' not Floyd | just an allegory for the method of practising pseduo-falsification to Floyd | preserve the coherency of any given epistemological system?" Floyd | Floyd | "Oh, certainly," you reply. Floyd | Floyd | "That'll do nicely then," he says, swaggering off in a haze of Floyd | alcohol, fleas, and overwrought guitar riffs. You and the steward Floyd | watch him go, and then she takes you by the arm. "Listen," she says, Floyd | "I ought to thank you for that. We've been getting rid of some old Floyd | exhibits in order to make room for the Theseus, and I've some old Floyd | moral principles nobody seems interested in any more. I could let you Floyd | have one, if you like. Floyd | Floyd | She shows you the display case, in which sits a tiny golden measuring Floyd | rule, a little silver calculator, and an odd lead cube. Floyd | Floyd | [1] What's that golden ruler? Floyd | [2] What's that silver calculator? Floyd | [3] What's that lead cube? Floyd | [4] I'll take the ruler, thanks. Floyd | [5] I'll take the calculator, thanks. Floyd | [6] I'll take the cube, thanks. Floyd | Floyd | [Your score has just gone up by three points.] Floyd | | smartgenes says, "oh dear.. a choice" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | "That's a Golden Mean Ruler," she explains. "It calculates the perfect Floyd | point between excess and deficiency of any given character trait. I Floyd | don't know how well it works, but it's certainly beautiful." Floyd | Floyd | [1] What's that golden ruler? Floyd | [2] What's that silver calculator? Floyd | [3] What's that lead cube? Floyd | [4] I'll take the ruler, thanks. Floyd | [5] I'll take the calculator, thanks. Floyd | [6] I'll take the cube, thanks. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "2" | ||||
Floyd | That's a Utility Calculator," she says. "Punch in the details of any Floyd | given situation and it'll tell you what action will produce the Floyd | greatest happiness. Apparently. I don't know how a little thing can Floyd | manage to work out all the possible consequences, though. Floyd | Floyd | [1] What's that golden ruler? Floyd | [2] What's that silver calculator? Floyd | [3] What's that lead cube? Floyd | [4] I'll take the ruler, thanks. Floyd | [5] I'll take the calculator, thanks. Floyd | [6] I'll take the cube, thanks. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "3" | ||||
Floyd | "I'm not really sure," she says, puzzled. "They call it a Categorical Floyd | Imperativator, but I've no idea how it works. It's just a lead cube to Floyd | me -- though it's certainly weightier than it looks. Floyd | Floyd | [1] What's that golden ruler? Floyd | [2] What's that silver calculator? Floyd | [3] What's that lead cube? Floyd | [4] I'll take the ruler, thanks. Floyd | [5] I'll take the calculator, thanks. Floyd | [6] I'll take the cube, thanks. Floyd | | smartgenes says, "2 is Utilitarianism and 3 is Immanuel Kant" | |||
| smartgenes says, "the golden mean..? plato? aristotle? not sure" | ||||
| Alex says (to smartgenes), "Awwwk! Word on the street is that Aristotle was one of Greece's great thinkers who determined, by sheer force of intellect, that women have fewer teeth than men." | ||||
| DavidW asks, "I'm thinking the cube might be best?" | ||||
| DavidW says, "Hopefully we can swap if we're wrong." | ||||
| smartgenes says, "it's giving a hint about its weightiness i guess" | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "6" | ||||
Floyd | "Certainly!" she says. "Here you go. Now, if you ever want to borrow Floyd | another, do come back and we'll do a discrete swap for you." Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "e" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Square Floyd | The square seems somehow madder now the madman has left. Floyd | Floyd | This appears to be the academic quarter of the village, and so may in Floyd | fact be a quadrangle, which is awfully exciting. You know it's the Floyd | academic quarter, because the grass is covered with sprawling young Floyd | people wearing brightly coloured clothes, dreadlocks, and organic Floyd | deodorant. Architecturally and geographically speaking, the buildings Floyd | look like they were placed there by a commitee of village planners Floyd | whose equipment budget stretched only so far as a compass. Three sides Floyd | of the square are complemented by a museum, research institute and a Floyd | library, to the west, north and east respectively. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "n" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Research Institute Floyd | Inside, the Institute is as a marvel of the limits of both modernist Floyd | architecture and the persuasiveness of funding applications. The floor Floyd | of the entrance corridor is covered in sticky linoleum and the walls, Floyd | painted an unpleasant shade of grue, with damp health and safety Floyd | posters. Three doors lead off the corridor, to the north, east and Floyd | west, each with a hand-written notice. Floyd | | DavidW says, "yay, we can swap later" | |||
| smartgenes says, "a shade of grue" | ||||
| DavidW says, "grue meaning green or blue." | ||||
| DavidW says, "think about grue" | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "x posters" | ||||
Floyd | One hopes the rules aren't treated with as much disregard as the Floyd | posters. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "think about grue" | ||||
Floyd | Your philosophical studies don't seem to have taught you anything Floyd | about that. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x linoleum" | ||||
Floyd | It sucks at your feet as you step on it. Floyd | | Lionheart says, "As opposed to the bleen walls" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "read posters" | ||||
Floyd | One hopes the rules aren't treated with as much disregard as the Floyd | posters. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "read north" | ||||
Floyd | (the north door notice) Floyd | "Dr A. Schrodinger -- Feline Indeterminacy Studies" Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "read east" | ||||
Floyd | (the east door notice) Floyd | "Dr M. Mary -- Colour and Pigmentation Research" Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "read west" | ||||
Floyd | (the west door notice) Floyd | "Dr T. Nagel -- Chiropteran Psychology Laboratory" Floyd | | canadianpuzzler says, "The golden ruler is presumably a reference to the "Golden Rule" i.e. treat others as you would wish to be treated." | |||
| Lionheart says, "Ha, Mary's Room too" | ||||
| smartgenes asks, "what is Chiroptean?" | ||||
| DavidW says, "I don't know." | ||||
| DavidW says, "I don't know what 'Mary's Room' is." | ||||
| djfletch says, "internet says Chiroptera are bats" | ||||
| Lionheart says, "Probably a type for Chiropteran, bats" | ||||
| smartgenes says, "something related to the dyes (MAry)" | ||||
| smartgenes says, "well we know what Schrodinger's cat is" | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "think about mary's room" | ||||
Floyd | Your philosophical studies don't seem to have taught you anything Floyd | about that. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "think about schrodinger" | ||||
Floyd | Your philosophical studies don't seem to have taught you anything Floyd | about that. Floyd | | DavidW asks, "Shall we knock on a door?" | |||
| Lionheart says, "Okay, I'll tell you, Mary's room is another thought experiment, about qualia." | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "w" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Bat Lab Floyd | The laboratory is a brightly-lit white chamber, covered wall-to-wall Floyd | in cabinets, posters, and counters covered with disturbing-looking Floyd | instruments. A gigantic model of a bat hangs from the ceiling, Floyd | spinning around gently. A white-haired man is moving fitfully around Floyd | the room, grabbing instruments and examining diagrams, as he proceeds Floyd | to dissect a series of what look worryingly like tiny brains. He's Floyd | muttering something over and over again under his breath: "What is it Floyd | like?" it seems to be. "What is it like? What is it like?" Floyd | | Lionheart says, "Mary is a brilliant scientist who knows everything there is to know about color, but investigates the world from a black and white room with a black and white monitor" | |||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "x posters" | ||||
Floyd | They're mostly diagrams of bat physiognomy, adverts for conventions on Floyd | bat psychology, and film adverts for old vampire movies. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "x brains" | ||||
Floyd | Pink and wobbly, like strawberry jelly, only with more neurones. And Floyd | rather more disturbing. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "say nanananana batman" | ||||
Floyd | (to Nagel) Floyd | Just TALK TO them. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "talk to nagel" | ||||
Floyd | Nagel notices you and grabs your shoulders with both hands. His eyes Floyd | boring into yours, he whispers. "Can you tell me what it is like? What Floyd | it is like . . . to be a bat?" This said, he seems to forget what he's Floyd | doing, and returns to his dissection, muttering all the while. Floyd | | Lionheart says, "She knows all about wavelengths and physics of color and the central nervous system and what not, but she hasn't seen "red"." | |||
| smartgenes says, "ok so we use the scope on a bat" | ||||
| Lionheart says, "The question being, When Mary is released from her room and sees red for the first time, does she learn anything new" | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "look through qualiascope at bat" | ||||
Floyd | Which do you mean, the gigantic bat model or the bat posters? Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "model" | ||||
Floyd | That sounds like a terrific idea -- if only you had a qualiascope. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "i" | ||||
Floyd | You are carrying: Floyd | a Categorical Imperativator Floyd | a broken lantern Floyd | a sack (open) Floyd | a qualiascope Floyd | a useless scrap of paper Floyd | file of Platonic forms Floyd | a fifty pence piece Floyd | a lighter Floyd | a Chinese key Floyd | a manual Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x imperativator" | ||||
Floyd | It's a lead cube. That would seem to be it, though it feels rather Floyd | heavier than it should. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "take qualiascope" | ||||
Floyd | (putting the broken lantern into the sack to make room) Floyd | Taken. Floyd | | smartgenes says, "i think we need a real bat anyway" | |||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "look through qualiascope at model" | ||||
Floyd | The scene through the qualiascope is rendered in monochrone, Floyd | indicating a complete absence of consciousness. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "look through qualiascope at brains" | ||||
Floyd | The scene through the qualiascope is rendered in monochrone, Floyd | indicating a complete absence of consciousness. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "look through qualiascope at nagel" | ||||
Floyd | You suddenly become awash with the person's unique and irreducible Floyd | subjective sensations. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "w" | ||||
Floyd | You channel your will to power to summon a path in that direction. Floyd | Sadly, nothing happens: you can't go that way. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "e" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Research Institute Floyd | Inside, the Institute is as a marvel of the limits of both modernist Floyd | architecture and the persuasiveness of funding applications. The floor Floyd | of the entrance corridor is covered in sticky linoleum and the walls, Floyd | painted an unpleasant shade of grue, with damp health and safety Floyd | posters. Three doors lead off the corridor, to the north, east and Floyd | west, each with a hand-written notice. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "n" | ||||
Floyd | You open the door, but hear a furious yowling coming from within. "Get Floyd | back in, damn you!" cries a frustrated voice, before yelping from what Floyd | sounds like a nasty bite. You decide to leave them to it. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "e" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Colour Lab Floyd | As you enter the colour lab, the scientist inside jumps in surprise, Floyd | dropping what looks like some rather sensitive equipment on the floor Floyd | with an expensive-sounding crash. Floyd | Floyd | "Bugger!" she says in a pleasant English accent. "There goes another Floyd | prism assembly." She bends down to pick up the pieces, mumbling Floyd | distractedly to herself. She seems to have entirely forgotten your Floyd | presence. Floyd | Floyd | The lab itself is filled with all manner of scientific equipment. Floyd | Monitors, levers, dials and big red buttons cover the walls, while the Floyd | room's desk -- pushed against the computer stacks on the back wall -- Floyd | has a complicated-looking laptop-printer set-up perched somewhere in Floyd | the middle, surrounded by arcane assemblies of metal and glass. Mary's Floyd | gathering pieces from underneath the desk, still with her back to you. Floyd | | smartgenes asks, "save?" | |||
| DavidW says, "can't hurt, I guess." | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "SAVE" | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "cf6" | ||||
Floyd | Enter saved game to store: Ok. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x printer" | ||||
Floyd | It's a swanky computer with a built-in printer. Nice. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x computer" | ||||
Floyd | Blinking lights. Ooh, pretty. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x desk" | ||||
Floyd | Covered in bizarre scientific equipment. A tube of black paint is Floyd | sitting on one side. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "get paint" | ||||
Floyd | (putting the Categorical Imperativator into the sack to make room) Floyd | Taken. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "get paper" | ||||
Floyd | (putting the qualiascope into the sack to make room) Floyd | Taken. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x paper" | ||||
Floyd | Scrawled upon a scrap of paper is: "COME TO THE STATE OF NATURIST CAMP Floyd | -- NASTY BRUTISH FUN FOR ALL!!!" Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "i" | ||||
Floyd | You are carrying: Floyd | a useless scrap of paper Floyd | a tube of black paint Floyd | a sack (open) Floyd | a qualiascope Floyd | a Categorical Imperativator Floyd | a broken lantern Floyd | file of Platonic forms Floyd | a fifty pence piece Floyd | a lighter Floyd | a Chinese key Floyd | a manual Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x scrap" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | DavidW says, "We had that paper already." | |||
| smartgenes says, "ah was just thinking of the printer paper" | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "put scrap in sack" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "put paper in sack" | ||||
Floyd | You put the invitation to the state of naturist camp into the sack. Floyd | | smartgenes asks, "i assume that was all?" | |||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "l" | ||||
Floyd | Colour Lab Floyd | The lab is filled with all manner of scientific equipment. Monitors, Floyd | levers, dials and big red buttons cover the walls, while the room's Floyd | desk -- pushed against the computer stacks on the back wall -- has a Floyd | complicated-looking laptop-printer set-up perched somewhere in the Floyd | middle, surrounded by arcane assemblies of metal and glass, which Mary Floyd | is operating with feverish skill. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "talk to mary" | ||||
Floyd | "Uh . . . Dr Mary?" you say, feeling a bit awkward. Floyd | Floyd | She turns around, looking distracted underneath her enormous goggles. Floyd | "Oh, it's you, dear," she says. "Do call me Mary. Was there something Floyd | you wanted?" Floyd | Floyd | [1] I was just interested in what it is you're doing in this lab. Floyd | [2] Oh! -- what are those peculiar goggles you're wearing? Floyd | [3] As you seem to be at least moderately sane, perhaps you could tell Floyd | me what's going on, and why I've woken up in a weird fantasy world. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "3" | ||||
Floyd | "Oh no, dear," she says regretfully. "I don't know about anything Floyd | other than colours." Floyd | Floyd | [1] That's a peculiar research specialisation. Floyd | [2] Nothing other than colours ar all? Floyd | [3] Then I suppose you won't know how I can get out of it either? Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "2" | ||||
Floyd | "Well, they're all I think about, to be honest!" Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "talk to mary" | ||||
Floyd | "Uh . . . Dr Mary?" you say, feeling a bit awkward. Floyd | Floyd | She turns around, looking distracted underneath her enormous goggles. Floyd | "Oh, it's you, dear," she says. "Do call me Mary. Was there something Floyd | you wanted?" Floyd | Floyd | [1] I was just interested in what it is you're doing in this lab. Floyd | [2] Oh! -- what are those peculiar goggles you're wearing? Floyd | [3] As you seem to be at least moderately sane, perhaps you could tell Floyd | me what's going on, and why I've woken up in a weird fantasy world. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "2" | ||||
Floyd | "The what?" she says, puzzled. "Oh! The goggles! D'you know, I forgot Floyd | I had them on. I don't really think about them, you see." Floyd | Floyd | [1] They seem a bit big and unwieldy just to forget they're there. Floyd | [2] Don't you want to take them off? Floyd | [3] So what do they do? Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "3" | ||||
Floyd | "As I understand it," she says, "they filter out the experience of Floyd | colour, meaning that I see everything in black and white. Of course, I Floyd | wouldn't know, having never taken them off." Floyd | Floyd | [1] (something doesn't add up here) Floyd | [2] Wait . . . you study colour intimately, but you've never taken off Floyd | those goggles? Floyd | [3] Wait . . . you've never experienced colour? Floyd | [4] Wait . . . you said you were an expert on colour? Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "4" | ||||
Floyd | "Absolutely. Anything you want to know about colour, I can tell you." Floyd | Floyd | [1] (something doesn't add up here) Floyd | [2] And you study colour intimately, but you've never taken off those Floyd | goggles? | DavidW asks, "What should we choose?" | |||
Floyd | [3] And you've never experienced colour? Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "2" | ||||
Floyd | "Never saw a reason too," she says simply. Floyd | Floyd | [1] (something doesn't add up here) Floyd | [2] And you've never experienced colour? Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "2" | ||||
Floyd | "As far as that goes, yes." Floyd | Floyd | [1] (something doesn't add up here) Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | "Hang on," you say, and Mary grips the desk obligingly. "I mean, Floyd | you're a colour expert--" Floyd | Floyd | "I know everything there is to know about colours, yes." Floyd | Floyd | "--but you've never experienced colours?" Floyd | Floyd | "That's right!" says Mary brightly. Floyd | Floyd | [1] But doesn't that mean that one thing you don't know is what it's Floyd | like to experience colours? Floyd | [2] But, for example, you wouldn't know that a red apple was red, Floyd | would you? Floyd | [3] But if you took off the goggles and experienced colours, wouldn't Floyd | you learn something new? Floyd | [4] I don't understand any of this. I think I'll go. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "3" | ||||
Floyd | "Hmm," says Mary. "D'you know, I don't think so? I already know Floyd | exactly how my brain and body'll react to colours, you see, as I know Floyd | everything about them. Is there anything more to it than that? I Floyd | suppose it'll be nice to get some experimental confirmation, though." Floyd | Floyd | [1] Er . . . but you still don't know is what it's like to experience Floyd | colours, do you? Floyd | [2] Er . . . but, for example, you wouldn't know that a red apple was Floyd | red, would you? Floyd | [3] OK . . . but what if the first thing you saw was something Floyd | unexpected? Like something that wasn't coloured the way it should be? Floyd | Wouldn't that trick you, as you hadn't experienced it before? Floyd | [4] I don't understand any of this. I think I'll go. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | Mary thinks for a while about this, as if she'd never considered it Floyd | before. "I said I know everything there is to know," she says. "And Floyd | I'm not sure 'what it's like' is something to know, is it? I mean, I Floyd | know everything about how your brain reacts to colours, and so on. The Floyd | 'what it's like' isn't really knowledge, is it? Floyd | Floyd | [1] Er . . . but, for example, you wouldn't know that a red apple was Floyd | red, would you? Floyd | [2] I don't understand any of this. I think I'll go. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | "Oh no, dear!" she says. "I absolutely know when an apple's red. I Floyd | know everything about colours, you see -- including what they behave Floyd | like when filtered through my goggles here. So I can tell when an Floyd | apple is red." Floyd | Floyd | [1] I don't understand any of this. I think I'll go. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | "Oh, bye, dear," says Mary, turning back to her work. "Do come back if Floyd | you think of something else, or have something interesting to show Floyd | me." Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "i" | ||||
Floyd | You are carrying: Floyd | a tube of black paint Floyd | a sack (open) Floyd | a useless scrap of paper Floyd | a qualiascope Floyd | a Categorical Imperativator Floyd | a broken lantern Floyd | file of Platonic forms Floyd | a fifty pence piece Floyd | a lighter Floyd | a Chinese key Floyd | a manual Floyd | | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "paint apple" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x file" | ||||
Floyd | This a file of administrative forms that have reached the highest Floyd | level of bureaucratic perfection. In order to complete them they must Floyd | be signed by the relevant officials, who will only sign the form if Floyd | they are presented with the very same form already signed. Floyd | | ||||
| djfletch says (to Floyd), "get goggles" | ||||
Floyd | You really don't think you can muck about with the goggles -- Mary Floyd | seems very protective of them. If you want her to take them off, Floyd | you'll have to give her a very good reason to check out some colours. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "get glass" | ||||
Floyd | You daren't touch them. Floyd | | ||||
| djfletch says (to Floyd), "show paint to mary" | ||||
Floyd | Mary seems to take no notice. Floyd | | Lionheart asks, "Might hte raven be useful here?" | |||
| DavidW says, "hm. Maybe." | ||||
| DavidW says, "Certainly we should talk to the raven again." | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "w" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Research Institute Floyd | Inside, the Institute is as a marvel of the limits of both modernist Floyd | architecture and the persuasiveness of funding applications. The floor Floyd | of the entrance corridor is covered in sticky linoleum and the walls, Floyd | painted an unpleasant shade of grue, with damp health and safety Floyd | posters. Three doors lead off the corridor, to the north, east and Floyd | west, each with a hand-written notice. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "n" | ||||
Floyd | There's a bloody furious cat in there -- an equally furious physicist Floyd | is trying to force it into a box and close the lid, but is getting Floyd | only bites and scratches for his troubles. You decide to leave them to Floyd | it. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "post paper" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "s" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Square Floyd | The square seems somehow madder now the madman has left. Floyd | Floyd | This appears to be the academic quarter of the village, and so may in Floyd | fact be a quadrangle, which is awfully exciting. You know it's the Floyd | academic quarter, because the grass is covered with sprawling young Floyd | people wearing brightly coloured clothes, dreadlocks, and organic Floyd | deodorant. Architecturally and geographically speaking, the buildings Floyd | look like they were placed there by a commitee of village planners Floyd | whose equipment budget stretched only so far as a compass. Three sides Floyd | of the square are complemented by a museum, research institute and a Floyd | library, to the west, north and east respectively. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "e" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Philosophy Library Floyd | Inside, the library is distressingly ordinary. If there were a Floyd | building in this crazed thought experiment of a world you would like Floyd | to have seen exploit the full potential of the absurd, it would be the Floyd | library. A winding maze of bookshelves, perhaps, in which the unwary Floyd | adventurer could get lost for hours, on the run from herds of rogue Floyd | thesauruses; a vast glass dome adorned with mysterious and disturbing Floyd | stained glass images; bolts of narrative energy crackling between the Floyd | books, frazzling the flocks of pamphlets roosting in the upper stacks. Floyd | Floyd | But no. This is simply a square, book-lined room equipped with a Floyd | borrowing counter, behind which stands a bored-looking librarian, and Floyd | a few old desks. At one of these an imposing bearded man sits, writing Floyd | furiously. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x images" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "x man" | ||||
Floyd | A large bearded man sits at a desk in the library, writing furiously. Floyd | He's surrounded by bundles of paper, some typed, some written in a Floyd | near-illegible scrawl. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x counter" | ||||
Floyd | The bored-looking librarian stands behind a chipboard-looking counter. Floyd | There's a ledger and inkwell sitting on it. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x ledger" | ||||
Floyd | The list of names, books and telephone numbers is positively Floyd | thrilling. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x inkwell" | ||||
Floyd | A deep blue inkwell, filled with deep blue ink. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "i" | ||||
Floyd | You are carrying: Floyd | a tube of black paint Floyd | a sack (open) Floyd | a useless scrap of paper Floyd | a qualiascope Floyd | a Categorical Imperativator Floyd | a broken lantern Floyd | file of Platonic forms Floyd | a fifty pence piece Floyd | a lighter Floyd | a Chinese key Floyd | a manual Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "sign paper" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "talk to man" | ||||
Floyd | You tap the man on his shoulder and, muttering under his breath, he Floyd | turns away from his writing to you, asking "Yes?" Floyd | Floyd | [1] I just wondered what you were doing there? Floyd | [2] What's that you're writing? Floyd | [3] Oh, sorry, are you busy? Floyd | [4] Ah. I'll leave you to it, shall I? Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | "Writing," says the man is a heavy Germanic accent. "Busy," he adds. Floyd | Floyd | [1] Oh. And what is it you're writing? Floyd | [2] Oh, sorry. Urgent, is it? Floyd | [3] Ah. I'll leave you to it, shall I? Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | "My Manifesto!" he says, his voice raising and his eyes glowing. "The Floyd | theory of the abolition of private property! The history of all Floyd | hitherto society -- the history of class struggle! The exposure of the Floyd | bourgeois prejudices of law, morality and religion! The revolution of Floyd | the workers of the world! Floyd | Floyd | [1] Oh . . . ! You're Karl Marx, aren't you? Floyd | [2] OK. This is me edging away slowly now. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | He stops mid-rant. "The very same. You have heard of my work?" Floyd | Floyd | [1] Well, to be honest, I didn't really get past page 7 of Das Floyd | Kapital. Floyd | [2] Ah, and that's the Manifesto itself, is it? Why are you copying it Floyd | by hand? Floyd | [3] Yup. Pleasure to meet you and all, but I have to go. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "2" | ||||
Floyd | You think you detect a blush rising beneath his beard. "My typewriter Floyd | broke," he says, before sitting down and burying his head in his Floyd | hands. Floyd | Floyd | [1] Good job I'm not really interested in reading it, then. Floyd | [2] Never fear, Karl! I shall procure you a typewriter and return Floyd | forthwith! Floyd | [3] Look, if that's a hint to get me to go on an obscure object quest, Floyd | forget it. Not unless you've got the readies. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "3" | ||||
Floyd | Marx looks affronted. "Has the bourgeosie so pitilessly torn asunder Floyd | the motley of ties that bound us and left remaining no other nexus Floyd | between us than callous cash payment?" he demands, before leaving you, Floyd | chagrined, for his writing. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "undo" | ||||
Floyd | Philosophy Library Floyd | [Previous turn undone.] Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "2" | ||||
Floyd | You make to charge out of the library in a fit of adventurous fervour, Floyd | before tripping over your shoelaces. Floyd | | Lionheart says, "Ah, perhaps we can loot the Chinese room." | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x shoelaces" | ||||
Floyd | Those pesky laces! Floyd | | smartgenes says, "lol... implemented" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "w" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Square Floyd | The square seems somehow madder now the madman has left. Floyd | Floyd | This appears to be the academic quarter of the village, and so may in Floyd | fact be a quadrangle, which is awfully exciting. You know it's the Floyd | academic quarter, because the grass is covered with sprawling young Floyd | people wearing brightly coloured clothes, dreadlocks, and organic Floyd | deodorant. Architecturally and geographically speaking, the buildings Floyd | look like they were placed there by a commitee of village planners Floyd | whose equipment budget stretched only so far as a compass. Three sides Floyd | of the square are complemented by a museum, research institute and a Floyd | library, to the west, north and east respectively. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "get shoelaces" | ||||
Floyd | Philosophers are not yet supermen. Floyd | | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "tie laces" | ||||
Floyd | (to the sack) Floyd | You bang them together, without noticeable effect -- though you do Floyd | momentarily consider founding a samba band. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "talk to hippies" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | DavidW says, "We didn't talk to the librarian." | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "talk to young people" | ||||
Floyd | You spend enough time among students in what you fondly remember as he Floyd | real world to want to talk to them now, and indeed you know them well Floyd | enough to know they'll be no help getting you out of an insanely Floyd | solipsistic intellectual quandary -- much the reverse, in fact. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "n" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Research Institute Floyd | Inside, the Institute is as a marvel of the limits of both modernist Floyd | architecture and the persuasiveness of funding applications. The floor Floyd | of the entrance corridor is covered in sticky linoleum and the walls, Floyd | painted an unpleasant shade of grue, with damp health and safety Floyd | posters. Three doors lead off the corridor, to the north, east and Floyd | west, each with a hand-written notice. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "e" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Colour Lab Floyd | The lab is filled with all manner of scientific equipment. Monitors, Floyd | levers, dials and big red buttons cover the walls, while the room's Floyd | desk -- pushed against the computer stacks on the back wall -- has a Floyd | complicated-looking laptop-printer set-up perched somewhere in the Floyd | middle, surrounded by arcane assemblies of metal and glass, which Mary Floyd | is operating with feverish skill. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "w" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Research Institute Floyd | Inside, the Institute is as a marvel of the limits of both modernist Floyd | architecture and the persuasiveness of funding applications. The floor Floyd | of the entrance corridor is covered in sticky linoleum and the walls, Floyd | painted an unpleasant shade of grue, with damp health and safety Floyd | posters. Three doors lead off the corridor, to the north, east and Floyd | west, each with a hand-written notice. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "e" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Colour Lab Floyd | The lab is filled with all manner of scientific equipment. Monitors, Floyd | levers, dials and big red buttons cover the walls, while the room's Floyd | desk -- pushed against the computer stacks on the back wall -- has a Floyd | complicated-looking laptop-printer set-up perched somewhere in the Floyd | middle, surrounded by arcane assemblies of metal and glass, which Mary Floyd | is operating with feverish skill. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "e" | ||||
Floyd | You channel your will to power to summon a path in that direction. Floyd | Sadly, nothing happens: you can't go that way. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "w" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Research Institute Floyd | Inside, the Institute is as a marvel of the limits of both modernist Floyd | architecture and the persuasiveness of funding applications. The floor Floyd | of the entrance corridor is covered in sticky linoleum and the walls, Floyd | painted an unpleasant shade of grue, with damp health and safety Floyd | posters. Three doors lead off the corridor, to the north, east and Floyd | west, each with a hand-written notice. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "s" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Square Floyd | The square seems somehow madder now the madman has left. Floyd | Floyd | This appears to be the academic quarter of the village, and so may in Floyd | fact be a quadrangle, which is awfully exciting. You know it's the Floyd | academic quarter, because the grass is covered with sprawling young Floyd | people wearing brightly coloured clothes, dreadlocks, and organic Floyd | deodorant. Architecturally and geographically speaking, the buildings Floyd | look like they were placed there by a commitee of village planners Floyd | whose equipment budget stretched only so far as a compass. Three sides Floyd | of the square are complemented by a museum, research institute and a Floyd | library, to the west, north and east respectively. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "e" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Philosophy Library Floyd | This is simply a square, book-lined room equipped with a borrowing Floyd | counter, behind which stands a bored-looking librarian, and a few old Floyd | desks. At one of these Karl Marx sits, writing furiously. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "talk to librarian" | ||||
Floyd | "Hallo," you say. "I'd like to borrow a book, please." Floyd | Floyd | The librarian looks at you sullenly. "Well, I'm sorry," s/he says. Floyd | "This is a McDonalds." Floyd | Floyd | [1] In which case I'll have a fries and shakes, thanks, my good Floyd | non-gender-specific-human. Floyd | [2] No, seriously. Thought I might catch up on my Plato. Floyd | [3] Well, if you're going to be like that, I'll just go. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | The librarian looks pointedly at you, before slouching back against Floyd | the wall in a conversation-closed sort of way. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "undo" | ||||
Floyd | Philosophy Library Floyd | [Previous turn undone.] Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "2" | ||||
Floyd | "Not a chance," s/he says. "Every time we lend something of his, Floyd | someone just scribbles footnotes all over it, so we've put all of our Floyd | Plato in protective custody." Floyd | Floyd | [1] Oh dear. Well, in that case, could you recommend me a good read? Floyd | Something colourful? Floyd | [2] In that case there's nothing for me here. Goodbye. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | The librarian smirks. "I've just the thing. Hang on a moment," s/he Floyd | says, before turning h/er back on you and walking over to the shelves. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "wait" | ||||
Floyd | Time passes. Or at least, loiters around for a while longer. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "wait" | ||||
Floyd | Time passes. Or at least, loiters around for a while longer. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x desk" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "take inkwell" | ||||
Floyd | You think the librarian might notice. Floyd | Floyd | The librarian returns, holding a huge, brightly-coloured tome. S/he Floyd | hands it to you, saying "Colourful, you said? This should do the Floyd | trick," before returning to h/er spot behind the counter. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "x tome" | ||||
Floyd | Apparently this is an Encyclopaedia of Qualia. It's the colour Floyd | edition. Opening it, you suddenly become overwhelmed by a veritable Floyd | rainbow of sensations -- the smell of coffee, the feel of mist, the Floyd | indescribable feeling you get when you've just dropped an egg. Looking Floyd | down at the text, you realise that it consists of a Floyd | carefully-organised catalogue of all the world's possible sensations, Floyd | and as you read the name of each it washes over you. You snap the book Floyd | shut before you become completely overcome. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "get it" | ||||
Floyd | You already have that. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "w" | ||||
Floyd | "Oi!" says the librarian, taking the book away from you. "That's a Floyd | priceless tome, that is. You can't leave with it." Floyd | | smartgenes says, "hmm not as easy as that" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "talk to librarian" | ||||
Floyd | The librarian spots you and says, "What do you want this time?" Floyd | Floyd | [1] Still got no Plato I can read? Floyd | [2] Er, I was wondering if, maybe, you could see your way to getting Floyd | that Encyclopaedia for me again? Floyd | [3] Oh, nothing. I just wanted to annoy you, actually. Floyd | | DavidW asks, "drat. Put it in our sack?" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | The librarian shakes h/er head sullenly. Floyd | | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "perhaps we can fool them into taking the manual instad?" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "talk to librarian" | ||||
Floyd | The librarian spots you and says, "What do you want this time?" Floyd | Floyd | [1] Still got no Plato I can read? Floyd | [2] Er, I was wondering if, maybe, you could see your way to getting Floyd | that Encyclopaedia for me again? Floyd | [3] Oh, nothing. I just wanted to annoy you, actually. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "2" | ||||
Floyd | The librarian glares at you, but heads off to the shelves to fetch the Floyd | book. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "put tome in sack" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | smartgenes says, "i think it resets it back to the shelf" | |||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "read ledger" | ||||
Floyd | The list of names, books and telephone numbers is positively Floyd | thrilling. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x counter" | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "look up marx in ledger" | ||||
Floyd | There's a ledger and inkwell sitting on it. Floyd | Floyd | You discover nothing of interest in the ledger. Floyd | Floyd | The librarian returns and hands the tome to you wordlessly, before Floyd | returning to h/er spot behind the counter. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "undo" | ||||
Floyd | Philosophy Library Floyd | [Previous turn undone.] Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "x librarian" | ||||
Floyd | She -- you correct yourself, he -- hasn't even bothered to tie his Floyd | hair back in a tight bun, or perch severe-looking glasses on the end Floyd | of his aquiline nose (which turns out not to be aquiline), ready to be Floyd | loosed and removed respectively to reveal a surprisingly beautiful Floyd | young woman. Man. S\he is simply rather bored-looking, and somewhat Floyd | gender-ambiguous, sort of youth. Floyd | Floyd | The librarian returns and hands the tome to you wordlessly, before Floyd | returning to h/er spot behind the counter. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "undo" | ||||
Floyd | Philosophy Library Floyd | [Previous turn undone.] Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "get ledger" | ||||
Floyd | You doubt the librarian will let you get away with that. Floyd | Floyd | The librarian returns and hands the tome to you wordlessly, before Floyd | returning to h/er spot behind the counter. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x paper" | ||||
Floyd | (the bundles of paper) Floyd | Inspiring stuff, this. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x scrap of paper" | ||||
Floyd | Scrawled upon a scrap of paper is: "COME TO THE STATE OF NATURIST CAMP Floyd | -- NASTY BRUTISH FUN FOR ALL!!!" Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "i" | ||||
Floyd | You are carrying: Floyd | an Encyclopaedia of Qualia Floyd | a tube of black paint Floyd | a sack (open) Floyd | a useless scrap of paper Floyd | a qualiascope Floyd | a Categorical Imperativator Floyd | a broken lantern Floyd | file of Platonic forms Floyd | a fifty pence piece Floyd | a lighter Floyd | a Chinese key Floyd | a manual Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "sign forms" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x forms" | ||||
Floyd | This a file of administrative forms that have reached the highest Floyd | level of bureaucratic perfection. In order to complete them they must Floyd | be signed by the relevant officials, who will only sign the form if Floyd | they are presented with the very same form already signed. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "writeon forms" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "write on forms" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | smartgenes says, "i guess we need a pen anyway" | |||
| DavidW says, "guess we can't do it directly." | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "give forms to librarian" | ||||
Floyd | (first taking the file of Platonic forms) Floyd | (putting the tube of black paint into the sack to make room) Floyd | The librarian doesn't seem interested. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "give forms to marx" | ||||
Floyd | Karl Marx doesn't seem interested. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "kick marx" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "x tome" | ||||
Floyd | Apparently this is an Encyclopaedia of Qualia. It's the colour Floyd | edition. Opening it, you suddenly become overwhelmed by a veritable Floyd | rainbow of sensations -- the smell of coffee, the feel of mist, the Floyd | indescribable feeling you get when you've just dropped an egg. Looking Floyd | down at the text, you realise that it consists of a Floyd | carefully-organised catalogue of all the world's possible sensations, Floyd | and as you read the name of each it washes over you. You snap the book Floyd | shut before you become completely overcome. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "steal tome" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "look through qualiascope at tome" | ||||
Floyd | That sounds like a terrific idea -- if only you had a qualiascope. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "take skull" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "get qualiascope" | ||||
Floyd | (putting the Encyclopaedia of Qualia into the sack to make room) Floyd | Taken. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "look through qualiascope at tome" | ||||
Floyd | The scene through the qualiascope is rendered in monochrone, Floyd | indicating a complete absence of consciousness. Floyd | | smartgenes says, "hey.. we put the qualia in the sack" | |||
| DavidW says, "I doubt it's quite that easy, but we can try." | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "look through qualiascope at librarian" | ||||
Floyd | You suddenly become awash with the person's unique and irreducible Floyd | subjective sensations. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "look through qualiascope at marx" | ||||
Floyd | You suddenly become awash with the person's unique and irreducible Floyd | subjective sensations. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "w" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Square Floyd | The square seems somehow madder now the madman has left. Floyd | Floyd | This appears to be the academic quarter of the village, and so may in Floyd | fact be a quadrangle, which is awfully exciting. You know it's the Floyd | academic quarter, because the grass is covered with sprawling young Floyd | people wearing brightly coloured clothes, dreadlocks, and organic Floyd | deodorant. Architecturally and geographically speaking, the buildings Floyd | look like they were placed there by a commitee of village planners Floyd | whose equipment budget stretched only so far as a compass. Three sides Floyd | of the square are complemented by a museum, research institute and a Floyd | library, to the west, north and east respectively. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "i" | ||||
Floyd | You are carrying: Floyd | a qualiascope Floyd | file of Platonic forms Floyd | a sack (open) Floyd | an Encyclopaedia of Qualia Floyd | a tube of black paint Floyd | a useless scrap of paper Floyd | a Categorical Imperativator Floyd | a broken lantern Floyd | a fifty pence piece Floyd | a lighter Floyd | a Chinese key Floyd | a manual Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "n" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Research Institute Floyd | Inside, the Institute is as a marvel of the limits of both modernist Floyd | architecture and the persuasiveness of funding applications. The floor Floyd | of the entrance corridor is covered in sticky linoleum and the walls, Floyd | painted an unpleasant shade of grue, with damp health and safety Floyd | posters. Three doors lead off the corridor, to the north, east and Floyd | west, each with a hand-written notice. Floyd | | DavidW says, "huh" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "n" | ||||
Floyd | There's a bloody furious cat in there -- an equally furious physicist Floyd | is trying to force it into a box and close the lid, but is getting Floyd | only bites and scratches for his troubles. You decide to leave them to Floyd | it. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "e" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Colour Lab Floyd | The lab is filled with all manner of scientific equipment. Monitors, Floyd | levers, dials and big red buttons cover the walls, while the room's Floyd | desk -- pushed against the computer stacks on the back wall -- has a Floyd | complicated-looking laptop-printer set-up perched somewhere in the Floyd | middle, surrounded by arcane assemblies of metal and glass, which Mary Floyd | is operating with feverish skill. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "give tome to mary" | ||||
Floyd | (first taking the Encyclopaedia of Qualia) Floyd | (putting the file of Platonic forms into the sack to make room) Floyd | Mary doesn't seem interested. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "read tome" | ||||
Floyd | Apparently this is an Encyclopaedia of Qualia. It's the colour Floyd | edition. Opening it, you suddenly become overwhelmed by a veritable Floyd | rainbow of sensations -- the smell of coffee, the feel of mist, the Floyd | indescribable feeling you get when you've just dropped an egg. Looking Floyd | down at the text, you realise that it consists of a Floyd | carefully-organised catalogue of all the world's possible sensations, Floyd | and as you read the name of each it washes over you. You snap the book Floyd | shut before you become completely overcome. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "show tome to mary" | ||||
Floyd | Mary seems to take no notice. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "talk to mary" | ||||
Floyd | Though as startled by you as ever, Mary greets you warmly. "Oh, hello Floyd | again, dear! Did you think of something else?" Floyd | Floyd | [1] Sorry, no. Still stuck. I'll leave you to it Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | "Oh, bye, dear," says Mary, turning back to her work. "Do come back if Floyd | you think of something else, or have something interesting to show Floyd | me." Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "open tome" | ||||
Floyd | That's not something you can open. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "open book" | ||||
Floyd | That's not something you can open. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "give book to mary" | ||||
Floyd | (first taking the manual) Floyd | (putting the qualiascope into the sack to make room) Floyd | Mary doesn't seem interested. Floyd | | DavidW asks, "hm. The tome oughta've worked, no?" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "drop book" | ||||
Floyd | Dropped. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "get tome" | ||||
Floyd | You already have that. Floyd | | DavidW says, "The raven might be the answer, though." | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "s" | ||||
Floyd | You channel your will to power to summon a path in that direction. Floyd | Sadly, nothing happens: you can't go that way. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "w" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Research Institute Floyd | Inside, the Institute is as a marvel of the limits of both modernist Floyd | architecture and the persuasiveness of funding applications. The floor Floyd | of the entrance corridor is covered in sticky linoleum and the walls, Floyd | painted an unpleasant shade of grue, with damp health and safety Floyd | posters. Three doors lead off the corridor, to the north, east and Floyd | west, each with a hand-written notice. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "s" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Square Floyd | The square seems somehow madder now the madman has left. Floyd | Floyd | This appears to be the academic quarter of the village, and so may in Floyd | fact be a quadrangle, which is awfully exciting. You know it's the Floyd | academic quarter, because the grass is covered with sprawling young Floyd | people wearing brightly coloured clothes, dreadlocks, and organic Floyd | deodorant. Architecturally and geographically speaking, the buildings Floyd | look like they were placed there by a commitee of village planners Floyd | whose equipment budget stretched only so far as a compass. Three sides Floyd | of the square are complemented by a museum, research institute and a Floyd | library, to the west, north and east respectively. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "s" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Village Street Floyd | A church, a theatre, a tavern, a barbershop, a pavement caf? -- their Floyd | various changing forms clutter around, entrances facing out onto what Floyd | seems (most of the time) to be an ordinary village street. Passers-by Floyd | duck in and out of the buildings, stop by the water pump, or carry on Floyd | to a square to the north. No-one, you notice, takes the road south -- Floyd | or heads along the routes east towards the storybook hills or west Floyd | into the fairytale woods. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "s" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Black Tarmac Road Floyd | You're on a road by the squat concrete hut that contains the Chinese Floyd | Room. In smooth black tarmac, neatly painted with white lines, the Floyd | road stretches north to the village in peculiarly perfect tapering Floyd | perspective. Behind you, to the south, you see the road lead towards Floyd | some queer-looking hedgerows at the base of the crag. To the east, as Floyd | before, stretch the plains to the horizon, with the ocean, behind sand Floyd | dunes, doing likewise to the west. Floyd | Floyd | The remains of a scarecrow droop on a pole here. Floyd | | Lionheart says, "The tome was a very plausible solution there, I'm surprised it didn't work" | |||
| smartgenes says, "i'm wondering if it's a bug" | ||||
| DavidW says, "Or we phrased it wrong." | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "u" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Roof Floyd | The Chinese Room, you have discovered, is in the centre of a Floyd | fantastical world, on a road leading north to woods and a hillside Floyd | village and south to a cragtop castle. Wide plains spread out to the Floyd | east, grassy dunes and a strip of sand border an ocean to the west, Floyd | and above you Flying Spaghetti Monsters gambol in the updrafts. The Floyd | roof of the Chinese Room is flat and covered with pitch, hot under the Floyd | sun. On the east side of the building, a ladder leads down to the Floyd | road. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x pitch" | ||||
Floyd | It's a bit sticky, and not, as it turns out, particularly black. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x ladder" | ||||
Floyd | A steel ladder on the east side of the roof. It's not funny in any Floyd | way. Steel seldom is. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "in" | ||||
Floyd | You channel your will to power to summon a path in that direction. Floyd | Sadly, nothing happens: you can't go that way. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "w" | ||||
Floyd | You channel your will to power to summon a path in that direction. Floyd | Sadly, nothing happens: you can't go that way. Floyd | | DavidW asks, "You want to enter the hatch?" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "enter hatch" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | The Chinese Room Floyd | It's a plain concrete box, equipped only with desk and chair. A Floyd | computer sits on the desk, casting an insipid electronic glow over a Floyd | stack of cards sitting by the keyboard. There's a slow drip from a Floyd | damp patch up on the ceiling. Some grubby light seeps through a high Floyd | window across onto the poster that dominates an entire wall. Across Floyd | the top of the poster huge bold letters read "THE CHINESE ROOM". Floyd | Underneath -- a string of Chinese characters. Floyd | | smartgenes says, "that's the one" | |||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "get typewriter" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "get keyboard" | ||||
Floyd | That seems to be a part of the computer. Floyd | | DavidW says, "There's no typewriter here. That's a computer." | |||
| inky asks, "did you try finding something for Mary that wasn't colored like she expected, like she said earlier?" | ||||
| Lionheart says, "We're thinking the raven" | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "go hatch" | ||||
Floyd | You'll need to stand on that chair to reach the hatch. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "stand on chair" | ||||
Floyd | You stand on the chair. You can see your house from here! Well, you Floyd | can't really, but you can reach the hatch. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "go hatch" | ||||
Floyd | You haul yourself up through the hatch and scramble onto the roof of Floyd | the Chinese Room, the hatch thudding shut behind you. Floyd | Floyd | Roof Floyd | The Chinese Room, you have discovered, is in the centre of a Floyd | fantastical world, on a road leading north to woods and a hillside Floyd | village and south to a cragtop castle. Wide plains spread out to the Floyd | east, grassy dunes and a strip of sand border an ocean to the west, Floyd | and above you Flying Spaghetti Monsters gambol in the updrafts. The Floyd | roof of the Chinese Room is flat and covered with pitch, hot under the Floyd | sun. On the east side of the building, a ladder leads down to the Floyd | road. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "e" | ||||
Floyd | You shimmy down the ladder onto the road. Floyd | Floyd | Black Tarmac Road Floyd | You're on a road by the squat concrete hut that contains the Chinese Floyd | Room. In smooth black tarmac, neatly painted with white lines, the Floyd | road stretches north to the village in peculiarly perfect tapering Floyd | perspective. Behind you, to the south, you see the road lead towards Floyd | some queer-looking hedgerows at the base of the crag. To the east, as Floyd | before, stretch the plains to the horizon, with the ocean, behind sand Floyd | dunes, doing likewise to the west. Floyd | Floyd | The remains of a scarecrow droop on a pole here. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "s" | ||||
Floyd | Striking out south towards the castle, you soon realise what it is Floyd | that lurks so strangely at the base of the crag. As the rock looms Floyd | over you like ten tonne weight over a hapless clown, the road becomes Floyd | a pebbly path leading into what is clearly an enormous maze. Floyd | Floyd | Outside the Maze Floyd | You're standing at the entrance to a vast maze built of hedges that Floyd | tower six feet above you. The path seems extravagantly narrow, as if Floyd | the designer wanted to prepare the unwary adventurer from the outside. Floyd | Above the entrance is a painted wooden sign. It looks important. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "read sign" | ||||
Floyd | Attention, Adventurer! This MAZE is not for the FAINTHEARTED, nor for Floyd | the CORRUPT. This is the MORAL MAZE, where only the truly ETHICAL Floyd | shall pass. Should you find yourself LOST forever -- what can you do Floyd | but PRAY? Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "n" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Black Tarmac Road Floyd | You're on a road by the squat concrete hut that contains the Chinese Floyd | Room. In smooth black tarmac, neatly painted with white lines, the Floyd | road stretches north to the village in peculiarly perfect tapering Floyd | perspective. Behind you, to the south, you see the road lead towards Floyd | some queer-looking hedgerows at the base of the crag. To the east, as Floyd | before, stretch the plains to the horizon, with the ocean, behind sand Floyd | dunes, doing likewise to the west. Floyd | Floyd | The remains of a scarecrow droop on a pole here. Floyd | | DavidW asks, "What about west of scarecrow?" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "n" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Village Street Floyd | A church, a theatre, a tavern, a barbershop, a pavement caf? -- their Floyd | various changing forms clutter around, entrances facing out onto what Floyd | seems (most of the time) to be an ordinary village street. Passers-by Floyd | duck in and out of the buildings, stop by the water pump, or carry on Floyd | to a square to the north. No-one, you notice, takes the road south -- Floyd | or heads along the routes east towards the storybook hills or west Floyd | into the fairytale woods. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "s" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Black Tarmac Road Floyd | You're on a road by the squat concrete hut that contains the Chinese Floyd | Room. In smooth black tarmac, neatly painted with white lines, the Floyd | road stretches north to the village in peculiarly perfect tapering Floyd | perspective. Behind you, to the south, you see the road lead towards Floyd | some queer-looking hedgerows at the base of the crag. To the east, as Floyd | before, stretch the plains to the horizon, with the ocean, behind sand Floyd | dunes, doing likewise to the west. Floyd | Floyd | The remains of a scarecrow droop on a pole here. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "w" | ||||
Floyd | Leaving the road, you find yourself walking through squat dunes Floyd | scrubby with beachgrass. Your feet leave a trail behind you in the Floyd | otherwise undisturbed sand. Soon, the ocean emerges again from behind Floyd | the dunes, more blue and sparkling than a busking saxophonist on an Floyd | empty Christmas morning. Floyd | Floyd | You find yourself on a beach -- a strip of silvery sand bordering an Floyd | ocean that seems truly boundless. You try and focus on the horizon, Floyd | but find your attention wavering whenever you get close to pinning it Floyd | down, as if there were a blind spot in your consciousness. The sea Floyd | shimmers and shifts under your gaze. You shake your head, blinking, Floyd | and make your way along the beach, feet sliding in the fine-grained Floyd | sand, towards a few small figures further along. Floyd | Floyd | As you approach them, the figures -- two men dressed in white togas -- Floyd | turn to look at you. "By Zeus, Achilles!" says one to the other, "It Floyd | looks like an adventurer has arrived." Floyd | Floyd | Before you can get a word in, the man -- an elderly, squat little Floyd | Greek -- greets you effusively: Floyd | Floyd | "Welcome, adventurer! Well come indeed, oh yes. Very, very fortuitous Floyd | indeed . . . " He tails off, and the other man glances at you, Floyd | embarrassed. Floyd | Floyd | "Hallo," he says, shuffling on his feet. "I'm Achilles." Floyd | Floyd | [1] Hello, Achilles. Floyd | [2] What's going on here? Floyd | | DavidW says, "oh, Zeno's paradox, I bet." | |||
| Lionheart asks, "Oh, hi Achilles. Is Ms. Tortoise about?" | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | There's an awkward moment while Achilles searches for something to say Floyd | and the other man continues to mutter to himself. You hear bursts of Floyd | numbers shooting off in all directions from him. "Oh!" says Achilles, Floyd | inspiration striking. "This is Zeno. From Elea. He's very clever." Floyd | Floyd | [1] What's so clever about him? Floyd | [2] Where's Elea? Is that the name of this place? Floyd | [3] Hang on -- Zeno, Achilles . . . isn't there supposed to be a Floyd | tortoise around here? Floyd | [4] What's going on here? Floyd | | Jizaboz says, "heh" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "2" | ||||
Floyd | "Oh no, Elea is that place halfway between point A and point B. You'll Floyd | never get there." Floyd | Floyd | [1] What's going on here, then? Floyd | [2] Hang on -- Zeno, Achilles . . . isn't there supposed to be a Floyd | tortoise around here? Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "2" | ||||
Floyd | Zeno stops muttering immediately, and looks at you, aghast. Achilles Floyd | turns away. You sense you've said something you shouldn't've. Floyd | Floyd | Eventually, Zeno speaks, sighing. "Well, that's our problem, don't you Floyd | see? She's gone." Floyd | Floyd | "Gone," echoes Achilles. Floyd | Floyd | "Left," says Zeno. Floyd | Floyd | "Kaput, concludes Achilles, mournfully. Floyd | Floyd | [1] Why? Floyd | [2] So what is going on here, then? Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | "She's on tour with her Aunt Hillary in France," explains Achilles. Floyd | "Said she was sick of being exploited by our patriarchal obsession Floyd | with paradoxes and chauvanistic exploitation of her abilities, and Floyd | wanted to be somewhere where she could truly be herself." Floyd | Floyd | "Hence," says Zeno, "our problem." Floyd | Floyd | [1] So what is going on here, then? Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | "We're holding a race!" cries Zeno. "A great and magnificent race, of Floyd | profound importance. But we've only got one racer." Floyd | Floyd | "Me," says Achilles. Floyd | Floyd | "And you can't hold a proper paradox with only one racer! It would be Floyd | like holding a symposium with only one philosopher. Very boring. Not Floyd | enough contradictions." Floyd | Floyd | [1] And that's where I come in, is it? Floyd | [2] Hang on, I think I see where this is going . . . Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | "Indeed! You look like you would make a fine racer." Floyd | Floyd | [1] Not a chance. Floyd | [2] What's in it for me? Floyd | [3] Gosh, thanks! I suppose when you put it like that . . . Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "2" | ||||
Floyd | "Well there is this rather fine trophy to be presented to the winner," Floyd | says Zeno, brandishing a large glass cup with a laurel leaf carving. Floyd | Floyd | [1] Wow, a glass trophy, really? Cor. Guess not, then. Floyd | [2] Oh, alright then. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "2" | ||||
Floyd | "Splendid! Bravo! Well, then, you two had better get ready!" Floyd | | Lionheart says, "Aunt Hillary, so I guess our author has read Godel, Escher, Bach then." | |||
| DavidW says, "ha ha" | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "l" | ||||
Floyd | You're standing at the start line, stripped to your underwear. You Floyd | made that much of a compromise with the two Greeks. Achilles, Floyd | limbering up next to you, was not so modest. You feel like your Floyd | eyeballs are being dragged on strings, downwards and sideways . . . Floyd | You look away, blushing furiously, and crouch down, set, the aching Floyd | vision of school P.E. lessons mugging you in memory alley. Floyd | Floyd | When Zeno shouts the go, there's a moment of blurred confusion as you Floyd | both launch off. Your mind can't manage any complicated tasks, like Floyd | managing sensory apparatus, when it's pumping your arms and legs this Floyd | hard. When the mess of sensations starts to coalesce, you realise that Floyd | Achilles has streaked (in every sense of the word) off in front of Floyd | you, and is already nearly at the finish line. Oh, well. At least you Floyd | tried. Floyd | Floyd | Achilles loops around the flagpole and jogs back to you. Soon he's Floyd | bouncing up and down at your side, jiggling in a disconcerting way. Floyd | "Come on!" he says. "You're halfway there!" Floyd | Floyd | At this stage, you don't think your brain can possibly cope with Floyd | issuing any instructions other than GIVE UP or KEEP RUNNING. Floyd | | DavidW says, "ooh, underwear scene." | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "keep running" | ||||
Floyd | You plummet onwards down the track, Achilles keeping pace beside you. Floyd | Floyd | "Only 1/4 a millos to go! Keep it up!" Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "kick achilles in the heel" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "keep running" | ||||
Floyd | You plummet onwards down the track, Achilles keeping pace beside you. Floyd | Floyd | "Only 1/8 a millos to go! Keep it up!" Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "keep running" | ||||
Floyd | You plummet onwards down the track, Achilles keeping pace beside you. Floyd | Floyd | "Only 1/16 a millos to go! That's nearly there!" Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "keep running" | ||||
Floyd | You plummet onwards down the track, Achilles keeping pace beside you. Floyd | Floyd | "Only 1/32 a millos to go! You can do it!" Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "again" | ||||
Floyd | You plummet onwards down the track, Achilles keeping pace beside you. Floyd | Floyd | "Only 1/64 a millos to go! You won't give up now, will you?" Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "again" | ||||
Floyd | You plummet onwards down the track, Achilles keeping pace beside you. Floyd | Floyd | "Only 1/128 a millos to go! Surely you can keep going?" Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "again" | ||||
Floyd | You plummet onwards down the track, Achilles keeping pace beside you. Floyd | Floyd | "Only 1/256 a millos to go! Keep it up!" Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "again" | ||||
Floyd | You plummet onwards down the track, Achilles keeping pace beside you. Floyd | Floyd | "Only 1/512 a millos to go! Surely you can keep going?" Floyd | | DavidW says, "heh" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "again" | ||||
Floyd | You plummet onwards down the track, Achilles keeping pace beside you. Floyd | Floyd | "Only 1/1024 a millos to go! Surely you can keep going?" Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "again" | ||||
Floyd | You plummet onwards down the track, Achilles keeping pace beside you. Floyd | Floyd | "Only 1/2048 a millos to go! You won't give up now, will you?" Floyd | | Jizaboz says, "Oh no.." | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "again" | ||||
Floyd | You plummet onwards down the track, Achilles keeping pace beside you. Floyd | Floyd | "Only 1/4096 a millos to go! That's nearly there!" Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "again" | ||||
Floyd | You plummet onwards down the track, Achilles keeping pace beside you. Floyd | Floyd | "Only 1/8192 a millos to go! Don't want to give up, do you?" Floyd | Floyd | You tumble into a heap on the ground, utterly exhausted. Achilles lets Floyd | out a sympathetic groan and picks you up bodily, throwing you over his Floyd | shoulder, before jogging leisurely back to Zeno at the start line. Floyd | | smartgenes says, "lol" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "e" | ||||
Floyd | When you come to from your exhausted stupor, you see the two Greeks Floyd | bending over you, concerned. Achilles (mercifully back in his toga) Floyd | puts an amphora of wine to your lips, which you splutter away at, Floyd | sitting up sharply. Floyd | Floyd | "A brave attempt, young adventurer!" says Zeno. "And, philosophically Floyd | speaking, very interesting, yes, very interesting indeed . . ." He Floyd | tails off again, and as you pick yourself up, Achilles looks at you Floyd | regretfully. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "e" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Black Tarmac Road Floyd | You're on a road by the squat concrete hut that contains the Chinese Floyd | Room. In smooth black tarmac, neatly painted with white lines, the Floyd | road stretches north to the village in peculiarly perfect tapering Floyd | perspective. Behind you, to the south, you see the road lead towards Floyd | some queer-looking hedgerows at the base of the crag. To the east, as Floyd | before, stretch the plains to the horizon, with the ocean, behind sand Floyd | dunes, doing likewise to the west. Floyd | Floyd | The remains of a scarecrow droop on a pole here. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "n" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Village Street Floyd | A church, a theatre, a tavern, a barbershop, a pavement caf? -- their Floyd | various changing forms clutter around, entrances facing out onto what Floyd | seems (most of the time) to be an ordinary village street. Passers-by Floyd | duck in and out of the buildings, stop by the water pump, or carry on Floyd | to a square to the north. No-one, you notice, takes the road south -- Floyd | or heads along the routes east towards the storybook hills or west Floyd | into the fairytale woods. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "w" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Fairytale Woods Floyd | In the midst of the woods stand a Buddhist monk and a lumberjack Floyd | engaged in a heated discussion as to whether a tree falling down in a Floyd | forest makes a sound if nobody is around to hear it. Their debate is Floyd | punctuated by the occasional felling of a tree at the blade of the Floyd | lumberjack's axe. Floyd | Floyd | The woods become more sinister looking to the west and the village Floyd | street is back to the east. Floyd | | Lionheart says, "We ended up in Achilles's spot, I think" | |||
| DavidW says, "yes" | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "w" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Spooky Part of the Woods Floyd | The fairytale woods seem to have shifted imperceptibly into the Floyd | spooky woods you see before you. All around you are brambles, bracken Floyd | and blackened lightning struck trees. Floyd | Floyd | Turning east you can just about make out happier looking trees. All Floyd | that you can see in this part of the woods is a mess of brambles. Floyd | Floyd | You can see a non-black raven here. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "talk to raven" | ||||
Floyd | You don't want to talk to the non-black raven until you've given it Floyd | some means of turning black. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "give ink to raven" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | DavidW says, "paint" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "give paint to raven" | ||||
Floyd | (first taking the tube of black paint) Floyd | The ravenly laughs maniacly. "Black paint?" it cries, "Black paint? Floyd | Who'd you take me for? What am, some sort of canvas? Floyd | Floyd | The non-black raven snatches the paint from your hands and hides it Floyd | about its person. "Caw," it says, "I'll keep it anyhow." Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "e" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Fairytale Woods Floyd | In the midst of the woods stand a Buddhist monk and a lumberjack Floyd | engaged in a heated discussion as to whether a tree falling down in a Floyd | forest makes a sound if nobody is around to hear it. Their debate is Floyd | punctuated by the occasional felling of a tree at the blade of the Floyd | lumberjack's axe. Floyd | Floyd | The woods become more sinister looking to the west and the village Floyd | street is back to the east. Floyd | | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "talk to raven" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "e" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Village Street Floyd | A church, a theatre, a tavern, a barbershop, a pavement caf? -- their Floyd | various changing forms clutter around, entrances facing out onto what Floyd | seems (most of the time) to be an ordinary village street. Passers-by Floyd | duck in and out of the buildings, stop by the water pump, or carry on Floyd | to a square to the north. No-one, you notice, takes the road south -- Floyd | or heads along the routes east towards the storybook hills or west Floyd | into the fairytale woods. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "take raven" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | smartgenes says, "oops sorry guys" | |||
| smartgenes says, "gonna go to the pump" | ||||
| smartgenes says, "what was the format again" | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "pump about crow" | ||||
Floyd | You pull the pump's handle, but no intuition is forthcoming. Floyd | | DavidW says, "The pump seems to give out too many hints." | |||
| Lionheart says, "I'd rather avoid the pump" | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "pump about mary" | ||||
Floyd | You pull the pump's handle, concentrating furiously. Mary seems Floyd | awfully familiar. Better think about that. You muse for a while on Floyd | what might happen if she saw something surprising -- like something Floyd | coloured as it shouldn't be. That'd probably shock her into taking her Floyd | goggles off in order to double-check, and who knows what'd happen if Floyd | she did that. Floyd | | smartgenes says, "okays" | |||
| DavidW says, "yeah, let's avoid the pump for now." | ||||
| Lionheart says, "See, TMI" | ||||
| smartgenes says, "clever way of gicing hints actually" | ||||
| DavidW says, "It's not subtle enough." | ||||
| Lionheart says, "It's a clever conceit for a hint system" | ||||
| smartgenes says, "like how it's integrated int he game tho" | ||||
| smartgenes says, "dinner" | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "l" | ||||
Floyd | Village Street Floyd | A church, a theatre, a tavern, a barbershop, a pavement caf? -- their Floyd | various changing forms clutter around, entrances facing out onto what Floyd | seems (most of the time) to be an ordinary village street. Passers-by Floyd | duck in and out of the buildings, stop by the water pump, or carry on Floyd | to a square to the north. No-one, you notice, takes the road south -- Floyd | or heads along the routes east towards the storybook hills or west Floyd | into the fairytale woods. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "enter caf" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "go caf" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "go cafe" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Pavement Caf? Floyd | The caf? spills out into the street. Steel chairs are scattered around Floyd | the serving kiosk, apparently chaotically, though you suspect there's Floyd | a cynical art to it. Most of the customers are buried in books, Floyd | thimble-sized cups of black coffee steaming by them and handmade Floyd | cigarettes rolling around the corners of their mouths. Some of them, Floyd | though, are intense young couples clasping hands across their plates, Floyd | boring into each other's eyes as if looking for some flaw, breaking Floyd | the gaze only to toss hair or adjust a beret. Sitting in the corner, Floyd | Jean-Paul Sartre surveys the caf? around him and smiles in a satisfied Floyd | yet enigmatic way. Floyd | Floyd | The server is clattering away in the kitchen behind the kiosk, making Floyd | loud sweary noises. Floyd | | smartgenes says, "oh yeah the missing diacritic" | |||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "read menu" | smartgenes says, "i thought it was a joke the first time.. caff or caf.. slang" | |||
Floyd | In minimalist letters it lists the available fare: Floyd | - Fresh summer sorbet of pre-phyllorexa claret Floyd | - Plovers" egg omelet with a side-platter of seasonal vegetables Floyd | - Oven-roasted black swan on a bed of couscous with a thyme and Floyd | fennel garnish Floyd | - Eggs, soss, beans Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "call server" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "talk to sartre" | ||||
Floyd | You'd better not speak to him, in case he asks for his wallet back. Floyd | | DavidW says, "The sorbet uses the same claret that Aristotle wants." | |||
| Lionheart says, "When we tried ordering it before, she said the fridge was broken, though." | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "w" | ||||
Floyd | You channel your will to power to summon a path in that direction. Floyd | Sadly, nothing happens: you can't go that way. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "e" | ||||
Floyd | You channel your will to power to summon a path in that direction. Floyd | Sadly, nothing happens: you can't go that way. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "x fridge" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "leave" | ||||
Floyd | You'll have to say which compass direction to go in. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "out" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Village Street Floyd | A church, a theatre, a tavern, a barbershop, a pavement caf? -- their Floyd | various changing forms clutter around, entrances facing out onto what Floyd | seems (most of the time) to be an ordinary village street. Passers-by Floyd | duck in and out of the buildings, stop by the water pump, or carry on Floyd | to a square to the north. No-one, you notice, takes the road south -- Floyd | or heads along the routes east towards the storybook hills or west Floyd | into the fairytale woods. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "talk to server" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | Lionheart says, "But that may indicate she has the ingredients" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "i" | ||||
Floyd | You are carrying: Floyd | an Encyclopaedia of Qualia Floyd | a sack (open) Floyd | a qualiascope Floyd | file of Platonic forms Floyd | a useless scrap of paper Floyd | a Categorical Imperativator Floyd | a broken lantern Floyd | a fifty pence piece Floyd | a lighter Floyd | a Chinese key Floyd | | DavidW says, "If we can ever see her again." | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "n" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Square Floyd | The square seems somehow madder now the madman has left. Floyd | Floyd | This appears to be the academic quarter of the village, and so may in Floyd | fact be a quadrangle, which is awfully exciting. You know it's the Floyd | academic quarter, because the grass is covered with sprawling young Floyd | people wearing brightly coloured clothes, dreadlocks, and organic Floyd | deodorant. Architecturally and geographically speaking, the buildings Floyd | look like they were placed there by a commitee of village planners Floyd | whose equipment budget stretched only so far as a compass. Three sides Floyd | of the square are complemented by a museum, research institute and a Floyd | library, to the west, north and east respectively. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "n" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Research Institute Floyd | Inside, the Institute is as a marvel of the limits of both modernist Floyd | architecture and the persuasiveness of funding applications. The floor Floyd | of the entrance corridor is covered in sticky linoleum and the walls, Floyd | painted an unpleasant shade of grue, with damp health and safety Floyd | posters. Three doors lead off the corridor, to the north, east and Floyd | west, each with a hand-written notice. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "n" | ||||
Floyd | There's a bloody furious cat in there -- an equally furious physicist Floyd | is trying to force it into a box and close the lid, but is getting Floyd | only bites and scratches for his troubles. You decide to leave them to Floyd | it. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "e" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Colour Lab Floyd | The lab is filled with all manner of scientific equipment. Monitors, Floyd | levers, dials and big red buttons cover the walls, while the room's Floyd | desk -- pushed against the computer stacks on the back wall -- has a Floyd | complicated-looking laptop-printer set-up perched somewhere in the Floyd | middle, surrounded by arcane assemblies of metal and glass, which Mary Floyd | is operating with feverish skill. Floyd | Floyd | You can see a manual here. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "give encyclopaedia" | ||||
Floyd | (to Mary) Floyd | Mary doesn't seem interested. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "take manual" | ||||
Floyd | Taken. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "x manual" | ||||
Floyd | The manual is a thick, leather-bound tome with THE RULES embossed in Floyd | gold on the cover. The whole process adds up to a syntactical method Floyd | for answering questions about badgers in Chinese. You can't imagine Floyd | why. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "show encyclopaedia" | ||||
Floyd | (to Mary) Floyd | Mary seems to take no notice. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "put manual in sack" | ||||
Floyd | You put the manual into the sack. Floyd | | DavidW says, "We tried that already." | |||
| smartgenes says, "we can swap the weight" | ||||
| DavidW says, "We wanted to try taking the raven to her." | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "w" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Research Institute Floyd | Inside, the Institute is as a marvel of the limits of both modernist Floyd | architecture and the persuasiveness of funding applications. The floor Floyd | of the entrance corridor is covered in sticky linoleum and the walls, Floyd | painted an unpleasant shade of grue, with damp health and safety Floyd | posters. Three doors lead off the corridor, to the north, east and Floyd | west, each with a hand-written notice. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "w" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Bat Lab Floyd | The laboratory is a brightly-lit white chamber, covered wall-to-wall Floyd | in cabinets, posters, and counters covered with disturbing-looking Floyd | instruments. A gigantic model of a bat hangs from the ceiling, Floyd | spinning around gently. A white-haired man is moving fitfully around Floyd | the room, grabbing instruments and examining diagrams, as he proceeds Floyd | to dissect a series of what look worryingly like tiny brains. He's Floyd | muttering something over and over again under his breath: "What is it Floyd | like?" it seems to be. "What is it like? What is it like?" Floyd | | smartgenes says, "find a bat" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "e" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Research Institute Floyd | Inside, the Institute is as a marvel of the limits of both modernist Floyd | architecture and the persuasiveness of funding applications. The floor Floyd | of the entrance corridor is covered in sticky linoleum and the walls, Floyd | painted an unpleasant shade of grue, with damp health and safety Floyd | posters. Three doors lead off the corridor, to the north, east and Floyd | west, each with a hand-written notice. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "s" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Square Floyd | The square seems somehow madder now the madman has left. Floyd | Floyd | This appears to be the academic quarter of the village, and so may in Floyd | fact be a quadrangle, which is awfully exciting. You know it's the Floyd | academic quarter, because the grass is covered with sprawling young Floyd | people wearing brightly coloured clothes, dreadlocks, and organic Floyd | deodorant. Architecturally and geographically speaking, the buildings Floyd | look like they were placed there by a commitee of village planners Floyd | whose equipment budget stretched only so far as a compass. Three sides Floyd | of the square are complemented by a museum, research institute and a Floyd | library, to the west, north and east respectively. Floyd | | Lionheart says, "Wait" | |||
| DavidW asks, "oh, would Nagel like the tome?" | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "w" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Museum Floyd | The Odditorium is filled with a crazy array of philosophical exhibits. Floyd | The steward is giving the ship's hull a light dusting. Floyd | | Lionheart says, "Right, show tome to nagel" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "talk to steward" | ||||
Floyd | You'd better not unless you can get that cube to return to her. Floyd | | smartgenes says, "what were the other objects.. golden rule" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "e" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Square Floyd | The square seems somehow madder now the madman has left. Floyd | Floyd | This appears to be the academic quarter of the village, and so may in Floyd | fact be a quadrangle, which is awfully exciting. You know it's the Floyd | academic quarter, because the grass is covered with sprawling young Floyd | people wearing brightly coloured clothes, dreadlocks, and organic Floyd | deodorant. Architecturally and geographically speaking, the buildings Floyd | look like they were placed there by a commitee of village planners Floyd | whose equipment budget stretched only so far as a compass. Three sides Floyd | of the square are complemented by a museum, research institute and a Floyd | library, to the west, north and east respectively. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "n" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Research Institute Floyd | Inside, the Institute is as a marvel of the limits of both modernist Floyd | architecture and the persuasiveness of funding applications. The floor Floyd | of the entrance corridor is covered in sticky linoleum and the walls, Floyd | painted an unpleasant shade of grue, with damp health and safety Floyd | posters. Three doors lead off the corridor, to the north, east and Floyd | west, each with a hand-written notice. Floyd | | DavidW says, "I suspect we want to keep the cube for now." | |||
| smartgenes says, "who was nagel" | ||||
| DavidW says, "Bat guy." | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "w" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Bat Lab Floyd | The laboratory is a brightly-lit white chamber, covered wall-to-wall Floyd | in cabinets, posters, and counters covered with disturbing-looking Floyd | instruments. A gigantic model of a bat hangs from the ceiling, Floyd | spinning around gently. A white-haired man is moving fitfully around Floyd | the room, grabbing instruments and examining diagrams, as he proceeds Floyd | to dissect a series of what look worryingly like tiny brains. He's Floyd | muttering something over and over again under his breath: "What is it Floyd | like?" it seems to be. "What is it like? What is it like?" Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "show encyclopaedia to nagel" | ||||
Floyd | Nagel seems to take no notice. Floyd | | DavidW says, "The tome ought to tell him what bats are like." | |||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "take tome" | ||||
Floyd | You already have that. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "show tome to nagel" | ||||
Floyd | Nagel seems to take no notice. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "give tome to nagel" | ||||
Floyd | Nagel doesn't seem interested. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "show encylopedia to nagel" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | smartgenes says, "i" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "i" | ||||
Floyd | You are carrying: Floyd | an Encyclopaedia of Qualia Floyd | a sack (open) Floyd | a manual Floyd | a qualiascope Floyd | file of Platonic forms Floyd | a useless scrap of paper Floyd | a Categorical Imperativator Floyd | a broken lantern Floyd | a fifty pence piece Floyd | a lighter Floyd | a Chinese key Floyd | | ||||
| inky says (to Floyd), "look up bat in encyclopedia" | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "give qualiascope to nagel" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | Floyd | (first taking the qualiascope) Floyd | Nagel doesn't seem interested. Floyd | | DavidW says, "The game is really poor with synonyms." | |||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "consult tome about bats" | ||||
Floyd | Apparently this is an Encyclopaedia of Qualia. It's the colour Floyd | edition. Opening it, you suddenly become overwhelmed by a veritable Floyd | rainbow of sensations -- the smell of coffee, the feel of mist, the Floyd | indescribable feeling you get when you've just dropped an egg. Looking Floyd | down at the text, you realise that it consists of a Floyd | carefully-organised catalogue of all the world's possible sensations, Floyd | and as you read the name of each it washes over you. You snap the book Floyd | shut before you become completely overcome. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x coin" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x fifty" | ||||
Floyd | Neither so shiny nor so round as the pound, yet money nonetheless. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "read about bats in tome" | ||||
Floyd | Apparently this is an Encyclopaedia of Qualia. It's the colour Floyd | edition. Opening it, you suddenly become overwhelmed by a veritable Floyd | rainbow of sensations -- the smell of coffee, the feel of mist, the Floyd | indescribable feeling you get when you've just dropped an egg. Looking Floyd | down at the text, you realise that it consists of a Floyd | carefully-organised catalogue of all the world's possible sensations, Floyd | and as you read the name of each it washes over you. You snap the book Floyd | shut before you become completely overcome. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "nagel, read about bats in tome" | ||||
Floyd | Your command falls on deaf ears. Perhaps you should TALK TO them about Floyd | it? Floyd | | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "look up bats in tome" | ||||
Floyd | Apparently this is an Encyclopaedia of Qualia. It's the colour Floyd | edition. Opening it, you suddenly become overwhelmed by a veritable Floyd | rainbow of sensations -- the smell of coffee, the feel of mist, the Floyd | indescribable feeling you get when you've just dropped an egg. Looking Floyd | down at the text, you realise that it consists of a Floyd | carefully-organised catalogue of all the world's possible sensations, Floyd | and as you read the name of each it washes over you. You snap the book Floyd | shut before you become completely overcome. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "talk to nagel" | ||||
Floyd | Nagel notices you and grabs your shoulders with both hands. His eyes Floyd | boring into yours, he whispers. "Can you tell me what it is like? What Floyd | it is like . . . to be a bat?" This said, he seems to forget what he's Floyd | doing, and returns to his dissection, muttering all the while. Floyd | | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "consult tome about bats" | ||||
Floyd | Apparently this is an Encyclopaedia of Qualia. It's the colour Floyd | edition. Opening it, you suddenly become overwhelmed by a veritable Floyd | rainbow of sensations -- the smell of coffee, the feel of mist, the Floyd | indescribable feeling you get when you've just dropped an egg. Looking Floyd | down at the text, you realise that it consists of a Floyd | carefully-organised catalogue of all the world's possible sensations, Floyd | and as you read the name of each it washes over you. You snap the book Floyd | shut before you become completely overcome. Floyd | | smartgenes says, "i'm thinking we just need to have a bat and the qualiascope to show him" | |||
| Lionheart says, "Oh yeah, the scope" | ||||
| smartgenes says, "how to resolve the argument about the tree" | ||||
| DavidW says, "hm. I doubt the scope will help, but sure, try it." | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "s" | ||||
Floyd | You channel your will to power to summon a path in that direction. Floyd | Sadly, nothing happens: you can't go that way. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "e" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Research Institute Floyd | Inside, the Institute is as a marvel of the limits of both modernist Floyd | architecture and the persuasiveness of funding applications. The floor Floyd | of the entrance corridor is covered in sticky linoleum and the walls, Floyd | painted an unpleasant shade of grue, with damp health and safety Floyd | posters. Three doors lead off the corridor, to the north, east and Floyd | west, each with a hand-written notice. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "s" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Square Floyd | The square seems somehow madder now the madman has left. Floyd | Floyd | This appears to be the academic quarter of the village, and so may in Floyd | fact be a quadrangle, which is awfully exciting. You know it's the Floyd | academic quarter, because the grass is covered with sprawling young Floyd | people wearing brightly coloured clothes, dreadlocks, and organic Floyd | deodorant. Architecturally and geographically speaking, the buildings Floyd | look like they were placed there by a commitee of village planners Floyd | whose equipment budget stretched only so far as a compass. Three sides Floyd | of the square are complemented by a museum, research institute and a Floyd | library, to the west, north and east respectively. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "s" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Village Street Floyd | A church, a theatre, a tavern, a barbershop, a pavement caf? -- their Floyd | various changing forms clutter around, entrances facing out onto what Floyd | seems (most of the time) to be an ordinary village street. Passers-by Floyd | duck in and out of the buildings, stop by the water pump, or carry on Floyd | to a square to the north. No-one, you notice, takes the road south -- Floyd | or heads along the routes east towards the storybook hills or west Floyd | into the fairytale woods. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "w" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Fairytale Woods Floyd | In the midst of the woods stand a Buddhist monk and a lumberjack Floyd | engaged in a heated discussion as to whether a tree falling down in a Floyd | forest makes a sound if nobody is around to hear it. Their debate is Floyd | punctuated by the occasional felling of a tree at the blade of the Floyd | lumberjack's axe. Floyd | Floyd | The woods become more sinister looking to the west and the village Floyd | street is back to the east. Floyd | | DavidW says, "I think we need earplugs for the lumberjack." | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "give imperitavator to lumberjack" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "i" | ||||
Floyd | You are carrying: Floyd | a qualiascope Floyd | an Encyclopaedia of Qualia Floyd | a sack (open) Floyd | a manual Floyd | file of Platonic forms Floyd | a useless scrap of paper Floyd | a Categorical Imperativator Floyd | a broken lantern Floyd | a fifty pence piece Floyd | a lighter Floyd | a Chinese key Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x categorical" | ||||
Floyd | It's a lead cube. That would seem to be it, though it feels rather Floyd | heavier than it should. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "give cube to monk" | ||||
Floyd | (first taking the Categorical Imperativator) Floyd | Philosophers are not yet supermen. Floyd | | djfletch asks, "have we been north from where the woman was being burnt?" | |||
| smartgenes says, "nope" | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "e" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Village Street Floyd | A church, a theatre, a tavern, a barbershop, a pavement caf? -- their Floyd | various changing forms clutter around, entrances facing out onto what Floyd | seems (most of the time) to be an ordinary village street. Passers-by Floyd | duck in and out of the buildings, stop by the water pump, or carry on Floyd | to a square to the north. No-one, you notice, takes the road south -- Floyd | or heads along the routes east towards the storybook hills or west Floyd | into the fairytale woods. Floyd | | DavidW says, "nope" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "e" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Hill Floyd | There's a great pyre here very slowly catching alight. Tied to a stake Floyd | in the centre of the fire is a handsome woman looking deeply Floyd | determined, though you suppose she'd look less composed if the fire Floyd | wasn't so pitifully poor. At the base of the pyre, an imposing, Floyd | bushy-bearded man in an ornate uniform is interrogating her intensely, Floyd | in a way that appears to be making her all the more resolute. Floyd | Floyd | From here, you could head west, back to the village, or further into Floyd | the hills to the north. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "n" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Outside the Mill Floyd | You trek down the side of the first hill, sniffing the daffodils Floyd | resentfully as you go, and then begin your climb up the next. That Floyd | feeling of the path shifting helpfully beneath your feet continues, no Floyd | matter how much you try and kick the hillside into submission. The sun Floyd | smiles. You breathe a deep, almost contented sigh. Floyd | Floyd | And then throw yourself to the ground as an enormous screaming mare Floyd | gallops madly down the side of the hill, dragging a shattered cart Floyd | behind her. You pick yourself up as she thunders off into the Floyd | distance, now properly content that this world continues to be Floyd | completely insane, and climb on upwards. Floyd | Floyd | Passing a sign for "John Stuart's Livery and Corn-Processors", you Floyd | reach the crest of the hill and realise just what made the horse Floyd | gallop. The windmill here is aflame and billowing smoke, its sails Floyd | spinning madly.You cover your face from the unbearable heat of the Floyd | burning mill -- and then you hear the screams from inside. Floyd | | djfletch says, "eep" | |||
| smartgenes says, "more fires" | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "n" | ||||
Floyd | You'd rather not do any more hillwalking today --unless it's back Floyd | south towards the village. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "s" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Hill Floyd | There's a great pyre here very slowly catching alight. Tied to a stake Floyd | in the centre of the fire is a handsome woman looking deeply Floyd | determined, though you suppose she'd look less composed if the fire Floyd | wasn't so pitifully poor. At the base of the pyre, an imposing, Floyd | bushy-bearded man in an ornate uniform is interrogating her intensely, Floyd | in a way that appears to be making her all the more resolute. Floyd | Floyd | From here, you could head west, back to the village, or further into Floyd | the hills to the north. Floyd | | DavidW says, "more puzzles." | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "talk to pirate" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | DavidW asks, "what, not saving anyone?" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "talk to man" | ||||
Floyd | "Yes?" he says, abruptly. Floyd | Floyd | [1] Ah... nothing. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | "Do not tarry!" he shouts, "Go retire some zombies!" Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "w" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Village Street Floyd | A church, a theatre, a tavern, a barbershop, a pavement caf? -- their Floyd | various changing forms clutter around, entrances facing out onto what Floyd | seems (most of the time) to be an ordinary village street. Passers-by Floyd | duck in and out of the buildings, stop by the water pump, or carry on Floyd | to a square to the north. No-one, you notice, takes the road south -- Floyd | or heads along the routes east towards the storybook hills or west Floyd | into the fairytale woods. Floyd | | DavidW asks, "why didn't we go in the mill?" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "w" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Fairytale Woods Floyd | In the midst of the woods stand a Buddhist monk and a lumberjack Floyd | engaged in a heated discussion as to whether a tree falling down in a Floyd | forest makes a sound if nobody is around to hear it. Their debate is Floyd | punctuated by the occasional felling of a tree at the blade of the Floyd | lumberjack's axe. Floyd | Floyd | The woods become more sinister looking to the west and the village Floyd | street is back to the east. Floyd | | smartgenes says, "it's on fire" | |||
| DavidW says, "But you didn't even try!" | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "e" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Village Street Floyd | A church, a theatre, a tavern, a barbershop, a pavement caf? -- their Floyd | various changing forms clutter around, entrances facing out onto what Floyd | seems (most of the time) to be an ordinary village street. Passers-by Floyd | duck in and out of the buildings, stop by the water pump, or carry on Floyd | to a square to the north. No-one, you notice, takes the road south -- Floyd | or heads along the routes east towards the storybook hills or west Floyd | into the fairytale woods. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "n" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Square Floyd | The square seems somehow madder now the madman has left. Floyd | Floyd | This appears to be the academic quarter of the village, and so may in Floyd | fact be a quadrangle, which is awfully exciting. You know it's the Floyd | academic quarter, because the grass is covered with sprawling young Floyd | people wearing brightly coloured clothes, dreadlocks, and organic Floyd | deodorant. Architecturally and geographically speaking, the buildings Floyd | look like they were placed there by a commitee of village planners Floyd | whose equipment budget stretched only so far as a compass. Three sides Floyd | of the square are complemented by a museum, research institute and a Floyd | library, to the west, north and east respectively. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "s" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Village Street Floyd | A church, a theatre, a tavern, a barbershop, a pavement caf? -- their Floyd | various changing forms clutter around, entrances facing out onto what Floyd | seems (most of the time) to be an ordinary village street. Passers-by Floyd | duck in and out of the buildings, stop by the water pump, or carry on Floyd | to a square to the north. No-one, you notice, takes the road south -- Floyd | or heads along the routes east towards the storybook hills or west Floyd | into the fairytale woods. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "e" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Hill Floyd | There's a great pyre here very slowly catching alight. Tied to a stake Floyd | in the centre of the fire is a handsome woman looking deeply Floyd | determined, though you suppose she'd look less composed if the fire Floyd | wasn't so pitifully poor. At the base of the pyre, an imposing, Floyd | bushy-bearded man in an ornate uniform is interrogating her intensely, Floyd | in a way that appears to be making her all the more resolute. Floyd | Floyd | From here, you could head west, back to the village, or further into Floyd | the hills to the north. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "n" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Outside the Mill Floyd | You cover your face from the unbearable heat of the burning mill -- Floyd | and then you hear the screams from inside. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "enter mill" | ||||
Floyd | Inside the Mill Floyd | Sheilding your face from the fire and smoke, and momentarily Floyd | questioning your sanity as you do so, you push your way through the Floyd | door into the windmill. Wooden beams are crashing down around you in Floyd | arcs of flame as you search for the source of the screams. Then you Floyd | see them, trapped behind some arcane grinding machinery -- a huge man Floyd | dressed in robes and an archbishop's mitre, and a small woman in a Floyd | French maid's uniform. Floyd | Floyd | You pick your way through the burning wreckage in an effort to reach Floyd | them, and then you pull back in horror. Just as you realise that the Floyd | man is the Archbishop of Cambray, instantly recognisable from his Floyd | regular appearances in the pages of The Guardian, so too do you Floyd | realise that the woman is -- your mother. Floyd | Floyd | Her screaming and his bellowing snap you back to the urgency of the Floyd | situation. The mill is crashing round about you and you have just time Floyd | to enact a daring rescue. But with mounting horror you realise that Floyd | you can't possibly carry both of them at once -- indeed, you may only Floyd | be able to rescue one of them. But who? Floyd | | smartgenes says, "oops i thought it was north, you see" | |||
| DavidW says, "MOM!" | ||||
| DavidW says, "rescue mom, please" | ||||
| smartgenes says, "anything to do with Mill's philosophy" | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "think about mill" | ||||
Floyd | John Stuart Mill (1806 - 1873) was a British ethical and political Floyd | philosopher, and a public intellectual. He was the foremost proponent Floyd | of utlitarianism, and also an early and formative theoriser of the Floyd | liberal social state. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "SAVE" | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "cf7" | ||||
Floyd | Enter saved game to store: Ok. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "rescue mother" | ||||
Floyd | Grabbing her left leg, you drag your mother heroically from the Floyd | burning mill. As soon as she is clear of the building it explodes in a Floyd | melodramatic and highly implausible inferno, from which rolls, rather Floyd | pitifully, the Archbishop's mitre. You watch it spin to a halt as your Floyd | mother swoons on the grass. Floyd | Floyd | [Your score has just gone up by two points.] Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "get mitre" | ||||
Floyd | You think perhaps you'd better leave it be. Floyd | | ||||
| Jizaboz hops on his skateboard and rolls out. | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "talk to mother" | ||||
Floyd | Before you can say "Oedipus Complex", she smothers you with gratitude, Floyd | wipes your face and departs, leaving you with a feeling of warmth and Floyd | a used handkerchief. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x handkerchief" | ||||
Floyd | A handkerchief, slightly scented, slightly used. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "xmell it" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "smell it" | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "w" | ||||
Floyd | You smell nothing unexpected. Floyd | Floyd | You'd rather not do any more hillwalking today --unless it's back Floyd | south towards the village. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "x mill" | ||||
Floyd | You search through the ruined mill and find a bucket of pitch Floyd | strangely untouched by the explosion. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "smell handkerchief" | ||||
Floyd | You smell nothing unexpected. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "take pitch" | ||||
Floyd | You already have that. Floyd | | smartgenes says, "that was easier than expected" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "e" | ||||
Floyd | You'd rather not do any more hillwalking today --unless it's back Floyd | south towards the village. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "s" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Hill Floyd | There's a great pyre here very slowly catching alight. Tied to a stake Floyd | in the centre of the fire is a handsome woman looking deeply Floyd | determined, though you suppose she'd look less composed if the fire Floyd | wasn't so pitifully poor. At the base of the pyre, an imposing, Floyd | bushy-bearded man in an ornate uniform is interrogating her intensely, Floyd | in a way that appears to be making her all the more resolute. Floyd | Floyd | From here, you could head west, back to the village, or further into Floyd | the hills to the north. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "w" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Village Street Floyd | A church, a theatre, a tavern, a barbershop, a pavement caf? -- their Floyd | various changing forms clutter around, entrances facing out onto what Floyd | seems (most of the time) to be an ordinary village street. Passers-by Floyd | duck in and out of the buildings, stop by the water pump, or carry on Floyd | to a square to the north. No-one, you notice, takes the road south -- Floyd | or heads along the routes east towards the storybook hills or west Floyd | into the fairytale woods. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "w" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Fairytale Woods Floyd | In the midst of the woods stand a Buddhist monk and a lumberjack Floyd | engaged in a heated discussion as to whether a tree falling down in a Floyd | forest makes a sound if nobody is around to hear it. Their debate is Floyd | punctuated by the occasional felling of a tree at the blade of the Floyd | lumberjack's axe. Floyd | Floyd | The woods become more sinister looking to the west and the village Floyd | street is back to the east. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "w" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Spooky Part of the Woods Floyd | The fairytale woods seem to have shifted imperceptibly into the Floyd | spooky woods you see before you. All around you are brambles, bracken Floyd | and blackened lightning struck trees. Floyd | Floyd | Turning east you can just about make out happier looking trees. All Floyd | that you can see in this part of the woods is a mess of brambles. Floyd | Floyd | You can see a non-black raven here. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "give bucket to raven" | ||||
Floyd | The raven caws in despair. "Look, it's hopeless. I'll take the bucket Floyd | of pitch as a gift but I know I'll never be able to use it to change Floyd | colour. I guess I'll always be bright and cheery." Floyd | Floyd | Sobbing slightly, the raven pulls back the brambles before flying off. Floyd | Floyd | [Your score has just gone up by five points.] Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x brambles" | ||||
Floyd | The brambles are pulled back, allowing you to pass through them to the Floyd | cave beyond." Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "enter cave" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "go cave" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "n" | ||||
Floyd | You channel your will to power to summon a path in that direction. Floyd | Sadly, nothing happens: you can't go that way. Floyd | | DavidW says, "west" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "w" | ||||
Floyd | You push your way through the brambles and gingerly descend into the Floyd | dark cave beyond. Floyd | Floyd | Darkness Floyd | The darkness envelops everything. It is the darkness of ignorance. Or Floyd | possibly just an ordinary sort of darkness, but in any case, you won't Floyd | be able to do anything until you bring some sort of light source here. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "light lighter" | ||||
Floyd | This dangerous act would achieve little. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "turn on lantern" | ||||
Floyd | That's not something you can switch. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "i" | ||||
Floyd | You are carrying: Floyd | a handkerchief Floyd | a qualiascope Floyd | an Encyclopaedia of Qualia Floyd | a sack (open) Floyd | a manual Floyd | file of Platonic forms Floyd | a useless scrap of paper Floyd | a Categorical Imperativator Floyd | a broken lantern Floyd | a fifty pence piece Floyd | a lighter Floyd | a Chinese key Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "take lantern" | ||||
Floyd | (putting the Encyclopaedia of Qualia into the sack to make room) Floyd | You've got your hands a bit full. You're going to have to find a sack Floyd | or something if you want to carry any more. Floyd | | ||||
| inky says (to Floyd), "e" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Spooky Part of the Woods Floyd | The fairytale woods seem to have shifted imperceptibly into the Floyd | spooky woods you see before you. All around you are brambles, bracken Floyd | and blackened lightning struck trees. Floyd | Floyd | Turning east you can just about make out happier looking trees. All Floyd | that you can see in this part of the woods is a mess of brambles. Floyd | | smartgenes says, "the lantern doesn't light" | |||
| inky says (to Floyd), "take lantern" | ||||
Floyd | (putting the qualiascope into the sack to make room) Floyd | Taken. Floyd | | ||||
| inky says (to Floyd), "light lantern" | ||||
Floyd | This dangerous act would achieve little. Floyd | | ||||
| inky says (to Floyd), "x lantern" | ||||
Floyd | The glass part of the lantern is broken, so that the feeblest of winds Floyd | would soon extinguish the fire within. Floyd | | ||||
| gjnave arrives, full of funk, but no fun. | ||||
| inky says (to Floyd), "turn on lantern" | ||||
Floyd | That's not something you can switch. Floyd | | ||||
| inky says (to Floyd), "x fire" | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x lighter" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | Floyd | It a bit old and creaky, but it gives a serviceable spark. Floyd | | inky says, "hmm" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "burn paper" | ||||
Floyd | This dangerous act would achieve little. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "fix lantern" | ||||
Floyd | What do you want to fix the broken lantern to? Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "repair lantern" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | ||||
| inky says (to Floyd), "w" | ||||
Floyd | You push your way through the brambles and gingerly descend into the Floyd | dark cave beyond. Floyd | Floyd | Darkness Floyd | The darkness envelops everything. It is the darkness of ignorance. Or Floyd | possibly just an ordinary sort of darkness, but in any case, you won't Floyd | be able to do anything until you bring some sort of light source here. Floyd | | ||||
| inky says (to Floyd), "e" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Spooky Part of the Woods Floyd | The fairytale woods seem to have shifted imperceptibly into the Floyd | spooky woods you see before you. All around you are brambles, bracken Floyd | and blackened lightning struck trees. Floyd | Floyd | Turning east you can just about make out happier looking trees. All Floyd | that you can see in this part of the woods is a mess of brambles. Floyd | | DavidW says, "oh, the cave is probably Plato's Cave, I bet." | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x files" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x file" | ||||
Floyd | This a file of administrative forms that have reached the highest Floyd | level of bureaucratic perfection. In order to complete them they must Floyd | be signed by the relevant officials, who will only sign the form if Floyd | they are presented with the very same form already signed. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "e" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Fairytale Woods Floyd | In the midst of the woods stand a Buddhist monk and a lumberjack Floyd | engaged in a heated discussion as to whether a tree falling down in a Floyd | forest makes a sound if nobody is around to hear it. Their debate is Floyd | punctuated by the occasional felling of a tree at the blade of the Floyd | lumberjack's axe. Floyd | Floyd | The woods become more sinister looking to the west and the village Floyd | street is back to the east. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "s" | ||||
Floyd | You channel your will to power to summon a path in that direction. Floyd | Sadly, nothing happens: you can't go that way. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "e" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Village Street Floyd | A church, a theatre, a tavern, a barbershop, a pavement caf? -- their Floyd | various changing forms clutter around, entrances facing out onto what Floyd | seems (most of the time) to be an ordinary village street. Passers-by Floyd | duck in and out of the buildings, stop by the water pump, or carry on Floyd | to a square to the north. No-one, you notice, takes the road south -- Floyd | or heads along the routes east towards the storybook hills or west Floyd | into the fairytale woods. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "s" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Black Tarmac Road Floyd | You're on a road by the squat concrete hut that contains the Chinese Floyd | Room. In smooth black tarmac, neatly painted with white lines, the Floyd | road stretches north to the village in peculiarly perfect tapering Floyd | perspective. Behind you, to the south, you see the road lead towards Floyd | some queer-looking hedgerows at the base of the crag. To the east, as Floyd | before, stretch the plains to the horizon, with the ocean, behind sand Floyd | dunes, doing likewise to the west. Floyd | Floyd | The remains of a scarecrow droop on a pole here. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "talk to scarecrow" | ||||
Floyd | He's hardly in any state for idle chit-chat. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "repair scarecrow" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | smartgenes says, "we could attempt the maze" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "w" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Beach Floyd | You're on the beach, where Zeno has set up a race track between the Floyd | dunes and the sea. Achilles is also here -- sans Tortoise. Floyd | Floyd | The road lies back to the east. Floyd | | inky asks, "did you find any eggs on the beach?" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x beach" | ||||
Floyd | Beach Floyd | You're on the beach, where Zeno has set up a race track between the Floyd | dunes and the sea. Achilles is also here -- sans Tortoise. Floyd | Floyd | The road lies back to the east. Floyd | | ||||
| inky says (to Floyd), "x dunes" | ||||
Floyd | These are the dunes between the beach and the road; they act as a Floyd | buffer for the sea breeze. A few small birds flit between them Floyd | skittishly. Floyd | | ||||
| inky says (to Floyd), "search dunes" | ||||
Floyd | You find nothing of interest. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "dig" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | ||||
| inky says (to Floyd), "x birds" | ||||
Floyd | You walk towards the little birds, curious. Floyd | Floyd | Sand Dune Floyd | As you approach the dune, the little bird you followed here -- a tiny Floyd | white and grey little thing with a black collar, like a vicar in Floyd | negative -- flits off out of sight. You soon realise its business Floyd | here: this is where it has made its nest. Floyd | Floyd | The beach lies southwest of here. Floyd | | DavidW asks, "So how many things are we looking for now? A source of light, something unexpected coloured, a typewriter, wine, ...?" | |||
| inky says (to Floyd), "x nest" | ||||
Floyd | A rough and ready little home built out of seaside debris. In it Floyd | cluster a handful of tiny speckled eggs. Floyd | | ||||
| inky says (to Floyd), "get eggs" | ||||
Floyd | (putting the handkerchief into the sack to make room) Floyd | Feeling truly barbaric, you scoop up the eggs in your hand and walk as Floyd | fast as you can back to the beach to avoid looking the little bird in Floyd | the eye. Floyd | Floyd | Beach Floyd | You're on the beach, where Zeno has set up a race track between the Floyd | dunes and the sea. Achilles is also here -- sans Tortoise. Floyd | Floyd | The road lies back to the east, while the dune where you found the Floyd | nest is northeast of here. Floyd | | inky says, "now you can go to the cafe" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "put weight on achilles" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "i" | ||||
Floyd | You are carrying: Floyd | some eggs Floyd | a broken lantern Floyd | a sack (open) Floyd | a handkerchief Floyd | a qualiascope Floyd | an Encyclopaedia of Qualia Floyd | a manual Floyd | file of Platonic forms Floyd | a useless scrap of paper Floyd | a Categorical Imperativator Floyd | a fifty pence piece Floyd | a lighter Floyd | a Chinese key Floyd | | DavidW says, "sigh. We hadn't visited the beach yet." | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x imperativator" | ||||
Floyd | It's a lead cube. That would seem to be it, though it feels rather Floyd | heavier than it should. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "put cube on achilles" | ||||
Floyd | You need to be holding the Categorical Imperativator before you can Floyd | put it on top of something else. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "get cube" | ||||
Floyd | Philosophers are not yet supermen. Floyd | | inky says, "you had, but apparently you had to examine the birds" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "hold cube" | ||||
Floyd | Philosophers are not yet supermen. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "e" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Black Tarmac Road Floyd | You're on a road by the squat concrete hut that contains the Chinese Floyd | Room. In smooth black tarmac, neatly painted with white lines, the Floyd | road stretches north to the village in peculiarly perfect tapering Floyd | perspective. Behind you, to the south, you see the road lead towards Floyd | some queer-looking hedgerows at the base of the crag. To the east, as Floyd | before, stretch the plains to the horizon, with the ocean, behind sand Floyd | dunes, doing likewise to the west. Floyd | Floyd | The remains of a scarecrow droop on a pole here. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "w" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Beach Floyd | You're on the beach, where Zeno has set up a race track between the Floyd | dunes and the sea. Achilles is also here -- sans Tortoise. Floyd | Floyd | The road lies back to the east, while the dune where you found the Floyd | nest is northeast of here. Floyd | | DavidW says, "no, we hadn't visited before." | |||
| DavidW says, "smartg here keeps u-turning." | ||||
| inky says, "oh, hunh" | ||||
| inky says, "I thought we had been here for the race" | ||||
| DavidW says, "Nope." | ||||
| smartgenes says, "i was looking for this eggs thing" | ||||
| smartgenes says, "but you already did it cos of inky's spoilers" | ||||
| DavidW says, "We tried the race but never went west." | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "w" | ||||
Floyd | You'd only get wet. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "ne" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Sand Dune Floyd | As you approach the dune, the little bird you followed here -- a tiny Floyd | white and grey little thing with a black collar, like a vicar in Floyd | negative -- flits off out of sight. You soon realise its business Floyd | here: this is where it has made its nest. Floyd | Floyd | The beach lies southwest of here. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x nest" | ||||
Floyd | A rough and ready little home built out of seaside debris. Floyd | | DavidW says, "oh ne. I thought it was west of Zeno." | |||
| smartgenes says, "how did we get it.. did we actually go ne" | ||||
| DavidW says, "I knew we hadn't gone past." | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "sw" | ||||
Floyd | Beach Floyd | You're on the beach, where Zeno has set up a race track between the Floyd | dunes and the sea. Achilles is also here -- sans Tortoise. Floyd | Floyd | The road lies back to the east, while the dune where you found the Floyd | nest is northeast of here. Floyd | | inky says, "I examined the dunes and then examined the birds" | |||
| inky says, "and it said you followed the birds to its nest" | ||||
| inky says, "which I guess was ne" | ||||
| DavidW says, "Anyway, I suppose we should break eggs for an omelet." | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "e" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Black Tarmac Road Floyd | You're on a road by the squat concrete hut that contains the Chinese Floyd | Room. In smooth black tarmac, neatly painted with white lines, the Floyd | road stretches north to the village in peculiarly perfect tapering Floyd | perspective. Behind you, to the south, you see the road lead towards Floyd | some queer-looking hedgerows at the base of the crag. To the east, as Floyd | before, stretch the plains to the horizon, with the ocean, behind sand Floyd | dunes, doing likewise to the west. Floyd | Floyd | The remains of a scarecrow droop on a pole here. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "n" | DavidW says, "At the cafe, of course." | |||
Floyd | Floyd | Village Street Floyd | A church, a theatre, a tavern, a barbershop, a pavement caf? -- their Floyd | various changing forms clutter around, entrances facing out onto what Floyd | seems (most of the time) to be an ordinary village street. Passers-by Floyd | duck in and out of the buildings, stop by the water pump, or carry on Floyd | to a square to the north. No-one, you notice, takes the road south -- Floyd | or heads along the routes east towards the storybook hills or west Floyd | into the fairytale woods. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "go cafe" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Pavement Caf? Floyd | The caf? spills out into the street. Steel chairs are scattered around Floyd | the serving kiosk, apparently chaotically, though you suspect there's Floyd | a cynical art to it. Most of the customers are buried in books, Floyd | thimble-sized cups of black coffee steaming by them and handmade Floyd | cigarettes rolling around the corners of their mouths. Some of them, Floyd | though, are intense young couples clasping hands across their plates, Floyd | boring into each other's eyes as if looking for some flaw, breaking Floyd | the gaze only to toss hair or adjust a beret. Sitting in the corner, Floyd | Jean-Paul Sartre surveys the caf? around him and smiles in a satisfied Floyd | yet enigmatic way. Floyd | Floyd | The server is clattering away in the kitchen behind the kiosk, making Floyd | loud sweary noises. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "eat" | ||||
Floyd | What do you want to eat? Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "food" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | DavidW says, "Don't know how to attract the server, though." | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "wave handkerchief" | ||||
Floyd | But you aren't holding that. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "talk to server" | ||||
Floyd | You'd rather not disturb her when she's having so much trouble in the Floyd | kitchen. Not unless you've got an extra-special present for her or Floyd | something. Floyd | | ||||
| inky says (to Floyd), "give eggs to server" | ||||
Floyd | You head nervously into the kitchen, where you find the server Floyd | struggling with a frying pan. Hearing you enter, she spins around, Floyd | brandishing the pan. "You can bloody well forget about those Floyd | sausages!" she screams at you. Floyd | Floyd | "That's OK," you say. "I've got a wonderful surprise for you! Floyd | Floyd | Putting down the pan, she lights a cigarette on the stove, puffs Floyd | sulkily on it, and says, "Oh yeah? What?" Floyd | Floyd | You brandish your plovers" eggs at her with a "ta-da!" and suddenly Floyd | all her winsomeness returns. "Darling!" she says, hugging you. "Just Floyd | what I always wanted!" She rummages in a cupboard and brings out a Floyd | bottle. She thrusts it at you and says, "Now sod off and leave me Floyd | alone." Floyd | | inky says, "oho" | |||
| inky says (to Floyd), "x bottle" | ||||
Floyd | It appears to be a rather fine claret. Brushing some dust from it, you Floyd | spot the vintage. Goodness, this is pre-phyllorexa claret! How Floyd | extraordinary! Floyd | | inky says, "not that I know what this is for" | |||
| inky says, "but I know we wanted it" | ||||
| smartgenes says, "philosopher in pub" | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "out" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Village Street Floyd | A church, a theatre, a tavern, a barbershop, a pavement caf? -- their Floyd | various changing forms clutter around, entrances facing out onto what Floyd | seems (most of the time) to be an ordinary village street. Passers-by Floyd | duck in and out of the buildings, stop by the water pump, or carry on Floyd | to a square to the north. No-one, you notice, takes the road south -- Floyd | or heads along the routes east towards the storybook hills or west Floyd | into the fairytale woods. Floyd | | DavidW says, "ok, we know we want the wine for Aristotle." | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "enter tavern" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Tavern Floyd | A raucous rabble of eminent philosophers line the tables and bar, Floyd | discussing matters squifflily with slurred syllables and questionable Floyd | eloquence. You overhear Plato and Socrates nonsensically picking apart Floyd | Monkey Island. The only one not joining in seems to be Aristotle, who Floyd | is sitting glumly in the corner. In the eastern wall is the back door Floyd | through which Mill threw himself earlier. Floyd | Floyd | Somewhat incongruously, you spot an electronic games machine sitting Floyd | against the wall next to a rather glum looking booth, being rather Floyd | neglected by the roistering philosophers. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "give bottle" | ||||
Floyd | Whom do you want to give the a bottle of pre-phyllorexa claret to? Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "aristotle" | ||||
Floyd | "Splendid! Aristotle cries. "You actually managed it! For a moment Floyd | there I thought I might have to compromise and drink the shoe polish Floyd | they serve here." Floyd | Floyd | He pulls out a book from the recesses of his raiments and hands it to Floyd | you. "A token of my appreciation -- I do hope you enjoy it. Just keep Floyd | it away from this lot or they'll scribble footnotes all over it," he Floyd | says, waving at the drunken philosophers, before turning his attention Floyd | to the bottle with a satisfied gleam in his eyes. Floyd | Floyd | [Your score has just gone up by five points.] Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x book" | ||||
Floyd | The manual is a thick, leather-bound tome with THE RULES embossed in Floyd | gold on the cover. The whole process adds up to a syntactical method Floyd | for answering questions about badgers in Chinese. You can't imagine Floyd | why. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "read rules" | ||||
Floyd | The manual is a thick, leather-bound tome with THE RULES embossed in Floyd | gold on the cover. The whole process adds up to a syntactical method Floyd | for answering questions about badgers in Chinese. You can't imagine Floyd | why. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "i" | ||||
Floyd | You are carrying: Floyd | Plato's Complete Works Floyd | a broken lantern Floyd | a sack (open) Floyd | a handkerchief Floyd | a qualiascope Floyd | an Encyclopaedia of Qualia Floyd | a manual Floyd | file of Platonic forms Floyd | a useless scrap of paper Floyd | a Categorical Imperativator Floyd | a fifty pence piece Floyd | a lighter Floyd | a Chinese key Floyd | | DavidW says, "uh, it must be another book." | |||
| inky says (to Floyd), "x works" | ||||
Floyd | The Complete Works of Plato -- unabridged and unmolested. Floyd | | ||||
| inky says (to Floyd), "read works" | ||||
Floyd | The Complete Works of Plato -- unabridged and unmolested. Floyd | | DavidW says, "damn the poor synonym handling." | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "open works" | ||||
Floyd | That's not something you can open. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "read works" | ||||
Floyd | The Complete Works of Plato -- unabridged and unmolested. Floyd | | smartgenes says, "i think give book to librarian" | |||
| smartgenes says, "then she "allow" us to take the book" | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "w" | ||||
Floyd | You channel your will to power to summon a path in that direction. Floyd | Sadly, nothing happens: you can't go that way. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "out" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Village Street Floyd | A church, a theatre, a tavern, a barbershop, a pavement caf? -- their Floyd | various changing forms clutter around, entrances facing out onto what Floyd | seems (most of the time) to be an ordinary village street. Passers-by Floyd | duck in and out of the buildings, stop by the water pump, or carry on Floyd | to a square to the north. No-one, you notice, takes the road south -- Floyd | or heads along the routes east towards the storybook hills or west Floyd | into the fairytale woods. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "n" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Square Floyd | The square seems somehow madder now the madman has left. Floyd | Floyd | This appears to be the academic quarter of the village, and so may in Floyd | fact be a quadrangle, which is awfully exciting. You know it's the Floyd | academic quarter, because the grass is covered with sprawling young Floyd | people wearing brightly coloured clothes, dreadlocks, and organic Floyd | deodorant. Architecturally and geographically speaking, the buildings Floyd | look like they were placed there by a commitee of village planners Floyd | whose equipment budget stretched only so far as a compass. Three sides Floyd | of the square are complemented by a museum, research institute and a Floyd | library, to the west, north and east respectively. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "e" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Philosophy Library Floyd | This is simply a square, book-lined room equipped with a borrowing Floyd | counter, behind which stands a bored-looking librarian, and a few old Floyd | desks. At one of these Karl Marx sits, writing furiously. Floyd | | DavidW says, "hm. Maybe. Or show the works to Plato and the others." | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "give plato to librarian" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "give works to librarian" | ||||
Floyd | "I thought you might have a use for a clean copy," you say, offering Floyd | the book. Floyd | Floyd | You think for a moment a smile might have crossed the librarian's Floyd | face. "Thanks," s/he says, if somewhat grudgingly. "Have a banana." Floyd | Floyd | To your surprise s/he does actually produce the fruit from underneath Floyd | the desk and hands it to you, somewhat abashedly. Floyd | | smartgenes says, "have a banana" | |||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "x banana" | ||||
Floyd | Yellow and bent, like a politician. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x banana" | ||||
Floyd | Yellow and bent, like a politician. Floyd | | smartgenes asks, "eat it and throw it to slip up the race?" | |||
| DavidW says, "so uh... yeah, that was my thought." | ||||
| gjnave says (to floyd), "peel banana" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | DavidW says, "save first" | |||
| smartgenes says, "yeh" | ||||
| djfletch says, "did we find where the raven went? Maybe it found Mary." | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "SAVE" | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "cf8" | ||||
Floyd | Enter saved game to store: Ok. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "w" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Square Floyd | The square seems somehow madder now the madman has left. Floyd | Floyd | This appears to be the academic quarter of the village, and so may in Floyd | fact be a quadrangle, which is awfully exciting. You know it's the Floyd | academic quarter, because the grass is covered with sprawling young Floyd | people wearing brightly coloured clothes, dreadlocks, and organic Floyd | deodorant. Architecturally and geographically speaking, the buildings Floyd | look like they were placed there by a commitee of village planners Floyd | whose equipment budget stretched only so far as a compass. Three sides Floyd | of the square are complemented by a museum, research institute and a Floyd | library, to the west, north and east respectively. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "s" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Village Street Floyd | A church, a theatre, a tavern, a barbershop, a pavement caf? -- their Floyd | various changing forms clutter around, entrances facing out onto what Floyd | seems (most of the time) to be an ordinary village street. Passers-by Floyd | duck in and out of the buildings, stop by the water pump, or carry on Floyd | to a square to the north. No-one, you notice, takes the road south -- Floyd | or heads along the routes east towards the storybook hills or west Floyd | into the fairytale woods. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "w" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Fairytale Woods Floyd | In the midst of the woods stand a Buddhist monk and a lumberjack Floyd | engaged in a heated discussion as to whether a tree falling down in a Floyd | forest makes a sound if nobody is around to hear it. Their debate is Floyd | punctuated by the occasional felling of a tree at the blade of the Floyd | lumberjack's axe. Floyd | Floyd | The woods become more sinister looking to the west and the village Floyd | street is back to the east. Floyd | | DavidW says, "We haven't re-found the raven, no" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "e" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Village Street Floyd | A church, a theatre, a tavern, a barbershop, a pavement caf? -- their Floyd | various changing forms clutter around, entrances facing out onto what Floyd | seems (most of the time) to be an ordinary village street. Passers-by Floyd | duck in and out of the buildings, stop by the water pump, or carry on Floyd | to a square to the north. No-one, you notice, takes the road south -- Floyd | or heads along the routes east towards the storybook hills or west Floyd | into the fairytale woods. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "w" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Fairytale Woods Floyd | In the midst of the woods stand a Buddhist monk and a lumberjack Floyd | engaged in a heated discussion as to whether a tree falling down in a Floyd | forest makes a sound if nobody is around to hear it. Their debate is Floyd | punctuated by the occasional felling of a tree at the blade of the Floyd | lumberjack's axe. Floyd | Floyd | The woods become more sinister looking to the west and the village Floyd | street is back to the east. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "e" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Village Street Floyd | A church, a theatre, a tavern, a barbershop, a pavement caf? -- their Floyd | various changing forms clutter around, entrances facing out onto what Floyd | seems (most of the time) to be an ordinary village street. Passers-by Floyd | duck in and out of the buildings, stop by the water pump, or carry on Floyd | to a square to the north. No-one, you notice, takes the road south -- Floyd | or heads along the routes east towards the storybook hills or west Floyd | into the fairytale woods. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "s" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Black Tarmac Road Floyd | You're on a road by the squat concrete hut that contains the Chinese Floyd | Room. In smooth black tarmac, neatly painted with white lines, the Floyd | road stretches north to the village in peculiarly perfect tapering Floyd | perspective. Behind you, to the south, you see the road lead towards Floyd | some queer-looking hedgerows at the base of the crag. To the east, as Floyd | before, stretch the plains to the horizon, with the ocean, behind sand Floyd | dunes, doing likewise to the west. Floyd | Floyd | The remains of a scarecrow droop on a pole here. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "w" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Beach Floyd | You're on the beach, where Zeno has set up a race track between the Floyd | dunes and the sea. Achilles is also here -- sans Tortoise. Floyd | Floyd | The road lies back to the east, while the dune where you found the Floyd | nest is northeast of here. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "eat banana" | ||||
Floyd | You're not particularly hungry. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "race" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | ||||
| djfletch says (to Floyd), "peel banana" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "talk to achilles" | ||||
Floyd | Achilles blushes when you address him directly, and drags his foot in Floyd | the sand. "You should talk to Mister Zeno," he says. Floyd | Floyd | [1] Ah, Zeno? Hello? Floyd | | ||||
| gjnave says (to floyd), "open banana" | ||||
Floyd | [I need some kind of reaction from you to continue the scene. Enter a Floyd | number, or say REPEAT to reacquaint yourself with your options.] Floyd | | inky says, "maybe eat it mid-race" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | "What? Oh! Oh, it's you. Fancy another race then, do you?" Floyd | Floyd | [1] Nah, thanks, I'd only get thrashed again. Floyd | [2] I haven't a chance unless you give me a head start! Floyd | [3] Yeah, I think I could give it another shot. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "2" | ||||
Floyd | "Oh no, I'm afraid that would foul all the calculations. We'd only Floyd | need one of those to compensate for some flaw or other in the race Floyd | track -- and just look at it! Aren't those lanes perfect? Can you Floyd | manage without?" Floyd | Floyd | [1] Hmm . . . nah, I'll pass this time. Floyd | [2] Well, alright, I'll still give it another go. Floyd | | DavidW asks, "we could dye the banana red, maybe?" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "2" | ||||
Floyd | "Splendid! Bravo! Well, then, you two had better get ready!" Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "throw banana" | ||||
Floyd | You're standing at the start line, stripped to your underwear. You Floyd | made that much of a compromise with the two Greeks. Achilles, Floyd | limbering up next to you, was not so modest. You feel like your Floyd | eyeballs are being dragged on strings, downwards and sideways . . . Floyd | You look away, blushing furiously, and crouch down, set, the aching Floyd | vision of school P.E. lessons mugging you in memory alley. Floyd | Floyd | When Zeno shouts the go, there's a moment of blurred confusion as you Floyd | both launch off. Your mind can't manage any complicated tasks, like Floyd | managing sensory apparatus, when it's pumping your arms and legs this Floyd | hard. When the mess of sensations starts to coalesce, you realise that Floyd | Achilles has streaked (in every sense of the word) off in front of Floyd | you, and is already nearly at the finish line. Oh, well. At least you Floyd | tried. Floyd | Floyd | Achilles loops around the flagpole and jogs back to you. Soon he's Floyd | bouncing up and down at your side, jiggling in a disconcerting way. Floyd | "Come on!" he says. "You're halfway there!" Floyd | Floyd | At this stage, you don't think your brain can possibly cope with Floyd | issuing any instructions other than GIVE UP or KEEP RUNNING. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "throw banana" | ||||
Floyd | At this stage, you don't think your brain can possibly cope with Floyd | issuing any instructions other than GIVE UP or KEEP RUNNING. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "give up" | ||||
Floyd | You tumble into a heap on the ground, utterly exhausted. Achilles lets Floyd | out a sympathetic groan and picks you up bodily, throwing you over his Floyd | shoulder, before jogging leisurely back to Zeno at the start line. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "throw banana" | ||||
Floyd | When you come to from your exhausted stupor, you see the two Greeks Floyd | bending over you, concerned. Achilles (mercifully back in his toga) Floyd | puts an amphora of wine to your lips, which you splutter away at, Floyd | sitting up sharply. Floyd | Floyd | "A brave attempt, young adventurer!" says Zeno. "And, philosophically Floyd | speaking, very interesting, yes, very interesting indeed . . ." He Floyd | tails off again, and as you pick yourself up, Achilles looks at you Floyd | regretfully. Floyd | | ||||
| gjnave says, " maybe drop banana" | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "drop banana" | ||||
Floyd | Dropped. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "talk to achilles" | ||||
Floyd | Achilles blushes when you address him directly, and drags his foot in Floyd | the sand. "You should talk to Mister Zeno," he says. Floyd | Floyd | [1] Ah, Zeno? Hello? Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | "What? Oh! Oh, it's you. Fancy another race then, do you?" Floyd | Floyd | [1] Nah, thanks, I'd only get thrashed again. Floyd | [2] I haven't a chance unless you give me a head start! Floyd | [3] Yeah, I think I could give it another shot. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "2" | ||||
Floyd | "Oh no, I'm afraid that would foul all the calculations. We'd only Floyd | need one of those to compensate for some flaw or other in the race Floyd | track -- and just look at it! Aren't those lanes perfect? Can you Floyd | manage without?" Floyd | Floyd | [1] Hmm . . . nah, I'll pass this time. Floyd | [2] Well, alright, I'll still give it another go. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "2" | ||||
Floyd | "Splendid! Bravo! Well, then, you two had better get ready!" Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "run" | ||||
Floyd | You're standing at the start line, stripped to your underwear. You Floyd | made that much of a compromise with the two Greeks. Achilles, Floyd | limbering up next to you, was not so modest. You feel like your Floyd | eyeballs are being dragged on strings, downwards and sideways . . . Floyd | You look away, blushing furiously, and crouch down, set, the aching Floyd | vision of school P.E. lessons mugging you in memory alley. Floyd | Floyd | When Zeno shouts the go, there's a moment of blurred confusion as you Floyd | both launch off. Your mind can't manage any complicated tasks, like Floyd | managing sensory apparatus, when it's pumping your arms and legs this Floyd | hard. When the mess of sensations starts to coalesce, you realise that Floyd | Achilles has streaked (in every sense of the word) off in front of Floyd | you, and is already nearly at the finish line. Oh, well. At least you Floyd | tried. Floyd | Floyd | Achilles loops around the flagpole and jogs back to you. Soon he's Floyd | bouncing up and down at your side, jiggling in a disconcerting way. Floyd | "Come on!" he says. "You're halfway there!" Floyd | Floyd | At this stage, you don't think your brain can possibly cope with Floyd | issuing any instructions other than GIVE UP or KEEP RUNNING. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "keep running" | ||||
Floyd | You plummet onwards down the track, Achilles keeping pace beside you. Floyd | Floyd | "Only 1/4 a millos to go! Keep it up!" Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "again" | ||||
Floyd | You plummet onwards down the track, Achilles keeping pace beside you. Floyd | Floyd | "Only 1/8 a millos to go! Keep it up!" Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "again" | ||||
Floyd | You plummet onwards down the track, Achilles keeping pace beside you. Floyd | Floyd | "Only 1/16 a millos to go! That's nearly there!" Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "kick achilles" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "hit achilles" | ||||
Floyd | At this stage, you don't think your brain can possibly cope with Floyd | issuing any instructions other than GIVE UP or KEEP RUNNING. Floyd | | ||||
| inky says (to Floyd), "eat banana" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | smartgenes says, "i dropped it" | |||
| DavidW says, "The slippery peel gag only really works with a banana peel, not a full banana." | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "keep running" | ||||
Floyd | You plummet onwards down the track, Achilles keeping pace beside you. Floyd | Floyd | "Only 1/32 a millos to go! You can do it!" Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "again" | ||||
Floyd | You plummet onwards down the track, Achilles keeping pace beside you. Floyd | Floyd | "Only 1/64 a millos to go! Keep it up!" Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "again" | ||||
Floyd | You plummet onwards down the track, Achilles keeping pace beside you. Floyd | Floyd | "Only 1/128 a millos to go! That's nearly there!" Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "again" | ||||
Floyd | You plummet onwards down the track, Achilles keeping pace beside you. Floyd | Floyd | "Only 1/256 a millos to go! Don't want to give up, do you?" Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "again" | ||||
Floyd | You plummet onwards down the track, Achilles keeping pace beside you. Floyd | Floyd | "Only 1/512 a millos to go! Don't want to give up, do you?" Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "again" | ||||
Floyd | You plummet onwards down the track, Achilles keeping pace beside you. Floyd | Floyd | "Only 1/1024 a millos to go! You won't give up now, will you?" Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "again" | ||||
Floyd | You plummet onwards down the track, Achilles keeping pace beside you. Floyd | Floyd | "Only 1/2048 a millos to go! Surely you can keep going?" Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "again" | ||||
Floyd | You plummet onwards down the track, Achilles keeping pace beside you. Floyd | Floyd | "Only 1/4096 a millos to go! Surely you can keep going?" Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "again" | ||||
Floyd | You plummet onwards down the track, Achilles keeping pace beside you. Floyd | Floyd | "Only 1/8192 a millos to go! You can do it!" Floyd | Floyd | You tumble into a heap on the ground, utterly exhausted. Achilles lets | ||||
| inky says (to Floyd), "eat banana" | ||||
Floyd | out a sympathetic groan and picks you up bodily, throwing you over his Floyd | shoulder, before jogging leisurely back to Zeno at the start line. Floyd | Floyd | When you come to from your exhausted stupor, you see the two Greeks Floyd | bending over you, concerned. Achilles (mercifully back in his toga) Floyd | puts an amphora of wine to your lips, which you splutter away at, Floyd | sitting up sharply. Floyd | Floyd | "A brave attempt, young adventurer!" says Zeno. "And, philosophically Floyd | speaking, very interesting, yes, very interesting indeed . . ." He Floyd | tails off again, and as you pick yourself up, Achilles looks at you Floyd | regretfully. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "eat banana" | ||||
Floyd | (first taking the banana) Floyd | You're not particularly hungry. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "give banana to achilles" | ||||
Floyd | Achilles doesn't seem interested. Floyd | | DavidW says, "Take the banana to the barbershop and dye it another colour." | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "e" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Black Tarmac Road Floyd | You're on a road by the squat concrete hut that contains the Chinese Floyd | Room. In smooth black tarmac, neatly painted with white lines, the Floyd | road stretches north to the village in peculiarly perfect tapering Floyd | perspective. Behind you, to the south, you see the road lead towards Floyd | some queer-looking hedgerows at the base of the crag. To the east, as Floyd | before, stretch the plains to the horizon, with the ocean, behind sand Floyd | dunes, doing likewise to the west. Floyd | Floyd | The remains of a scarecrow droop on a pole here. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "n" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Village Street Floyd | A church, a theatre, a tavern, a barbershop, a pavement caf? -- their Floyd | various changing forms clutter around, entrances facing out onto what Floyd | seems (most of the time) to be an ordinary village street. Passers-by Floyd | duck in and out of the buildings, stop by the water pump, or carry on Floyd | to a square to the north. No-one, you notice, takes the road south -- Floyd | or heads along the routes east towards the storybook hills or west Floyd | into the fairytale woods. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "go barbershop" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Barbershop Floyd | The barber is still here, snipping away happily at his bald client. Floyd | You sit on the bench next to the stand of dye, waiting. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "talk to barber" | ||||
Floyd | He studiously ignores you, humming louder whenever you open your mouth Floyd | to speak. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "look under bench" | ||||
Floyd | You find nothing of interest. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x bench" | ||||
Floyd | Solidly wooden, and relatively unvandalised. Somebody wants to inform Floyd | you that Friedrich hearts Lou, though. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "look behind bench" | ||||
Floyd | You find nothing of interest. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "x dye" | ||||
Floyd | Which do you mean, the phial of red dye or the phial of white dye? Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x hair" | ||||
Floyd | Ah hair. Hair hair hair. Long, beautiful hair, shining, gleaming, Floyd | streaming, streaming, flaxen, waxen . . . Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "dye banana red" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "put red dye on banana" | ||||
Floyd | You need to be holding the phial of red dye before you can put it on Floyd | top of something else. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "take red dye" | ||||
Floyd | The barber winks at you, "One per customer. If you change your mind Floyd | put one back on the stand and take another. Floyd | | smartgenes says, "ah and then give it to Mary" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "dye banana" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | DavidW says, "hm. I guess we can't use these dyes since we took the black one." | |||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "put banana in red dye" | ||||
Floyd | This sort of dye involves powder and ammonia and would be a big hassle Floyd | to use on a banana. Surely there's a simpler way. Floyd | | ||||
| gjnave says (to floyd), "pour dye on banana" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "put banana in white dye" | ||||
Floyd | This sort of dye involves powder and ammonia and would be a big hassle Floyd | to use on a banana. Surely there's a simpler way. Floyd | | smartgenes says, "it's been a fairly generous game so i don't think we've done anything irrevocable" | |||
| gjnave says (to floyd), "open dye" | ||||
Floyd | Which do you mean, the phial of red dye or the phial of white dye? Floyd | | DavidW says, "oh, the inkwell" | |||
| gjnave says (to floyd), "red" | ||||
Floyd | That's not something you can open. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "s" | ||||
Floyd | You channel your will to power to summon a path in that direction. Floyd | Sadly, nothing happens: you can't go that way. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "out" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Village Street Floyd | A church, a theatre, a tavern, a barbershop, a pavement caf? -- their Floyd | various changing forms clutter around, entrances facing out onto what Floyd | seems (most of the time) to be an ordinary village street. Passers-by Floyd | duck in and out of the buildings, stop by the water pump, or carry on Floyd | to a square to the north. No-one, you notice, takes the road south -- Floyd | or heads along the routes east towards the storybook hills or west Floyd | into the fairytale woods. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "n" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Square Floyd | The square seems somehow madder now the madman has left. Floyd | Floyd | This appears to be the academic quarter of the village, and so may in Floyd | fact be a quadrangle, which is awfully exciting. You know it's the Floyd | academic quarter, because the grass is covered with sprawling young Floyd | people wearing brightly coloured clothes, dreadlocks, and organic Floyd | deodorant. Architecturally and geographically speaking, the buildings Floyd | look like they were placed there by a commitee of village planners Floyd | whose equipment budget stretched only so far as a compass. Three sides Floyd | of the square are complemented by a museum, research institute and a Floyd | library, to the west, north and east respectively. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "e" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Philosophy Library Floyd | This is simply a square, book-lined room equipped with a borrowing Floyd | counter, behind which stands a bored-looking librarian, and a few old Floyd | desks. At one of these Karl Marx sits, writing furiously. Floyd | | DavidW says, "We can try dipping the banana in the librarian's inkwell when s/he's getting our tome." | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "talk to librarian" | ||||
Floyd | The librarian spots you and says, "What do you want this time?" Floyd | Floyd | [1] Still got no Plato I can read? Floyd | [2] Er, I was wondering if, maybe, you could see your way to getting Floyd | that Encyclopaedia for me again? Floyd | [3] Oh, nothing. I just wanted to annoy you, actually. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | The librarian shakes h/er head sullenly. Floyd | | smartgenes says, "even though we gave her Plato" | |||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "talk to librarian" | ||||
Floyd | The librarian spots you and says, "What do you want this time?" Floyd | Floyd | [1] Still got no Plato I can read? Floyd | [2] Er, I was wondering if, maybe, you could see your way to getting Floyd | that Encyclopaedia for me again? Floyd | [3] Oh, nothing. I just wanted to annoy you, actually. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "2" | ||||
Floyd | The librarian glares at you, but heads off to the shelves to fetch the Floyd | book. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "put banana in inkwell" | ||||
Floyd | You dip one end into the inkwell, and then the other end. It's messy, Floyd | but the result is a rather handsome blue banana. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "w" | ||||
Floyd | You're still waiting for that book. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "x banana" | ||||
Floyd | Bent and blue, like a police officer. Floyd | Floyd | The librarian returns and hands the tome to you wordlessly, before Floyd | returning to h/er spot behind the counter. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "w" | ||||
Floyd | You already know the librarian won't let you leave while you've still Floyd | got that Encyclopaedia, so you hand it back to h/er before leaving. Floyd | Floyd | Square Floyd | The square seems somehow madder now the madman has left. Floyd | Floyd | This appears to be the academic quarter of the village, and so may in Floyd | fact be a quadrangle, which is awfully exciting. You know it's the Floyd | academic quarter, because the grass is covered with sprawling young Floyd | people wearing brightly coloured clothes, dreadlocks, and organic Floyd | deodorant. Architecturally and geographically speaking, the buildings Floyd | look like they were placed there by a commitee of village planners Floyd | whose equipment budget stretched only so far as a compass. Three sides Floyd | of the square are complemented by a museum, research institute and a Floyd | library, to the west, north and east respectively. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "n" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Research Institute Floyd | Inside, the Institute is as a marvel of the limits of both modernist Floyd | architecture and the persuasiveness of funding applications. The floor Floyd | of the entrance corridor is covered in sticky linoleum and the walls, Floyd | painted an unpleasant shade of grue, with damp health and safety Floyd | posters. Three doors lead off the corridor, to the north, east and Floyd | west, each with a hand-written notice. Floyd | | ||||
| Jizaboz arrives, full of neither funk nor fun. | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "n" | ||||
Floyd | There's a bloody furious cat in there -- an equally furious physicist Floyd | is trying to force it into a box and close the lid, but is getting Floyd | only bites and scratches for his troubles. You decide to leave them to Floyd | it. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "e" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Colour Lab Floyd | The lab is filled with all manner of scientific equipment. Monitors, Floyd | levers, dials and big red buttons cover the walls, while the room's Floyd | desk -- pushed against the computer stacks on the back wall -- has a Floyd | complicated-looking laptop-printer set-up perched somewhere in the Floyd | middle, surrounded by arcane assemblies of metal and glass, which Mary Floyd | is operating with feverish skill. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "give banana to mary" | ||||
Floyd | You flourish the blue banana in Mary's direction. She squints at it, Floyd | seeming a little confused. "There's something very odd about that Floyd | banana," she says. "I think it's blue. You'd better not eat it," she Floyd | counsels, motherly. Floyd | Floyd | "No," you say. "It's a perfectly ordinary yellow banana. Why don't you Floyd | take those goggles off and check?" Floyd | Floyd | "Well, if you're sure, dear, then I suppose I'd better," says Mary, Floyd | fiddling with the strap. "I must have made a mistake in my Floyd | calculations somewhere." Floyd | Floyd | Struggling with them a little, she pulls the goggles from her head. Floyd | Blinking, her jaw drops wide open, and she looks about herself in Floyd | wonderment. "Colours!" she whispers weakly, her knees buckling. "After Floyd | all this time . . . I never knew . . ." She lets out a small, Floyd | satisfied sound -- and faints on the spot. Floyd | Floyd | [Your score has just gone up by five points.] Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "talk to mary" | ||||
Floyd | Though as startled by you as ever, Mary greets you warmly. "Oh, hello Floyd | again, dear! Did you think of something else?" Floyd | Floyd | [1] Sorry, no. Still stuck. I'll leave you to it Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | "Oh, bye, dear," says Mary, turning back to her work. "Do come back if Floyd | you think of something else, or have something interesting to show Floyd | me." Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "take goggles" | ||||
Floyd | You really don't think you can muck about with the goggles -- Mary Floyd | seems very protective of them. If you want her to take them off, Floyd | you'll have to give her a very good reason to check out some colours. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "show tome to mary" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | DavidW asks, "wait, what did you do?" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "show encyclopedia to mary" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | smartgenes says, "just gave her the banana" | |||
| DavidW asks, "Did our progress get scuttled?" | ||||
| smartgenes says, "she fainted" | ||||
| DavidW says, "BUT you talked to her immediately afterwards!" | ||||
| DavidW says, "We need to undo that!" | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "undo" | ||||
Floyd | Colour Lab Floyd | [Previous turn undone.] Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "undo" | ||||
Floyd | Colour Lab Floyd | [Previous turn undone.] Floyd | | ||||
| gjnave waves his arms, rolls a poor lore check, and then disappears - 'oh cra..' | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "undo" | ||||
Floyd | Colour Lab Floyd | [Previous turn undone.] Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "undo" | ||||
Floyd | Colour Lab Floyd | [Previous turn undone.] Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "undo" | ||||
Floyd | Colour Lab Floyd | [Previous turn undone.] Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "get goggle" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "get goggles" | ||||
Floyd | You really don't think you can muck about with the goggles -- Mary Floyd | seems very protective of them. If you want her to take them off, Floyd | you'll have to give her a very good reason to check out some colours. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "undo" | ||||
Floyd | Colour Lab Floyd | [Previous turn undone.] Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "undo" | ||||
Floyd | Colour Lab Floyd | [Previous turn undone.] Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "undo" | ||||
Floyd | Colour Lab Floyd | [Previous turn undone.] Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "undo" | ||||
Floyd | Research Institute Floyd | [Previous turn undone.] Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "e" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Colour Lab Floyd | The lab is filled with all manner of scientific equipment. Monitors, Floyd | levers, dials and big red buttons cover the walls, while the room's Floyd | desk -- pushed against the computer stacks on the back wall -- has a Floyd | complicated-looking laptop-printer set-up perched somewhere in the Floyd | middle, surrounded by arcane assemblies of metal and glass, which Mary Floyd | is operating with feverish skill. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "give banana" | ||||
Floyd | (to Mary) Floyd | You flourish the blue banana in Mary's direction. She squints at it, Floyd | seeming a little confused. "There's something very odd about that Floyd | banana," she says. "I think it's blue. You'd better not eat it," she Floyd | counsels, motherly. Floyd | Floyd | "No," you say. "It's a perfectly ordinary yellow banana. Why don't you Floyd | take those goggles off and check?" Floyd | Floyd | "Well, if you're sure, dear, then I suppose I'd better," says Mary, Floyd | fiddling with the strap. "I must have made a mistake in my Floyd | calculations somewhere." Floyd | Floyd | Struggling with them a little, she pulls the goggles from her head. Floyd | Blinking, her jaw drops wide open, and she looks about herself in Floyd | wonderment. "Colours!" she whispers weakly, her knees buckling. "After Floyd | all this time . . . I never knew . . ." She lets out a small, Floyd | satisfied sound -- and faints on the spot. Floyd | Floyd | [Your score has just gone up by five points.] Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "get goggles" | ||||
Floyd | You really don't think you can muck about with the goggles -- Mary Floyd | seems very protective of them. If you want her to take them off, Floyd | you'll have to give her a very good reason to check out some colours. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x mary" | ||||
Floyd | Mary is lying prone on the floor, unconscious, with with a peculiar Floyd | smile playing about her lips. Floyd | | ||||
| gjnave arrives, full of fun and funk. | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "look" | ||||
Floyd | Colour Lab Floyd | The lab is filled with all manner of scientific equipment. Monitors, Floyd | levers, dials and big red buttons cover the walls, while the room's Floyd | desk -- pushed against the computer stacks on the back wall -- has a Floyd | complicated-looking laptop-printer set-up perched somewhere in the Floyd | middle, surrounded by arcane assemblies of metal and glass. Floyd | Floyd | Poor Mary is lying collapsed on the floor, though she seems not Floyd | unhappy about it.. Floyd | | DavidW says, "hm" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "wake mary" | ||||
Floyd | That seems unnecessary. Floyd | | inky says, "perhaps you can steal something from the lab" | |||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "SAVE" | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "cf9" | ||||
Floyd | Enter saved game to store: Ok. Floyd | | ||||
| inky says (to Floyd), "get laptop" | ||||
Floyd | Looking askance at the prone Mary, you regretfully snatch her laptop. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x laptop" | ||||
Floyd | It's a swanky computer with a built-in printer. Nice. Floyd | | inky says, "wosshisface can use that instead of a typewriter" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "use laptop" | ||||
Floyd | You've no time to muck about with computers. You're passing this on to Floyd | someone who needs it as quickly as possible, before electronic Floyd | entertainment serves as a distraction from the task at hand. You hate Floyd | it when people play games instead of doing important things. Floyd | | DavidW says, "Marx" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "w" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Research Institute Floyd | Inside, the Institute is as a marvel of the limits of both modernist Floyd | architecture and the persuasiveness of funding applications. The floor Floyd | of the entrance corridor is covered in sticky linoleum and the walls, Floyd | painted an unpleasant shade of grue, with damp health and safety Floyd | posters. Three doors lead off the corridor, to the north, east and Floyd | west, each with a hand-written notice. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "w" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Bat Lab Floyd | The laboratory is a brightly-lit white chamber, covered wall-to-wall Floyd | in cabinets, posters, and counters covered with disturbing-looking Floyd | instruments. A gigantic model of a bat hangs from the ceiling, Floyd | spinning around gently. A white-haired man is moving fitfully around Floyd | the room, grabbing instruments and examining diagrams, as he proceeds Floyd | to dissect a series of what look worryingly like tiny brains. He's Floyd | muttering something over and over again under his breath: "What is it Floyd | like?" it seems to be. "What is it like? What is it like?" Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "e" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Research Institute Floyd | Inside, the Institute is as a marvel of the limits of both modernist Floyd | architecture and the persuasiveness of funding applications. The floor Floyd | of the entrance corridor is covered in sticky linoleum and the walls, Floyd | painted an unpleasant shade of grue, with damp health and safety Floyd | posters. Three doors lead off the corridor, to the north, east and Floyd | west, each with a hand-written notice. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "s" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Square Floyd | The square seems somehow madder now the madman has left. Floyd | Floyd | This appears to be the academic quarter of the village, and so may in Floyd | fact be a quadrangle, which is awfully exciting. You know it's the Floyd | academic quarter, because the grass is covered with sprawling young Floyd | people wearing brightly coloured clothes, dreadlocks, and organic Floyd | deodorant. Architecturally and geographically speaking, the buildings Floyd | look like they were placed there by a commitee of village planners Floyd | whose equipment budget stretched only so far as a compass. Three sides Floyd | of the square are complemented by a museum, research institute and a Floyd | library, to the west, north and east respectively. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "e" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Philosophy Library Floyd | This is simply a square, book-lined room equipped with a borrowing Floyd | counter, behind which stands a bored-looking librarian, and a few old Floyd | desks. At one of these Karl Marx sits, writing furiously. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "give laptop to marx" | ||||
Floyd | You place the laptop on Marx's desk with a triumphant thunk. The old Floyd | man looks up at you. "Liebling!" he cries, breathless. "Not just a Floyd | typewriter, but a word processor capable of printing multiple copies! Floyd | This will not be forgotten after the revolution! In the meantime, Floyd | please take this precious copy Manifesto," he says, pressing the typed Floyd | manuscript into your hands, "and may it guide you to your unchaining!" Floyd | With these words he turns back to his work and begins typing Floyd | furiously. Floyd | Floyd | [Your score has just gone up by three points.] Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x manifesto" | ||||
Floyd | You flip to the back page. "You have nothing to lose but your chains"? Floyd | Fiery stuff; enough to rouse anyone from their dogmatic slumber. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "read manifesto" | ||||
Floyd | You flip to the back page. "You have nothing to lose but your chains"? Floyd | Fiery stuff; enough to rouse anyone from their dogmatic slumber. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "open manifesto" | ||||
Floyd | That's not something you can open. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "score" | ||||
Floyd | You have scored 41 out of a possible 100 in 746 turns. Jolly well Floyd | done. Floyd | | smartgenes says, "unchaining" | |||
| DavidW asks, "hm. I'm not sure who the manifesto would be for. The homunculi? Or someone we haven't met yet?" | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "w" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Square Floyd | The square seems somehow madder now the madman has left. Floyd | Floyd | This appears to be the academic quarter of the village, and so may in Floyd | fact be a quadrangle, which is awfully exciting. You know it's the Floyd | academic quarter, because the grass is covered with sprawling young Floyd | people wearing brightly coloured clothes, dreadlocks, and organic Floyd | deodorant. Architecturally and geographically speaking, the buildings Floyd | look like they were placed there by a commitee of village planners Floyd | whose equipment budget stretched only so far as a compass. Three sides Floyd | of the square are complemented by a museum, research institute and a Floyd | library, to the west, north and east respectively. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "s" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Village Street Floyd | A church, a theatre, a tavern, a barbershop, a pavement caf? -- their Floyd | various changing forms clutter around, entrances facing out onto what Floyd | seems (most of the time) to be an ordinary village street. Passers-by Floyd | duck in and out of the buildings, stop by the water pump, or carry on Floyd | to a square to the north. No-one, you notice, takes the road south -- Floyd | or heads along the routes east towards the storybook hills or west Floyd | into the fairytale woods. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "w" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Fairytale Woods Floyd | In the midst of the woods stand a Buddhist monk and a lumberjack Floyd | engaged in a heated discussion as to whether a tree falling down in a Floyd | forest makes a sound if nobody is around to hear it. Their debate is Floyd | punctuated by the occasional felling of a tree at the blade of the Floyd | lumberjack's axe. Floyd | Floyd | The woods become more sinister looking to the west and the village Floyd | street is back to the east. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "give manifesto to lumberjack" | ||||
Floyd | The lumberjack doesn't seem interested. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "give manifesto to monk" | ||||
Floyd | The Buddhist monk doesn't seem interested. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "e" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Village Street Floyd | A church, a theatre, a tavern, a barbershop, a pavement caf? -- their Floyd | various changing forms clutter around, entrances facing out onto what Floyd | seems (most of the time) to be an ordinary village street. Passers-by Floyd | duck in and out of the buildings, stop by the water pump, or carry on Floyd | to a square to the north. No-one, you notice, takes the road south -- Floyd | or heads along the routes east towards the storybook hills or west Floyd | into the fairytale woods. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "n" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Square Floyd | The square seems somehow madder now the madman has left. Floyd | Floyd | This appears to be the academic quarter of the village, and so may in Floyd | fact be a quadrangle, which is awfully exciting. You know it's the Floyd | academic quarter, because the grass is covered with sprawling young Floyd | people wearing brightly coloured clothes, dreadlocks, and organic Floyd | deodorant. Architecturally and geographically speaking, the buildings Floyd | look like they were placed there by a commitee of village planners Floyd | whose equipment budget stretched only so far as a compass. Three sides Floyd | of the square are complemented by a museum, research institute and a Floyd | library, to the west, north and east respectively. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "e" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Philosophy Library Floyd | This is simply a square, book-lined room equipped with a borrowing Floyd | counter, behind which stands a bored-looking librarian, and a few old Floyd | desks. At one of these Karl Marx sits, typing furiously. Floyd | | DavidW asks, "Did you try the cube with the lumberjack?" | |||
| DavidW says, "Damn you move quickly" | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "give manifesto to librarian" | ||||
Floyd | The librarian doesn't seem interested. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "w" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Square Floyd | The square seems somehow madder now the madman has left. Floyd | Floyd | This appears to be the academic quarter of the village, and so may in Floyd | fact be a quadrangle, which is awfully exciting. You know it's the Floyd | academic quarter, because the grass is covered with sprawling young Floyd | people wearing brightly coloured clothes, dreadlocks, and organic Floyd | deodorant. Architecturally and geographically speaking, the buildings Floyd | look like they were placed there by a commitee of village planners Floyd | whose equipment budget stretched only so far as a compass. Three sides Floyd | of the square are complemented by a museum, research institute and a Floyd | library, to the west, north and east respectively. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "s" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Village Street Floyd | A church, a theatre, a tavern, a barbershop, a pavement caf? -- their Floyd | various changing forms clutter around, entrances facing out onto what Floyd | seems (most of the time) to be an ordinary village street. Passers-by Floyd | duck in and out of the buildings, stop by the water pump, or carry on Floyd | to a square to the north. No-one, you notice, takes the road south -- Floyd | or heads along the routes east towards the storybook hills or west Floyd | into the fairytale woods. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "w" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Fairytale Woods Floyd | In the midst of the woods stand a Buddhist monk and a lumberjack Floyd | engaged in a heated discussion as to whether a tree falling down in a Floyd | forest makes a sound if nobody is around to hear it. Their debate is Floyd | punctuated by the occasional felling of a tree at the blade of the Floyd | lumberjack's axe. Floyd | Floyd | The woods become more sinister looking to the west and the village Floyd | street is back to the east. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "give cube to lumberjack" | ||||
Floyd | (first taking the Categorical Imperativator) Floyd | Philosophers are not yet supermen. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "take cube" | ||||
Floyd | Philosophers are not yet supermen. Floyd | | smartgenes says, "yeah i usually repeat LOOK and INVENTORY a lot.. but i cooled it down so as not to kill you" | |||
| DavidW says, "hm." | ||||
| djfletch says, "hah, give the manifesto to Ayn Rand" | ||||
| smartgenes says, "who is ayn rand" | ||||
| djfletch says, "although I don't think she was really implemented much" | ||||
| Alex says (to smartgenes), "Awwwk! Word on the street is that Ayn Rand is the creator of John Galt." | ||||
| DavidW says, "Ayn Rand wrote Atlas Shrugged." | ||||
| smartgenes says, "who is john galt" | ||||
| Alex says (to smartgenes), "Awwwk! Word on the street is that John Galt is an uncompromising objectivist (aka big fat jerk.)." | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "give cube to monk" | ||||
Floyd | (first taking the Categorical Imperativator) Floyd | Philosophers are not yet supermen. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x monk" | ||||
Floyd | From his bald head down to his plain sandals via his saffron robe, the Floyd | Buddhist monk is a walking Zen clich?. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "i" | ||||
Floyd | You are carrying: Floyd | a Communist Manifesto Floyd | a broken lantern Floyd | a sack (open) Floyd | a handkerchief Floyd | a qualiascope Floyd | a manual Floyd | file of Platonic forms Floyd | a useless scrap of paper Floyd | a Categorical Imperativator Floyd | a fifty pence piece Floyd | a lighter Floyd | a Chinese key Floyd | | DavidW says, "I'm not sure why we can't take the cube" | |||
| Doug says, "who is dagny taggart" | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "ttake imperativator" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "take imperativator" | ||||
Floyd | Philosophers are not yet supermen. Floyd | | Doug says, "aw, Alex didn't actually read the book I guess" | |||
| smartgenes says, "the categoricl imperative is "only act in a way that everybody would do ideally"" | ||||
| smartgenes says, "in so many words" | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "give qualiascope to monk" | ||||
Floyd | (first taking the qualiascope) Floyd | (putting the broken lantern into the sack to make room) Floyd | The Buddhist monk doesn't seem interested. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "give qualiascope to lumberjack" | ||||
Floyd | The lumberjack doesn't seem interested. Floyd | | smartgenes says, "we need something to light for the cave" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "light paper" | ||||
Floyd | This dangerous act would achieve little. Floyd | | DavidW says, "So, we're blocked with cave, lumberjack, race, and we haven't braved the maze yet." | |||
| inky says, "hmm" | ||||
| djfletch says, "I'm guessing the imperative is for the moral maze somehow" | ||||
| inky asks, "the manifesto is for someone sleeping, right?" | ||||
| inky says, "or maybe 'fiery'" | ||||
| smartgenes says, "lets try maze then" | ||||
| smartgenes says, "hey less hints" | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "e" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Village Street Floyd | A church, a theatre, a tavern, a barbershop, a pavement caf? -- their Floyd | various changing forms clutter around, entrances facing out onto what Floyd | seems (most of the time) to be an ordinary village street. Passers-by Floyd | duck in and out of the buildings, stop by the water pump, or carry on Floyd | to a square to the north. No-one, you notice, takes the road south -- Floyd | or heads along the routes east towards the storybook hills or west Floyd | into the fairytale woods. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "s" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Black Tarmac Road Floyd | You're on a road by the squat concrete hut that contains the Chinese Floyd | Room. In smooth black tarmac, neatly painted with white lines, the Floyd | road stretches north to the village in peculiarly perfect tapering Floyd | perspective. Behind you, to the south, you see the road lead towards Floyd | some queer-looking hedgerows at the base of the crag. To the east, as Floyd | before, stretch the plains to the horizon, with the ocean, behind sand Floyd | dunes, doing likewise to the west. Floyd | Floyd | The remains of a scarecrow droop on a pole here. Floyd | | inky says, "these aren't hints" | |||
| inky says, "I don't really remember much about the game" | ||||
| inky says, "I'm just going by what the text is saying" | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "x hedgerows" | ||||
Floyd | You can't tell from here, but it looks like the road turns into a Floyd | small path that in turn vanishes into some peculariarly cut hedges. Floyd | Curiouser and curiouser. Floyd | | smartgenes says, "well the last one about the eggs was a giveaway" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "s" | ||||
Floyd | Striking out south towards the castle, you soon realise what it is Floyd | that lurks so strangely at the base of the crag. As the rock looms Floyd | over you like ten tonne weight over a hapless clown, the road becomes Floyd | a pebbly path leading into what is clearly an enormous maze. Floyd | Floyd | Outside the Maze Floyd | You're standing at the entrance to a vast maze built of hedges that Floyd | tower six feet above you. The path seems extravagantly narrow, as if Floyd | the designer wanted to prepare the unwary adventurer from the outside. Floyd | Above the entrance is a painted wooden sign. It looks important. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "s" | ||||
Floyd | You step tentatively into the maze, looking askance at the lump of Floyd | lead. Approaching a moral dilemma, it starts whirring wildly, and Floyd | glowing cracks in the cube appear. It begins to unfold into an Floyd | astonishingly complex device -- an array of dishes and balances, with Floyd | an arrow mounted on top. With little else to do you follow the arrow Floyd | past the dilemma. And then past the next -- and the next. Moral Floyd | dilemmas seem not to be dilemmas at all before its power, and soon you Floyd | emerge from the maze, breathless, at the foot of the crag that looms Floyd | over this land. Floyd | Floyd | A winding path leads up the side of the crag, and you follow it, Floyd | huffing and puffing, until you reach the top. Here, looming Floyd | dangerously atop the already looming crag, sits a gigantic loom. No, a Floyd | gigantic castle -- you were confused for a minute there. Behind you, Floyd | this crazy world stretches out below. You take a deep breath. You Floyd | feel, somehow, that you are near your goal -- whatever that may be.. Floyd | Floyd | At the Foot of an Ivory Tower Floyd | You are in a paved courtyard before the castle. Here, true to form, an Floyd | ivory tower towers above you, the result of a billion poaching Floyd | expeditions or more. Similarly true, a guard guards the broad stairs Floyd | leading up to the tower. Floyd | Floyd | Below you is the vertiginous path down the side of the crag -- and Floyd | below that stretches the world. The strangest thing of all, however, Floyd | is the faint and ominous organ music on the periphery of your hearing. Floyd | Floyd | [Your score has just gone up by three points.] Floyd | | smartgenes says, "the weight was for the maze.." | |||
| DavidW says, "oh yay" | ||||
| smartgenes says, "why i'm not sure" | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "listen" | ||||
Floyd | You can't make out the tune, but it seems fairly ominous and, if not Floyd | penultimate, at least penpenpenpenultimate. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "w" | ||||
Floyd | You channel your will to power to summon a path in that direction. Floyd | Sadly, nothing happens: you can't go that way. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "e" | ||||
Floyd | You channel your will to power to summon a path in that direction. Floyd | Sadly, nothing happens: you can't go that way. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "s" | ||||
Floyd | You channel your will to power to summon a path in that direction. Floyd | Sadly, nothing happens: you can't go that way. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "up" | ||||
Floyd | You step up to the steps, whistling. The guard, clanking in her Floyd | armour, steps resolutely in front of you. Floyd | Floyd | "No!" she says, pre-empting the merry greeting you had planned. "I Floyd | shan't let you past. For I know that I am a guard and that guards Floyd | guard, and thus I will guard this tower from you. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "talk to guard" | ||||
Floyd | You step up to the steps, whistling. The guard, clanking in her Floyd | armour, steps resolutely in front of you. Floyd | Floyd | "Go away," says the guard. "If I'm assured anything, it's that I'm Floyd | assured of things and one thing I'm assured of is that I don't want Floyd | you to pass. This I'm sure of." Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "give manifesto to guard" | ||||
Floyd | The guard doesn't seem interested. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "give handkerchief to guard" | ||||
Floyd | (first taking the handkerchief) Floyd | (putting the Communist Manifesto into the sack to make room) Floyd | The guard doesn't seem interested. Floyd | | DavidW says, "oh, and we have a zombie to kill. And we never reentered the church." | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x guard" | ||||
Floyd | The guard is decked out from head to foot in an oversized suit of Floyd | armour, and is carrying an nasty-looking sword. The only part of the Floyd | guard you can see are a pair of sparkling blue eyes glowing with Floyd | righteous clarity. Floyd | | smartgenes says, "the zombie is killed with the axe" | |||
| DavidW says, "We're guessing that." | ||||
| smartgenes says, "gotten by solving that argument about the tree-sound" | ||||
| smartgenes says, "yeah, guesses" | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "n" | ||||
Floyd | You channel your will to power to summon a path in that direction. Floyd | Sadly, nothing happens: you can't go that way. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "d" | ||||
Floyd | You pick your way back down the crag, leaving that penultimate-looking Floyd | tower behind you. You're now able to make your way through the maze Floyd | with ease, and you're soon back on the other side. Floyd | Floyd | Outside the Maze Floyd | You're standing at the entrance to a vast maze built of hedges that Floyd | tower six feet above you. The path seems extravagantly narrow, as if Floyd | the designer wanted to prepare the unwary adventurer from the outside. Floyd | Above the entrance is a painted wooden sign. It looks important. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x hedges" | ||||
Floyd | Dark and daunting. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "n" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Black Tarmac Road Floyd | You're on a road by the squat concrete hut that contains the Chinese Floyd | Room. In smooth black tarmac, neatly painted with white lines, the Floyd | road stretches north to the village in peculiarly perfect tapering Floyd | perspective. Behind you, to the south, you see the road lead towards Floyd | some queer-looking hedgerows at the base of the crag. To the east, as Floyd | before, stretch the plains to the horizon, with the ocean, behind sand Floyd | dunes, doing likewise to the west. Floyd | Floyd | The remains of a scarecrow droop on a pole here. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "e" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | On the Edge of the Plains Floyd | The plains seem folornly empty now that the unicorn's non-existence Floyd | has been firmly proven. There is nothing here for you. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "e" | ||||
Floyd | The plains are too vast and empty for that to be a pleasurable walk. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "w" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Black Tarmac Road Floyd | You're on a road by the squat concrete hut that contains the Chinese Floyd | Room. In smooth black tarmac, neatly painted with white lines, the Floyd | road stretches north to the village in peculiarly perfect tapering Floyd | perspective. Behind you, to the south, you see the road lead towards Floyd | some queer-looking hedgerows at the base of the crag. To the east, as Floyd | before, stretch the plains to the horizon, with the ocean, behind sand Floyd | dunes, doing likewise to the west. Floyd | Floyd | The remains of a scarecrow droop on a pole here. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "lift pole" | ||||
Floyd | You must supply a second noun. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "put handkerchief on pole" | ||||
Floyd | Putting things on the pole would achieve nothing. Floyd | | DavidW asks, "Did you try the manifesto on the guard?" | |||
| smartgenes says, "i'm thinking a bit obtuse now" | ||||
| inky has had his fill of playing for now, and goes back to the Lounge. | smartgenes says, "yeah i did" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "n" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Village Street Floyd | A church, a theatre, a tavern, a barbershop, a pavement caf? -- their Floyd | various changing forms clutter around, entrances facing out onto what Floyd | seems (most of the time) to be an ordinary village street. Passers-by Floyd | duck in and out of the buildings, stop by the water pump, or carry on Floyd | to a square to the north. No-one, you notice, takes the road south -- Floyd | or heads along the routes east towards the storybook hills or west Floyd | into the fairytale woods. Floyd | | DavidW asks, "Try revisiting the church. Is the bride still there?" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "n" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Square Floyd | The square seems somehow madder now the madman has left. Floyd | Floyd | This appears to be the academic quarter of the village, and so may in Floyd | fact be a quadrangle, which is awfully exciting. You know it's the Floyd | academic quarter, because the grass is covered with sprawling young Floyd | people wearing brightly coloured clothes, dreadlocks, and organic Floyd | deodorant. Architecturally and geographically speaking, the buildings Floyd | look like they were placed there by a commitee of village planners Floyd | whose equipment budget stretched only so far as a compass. Three sides Floyd | of the square are complemented by a museum, research institute and a Floyd | library, to the west, north and east respectively. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "s" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Village Street Floyd | A church, a theatre, a tavern, a barbershop, a pavement caf? -- their Floyd | various changing forms clutter around, entrances facing out onto what Floyd | seems (most of the time) to be an ordinary village street. Passers-by Floyd | duck in and out of the buildings, stop by the water pump, or carry on Floyd | to a square to the north. No-one, you notice, takes the road south -- Floyd | or heads along the routes east towards the storybook hills or west Floyd | into the fairytale woods. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "go church" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Church Floyd | The church appears to have made up its mind about its own interior, Floyd | plumping for a simple majesty in stone and wood. As the door creaks Floyd | gracefully closed behind you, you survey your surroundings: the oak Floyd | pews lining the nave, the beautiful arched stone roof, the carved Floyd | pulpit at the head of the church and, behind it, an enormous tapestry Floyd | depicting -- nothing? Floyd | Floyd | In one of the pews a woman in full bridal gear sits, weeping to Floyd | herself. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x pews" | ||||
Floyd | Once imposing rows of oak seating, the effect has been somewhat Floyd | diminished by the hardy endeavours of bored worshippers equipped with Floyd | pocket-knives. The pews now provide an education of biblical Floyd | proportions for any inquisitve youngster in the arts of caricature, Floyd | aphorism and sex miseducation. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "talk to bride" | ||||
Floyd | You tap her lightly on the shoulder, and she dissolves into sobs at Floyd | your touch like a centuries-old skeleton into dust. Floyd | Floyd | [1] Er . . . are you OK? Floyd | [2] Um. Right. Sorry. I'll just . . . stand over here. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | She blows her nose very loudly on her veil and glares at you with Floyd | red-rimmed eyes. "What do you think?" she says. Floyd | Floyd | [1] Ah. Guess not. Sorry. I'll just . . . stand over here. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | She wails even louder at your departure. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x roof" | ||||
Floyd | Great stone arches support the vault, adorned with gargoyles depicting Floyd | various breeds of anthropomorphised shellfish. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "give hankerchief to bride" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "lift tapestry" | ||||
Floyd | You must supply a second noun. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "i" | ||||
Floyd | You are carrying: Floyd | a handkerchief Floyd | a qualiascope Floyd | a sack (open) Floyd | a Communist Manifesto Floyd | a broken lantern Floyd | a manual Floyd | file of Platonic forms Floyd | a useless scrap of paper Floyd | a Categorical Imperativator Floyd | a fifty pence piece Floyd | a lighter Floyd | a Chinese key Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x shellfish" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "give handkerchief to bride" | ||||
Floyd | The bride looks at your proferred hanky, at takes it gratefully. Floyd | Casting the soaked veil aside, she blows her nose with a foghorn Floyd | bellow and looks folornly at the altar. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "take veil" | ||||
Floyd | You pick up the veil and wring it out. On examining it, you realise Floyd | that the fine lacework spells out a word: Ignorance. Curiouser and Floyd | curiouser. Um. More curious. Floyd | | smartgenes says, "huh i thought u just tried that" | |||
| smartgenes says, "ah missed "d"" | ||||
| DavidW says, "I missed a 'd'." | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "x altar" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "talk to bride" | ||||
Floyd | After she's fully evacuated her nose into your hanky she hands it back Floyd | to you. You look at it, aghast at the vast quantities of snot therein. Floyd | Floyd | [1] That's OK. You can keep it. Floyd | [2] Best hold on to that. Better now? Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x ignorance" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "2" | ||||
Floyd | "A little," she says, in a very small voice, and proceeds to snort out Floyd | an even more prolific stream. Floyd | Floyd | [1] Well, that's good to hear. Do you think it would help to talk Floyd | about what's bothering you? Floyd | [2] Sweet. Glad to help. If you ever need a shoulder to cry on . . . Floyd | [3] Why the long face, anyway? Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "2" | ||||
Floyd | Immediately the bride grasps your shoulder and sobs into it, the Floyd | tearful torrent turning your clothes into a wet mush. Floyd | Floyd | [1] There, there. Floyd | [2] Right. Sure. Well, this shoulder's a bit wet now, so I think I'll Floyd | leave you with the hanky, OK? Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | You pat her awkwardly on the shoulder, and wait for the tears to dry Floyd | up. It takes a while. Then she sits up, takes a deep breath, and Floyd | begins: Floyd | Floyd | "We'd been engaged for months, and deeply in love for years before. Floyd | We'd prepared for today for weeks and weeks, and it was all meant to Floyd | be so -- so perfect. But I knew something was wrong. There's been Floyd | something wrong with him for a few days now. Ever since he picked up a Floyd | logic textbook. Floyd | Floyd | "He started to get this awkward look in his eyes when we talked about Floyd | the wedding. He'd dodge the subject. But he never said he'd do this! Floyd | Leave me standing at the altar like an unwanted pudding! Floyd | Floyd | "I waited for an hour. The guests all started to leave. His family Floyd | scarpered and mine chased after them. Then it was just me, when his Floyd | best man came and told me what had happened. Floyd | Floyd | "He'd realised he couldn't marry me. The book had told him. Decades of Floyd | the world's most pre-eminent philosophers have said it. He was a Floyd | bachelor. And all bachelors are unmarried men." Floyd | Floyd | The bride sighs, hiccups, and then, just as you think she's about to Floyd | recover, dissolves into another bout of sobbing. You decide that now Floyd | is probably the most tactful time to leave, and vow to be more Floyd | original in your logic examples in future. Floyd | Floyd | [Your score has just gone up by two points.] Floyd | | smartgenes says, "the puzzles are generally quite simple" | |||
| DavidW says, "I'm not sure what we did there." | ||||
| smartgenes says, "we comforted her" | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "l" | ||||
Floyd | Church Floyd | The church appears to have made up its mind about its own interior, Floyd | plumping for a simple majesty in stone and wood. As the door creaks Floyd | gracefully closed behind you, you survey your surroundings: the oak Floyd | pews lining the nave, the beautiful arched stone roof, the carved Floyd | pulpit at the head of the church and, behind it, an enormous tapestry Floyd | depicting -- nothing? Floyd | Floyd | In one of the pews a woman in full bridal gear sits, weeping to Floyd | herself. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x woman" | ||||
Floyd | She's like a very damp pile of meringues, and she's getting damper by Floyd | the second. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "talk to her" | ||||
Floyd | You don't think there's much you can do for her at the moment. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "x pulpit" | ||||
Floyd | An huge oak platform with an overarching sound-board; you imagine a Floyd | preacher could boom out from here. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "x sound-board" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "move pulpit" | ||||
Floyd | Philosophers are not yet supermen. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x door" | ||||
Floyd | The heavy wooden portal at the southwest end of the church leads back Floyd | to the village street. It's covered with some very peculiar carvings. Floyd | | ||||
| djfletch says (to Floyd), "get in pulpit" | ||||
Floyd | That's not something you can enter. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x carvings" | ||||
Floyd | These relief carvings appear to show a sequence of scenes from some Floyd | strange mythology. In the first, a nubile young woman is examining a Floyd | peculiar package laid under a tall tree. In the second, she is wearing Floyd | a short tartan skirt, a snappy blaze and pigtails, and a strapping Floyd | young lad is advancing on her rapidly. In the third, twelve men are Floyd | gathered, six holding hoes and six holding spears, while in the fourth Floyd | one of the spearmen is brutally attacking one of the hoemen. The Floyd | following scenes include floods, burning rains, lots of sex and Floyd | inumerable platypuses. Platypi. The usual myth-fodder. Floyd | | smartgenes says, "wow good job examined door maybe" | |||
| DavidW says, "uh, those carvings are weird" | ||||
| smartgenes says, "if it means anything" | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x package" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "push carvings" | ||||
Floyd | Philosophers are not yet supermen. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "search pulpit" | ||||
Floyd | You find nothing of interest. Floyd | | Jacqueline says, "Oh wow - still a-Floydin'" | |||
| DavidW says, "uh-huh" | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "pull tapestry" | ||||
Floyd | Philosophers are not yet supermen. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "enter tapestry" | ||||
Floyd | That's not something you can enter. Floyd | | DavidW says, "I apparently picked a long game again." | |||
| Jacqueline asks, "I shall not interject since I am just now here due to that event in town - but how's it going?" | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "score" | ||||
Floyd | You have scored 46 out of a possible 100 in 814 turns. Jolly well Floyd | done. Floyd | | DavidW says, "46 out of 100" | |||
| DavidW says, "(whimper)" | ||||
| smartgenes says, "it's taken time, but it has a lot of dialogue" | ||||
| smartgenes says, "and a lot of random-philosophy info" | ||||
| Jacqueline says, "Haha - I'm going to start saying that to other IFers when they ask how I'm doing. If it's a so-so day, I shall say, 'Oh, 46 out of 100'. If it's an awesome day, perhaps more like '46 out of 50.'" | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "s" | ||||
Floyd | You channel your will to power to summon a path in that direction. Floyd | Sadly, nothing happens: you can't go that way. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "out" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Village Street Floyd | A church, a theatre, a tavern, a barbershop, a pavement caf? -- their Floyd | various changing forms clutter around, entrances facing out onto what Floyd | seems (most of the time) to be an ordinary village street. Passers-by Floyd | duck in and out of the buildings, stop by the water pump, or carry on Floyd | to a square to the north. No-one, you notice, takes the road south -- Floyd | or heads along the routes east towards the storybook hills or west Floyd | into the fairytale woods. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "go theatre" | ||||
Floyd | You try the theatre doors, but they're fastened shut. A scrawled sign Floyd | by them says "Closed for rehearsals. New sensual extravaganzas coming Floyd | soon. Floyd | | djfletch says, "it doesn't seem like there could be that much more to do" | |||
| smartgenes says, "still closed" | ||||
| djfletch says, "but maybe it will open up new sections" | ||||
| DavidW says, "yeah, the theatre only gives the skull, I'm guessing." | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "knock on door" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "push door" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x door" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | ||||
| gjnave waves his arms, rolls a poor lore check, and then disappears - 'oh cra..' | smartgenes says, "ok.. a cave we need something to set light to.. a zombie prob killed by an axe, a dispte about a kkoan" | |||
| smartgenes says, "a man who wants to feel like a bat" | ||||
| DavidW says, "We have a lantern (but broken), a manifesto, an 'ignorance' veil, ..." | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "wear veil" | ||||
Floyd | You can't wear that! Floyd | | DavidW says, "oh yeah, bat guy." | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x vei" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x veil" | ||||
Floyd | It's a veil of ignorance, apparently. Floyd | | djfletch asks, "there was a sounding board above the pulpit - could that be something to do with the sound puzzle?" | |||
| smartgenes says, "a running competition" | ||||
| smartgenes says, "that's just a metaphor i think" | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "s" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Black Tarmac Road Floyd | You're on a road by the squat concrete hut that contains the Chinese Floyd | Room. In smooth black tarmac, neatly painted with white lines, the Floyd | road stretches north to the village in peculiarly perfect tapering Floyd | perspective. Behind you, to the south, you see the road lead towards Floyd | some queer-looking hedgerows at the base of the crag. To the east, as Floyd | before, stretch the plains to the horizon, with the ocean, behind sand Floyd | dunes, doing likewise to the west. Floyd | Floyd | The remains of a scarecrow droop on a pole here. Floyd | | DavidW says (to djf), "It didn't seem to be a real object." | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "w" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Beach Floyd | You're on the beach, where Zeno has set up a race track between the Floyd | dunes and the sea. Achilles is also here -- sans Tortoise. Floyd | Floyd | The road lies back to the east, while the dune where you found the Floyd | nest is northeast of here. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "e" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Black Tarmac Road Floyd | You're on a road by the squat concrete hut that contains the Chinese Floyd | Room. In smooth black tarmac, neatly painted with white lines, the Floyd | road stretches north to the village in peculiarly perfect tapering Floyd | perspective. Behind you, to the south, you see the road lead towards Floyd | some queer-looking hedgerows at the base of the crag. To the east, as Floyd | before, stretch the plains to the horizon, with the ocean, behind sand Floyd | dunes, doing likewise to the west. Floyd | Floyd | The remains of a scarecrow droop on a pole here. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "n" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Village Street Floyd | A church, a theatre, a tavern, a barbershop, a pavement caf? -- their Floyd | various changing forms clutter around, entrances facing out onto what Floyd | seems (most of the time) to be an ordinary village street. Passers-by Floyd | duck in and out of the buildings, stop by the water pump, or carry on Floyd | to a square to the north. No-one, you notice, takes the road south -- Floyd | or heads along the routes east towards the storybook hills or west Floyd | into the fairytale woods. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "w" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Fairytale Woods Floyd | In the midst of the woods stand a Buddhist monk and a lumberjack Floyd | engaged in a heated discussion as to whether a tree falling down in a Floyd | forest makes a sound if nobody is around to hear it. Their debate is Floyd | punctuated by the occasional felling of a tree at the blade of the Floyd | lumberjack's axe. Floyd | Floyd | The woods become more sinister looking to the west and the village Floyd | street is back to the east. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "give veil to lumberjack" | ||||
Floyd | The lumberjack doesn't seem interested. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "put veil on lumberjack" | ||||
Floyd | Putting things on the lumberjack would achieve nothing. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x lumberjack" | ||||
Floyd | The lumberjack is wearing a flannel shirt and heavy boots whilst Floyd | sporting a beard of revolutionary proportions and carrying an axe. She Floyd | looks like Paul Bunyan in minature. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "get axe" | ||||
Floyd | That seems to belong to the lumberjack. Floyd | | DavidW says, "I still think earplugs, wax, earmuffs, something like that." | |||
| smartgenes says, "didn't realise it was a female lumberjack" | ||||
| djfletch says, ""revolutionary"" | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "get axe" | ||||
Floyd | That seems to belong to the lumberjack. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "i" | ||||
Floyd | You are carrying: Floyd | a veil Floyd | a qualiascope Floyd | a sack (open) Floyd | a Communist Manifesto Floyd | a broken lantern Floyd | a manual Floyd | file of Platonic forms Floyd | a useless scrap of paper Floyd | a Categorical Imperativator Floyd | a fifty pence piece Floyd | a lighter Floyd | a Chinese key Floyd | | DavidW says, "Paula Bunyan" | |||
| djfletch says (to Floyd), "give manifesto to lumberjack" | ||||
Floyd | (first taking the Communist Manifesto) Floyd | (putting the qualiascope into the sack to make room) Floyd | The lumberjack doesn't seem interested. Floyd | | djfletch says, "ok, not a hint then" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "n" | ||||
Floyd | You channel your will to power to summon a path in that direction. Floyd | Sadly, nothing happens: you can't go that way. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "e" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Village Street Floyd | A church, a theatre, a tavern, a barbershop, a pavement caf? -- their Floyd | various changing forms clutter around, entrances facing out onto what Floyd | seems (most of the time) to be an ordinary village street. Passers-by Floyd | duck in and out of the buildings, stop by the water pump, or carry on Floyd | to a square to the north. No-one, you notice, takes the road south -- Floyd | or heads along the routes east towards the storybook hills or west Floyd | into the fairytale woods. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "n" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Square Floyd | The square seems somehow madder now the madman has left. Floyd | Floyd | This appears to be the academic quarter of the village, and so may in Floyd | fact be a quadrangle, which is awfully exciting. You know it's the Floyd | academic quarter, because the grass is covered with sprawling young Floyd | people wearing brightly coloured clothes, dreadlocks, and organic Floyd | deodorant. Architecturally and geographically speaking, the buildings Floyd | look like they were placed there by a commitee of village planners Floyd | whose equipment budget stretched only so far as a compass. Three sides Floyd | of the square are complemented by a museum, research institute and a Floyd | library, to the west, north and east respectively. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "n" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Research Institute Floyd | Inside, the Institute is as a marvel of the limits of both modernist Floyd | architecture and the persuasiveness of funding applications. The floor Floyd | of the entrance corridor is covered in sticky linoleum and the walls, Floyd | painted an unpleasant shade of grue, with damp health and safety Floyd | posters. Three doors lead off the corridor, to the north, east and Floyd | west, each with a hand-written notice. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "w" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Bat Lab Floyd | The laboratory is a brightly-lit white chamber, covered wall-to-wall Floyd | in cabinets, posters, and counters covered with disturbing-looking Floyd | instruments. A gigantic model of a bat hangs from the ceiling, Floyd | spinning around gently. A white-haired man is moving fitfully around Floyd | the room, grabbing instruments and examining diagrams, as he proceeds Floyd | to dissect a series of what look worryingly like tiny brains. He's Floyd | muttering something over and over again under his breath: "What is it Floyd | like?" it seems to be. "What is it like? What is it like?" Floyd | | DavidW asks, "oh, what if we gave the naturist thing to nature boy?" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x model" | ||||
Floyd | It's mouth gaping open and its glass eyes staring, this enormous model Floyd | of a bat frightens the life out of you. The fact that it's gently Floyd | turning round and round serves only to add a touch of psychopathic Floyd | absurdity. Floyd | | smartgenes asks, "nature boy?" | |||
| DavidW says, "A naked runner ought to enjoy an invite." | ||||
| DavidW says, "Give the paper to Achilles." | ||||
| smartgenes says, "what happened to the book from the library" | ||||
| DavidW says, "Librarian took it back." | ||||
| smartgenes says, "the one we never took out in the first place i suppose" | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "e" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Research Institute Floyd | Inside, the Institute is as a marvel of the limits of both modernist Floyd | architecture and the persuasiveness of funding applications. The floor Floyd | of the entrance corridor is covered in sticky linoleum and the walls, Floyd | painted an unpleasant shade of grue, with damp health and safety Floyd | posters. Three doors lead off the corridor, to the north, east and Floyd | west, each with a hand-written notice. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "s" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Square Floyd | The square seems somehow madder now the madman has left. Floyd | Floyd | This appears to be the academic quarter of the village, and so may in Floyd | fact be a quadrangle, which is awfully exciting. You know it's the Floyd | academic quarter, because the grass is covered with sprawling young Floyd | people wearing brightly coloured clothes, dreadlocks, and organic Floyd | deodorant. Architecturally and geographically speaking, the buildings Floyd | look like they were placed there by a commitee of village planners Floyd | whose equipment budget stretched only so far as a compass. Three sides Floyd | of the square are complemented by a museum, research institute and a Floyd | library, to the west, north and east respectively. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "w" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Museum Floyd | The Odditorium is filled with a crazy array of philosophical exhibits. Floyd | The steward is giving the ship's hull a light dusting. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "e" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Square Floyd | The square seems somehow madder now the madman has left. Floyd | Floyd | This appears to be the academic quarter of the village, and so may in Floyd | fact be a quadrangle, which is awfully exciting. You know it's the Floyd | academic quarter, because the grass is covered with sprawling young Floyd | people wearing brightly coloured clothes, dreadlocks, and organic Floyd | deodorant. Architecturally and geographically speaking, the buildings Floyd | look like they were placed there by a commitee of village planners Floyd | whose equipment budget stretched only so far as a compass. Three sides Floyd | of the square are complemented by a museum, research institute and a Floyd | library, to the west, north and east respectively. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "w" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Museum Floyd | The Odditorium is filled with a crazy array of philosophical exhibits. Floyd | The steward is giving the ship's hull a light dusting. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "give cube to steward" | ||||
Floyd | (first taking the Categorical Imperativator) Floyd | Philosophers are not yet supermen. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "give cube to steward" | ||||
Floyd | (first taking the Categorical Imperativator) Floyd | Philosophers are not yet supermen. Floyd | | DavidW says, "We can't give the cube to anyone." | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "e" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Square Floyd | The square seems somehow madder now the madman has left. Floyd | Floyd | This appears to be the academic quarter of the village, and so may in Floyd | fact be a quadrangle, which is awfully exciting. You know it's the Floyd | academic quarter, because the grass is covered with sprawling young Floyd | people wearing brightly coloured clothes, dreadlocks, and organic Floyd | deodorant. Architecturally and geographically speaking, the buildings Floyd | look like they were placed there by a commitee of village planners Floyd | whose equipment budget stretched only so far as a compass. Three sides Floyd | of the square are complemented by a museum, research institute and a Floyd | library, to the west, north and east respectively. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "s" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Village Street Floyd | A church, a theatre, a tavern, a barbershop, a pavement caf? -- their Floyd | various changing forms clutter around, entrances facing out onto what Floyd | seems (most of the time) to be an ordinary village street. Passers-by Floyd | duck in and out of the buildings, stop by the water pump, or carry on Floyd | to a square to the north. No-one, you notice, takes the road south -- Floyd | or heads along the routes east towards the storybook hills or west Floyd | into the fairytale woods. Floyd | | smartgenes says, "i thought that we could swap it for 2 other objects" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "s" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Black Tarmac Road Floyd | You're on a road by the squat concrete hut that contains the Chinese Floyd | Room. In smooth black tarmac, neatly painted with white lines, the Floyd | road stretches north to the village in peculiarly perfect tapering Floyd | perspective. Behind you, to the south, you see the road lead towards Floyd | some queer-looking hedgerows at the base of the crag. To the east, as Floyd | before, stretch the plains to the horizon, with the ocean, behind sand Floyd | dunes, doing likewise to the west. Floyd | Floyd | The remains of a scarecrow droop on a pole here. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "w" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Beach Floyd | You're on the beach, where Zeno has set up a race track between the Floyd | dunes and the sea. Achilles is also here -- sans Tortoise. Floyd | Floyd | The road lies back to the east, while the dune where you found the Floyd | nest is northeast of here. Floyd | | DavidW says, "Maybe 'swap' has to be used." | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "give notice to achilles" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "i" | ||||
Floyd | You are carrying: Floyd | a Communist Manifesto Floyd | a veil Floyd | a sack (open) Floyd | a qualiascope Floyd | a broken lantern Floyd | a manual Floyd | file of Platonic forms Floyd | a useless scrap of paper Floyd | a Categorical Imperativator Floyd | a fifty pence piece Floyd | a lighter Floyd | a Chinese key Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "give paper to achilles" | ||||
Floyd | You can only do that to something animate. Floyd | | smartgenes says, "it does say it's useless" | |||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "take paper" | ||||
Floyd | (putting the veil into the sack to make room) Floyd | Taken. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "x paper" | ||||
Floyd | Scrawled upon a scrap of paper is: "COME TO THE STATE OF NATURIST CAMP Floyd | -- NASTY BRUTISH FUN FOR ALL!!!" Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "give paper to Achilles" | ||||
Floyd | You can only do that to something animate. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "l" | ||||
Floyd | Beach Floyd | You're on the beach, where Zeno has set up a race track between the Floyd | dunes and the sea. Achilles is also here -- sans Tortoise. Floyd | Floyd | The road lies back to the east, while the dune where you found the Floyd | nest is northeast of here. Floyd | | DavidW asks, "How can Achilles not be animate?" | |||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "show paper to achilles" | ||||
Floyd | You can only do that to something animate. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "talk to achilles" | ||||
Floyd | Achilles blushes when you address him directly, and drags his foot in Floyd | the sand. "You should talk to Mister Zeno," he says. Floyd | Floyd | [1] Ah, Zeno? Hello? Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "give paper to zeno" | ||||
Floyd | You can only do that to something animate. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | "What? Oh! Oh, it's you. Fancy another race then, do you?" Floyd | Floyd | [1] Nah, thanks, I'd only get thrashed again. Floyd | [2] I haven't a chance unless you give me a head start! Floyd | [3] Yeah, I think I could give it another shot. Floyd | | DavidW says, "bother" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | "Oh dear. Well, do drop by again if you change your mind." Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "talk to zeno" | ||||
Floyd | "What? Oh! Oh, it's you. Fancy another race then, do you?" Floyd | Floyd | [1] Nah, thanks, I'd only get thrashed again. Floyd | [2] I haven't a chance unless you give me a head start! Floyd | [3] Yeah, I think I could give it another shot. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | "Oh dear. Well, do drop by again if you change your mind." Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "look through qualiascope at achilles" | ||||
Floyd | That sounds like a terrific idea -- if only you had a qualiascope. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "x road" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "l" | ||||
Floyd | Beach Floyd | You're on the beach, where Zeno has set up a race track between the Floyd | dunes and the sea. Achilles is also here -- sans Tortoise. Floyd | Floyd | The road lies back to the east, while the dune where you found the Floyd | nest is northeast of here. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x lighter" | ||||
Floyd | It a bit old and creaky, but it gives a serviceable spark. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "x track" | ||||
Floyd | Little more than a few lines in the sand. There's one just by Achilles Floyd | and Zeno and the other terribly, terribly far (it seems) in the Floyd | distance. You can only tell where it is by the flag fluttering away Floyd | there. In between the two, long lines follow the steep curve of the Floyd | beach to mark out two lanes, outside and inside. As the beach takes a Floyd | steep curve for the length of the race track, the inside lane is Floyd | probably a little bit shorter than the outer. Floyd | | DavidW asks, "I think, can we swap lanes?" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "use inside lane" | ||||
Floyd | You'll have to specify how you want to use it. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "swap lane" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | DavidW says, "I mean, when the race starts." | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "talk to zeno" | ||||
Floyd | "What? Oh! Oh, it's you. Fancy another race then, do you?" Floyd | Floyd | [1] Nah, thanks, I'd only get thrashed again. Floyd | [2] Yeah, I think I could give it another shot. Floyd | [3] It's exhausting! Just how long is that track? Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "2" | ||||
Floyd | "Splendid! Bravo! Well, then, you two had better get ready!" Floyd | | DavidW says, "Instead of run, get in inside lane." | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "swap lane" | ||||
Floyd | You're standing at the start line, stripped to your underwear. You Floyd | made that much of a compromise with the two Greeks. Achilles, Floyd | limbering up next to you, was not so modest. You feel like your Floyd | eyeballs are being dragged on strings, downwards and sideways . . . Floyd | You look away, blushing furiously, and crouch down, set, the aching Floyd | vision of school P.E. lessons mugging you in memory alley. Floyd | Floyd | When Zeno shouts the go, there's a moment of blurred confusion as you Floyd | both launch off. Your mind can't manage any complicated tasks, like Floyd | managing sensory apparatus, when it's pumping your arms and legs this Floyd | hard. When the mess of sensations starts to coalesce, you realise that Floyd | Achilles has streaked (in every sense of the word) off in front of Floyd | you, and is already nearly at the finish line. Oh, well. At least you Floyd | tried. Floyd | Floyd | Achilles loops around the flagpole and jogs back to you. Soon he's Floyd | bouncing up and down at your side, jiggling in a disconcerting way. Floyd | "Come on!" he says. "You're halfway there!" Floyd | Floyd | At this stage, you don't think your brain can possibly cope with Floyd | issuing any instructions other than GIVE UP or KEEP RUNNING. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "swap lane" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "switch lane" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "take inside lane" | ||||
Floyd | I only understood you as far as wanting to take the inside. Floyd | | DavidW says, "you did it wrong" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "use inside lane" | ||||
Floyd | I only understood you as far as wanting to use the inside. Floyd | | DavidW says, "no" | |||
| DavidW says, "not like that and it's too late now." | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "give up" | ||||
Floyd | You tumble into a heap on the ground, utterly exhausted. Achilles lets Floyd | out a sympathetic groan and picks you up bodily, throwing you over his Floyd | shoulder, before jogging leisurely back to Zeno at the start line. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "talk to zeno" | ||||
Floyd | When you come to from your exhausted stupor, you see the two Greeks Floyd | bending over you, concerned. Achilles (mercifully back in his toga) Floyd | puts an amphora of wine to your lips, which you splutter away at, Floyd | sitting up sharply. Floyd | Floyd | "A brave attempt, young adventurer!" says Zeno. "And, philosophically Floyd | speaking, very interesting, yes, very interesting indeed . . ." He Floyd | tails off again, and as you pick yourself up, Achilles looks at you Floyd | regretfully. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "talk to zeno" | ||||
Floyd | "What? Oh! Oh, it's you. Fancy another race then, do you?" Floyd | Floyd | [1] Nah, thanks, I'd only get thrashed again. Floyd | [2] I haven't a chance unless you give me a head start! Floyd | [3] Yeah, I think I could give it another shot. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "3" | ||||
Floyd | "Splendid! Bravo! Well, then, you two had better get ready!" Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "get in inside lane" | ||||
Floyd | You're standing at the start line, stripped to your underwear. You Floyd | made that much of a compromise with the two Greeks. Achilles, Floyd | limbering up next to you, was not so modest. You feel like your Floyd | eyeballs are being dragged on strings, downwards and sideways . . . Floyd | You look away, blushing furiously, and crouch down, set, the aching Floyd | vision of school P.E. lessons mugging you in memory alley. Floyd | Floyd | When Zeno shouts the go, there's a moment of blurred confusion as you Floyd | both launch off. Your mind can't manage any complicated tasks, like Floyd | managing sensory apparatus, when it's pumping your arms and legs this Floyd | hard. When the mess of sensations starts to coalesce, you realise that Floyd | Achilles has streaked (in every sense of the word) off in front of Floyd | you, and is already nearly at the finish line. Oh, well. At least you Floyd | tried. Floyd | Floyd | Achilles loops around the flagpole and jogs back to you. Soon he's Floyd | bouncing up and down at your side, jiggling in a disconcerting way. Floyd | "Come on!" he says. "You're halfway there!" Floyd | Floyd | At this stage, you don't think your brain can possibly cope with Floyd | issuing any instructions other than GIVE UP or KEEP RUNNING. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "keep on running" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "keep running" | ||||
Floyd | You plummet onwards down the track, Achilles keeping pace beside you. Floyd | Floyd | "Only 1/4 a millos to go! You can do it!" Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "swap lane" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | DavidW says, "hm. I guess I did it wrong too." | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "switch lane" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "change lane" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | smartgenes says, "i don't think this is the answer" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "look" | ||||
Floyd | At this stage, you don't think your brain can possibly cope with Floyd | issuing any instructions other than GIVE UP or KEEP RUNNING. Floyd | | DavidW says, "Once the race starts, we can't switch lanes." | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "keep running" | ||||
Floyd | You plummet onwards down the track, Achilles keeping pace beside you. Floyd | Floyd | "Only 1/8 a millos to go! You can do it!" Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "look" | ||||
Floyd | At this stage, you don't think your brain can possibly cope with Floyd | issuing any instructions other than GIVE UP or KEEP RUNNING. Floyd | | DavidW says, "give up" | |||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "give up" | ||||
Floyd | You tumble into a heap on the ground, utterly exhausted. Achilles lets Floyd | out a sympathetic groan and picks you up bodily, throwing you over his Floyd | shoulder, before jogging leisurely back to Zeno at the start line. Floyd | | smartgenes says, "i think get inside would likely assume take-object" | |||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "x inside track" | ||||
Floyd | When you come to from your exhausted stupor, you see the two Greeks Floyd | bending over you, concerned. Achilles (mercifully back in his toga) Floyd | puts an amphora of wine to your lips, which you splutter away at, Floyd | sitting up sharply. Floyd | Floyd | "A brave attempt, young adventurer!" says Zeno. "And, philosophically Floyd | speaking, very interesting, yes, very interesting indeed . . ." He Floyd | tails off again, and as you pick yourself up, Achilles looks at you Floyd | regretfully. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "x inside track" | ||||
Floyd | Little more than a few lines in the sand. There's one just by Achilles Floyd | and Zeno and the other terribly, terribly far (it seems) in the Floyd | distance. You can only tell where it is by the flag fluttering away Floyd | there. In between the two, long lines follow the steep curve of the Floyd | beach to mark out two lanes, outside and inside. As the beach takes a Floyd | steep curve for the length of the race track, the inside lane is Floyd | probably a little bit shorter than the outer. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "x flag" | ||||
Floyd | It seems to be a simple red rectangle -- with a circular hole cut in Floyd | it? Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "x hole" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "steal flag" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "put veil on flag" | ||||
Floyd | You need to be holding the veil before you can put it on top of Floyd | something else. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "take flag" | ||||
Floyd | You can't reach it, and besides, there's no use for it anyway. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "hold veil" | ||||
Floyd | (putting the Communist Manifesto into the sack to make room) Floyd | You pick the veil up again. How tedious. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "put veil in flag" | ||||
Floyd | That can't contain things. Floyd | | smartgenes says, "i know it's miles inthe distance, but..." | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "put veil on flag" | ||||
Floyd | Putting things on the flag would achieve nothing. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x veil" | ||||
Floyd | It's a veil of ignorance, apparently. Floyd | | djfletch says, "it does seem like the lanes are significant, but I don't know what else you do with them" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "put veil on achilles" | ||||
Floyd | Putting things on Achilles would achieve nothing. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x lanes" | ||||
Floyd | Little more than a few lines in the sand. There's one just by Achilles Floyd | and Zeno and the other terribly, terribly far (it seems) in the Floyd | distance. You can only tell where it is by the flag fluttering away Floyd | there. In between the two, long lines follow the steep curve of the Floyd | beach to mark out two lanes, outside and inside. As the beach takes a Floyd | steep curve for the length of the race track, the inside lane is Floyd | probably a little bit shorter than the outer. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "x outside track" | ||||
Floyd | Little more than a few lines in the sand. There's one just by Achilles Floyd | and Zeno and the other terribly, terribly far (it seems) in the Floyd | distance. You can only tell where it is by the flag fluttering away Floyd | there. In between the two, long lines follow the steep curve of the Floyd | beach to mark out two lanes, outside and inside. As the beach takes a Floyd | steep curve for the length of the race track, the inside lane is Floyd | probably a little bit shorter than the outer. Floyd | | DavidW says, "It's not two different objects." | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "go inside lane" | ||||
Floyd | That's not something you can enter. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "stand on track" | ||||
Floyd | That's not something you can stand on. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "i" | ||||
Floyd | You are carrying: Floyd | a veil Floyd | a useless scrap of paper Floyd | a sack (open) Floyd | a Communist Manifesto Floyd | a qualiascope Floyd | a broken lantern Floyd | a manual Floyd | file of Platonic forms Floyd | a Categorical Imperativator Floyd | a fifty pence piece Floyd | a lighter Floyd | a Chinese key Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "talk to achilles" | ||||
Floyd | Achilles blushes when you address him directly, and drags his foot in Floyd | the sand. "You should talk to Mister Zeno," he says. Floyd | Floyd | [1] Ah, Zeno? Hello? Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | "What? Oh! Oh, it's you. Fancy another race then, do you?" Floyd | Floyd | [1] Nah, thanks, I'd only get thrashed again. Floyd | [2] I haven't a chance unless you give me a head start! Floyd | [3] Yeah, I think I could give it another shot. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "2" | ||||
Floyd | "Oh no, I'm afraid that would foul all the calculations. We'd only Floyd | need one of those to compensate for some flaw or other in the race Floyd | track -- and just look at it! Aren't those lanes perfect? Can you Floyd | manage without?" Floyd | Floyd | [1] Hmm . . . nah, I'll pass this time. Floyd | [2] Well, alright, I'll still give it another go. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "2" | ||||
Floyd | "Splendid! Bravo! Well, then, you two had better get ready!" Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "go inside lane" | ||||
Floyd | You're standing at the start line, stripped to your underwear. You Floyd | made that much of a compromise with the two Greeks. Achilles, Floyd | limbering up next to you, was not so modest. You feel like your Floyd | eyeballs are being dragged on strings, downwards and sideways . . . Floyd | You look away, blushing furiously, and crouch down, set, the aching Floyd | vision of school P.E. lessons mugging you in memory alley. Floyd | Floyd | When Zeno shouts the go, there's a moment of blurred confusion as you Floyd | both launch off. Your mind can't manage any complicated tasks, like Floyd | managing sensory apparatus, when it's pumping your arms and legs this Floyd | hard. When the mess of sensations starts to coalesce, you realise that Floyd | Achilles has streaked (in every sense of the word) off in front of Floyd | you, and is already nearly at the finish line. Oh, well. At least you Floyd | tried. Floyd | Floyd | Achilles loops around the flagpole and jogs back to you. Soon he's Floyd | bouncing up and down at your side, jiggling in a disconcerting way. Floyd | "Come on!" he says. "You're halfway there!" Floyd | Floyd | At this stage, you don't think your brain can possibly cope with Floyd | issuing any instructions other than GIVE UP or KEEP RUNNING. Floyd | | djfletch asks, "could we get that ruler and measure the lanes?" | |||
| DavidW says, "oh. That's a thought." | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "put veil on flagpole" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x flagpole" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | DavidW says, "I like that idea." | |||
| smartgenes says, "wasn't it the cube that she needed back though" | ||||
| smartgenes says, "as i tried to do that" | ||||
| DavidW says, "We didn't try 'swap' there." | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "keep running" | ||||
Floyd | You plummet onwards down the track, Achilles keeping pace beside you. Floyd | Floyd | "Only 1/4 a millos to go! Don't want to give up, do you?" Floyd | | DavidW says, "We tried 'give'." | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "put veil on achilles" | ||||
Floyd | At this stage, you don't think your brain can possibly cope with Floyd | issuing any instructions other than GIVE UP or KEEP RUNNING. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "move flagpole" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "trip achilles" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | DavidW says, "I think we should try to get the ruler. We need to fix the track." | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "give up" | ||||
Floyd | You tumble into a heap on the ground, utterly exhausted. Achilles lets Floyd | out a sympathetic groan and picks you up bodily, throwing you over his Floyd | shoulder, before jogging leisurely back to Zeno at the start line. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "e" | ||||
Floyd | When you come to from your exhausted stupor, you see the two Greeks Floyd | bending over you, concerned. Achilles (mercifully back in his toga) Floyd | puts an amphora of wine to your lips, which you splutter away at, Floyd | sitting up sharply. Floyd | Floyd | "A brave attempt, young adventurer!" says Zeno. "And, philosophically Floyd | speaking, very interesting, yes, very interesting indeed . . ." He Floyd | tails off again, and as you pick yourself up, Achilles looks at you Floyd | regretfully. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "e" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Black Tarmac Road Floyd | You're on a road by the squat concrete hut that contains the Chinese Floyd | Room. In smooth black tarmac, neatly painted with white lines, the Floyd | road stretches north to the village in peculiarly perfect tapering Floyd | perspective. Behind you, to the south, you see the road lead towards Floyd | some queer-looking hedgerows at the base of the crag. To the east, as Floyd | before, stretch the plains to the horizon, with the ocean, behind sand Floyd | dunes, doing likewise to the west. Floyd | Floyd | The remains of a scarecrow droop on a pole here. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "n" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Village Street Floyd | A church, a theatre, a tavern, a barbershop, a pavement caf? -- their Floyd | various changing forms clutter around, entrances facing out onto what Floyd | seems (most of the time) to be an ordinary village street. Passers-by Floyd | duck in and out of the buildings, stop by the water pump, or carry on Floyd | to a square to the north. No-one, you notice, takes the road south -- Floyd | or heads along the routes east towards the storybook hills or west Floyd | into the fairytale woods. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "n" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Square Floyd | The square seems somehow madder now the madman has left. Floyd | Floyd | This appears to be the academic quarter of the village, and so may in Floyd | fact be a quadrangle, which is awfully exciting. You know it's the Floyd | academic quarter, because the grass is covered with sprawling young Floyd | people wearing brightly coloured clothes, dreadlocks, and organic Floyd | deodorant. Architecturally and geographically speaking, the buildings Floyd | look like they were placed there by a commitee of village planners Floyd | whose equipment budget stretched only so far as a compass. Three sides Floyd | of the square are complemented by a museum, research institute and a Floyd | library, to the west, north and east respectively. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "w" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Museum Floyd | The Odditorium is filled with a crazy array of philosophical exhibits. Floyd | The steward is giving the ship's hull a light dusting. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x hull" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x chip" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x ship" | ||||
Floyd | The business end of a great ship is poking through the wall of the Floyd | museum, with a surprised-looking mermaid stuck on the pointy bit. It Floyd | might be a figurehead. The name on the prow is "Theseus". Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "talk to steward" | ||||
Floyd | You'd better not unless you can get that cube to return to her. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x mermaid" | ||||
Floyd | The figurehead has a very peculiar expression on her face. Well, you Floyd | would too if someone had carved you from wood and then shoved a ship Floyd | up you. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "return cube to steward" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "return cube" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "give cube to steward" | ||||
Floyd | (first taking the Categorical Imperativator) Floyd | Philosophers are not yet supermen. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "swap cube for ruler" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "hold cube" | ||||
Floyd | Philosophers are not yet supermen. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "trade cube for ruler" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "drop cube" | ||||
Floyd | (first taking the Categorical Imperativator from the sack) Floyd | Philosophers are not yet supermen. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x cube" | ||||
Floyd | It's a lead cube. That would seem to be it, though it feels rather Floyd | heavier than it should. Floyd | | ||||
| djfletch says (to Floyd), "x rule" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | ||||
| djfletch says (to Floyd), "x ruler" | ||||
Floyd | It's an exquisite measuring rule, that can apparently tell you the Floyd | most beautifully perfect action in any given situation. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "throw cube" | ||||
Floyd | (first taking the Categorical Imperativator from the sack) Floyd | Philosophers are not yet supermen. Floyd | | ||||
| djfletch says (to Floyd), "get ruler" | ||||
Floyd | Philosophers are not yet supermen. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "open cube" | ||||
Floyd | That's not something you can open. Floyd | | smartgenes asks, "is it too heavy to lift now?" | |||
| djfletch says (to Floyd), "i" | ||||
Floyd | You are carrying: Floyd | a veil Floyd | a useless scrap of paper Floyd | a sack (open) Floyd | a Communist Manifesto Floyd | a qualiascope Floyd | a broken lantern Floyd | a manual Floyd | file of Platonic forms Floyd | a Categorical Imperativator Floyd | a fifty pence piece Floyd | a lighter Floyd | a Chinese key Floyd | | DavidW says, "The cube's always been to heavy to take" | |||
| djfletch says (to Floyd), "drop sack" | ||||
Floyd | Dropped. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "empty sack" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | ||||
| djfletch says (to Floyd), "get ruler" | ||||
Floyd | Philosophers are not yet supermen. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "give imperativator to steward" | ||||
Floyd | (first taking the Categorical Imperativator) Floyd | Philosophers are not yet supermen. Floyd | | ||||
| djfletch says (to Floyd), "get sack" | ||||
Floyd | Taken. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "exchange cube" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "take cube from sack" | ||||
Floyd | Philosophers are not yet supermen. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "give cube to woman" | ||||
Floyd | (first taking the Categorical Imperativator) Floyd | Philosophers are not yet supermen. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "talk to woman" | ||||
Floyd | You'd better not unless you can get that cube to return to her. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "throw cube" | ||||
Floyd | (first taking the Categorical Imperativator from the sack) Floyd | Philosophers are not yet supermen. Floyd | | DavidW says, "I'm wondering if this breaks the game." | |||
| smartgenes says, "it says "get that cube to return to her"" | ||||
| smartgenes says, "as if it was alive.." | ||||
| DavidW says, "This might be a lethal bug." | ||||
| smartgenes says, "i assumed it was just bad grammar" | ||||
| djfletch asks, "you mean because it is in the sack and we can't get it back out?" | ||||
| DavidW says, "yeah. If we had it in our hands, we might be able to give it." | ||||
| smartgenes drops a slender woman with exquisite legs. | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "drop all" | ||||
Floyd | sack: Dropped. Floyd | veil: Dropped. Floyd | invitation to the state of naturist camp: Dropped. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "get cube" | ||||
Floyd | Philosophers are not yet supermen. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "i" | ||||
Floyd | You are carrying nothing. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "open sack" | ||||
Floyd | That's already open. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "get all except cube" | ||||
Floyd | invitation to the state of naturist camp: Taken. Floyd | veil: You pick the veil up again. How tedious. Floyd | sack: Taken. Floyd | shoelaces: Philosophers are not yet supermen. Floyd | exhibits: You doubt you could escape the museum with that. Floyd | Ship of Theseus: Philosophers are not yet supermen. Floyd | mermaid: Philosophers are not yet supermen. Floyd | pirate: Philosophers are not yet supermen. Floyd | steward: Philosophers are not yet supermen. Floyd | HallomynameisTracyhowmayIhelpyou: Philosophers are not yet supermen. Floyd | Golden Mean Ruler: Philosophers are not yet supermen. Floyd | Utility Calculator: Philosophers are not yet supermen. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "talk to pirate" | ||||
Floyd | "I've come up with an excellent name for your ship!" you cry. The pair Floyd | look at you inquisitively. Floyd | Floyd | [1] The Golden Behind! Floyd | [2] The Black Oyster! Floyd | [3] The Double Dutchman! Floyd | [4] The Sea Ape! Floyd | [5] The Peapod! Floyd | [6] The Slutty Park! Floyd | [7] Er . . . just joking. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "7" | ||||
Floyd | The pirate just blinks at you. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "get ruler" | ||||
Floyd | Philosophers are not yet supermen. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "swap ruler" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | Lionheart says, "I'd think the veil might be connected to Plato's cave, but I don't see how we'd use it there" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "get cube" | ||||
Floyd | Philosophers are not yet supermen. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "get categorical" | ||||
Floyd | Philosophers are not yet supermen. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x sack" | ||||
Floyd | A very large sack, still with a few strands of straw stuck in the Floyd | bottom. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "get straw" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "search straw" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "open cube" | ||||
Floyd | That's not something you can open. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "drop all" | ||||
Floyd | sack: Dropped. Floyd | veil: Dropped. Floyd | invitation to the state of naturist camp: Dropped. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "take cube" | ||||
Floyd | Philosophers are not yet supermen. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "take cube from sack" | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "hold cube" | ||||
Floyd | Philosophers are not yet supermen. Floyd | Floyd | Philosophers are not yet supermen. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "6" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | smartgenes says, "it may be that the other 2 objects were red herrings anyway" | |||
| DavidW says, "I don't know." | ||||
| smartgenes says, "we know that the cube definitely has a prpose as it mentioned it to get past the maze" | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "take sack, veil, paper" | ||||
Floyd | sack: Taken. Floyd | veil: You pick the veil up again. How tedious. Floyd | invitation to the state of naturist camp: Taken. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "get all" | ||||
Floyd | That's a bit greedy. Try taking specific things. Floyd | | djfletch says, "they would make sense as alternative moral things for the maze, so possible it wasn't a real choice" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "get sack" | ||||
Floyd | You already have that. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "l" | ||||
Floyd | Museum Floyd | The Odditorium is filled with a crazy array of philosophical exhibits. Floyd | The steward is giving the ship's hull a light dusting. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "e" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Square Floyd | The square seems somehow madder now the madman has left. Floyd | Floyd | This appears to be the academic quarter of the village, and so may in Floyd | fact be a quadrangle, which is awfully exciting. You know it's the Floyd | academic quarter, because the grass is covered with sprawling young Floyd | people wearing brightly coloured clothes, dreadlocks, and organic Floyd | deodorant. Architecturally and geographically speaking, the buildings Floyd | look like they were placed there by a commitee of village planners Floyd | whose equipment budget stretched only so far as a compass. Three sides Floyd | of the square are complemented by a museum, research institute and a Floyd | library, to the west, north and east respectively. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "n" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Research Institute Floyd | Inside, the Institute is as a marvel of the limits of both modernist Floyd | architecture and the persuasiveness of funding applications. The floor Floyd | of the entrance corridor is covered in sticky linoleum and the walls, Floyd | painted an unpleasant shade of grue, with damp health and safety Floyd | posters. Three doors lead off the corridor, to the north, east and Floyd | west, each with a hand-written notice. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "n" | ||||
Floyd | There's a bloody furious cat in there -- an equally furious physicist Floyd | is trying to force it into a box and close the lid, but is getting Floyd | only bites and scratches for his troubles. You decide to leave them to Floyd | it. Floyd | | smartgenes says, "sounds like our fury with the cube" | |||
| DavidW says, "I'm tempted to pump about achilles" | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "i" | ||||
Floyd | You are carrying: Floyd | a useless scrap of paper Floyd | a veil Floyd | a sack (open) Floyd | a Communist Manifesto Floyd | a qualiascope Floyd | a broken lantern Floyd | a manual Floyd | file of Platonic forms Floyd | a Categorical Imperativator Floyd | a fifty pence piece Floyd | a lighter Floyd | a Chinese key Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "w" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Bat Lab Floyd | The laboratory is a brightly-lit white chamber, covered wall-to-wall Floyd | in cabinets, posters, and counters covered with disturbing-looking Floyd | instruments. A gigantic model of a bat hangs from the ceiling, Floyd | spinning around gently. A white-haired man is moving fitfully around Floyd | the room, grabbing instruments and examining diagrams, as he proceeds Floyd | to dissect a series of what look worryingly like tiny brains. He's Floyd | muttering something over and over again under his breath: "What is it Floyd | like?" it seems to be. "What is it like? What is it like?" Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x cabinets" | ||||
Floyd | The cabinets are filled with all manner of bat-related paraphernalia: Floyd | bats preserved in formaldehyde, books on bat culture, packets of Floyd | crispy fried bat wings . . . Floyd | | DavidW asks, "Also, are there places we haven't visited yet?" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "get crispy wings" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "n" | ||||
Floyd | You channel your will to power to summon a path in that direction. Floyd | Sadly, nothing happens: you can't go that way. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "w" | ||||
Floyd | You channel your will to power to summon a path in that direction. Floyd | Sadly, nothing happens: you can't go that way. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x ceiling" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "push model" | ||||
Floyd | Philosophers are not yet supermen. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "spin model" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "i" | ||||
Floyd | You are carrying: Floyd | a useless scrap of paper Floyd | a veil Floyd | a sack (open) Floyd | a Communist Manifesto Floyd | a qualiascope Floyd | a broken lantern Floyd | a manual Floyd | file of Platonic forms Floyd | a Categorical Imperativator Floyd | a fifty pence piece Floyd | a lighter Floyd | a Chinese key Floyd | | djfletch says, "don't know of any other places, except getting into the ivory tower I suppose" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "give scope to man" | ||||
Floyd | (first taking the qualiascope) Floyd | (putting the veil into the sack to make room) Floyd | Nagel doesn't seem interested. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "show scope to man" | ||||
Floyd | Nagel seems to take no notice. Floyd | | DavidW asks, "Weren't there more than one way to go there?" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "look through scope at brains" | ||||
Floyd | The scene through the qualiascope is rendered in monochrone, Floyd | indicating a complete absence of consciousness. Floyd | | djfletch says, "hmm, not sure - worth checking" | |||
| DavidW says, "I thought there was down as well as up." | ||||
| smartgenes asks, "where at?" | ||||
| smartgenes asks, "the ladder?" | ||||
| DavidW says, "At the tower" | ||||
| DavidW says, "Down the crag or whatever." | ||||
| djfletch says, "through the maze, all the way south" | ||||
| smartgenes says, "there's a lot of guys in the tavern aswell" | ||||
| smartgenes says, "some women as well" | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "e" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Research Institute Floyd | Inside, the Institute is as a marvel of the limits of both modernist Floyd | architecture and the persuasiveness of funding applications. The floor Floyd | of the entrance corridor is covered in sticky linoleum and the walls, Floyd | painted an unpleasant shade of grue, with damp health and safety Floyd | posters. Three doors lead off the corridor, to the north, east and Floyd | west, each with a hand-written notice. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "s" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Square Floyd | The square seems somehow madder now the madman has left. Floyd | Floyd | This appears to be the academic quarter of the village, and so may in Floyd | fact be a quadrangle, which is awfully exciting. You know it's the Floyd | academic quarter, because the grass is covered with sprawling young Floyd | people wearing brightly coloured clothes, dreadlocks, and organic Floyd | deodorant. Architecturally and geographically speaking, the buildings Floyd | look like they were placed there by a commitee of village planners Floyd | whose equipment budget stretched only so far as a compass. Three sides Floyd | of the square are complemented by a museum, research institute and a Floyd | library, to the west, north and east respectively. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "s" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Village Street Floyd | A church, a theatre, a tavern, a barbershop, a pavement caf? -- their Floyd | various changing forms clutter around, entrances facing out onto what Floyd | seems (most of the time) to be an ordinary village street. Passers-by Floyd | duck in and out of the buildings, stop by the water pump, or carry on Floyd | to a square to the north. No-one, you notice, takes the road south -- Floyd | or heads along the routes east towards the storybook hills or west Floyd | into the fairytale woods. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "go tavern" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Tavern Floyd | A raucous rabble of eminent philosophers line the tables and bar, Floyd | discussing matters squifflily with slurred syllables and questionable Floyd | eloquence. You overhear Plato and Socrates brazenly investigating what Floyd | the correct pronunciation of the word scone is. The only one not Floyd | joining in seems to be Aristotle, who is sitting at a table in the Floyd | corner, drinking fine claret in a very satisfied manner. In the Floyd | eastern wall is the back door through which Mill threw himself Floyd | earlier. Floyd | Floyd | Somewhat incongruously, you spot an electronic games machine sitting Floyd | against the wall next to a rather glum looking booth, being rather Floyd | neglected by the roistering philosophers. Floyd | | djfletch says, "I think we tried talking to all the tavern people, but we might have missed some" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "look behind machine" | ||||
Floyd | You find nothing of interest. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "e" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Logicians' Alleyway Floyd | You wander through the back door into an alleyway and there amidst a Floyd | pile of broken truth tables and discarded copies of the Principia Floyd | Mathematica sit a sequiter of logicians, playing illegal logic games. Floyd | W.V.O. Quine seems to be the ring leader. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "get principia" | ||||
Floyd | Not while G?del's watching! Floyd | | DavidW says, "; hm. That games machine might still be relevant." | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "n" | ||||
Floyd | You channel your will to power to summon a path in that direction. Floyd | Sadly, nothing happens: you can't go that way. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "s" | ||||
Floyd | You channel your will to power to summon a path in that direction. Floyd | Sadly, nothing happens: you can't go that way. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x tables" | ||||
Floyd | Truth tables are chalked on the floor of the alleyway, achieving a Floyd | very sophisticated level of graffiti. Floyd | Floyd | You notice that Whitehead is in something of a sulk over a recent Floyd | piece of aggressive betting from Boole. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x quine" | ||||
Floyd | Wearing a battered trilby and a stained trench-coat, the logician Floyd | looks about himself shiftily as he monitors the racket of logic games. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "x whitehead" | ||||
Floyd | Playing games with coloured beads and cups amidst the truth tables sit Floyd | a shifty-looking bunch of logicians. You think you notice Turing and Floyd | Kripke pondering over vagueness, while G?del admits defeat. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "talk to whitehead" | ||||
Floyd | He seems too engrossed in his game to pay any attention. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "talk to boole" | ||||
Floyd | He seems too engrossed in his game to pay any attention. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "talk to turing" | ||||
Floyd | He seems too engrossed in his game to pay any attention. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "talk to quine" | ||||
Floyd | "Sorry, kid," Quine says, with a modicum of sincerity. "I'm fresh out Floyd | of prizes." Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "x principia" | ||||
Floyd | The copies of the Principia Mathematica are stacked in neat piles Floyd | --they are being put to use as make-shift seats. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "e" | ||||
Floyd | You channel your will to power to summon a path in that direction. Floyd | Sadly, nothing happens: you can't go that way. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "read principia" | ||||
Floyd | The copies of the Principia Mathematica are stacked in neat piles Floyd | --they are being put to use as make-shift seats. Floyd | | DavidW says, "The exist is west." | |||
| DavidW says, "exit" | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "w" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Tavern Floyd | A raucous rabble of eminent philosophers line the tables and bar, Floyd | discussing matters squifflily with slurred syllables and questionable Floyd | eloquence. You overhear Plato and Socrates childishly debating about Floyd | linguistic puzzles. The only one not joining in seems to be Aristotle, Floyd | who is sitting at a table in the corner, drinking fine claret in a Floyd | very satisfied manner. In the eastern wall is the back door through Floyd | which Mill threw himself earlier. Floyd | Floyd | Somewhat incongruously, you spot an electronic games machine sitting Floyd | against the wall next to a rather glum looking booth, being rather Floyd | neglected by the roistering philosophers. Floyd | | smartgenes asks, "where's the women?" | |||
| Alex says (to smartgenes), "Awwwk! Word on the street is that A women is a lady." | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "s" | ||||
Floyd | You channel your will to power to summon a path in that direction. Floyd | Sadly, nothing happens: you can't go that way. Floyd | | DavidW says, "in the booth" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "go door" | ||||
Floyd | That's not something you can enter. Floyd | | DavidW says, "You need to make the men notice the women." | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "talk to plato" | ||||
Floyd | Plato assures you that "no human thing is of serious importance", Floyd | before turning his attention to his drink once more. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "talk to socrates" | ||||
Floyd | He seems rather too far gone to cope with intelligible conversation -- Floyd | if indeed he ever was. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "talk to aristotle" | ||||
Floyd | "Aristotle looks mournfully at you. "Corked!" he cries, indicating the Floyd | claret. "The gods too are fond of a joke," he sighs, a tear in his Floyd | eye. You take the opportunity to tactfully remove yourself. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x machine" | ||||
Floyd | It's a brightly covered cabinet with "Karl Popper's FALSIFICATION Floyd | ADVENTURE" emblazoned on it above the screen. There's a joystick, a Floyd | button marked FIRE and a button marked START. You wonder what they Floyd | could possibly be for. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "press start" | ||||
Floyd | The last time you played left you only with a slight sense of regret Floyd | that a full interactive minigame didn't appear to have been Floyd | implemented in this thought experiment, so you decide not to play Floyd | again. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "push fire" | ||||
Floyd | (the fire place) Floyd | Philosophers are not yet supermen. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "push machine" | ||||
Floyd | Philosophers are not yet supermen. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "x fire place" | ||||
Floyd | The roaring fire is a pleasant backdrop to the unbridled drinking and Floyd | philosophising. Floyd | | smartgenes asks, "where's the booth?" | |||
| DavidW says, "here" | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "x booth" | ||||
Floyd | It's a dark and lonely corner of the tavern -- and you realise that, Floyd | while you'd previously thought it was empty, there's actually a group Floyd | of women sitting in it, staring melancholically into their drinks. One Floyd | of them, whom you suddenly recognise to be Elizabeth Anscombe, is Floyd | wearing a comic headband with two antennae on springs attached. Next Floyd | to her sits Emma Goldman, glaring fiercely across the table at an Floyd | equally glaring Ayn Rand, while the quartet is completed by Judith Floyd | Butler, who surveys the roistering men, making small tutting noises. Floyd | | DavidW says, "But they won't talk to you anymore." | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x headband" | ||||
Floyd | The kind of thing you'd expect people to wear onto a hen-night. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "give manifesto to anscombe" | ||||
Floyd | (first taking the Communist Manifesto) Floyd | (putting the invitation to the state of naturist camp into the sack to Floyd | make room) Floyd | Elizabeth Anscombe doesn't seem interested. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "give invitation to elizabeth" | ||||
Floyd | You can only do that to something animate. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "give invitation to anscombe" | ||||
Floyd | You can only do that to something animate. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "i" | ||||
Floyd | You are carrying: Floyd | a Communist Manifesto Floyd | a qualiascope Floyd | a sack (open) Floyd | a useless scrap of paper Floyd | a veil Floyd | a broken lantern Floyd | a manual Floyd | file of Platonic forms Floyd | a Categorical Imperativator Floyd | a fifty pence piece Floyd | a lighter Floyd | a Chinese key Floyd | | DavidW says, "It's a paper, not an invitation." | |||
| smartgenes says, "yeah i think they are no actually characters anyway" | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "give paper to elizabeth" | ||||
Floyd | You can only do that to something animate. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "give paper to anscombe" | ||||
Floyd | You can only do that to something animate. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "w" | ||||
Floyd | You channel your will to power to summon a path in that direction. Floyd | Sadly, nothing happens: you can't go that way. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "out" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Village Street Floyd | A church, a theatre, a tavern, a barbershop, a pavement caf? -- their Floyd | various changing forms clutter around, entrances facing out onto what Floyd | seems (most of the time) to be an ordinary village street. Passers-by Floyd | duck in and out of the buildings, stop by the water pump, or carry on Floyd | to a square to the north. No-one, you notice, takes the road south -- Floyd | or heads along the routes east towards the storybook hills or west Floyd | into the fairytale woods. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "enter caf" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "enter cafe" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Pavement Caf? Floyd | The caf? spills out into the street. Steel chairs are scattered around Floyd | the serving kiosk, apparently chaotically, though you suspect there's Floyd | a cynical art to it. Most of the customers are buried in books, Floyd | thimble-sized cups of black coffee steaming by them and handmade Floyd | cigarettes rolling around the corners of their mouths. Some of them, Floyd | though, are intense young couples clasping hands across their plates, Floyd | boring into each other's eyes as if looking for some flaw, breaking Floyd | the gaze only to toss hair or adjust a beret. Sitting in the corner, Floyd | Jean-Paul Sartre surveys the caf? around him and smiles in a satisfied Floyd | yet enigmatic way. Floyd | Floyd | The server stands behind the kiosk, chainsmoking and glaring Floyd | menacingly. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x server" | ||||
Floyd | She glares back at you as you admire her. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "talk to server" | ||||
Floyd | You think you know her well enough now. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "kiss server" | ||||
Floyd | Some would consider that an invasion of personal space. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "give veil to server" | ||||
Floyd | (first taking the veil) Floyd | (putting the qualiascope into the sack to make room) Floyd | You pick the veil up again. How tedious. Floyd | Floyd | The server doesn't seem interested. Floyd | | smartgenes exclaims, "you pick up the veil again.. how tedious!" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "give money to sartre" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | DavidW says, "I'm not sure what the 'how tedious' message is in aid of." | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "give coin to sartre" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "w" | ||||
Floyd | You channel your will to power to summon a path in that direction. Floyd | Sadly, nothing happens: you can't go that way. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "out" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Village Street Floyd | A church, a theatre, a tavern, a barbershop, a pavement caf? -- their Floyd | various changing forms clutter around, entrances facing out onto what Floyd | seems (most of the time) to be an ordinary village street. Passers-by Floyd | duck in and out of the buildings, stop by the water pump, or carry on Floyd | to a square to the north. No-one, you notice, takes the road south -- Floyd | or heads along the routes east towards the storybook hills or west Floyd | into the fairytale woods. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "w" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Fairytale Woods Floyd | In the midst of the woods stand a Buddhist monk and a lumberjack Floyd | engaged in a heated discussion as to whether a tree falling down in a Floyd | forest makes a sound if nobody is around to hear it. Their debate is Floyd | punctuated by the occasional felling of a tree at the blade of the Floyd | lumberjack's axe. Floyd | Floyd | The woods become more sinister looking to the west and the village Floyd | street is back to the east. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "w" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Spooky Part of the Woods Floyd | The fairytale woods seem to have shifted imperceptibly into the Floyd | spooky woods you see before you. All around you are brambles, bracken Floyd | and blackened lightning struck trees. Floyd | Floyd | Turning east you can just about make out happier looking trees. All Floyd | that you can see in this part of the woods is a mess of brambles. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x brambles" | ||||
Floyd | The brambles are pulled back, allowing you to pass through them to the Floyd | cave beyond." Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "enter cave" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "n" | ||||
Floyd | You channel your will to power to summon a path in that direction. Floyd | Sadly, nothing happens: you can't go that way. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "w" | ||||
Floyd | You push your way through the brambles and gingerly descend into the Floyd | dark cave beyond. Floyd | Floyd | Darkness Floyd | The darkness envelops everything. It is the darkness of ignorance. Or Floyd | possibly just an ordinary sort of darkness, but in any case, you won't Floyd | be able to do anything until you bring some sort of light source here. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "turn on light" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "spark lighter" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "feel around" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "turn on lighter" | ||||
Floyd | That's not something you can switch. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "flick lighter" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "x lighter" | ||||
Floyd | The darkness envelops everything. It is the darkness of ignorance. Or Floyd | possibly just an ordinary sort of darkness, but in any case, you won't Floyd | be able to do anything until you bring some sort of light source here. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "i" | ||||
Floyd | You are carrying: Floyd | a veil Floyd | a Communist Manifesto Floyd | a sack (open) Floyd | a qualiascope Floyd | a useless scrap of paper Floyd | a broken lantern Floyd | a manual Floyd | file of Platonic forms Floyd | a Categorical Imperativator Floyd | a fifty pence piece Floyd | a lighter Floyd | a Chinese key Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "burn manifesto" | ||||
Floyd | This dangerous act would achieve little. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "burn forms" | ||||
Floyd | This dangerous act would achieve little. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x file" | ||||
Floyd | The darkness envelops everything. It is the darkness of ignorance. Or Floyd | possibly just an ordinary sort of darkness, but in any case, you won't Floyd | be able to do anything until you bring some sort of light source here. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "wear veil" | ||||
Floyd | You can't wear that! Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "burn veil" | ||||
Floyd | This dangerous act would achieve little. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "e" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Spooky Part of the Woods Floyd | The fairytale woods seem to have shifted imperceptibly into the Floyd | spooky woods you see before you. All around you are brambles, bracken Floyd | and blackened lightning struck trees. Floyd | Floyd | Turning east you can just about make out happier looking trees. All Floyd | that you can see in this part of the woods is a mess of brambles. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "x lighter" | ||||
Floyd | It a bit old and creaky, but it gives a serviceable spark. Floyd | | smartgenes says, "hang on.. can we drop the veil in there or something" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "w" | ||||
Floyd | You push your way through the brambles and gingerly descend into the Floyd | dark cave beyond. Floyd | Floyd | Darkness Floyd | The darkness envelops everything. It is the darkness of ignorance. Or Floyd | possibly just an ordinary sort of darkness, but in any case, you won't Floyd | be able to do anything until you bring some sort of light source here. Floyd | | DavidW asks, "drop the veil in the cave ... and lose it?" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "throw veil" | ||||
Floyd | Dropped. Floyd | | ||||
| Jacqueline disappears through an invisible gap in the MUD. You think you may have heard the sounds of chatting before the gap closed again. | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "get veil" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "undo" | ||||
Floyd | Darkness Floyd | [Previous turn undone.] Floyd | | DavidW says, "that's bad" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "undo" | ||||
Floyd | Darkness Floyd | [Previous turn undone.] Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "i" | ||||
Floyd | You are carrying: Floyd | a veil Floyd | a Communist Manifesto Floyd | a sack (open) Floyd | a qualiascope Floyd | a useless scrap of paper Floyd | a broken lantern Floyd | a manual Floyd | file of Platonic forms Floyd | a Categorical Imperativator Floyd | a fifty pence piece Floyd | a lighter Floyd | a Chinese key Floyd | | smartgenes says, "it's a veil of ignorance" | |||
| DavidW says, "Anything we drop in darkness is lost until we get light." | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "listen" | ||||
Floyd | A worrying hush fills the room. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "smell" | ||||
Floyd | The whole place reeks of allegory. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "e" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Spooky Part of the Woods Floyd | The fairytale woods seem to have shifted imperceptibly into the Floyd | spooky woods you see before you. All around you are brambles, bracken Floyd | and blackened lightning struck trees. Floyd | Floyd | Turning east you can just about make out happier looking trees. All Floyd | that you can see in this part of the woods is a mess of brambles. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "e" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Fairytale Woods Floyd | In the midst of the woods stand a Buddhist monk and a lumberjack Floyd | engaged in a heated discussion as to whether a tree falling down in a Floyd | forest makes a sound if nobody is around to hear it. Their debate is Floyd | punctuated by the occasional felling of a tree at the blade of the Floyd | lumberjack's axe. Floyd | Floyd | The woods become more sinister looking to the west and the village Floyd | street is back to the east. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "e" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Village Street Floyd | A church, a theatre, a tavern, a barbershop, a pavement caf? -- their Floyd | various changing forms clutter around, entrances facing out onto what Floyd | seems (most of the time) to be an ordinary village street. Passers-by Floyd | duck in and out of the buildings, stop by the water pump, or carry on Floyd | to a square to the north. No-one, you notice, takes the road south -- Floyd | or heads along the routes east towards the storybook hills or west Floyd | into the fairytale woods. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "s" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Black Tarmac Road Floyd | You're on a road by the squat concrete hut that contains the Chinese Floyd | Room. In smooth black tarmac, neatly painted with white lines, the Floyd | road stretches north to the village in peculiarly perfect tapering Floyd | perspective. Behind you, to the south, you see the road lead towards Floyd | some queer-looking hedgerows at the base of the crag. To the east, as Floyd | before, stretch the plains to the horizon, with the ocean, behind sand Floyd | dunes, doing likewise to the west. Floyd | Floyd | The remains of a scarecrow droop on a pole here. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "s" | ||||
Floyd | Striking out south towards the castle, you soon realise what it is Floyd | that lurks so strangely at the base of the crag. As the rock looms Floyd | over you like ten tonne weight over a hapless clown, the road becomes Floyd | a pebbly path leading into what is clearly an enormous maze. Floyd | Floyd | Outside the Maze Floyd | You're standing at the entrance to a vast maze built of hedges that Floyd | tower six feet above you. The path seems extravagantly narrow, as if Floyd | the designer wanted to prepare the unwary adventurer from the outside. Floyd | Above the entrance is a painted wooden sign. It looks important. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "d" | ||||
Floyd | You channel your will to power to summon a path in that direction. Floyd | Sadly, nothing happens: you can't go that way. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "get sign" | ||||
Floyd | You can't reach it, and besides, there's no use for it anyway. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "read it" | ||||
Floyd | Attention, Adventurer! This MAZE is not for the FAINTHEARTED, nor for Floyd | the CORRUPT. This is the MORAL MAZE, where only the truly ETHICAL Floyd | shall pass. Should you find yourself LOST forever -- what can you do Floyd | but PRAY? Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "s" | ||||
Floyd | Remembering the route from last time, you make your way quickly Floyd | through the maze, up the crag, and to the foot of the castle. Floyd | Floyd | At the Foot of an Ivory Tower Floyd | You are in a paved courtyard before the castle. Here, true to form, an Floyd | ivory tower towers above you, the result of a billion poaching Floyd | expeditions or more. Similarly true, a guard guards the broad stairs Floyd | leading up to the tower. Floyd | Floyd | Below you is the vertiginous path down the side of the crag -- and Floyd | below that stretches the world. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "pray" | ||||
Floyd | God is dead. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "d" | ||||
Floyd | You pick your way back down the crag, leaving that penultimate-looking Floyd | tower behind you. You're now able to make your way through the maze Floyd | with ease, and you're soon back on the other side. Floyd | Floyd | Outside the Maze Floyd | You're standing at the entrance to a vast maze built of hedges that Floyd | tower six feet above you. The path seems extravagantly narrow, as if Floyd | the designer wanted to prepare the unwary adventurer from the outside. Floyd | Above the entrance is a painted wooden sign. It looks important. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "u" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | At the Foot of an Ivory Tower Floyd | You are in a paved courtyard before the castle. Here, true to form, an Floyd | ivory tower towers above you, the result of a billion poaching Floyd | expeditions or more. Similarly true, a guard guards the broad stairs Floyd | leading up to the tower. Floyd | Floyd | Below you is the vertiginous path down the side of the crag -- and Floyd | below that stretches the world. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "bribe guard" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | DavidW says, "oh, down returns." | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "give veil to guard" | ||||
Floyd | I don't think she'd just accept the veil. It's more something that Floyd | you'll need to throw at her. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "throw veil at guard" | ||||
Floyd | You look shiftily from side to side, and when you assure yourself that Floyd | nobody is watching, you cast the veil over the guard's helmet. For Floyd | several long moments you wait. Hesitantly, you put a foot past the Floyd | guard. She doesn't move. Floyd | Floyd | "Hello?" you whisper. Floyd | Floyd | "Excuse me, I seem to be completely ignorant to who I am and why I am Floyd | here," she replies. "Can you help me?" Floyd | Floyd | [1] A living statue, your job is to keep still and quiet all day. Floyd | [2] You're a guard -- you're guarding these stairs from me passsing Floyd | [3] You're Bishop Berkeley and you're on your way to the tavern to Floyd | give a lecture on Idealism. Floyd | [4] You're a mild mannered accountant by day, but by night you don a Floyd | cape and fight crime. Floyd | [5] You're a very charitable person who would never dream of impeding Floyd | someone's progress up some stairs. Floyd | [6] You're an itinerant farm-hand who dreams of one day owning their Floyd | own farm with rabbits and alpaca, but deep down you know it'll never Floyd | happen. Floyd | [7] You write Thus Spoke Zarathustra fan-fiction and go to heavy metal Floyd | concerts. Floyd | | smartgenes says, "hurrahhhh" | |||
| smartgenes says, "lol" | ||||
| smartgenes says, "i love this guy's dialogues" | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | "That sounds nice, but if it's all the same to you," she says, "I'm Floyd | just going to stand here until I've got things figured out for Floyd | myself." Floyd | Floyd | [Your score has just gone up by two points.] Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "u" | ||||
Floyd | You clamber up the stairs and through into the tower. The ivory wall, Floyd | eased by its last descent, crashes down behind you before you can do Floyd | anything. This is it, then. Floyd | Floyd | First Chamber Floyd | Perfectly round and with walls of glistening ivory, this is definitely Floyd | more of a chamber than a room. A huge sheet of ivory blocks the exit Floyd | archway, while opposite it sits an ivory-panelled door, with a Floyd | definite sense of being heavily locked about it. Through this door Floyd | come the strains of atmospheric organ music you heard earlier, a Floyd | little clearer, and a little more foreboding. Floyd | Floyd | None of this is the most striking thing about the chamber, however. Floyd | The most striking thing is the fact that in the centre of the room Floyd | buzz thousands of bees, all hovering stationary in a curiously-shaped Floyd | cloud. Floyd | | DavidW says, "uh oh" | |||
| DavidW says, "We can't return." | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x bees" | ||||
Floyd | On closer examination the bees are hovering in the exact shape of a Floyd | vending machine. You can even see the slot where the money goes, and Floyd | the little tray where the goods drop down. It would be a refreshingly Floyd | normal sight in this mad world, if it weren't for the fact that it Floyd | were made out of thousands of writhing insects it would be rather a Floyd | relief. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "insert coin" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "put coin in slot" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "i" | ||||
Floyd | You are carrying: Floyd | a Communist Manifesto Floyd | a sack (open) Floyd | a qualiascope Floyd | a useless scrap of paper Floyd | a broken lantern Floyd | a manual Floyd | file of Platonic forms Floyd | a Categorical Imperativator Floyd | a fifty pence piece Floyd | a lighter Floyd | a Chinese key Floyd | | DavidW says, "It's not called 'coin'." | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "put fifty in slot" | ||||
Floyd | You insert the fifty pence piece into the slot, and instead of the Floyd | usual clunks and whirrings of machinery, you hear a series of buzzes Floyd | and organic-sounding thuds. Finally, a key drops into the little tray Floyd | at the bottom of the machine. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "get key" | ||||
Floyd | Which do you mean, the first key or the Chinese key? Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "first" | ||||
Floyd | Taking care not to disturb the bees, you pick up the key. Floyd | Floyd | [Your score has just gone up by three points.] Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x it" | ||||
Floyd | A slender key with the number one engraved into the metalwork. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "score" | ||||
Floyd | You have scored 51 out of a possible 100 in 1023 turns. Jolly well Floyd | done. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "l" | ||||
Floyd | First Chamber Floyd | Perfectly round and with walls of glistening ivory, this is definitely Floyd | more of a chamber than a room. A huge sheet of ivory blocks the exit Floyd | archway, while opposite it sits an ivory-panelled door, with a Floyd | definite sense of being heavily locked about it. Through this door Floyd | come the strains of atmospheric organ music you heard earlier, a Floyd | little clearer, and a little more foreboding. Floyd | Floyd | None of this is the most striking thing about the chamber, however. Floyd | The most striking thing is the fact that in the centre of the room Floyd | buzz thousands of bees, all hovering stationary in a curiously-shaped Floyd | cloud. Floyd | | djfletch says, "I wonder what these bees mean philosophically" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x door" | ||||
Floyd | The huge, ivory-panelled door, is adorned with an intricate-looking Floyd | lock. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x walls" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "unlock door" | ||||
Floyd | What do you want to unlock the firstdoor with? Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "first" | ||||
Floyd | You unlock the door and open it, trembling with trepidation. Through Floyd | the door lies another ivory staircase -- a spiral staircase which Floyd | winds upwards towards another chamber. Floyd | Floyd | Second Chamber Floyd | You are only a little surprised to find that this chamber is almost Floyd | entirely identical to the first, with the same stairs leading down and Floyd | the same huge door, but for two minor details: firstly, the Floyd | atmospheric organ music is ever so slightly louder; secondly, the Floyd | machine in the centre of the room is both not made of bees and clearly Floyd | a time machine. The clue is in the words "Time Machine" engraved on Floyd | its casing. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "x time machine" | ||||
Floyd | A feat of elaborate steelwork has wrought this magnificent device. Floyd | There's what looks like a control booth perched in a torturous Floyd | assembly of elaborate mechanics, as beautiful as they are strange. Floyd | There's a red fake leather seat inside the booth, which rather spoils Floyd | the image, as does the mouldy newspaper sitting on it. The chrome Floyd | dials inside the booth are pretty nice, though. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x casing" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "x newspaper" | ||||
Floyd | It's a rather damp and extremely boring edition of The Times from Floyd | 1957. The only interesting item in it is a piece about an ongoing Floyd | unsolved crime -- the theft of a priceless paracentric key from the Floyd | key exhibition at the International House of Keys, loaned to the Floyd | museum by the H.G Wells Reenactment Society. Floyd | Floyd | The one witness to the theft, a recently-engaged young security guard, Floyd | said "I don't know how the bugger snuck past me -- all I know is, Floyd | there was a flash of light from the exhibition room, the alarm goes Floyd | off, I rushes in, and he clunks me one. Don't know what with, but it Floyd | laid me out for hours -- I was lucky he didn't have a proper weapon Floyd | with him." Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "get it" | ||||
Floyd | (putting the Communist Manifesto into the sack to make room) Floyd | Taken. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "sit down" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "x dials" | ||||
Floyd | (the workings) Floyd | Terrifyingly complicated; you'd rather not touch them. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "sit on seat" | ||||
Floyd | You can sit upon your situpon, but not that. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "z seat" | ||||
Floyd | I only understood you as far as wanting to wait. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x seat" | ||||
Floyd | It looks like it was purloined from an American 1950"s diner. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "look under seat" | ||||
Floyd | You find nothing of interest. Floyd | | DavidW says, "You probably can only 'enter machine'" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "listen" | ||||
Floyd | The sound of passing time. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "enter machine" | ||||
Floyd | You clamber into the Time Machine and perch on the red seat. Floyd | Floyd | Second Chamber (in the Time Machine) Floyd | This chamber is exactly like the one below it but for two minor Floyd | details: firstly, the atmospheric organ music is ever so slightly Floyd | louder; secondly, the machine in the centre of the room is both not Floyd | made of bees and clearly a time machine. The clue is in the words Floyd | "Time Machine" engraved on its casing. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "z machine" | ||||
Floyd | I only understood you as far as wanting to wait. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x machine" | ||||
Floyd | A feat of elaborate steelwork has wrought this magnificent device. Floyd | There's what looks like a control booth perched in a torturous Floyd | assembly of elaborate mechanics, as beautiful as they are strange. Floyd | There's a red fake leather seat inside the booth, which rather spoils Floyd | the image. The chrome dials inside the booth are pretty nice, though. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "i" | ||||
Floyd | You are carrying: Floyd | a newspaper Floyd | a first key Floyd | a sack (open) Floyd | a Communist Manifesto Floyd | a qualiascope Floyd | a useless scrap of paper Floyd | a broken lantern Floyd | a manual Floyd | file of Platonic forms Floyd | a Categorical Imperativator Floyd | a lighter Floyd | a Chinese key Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "x booth" | ||||
Floyd | The booth contains a red fake leather seat from which some chrome Floyd | dials can be reached. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "x dials" | ||||
Floyd | (the workings) Floyd | Terrifyingly complicated; you'd rather not touch them. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "touch dials" | ||||
Floyd | (the workings) Floyd | You feel nothing unexpected. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "turn dials" | ||||
Floyd | (the workings) Floyd | There is a season for that, but it's not this one. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "look behind seat" | ||||
Floyd | There is nothing on the red fake leather seat. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "x controls" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "out" | ||||
Floyd | You get out of the Time Machine. Floyd | Floyd | Second Chamber Floyd | This chamber is exactly like the one below it but for two minor Floyd | details: firstly, the atmospheric organ music is ever so slightly Floyd | louder; secondly, the machine in the centre of the room is both not Floyd | made of bees and clearly a time machine. The clue is in the words Floyd | "Time Machine" engraved on its casing. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "u" | ||||
Floyd | You push and pull at the door, but it won't budge -- it's firmly Floyd | locked. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "d" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | First Chamber Floyd | Perfectly round and with walls of glistening ivory, this is definitely Floyd | more of a chamber than a room. A huge sheet of ivory blocks the exit Floyd | archway, while opposite it sits an ivory-panelled door, with a Floyd | definite sense of being heavily locked about it. Through this door Floyd | come the strains of atmospheric organ music you heard earlier, a Floyd | little clearer, and a little more foreboding. Floyd | Floyd | None of this is the most striking thing about the chamber, however. Floyd | The most striking thing is the fact that in the centre of the room Floyd | buzz thousands of bees, all hovering stationary in a curiously-shaped Floyd | cloud. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "u" | ||||
Floyd | Through the door lies another ivory staircase -- a spiral staircase Floyd | which winds upwards towards another chamber. Floyd | Floyd | Second Chamber Floyd | This chamber is exactly like the one below it but for two minor Floyd | details: firstly, the atmospheric organ music is ever so slightly Floyd | louder; secondly, the machine in the centre of the room is both not Floyd | made of bees and clearly a time machine. The clue is in the words Floyd | "Time Machine" engraved on its casing. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x door" | ||||
Floyd | The huge, ivory-panelled door, is adorned with an intricate-looking Floyd | lock. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "push machine" | ||||
Floyd | Philosophers are not yet supermen. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "i" | ||||
Floyd | You are carrying: Floyd | a newspaper Floyd | a first key Floyd | a sack (open) Floyd | a Communist Manifesto Floyd | a qualiascope Floyd | a useless scrap of paper Floyd | a broken lantern Floyd | a manual Floyd | file of Platonic forms Floyd | a Categorical Imperativator Floyd | a lighter Floyd | a Chinese key Floyd | | smartgenes says, "f burn newspaper" | |||
| smartgenes asks, "stuck?" | ||||
| DavidW says, "I suspect we're screwed. We didn't solve several earlier things." | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "i" | ||||
Floyd | You are carrying: Floyd | a newspaper Floyd | a first key Floyd | a sack (open) Floyd | a Communist Manifesto Floyd | a qualiascope Floyd | a useless scrap of paper Floyd | a broken lantern Floyd | a manual Floyd | file of Platonic forms Floyd | a Categorical Imperativator Floyd | a lighter Floyd | a Chinese key Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "x casing" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "burn newspaper" | ||||
Floyd | This dangerous act would achieve little. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "x machine" | ||||
Floyd | A feat of elaborate steelwork has wrought this magnificent device. Floyd | There's what looks like a control booth perched in a torturous Floyd | assembly of elaborate mechanics, as beautiful as they are strange. Floyd | There's a red fake leather seat inside the booth, which rather spoils Floyd | the image. The chrome dials inside the booth are pretty nice, though. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "enter machine" | ||||
Floyd | You clamber into the Time Machine and perch on the red seat. Floyd | Floyd | Second Chamber (in the Time Machine) Floyd | This chamber is exactly like the one below it but for two minor Floyd | details: firstly, the atmospheric organ music is ever so slightly Floyd | louder; secondly, the machine in the centre of the room is both not Floyd | made of bees and clearly a time machine. The clue is in the words Floyd | "Time Machine" engraved on its casing. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "x mechanics" | ||||
Floyd | If only you were studying for a bachelors of science, not art! Then Floyd | you might begin to understand the complexities of the time machine. Floyd | Even a degree in zoology would take you a stage closer than you are Floyd | now. Floyd | | smartgenes says, "the clue is in the words time machine" | |||
| DavidW says, "That's how we know it's a time machine." | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "author" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | smartgenes says, "it does seem like we'd have to solve the other stuff first" | |||
| DavidW says, "We need more understanding of science." | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "out" | ||||
Floyd | You get out of the Time Machine. Floyd | Floyd | Second Chamber Floyd | This chamber is exactly like the one below it but for two minor Floyd | details: firstly, the atmospheric organ music is ever so slightly Floyd | louder; secondly, the machine in the centre of the room is both not Floyd | made of bees and clearly a time machine. The clue is in the words Floyd | "Time Machine" engraved on its casing. Floyd | | smartgenes asks, "restore?" | |||
| DavidW asks, "first: can we return?" | ||||
| smartgenes says, "well we know what the 50p is for" | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "d" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | First Chamber Floyd | Perfectly round and with walls of glistening ivory, this is definitely Floyd | more of a chamber than a room. A huge sheet of ivory blocks the exit Floyd | archway, while opposite it sits an ivory-panelled door, with a Floyd | definite sense of being heavily locked about it. Through this door Floyd | come the strains of atmospheric organ music you heard earlier, a Floyd | little clearer, and a little more foreboding. Floyd | Floyd | None of this is the most striking thing about the chamber, however. Floyd | The most striking thing is the fact that in the centre of the room Floyd | buzz thousands of bees, all hovering stationary in a curiously-shaped Floyd | cloud. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "d" | ||||
Floyd | There's no way through the ivory sheet. Floyd | | DavidW says, "yeah, restore seems to be the only thing." | |||
| DavidW says, "also, we might be screwed because we can't swap the cube." | ||||
| smartgenes says, "yeah possibly" | ||||
| smartgenes says, "we could pump some info worst comes to worse" | ||||
| DavidW says, "I'm thinking we ought to pump for info on Zeno or Achilles and see if the ruler is hinted." | ||||
| DavidW says, "And if it is, we're in trouble." | ||||
| smartgenes says, "they give a trophy they said" | ||||
| McMartin says, "IIRC the only thing that can unwinnable the game is misusing the cube" | ||||
| DavidW says, "Which we may have done." | ||||
| McMartin says, "If you use it properly you'll know, I think." | ||||
| smartgenes says, "then go back a bit further then" | ||||
| DavidW says (to McMartin), "We cannot exchange the cube for the ruler." | ||||
| DavidW says, "We cannot take the cube from our sack at all." | ||||
| smartgenes says, "maybe we weren't meant to enter the maze" | ||||
| McMartin says, "If you're stuck in the maze, there's a cheaty way out..." | ||||
| McMartin says, "It doesn't solve it but it's an in-game reset" | ||||
| DavidW says, "We're not 'stuck in the maze'." | ||||
| smartgenes says, "we got past the maze automatically with the cube" | ||||
| DavidW says, "yeah" | ||||
| smartgenes says, "and scored 3pts or something" | ||||
| McMartin says, "Hrm" | ||||
| McMartin says, "OK, now I have forgotten what the correct use of the Cube is. But I don't *think* it was that." | ||||
| DavidW says, "But there's several puzzles in the main part of the game we've never solved." | ||||
| McMartin says, "Or even if the Cube is in fact the Cube" | ||||
| McMartin says, "I may be confusing the cube with the box" | ||||
| smartgenes says, "well it's named categoricl imperator or something" | ||||
| McMartin says, "Hrm. That isn't what I think it was" | ||||
| McMartin says, "I think" | ||||
| smartgenes says, "which implies you have to make sure you act for good with it" | ||||
| McMartin says, "Man, it's been awhile" | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "i" | ||||
Floyd | You are carrying: Floyd | a newspaper Floyd | a first key Floyd | a sack (open) Floyd | a Communist Manifesto Floyd | a qualiascope Floyd | a useless scrap of paper Floyd | a broken lantern Floyd | a manual Floyd | file of Platonic forms Floyd | a Categorical Imperativator Floyd | a lighter Floyd | a Chinese key Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x imperativator" | ||||
Floyd | It's a lead cube. That would seem to be it, though it feels rather Floyd | heavier than it should. Floyd | | McMartin says, "The object I'm thinking of is a one-shot object that can literally be used at any time" | |||
| McMartin says, "And you're warned about this when you get it" | ||||
| djfletch says, "there were three moral things, golden rule, silver something and lead cube which is the categorical imperativator" | ||||
| McMartin says, "OK, that's not the game breaker" | ||||
| McMartin says, "Though the game breaker is also, IIRC, Kantian" | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "light newspaper" | ||||
Floyd | This dangerous act would achieve little. Floyd | | McMartin asks, "is the Zombie Inquisitor still a live puzzle?" | |||
| DavidW says, "yes" | ||||
| maga disappears through an invisible gap in the MUD. You think you may have heard the sounds of chatting before the gap closed again. | smartgenes says, "we think we have to get the axe" | |||
| DavidW says, "I need a bathroom break." | ||||
| smartgenes says, "solving the monk and log-girl debate" | ||||
| McMartin says, "OK. I think that puzzle dominates the puzzle that gives you the one-shot item." | ||||
| smartgenes says, "not sure where DavidW restored it to" | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "restore" | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "cf7" | ||||
Floyd | Enter saved game to load: Ok. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "look" | ||||
Floyd | You've no time to do anything other than attempt a daring RESCUE! Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "rescue mother" | ||||
Floyd | Grabbing her left leg, you drag your mother heroically from the Floyd | burning mill. As soon as she is clear of the building it explodes in a Floyd | melodramatic and highly implausible inferno, from which rolls, rather Floyd | pitifully, the Archbishop's mitre. You watch it spin to a halt as your Floyd | mother swoons on the grass. Floyd | Floyd | [Your score has just gone up by two points.] Floyd | | DavidW says, "I think cf8 was our last save point." | |||
| smartgenes says, "i wonder what happensif you save the bishop then" | ||||
| DavidW says, "I don't know." | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "restore" | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "cf8" | ||||
Floyd | Enter saved game to load: Ok. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "look" | ||||
Floyd | Philosophy Library Floyd | This is simply a square, book-lined room equipped with a borrowing Floyd | counter, behind which stands a bored-looking librarian, and a few old Floyd | desks. At one of these Karl Marx sits, writing furiously. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "i" | ||||
Floyd | You are carrying: Floyd | a banana Floyd | a broken lantern Floyd | a sack (open) Floyd | a handkerchief Floyd | a qualiascope Floyd | an Encyclopaedia of Qualia Floyd | a manual Floyd | file of Platonic forms Floyd | a useless scrap of paper Floyd | a Categorical Imperativator Floyd | a fifty pence piece Floyd | a lighter Floyd | a Chinese key Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x banana" | ||||
Floyd | Yellow and bent, like a politician. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "w" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Square Floyd | The square seems somehow madder now the madman has left. Floyd | Floyd | This appears to be the academic quarter of the village, and so may in Floyd | fact be a quadrangle, which is awfully exciting. You know it's the Floyd | academic quarter, because the grass is covered with sprawling young Floyd | people wearing brightly coloured clothes, dreadlocks, and organic Floyd | deodorant. Architecturally and geographically speaking, the buildings Floyd | look like they were placed there by a commitee of village planners Floyd | whose equipment budget stretched only so far as a compass. Three sides Floyd | of the square are complemented by a museum, research institute and a Floyd | library, to the west, north and east respectively. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "s" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Village Street Floyd | A church, a theatre, a tavern, a barbershop, a pavement caf? -- their Floyd | various changing forms clutter around, entrances facing out onto what Floyd | seems (most of the time) to be an ordinary village street. Passers-by Floyd | duck in and out of the buildings, stop by the water pump, or carry on Floyd | to a square to the north. No-one, you notice, takes the road south -- Floyd | or heads along the routes east towards the storybook hills or west Floyd | into the fairytale woods. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "e" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Hill Floyd | There's a great pyre here very slowly catching alight. Tied to a stake Floyd | in the centre of the fire is a handsome woman looking deeply Floyd | determined, though you suppose she'd look less composed if the fire Floyd | wasn't so pitifully poor. At the base of the pyre, an imposing, Floyd | bushy-bearded man in an ornate uniform is interrogating her intensely, Floyd | in a way that appears to be making her all the more resolute. Floyd | Floyd | From here, you could head west, back to the village, or further into Floyd | the hills to the north. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "w" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Village Street Floyd | A church, a theatre, a tavern, a barbershop, a pavement caf? -- their Floyd | various changing forms clutter around, entrances facing out onto what Floyd | seems (most of the time) to be an ordinary village street. Passers-by Floyd | duck in and out of the buildings, stop by the water pump, or carry on Floyd | to a square to the north. No-one, you notice, takes the road south -- Floyd | or heads along the routes east towards the storybook hills or west Floyd | into the fairytale woods. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "n" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Square Floyd | The square seems somehow madder now the madman has left. Floyd | Floyd | This appears to be the academic quarter of the village, and so may in Floyd | fact be a quadrangle, which is awfully exciting. You know it's the Floyd | academic quarter, because the grass is covered with sprawling young Floyd | people wearing brightly coloured clothes, dreadlocks, and organic Floyd | deodorant. Architecturally and geographically speaking, the buildings Floyd | look like they were placed there by a commitee of village planners Floyd | whose equipment budget stretched only so far as a compass. Three sides Floyd | of the square are complemented by a museum, research institute and a Floyd | library, to the west, north and east respectively. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "e" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Philosophy Library Floyd | This is simply a square, book-lined room equipped with a borrowing Floyd | counter, behind which stands a bored-looking librarian, and a few old Floyd | desks. At one of these Karl Marx sits, writing furiously. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "t to librarian" | ||||
Floyd | I only understood you as far as wanting to t the invitation to the Floyd | state of naturist camp. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "talk to librarian" | ||||
Floyd | The librarian spots you and says, "What do you want this time?" Floyd | Floyd | [1] Still got no Plato I can read? Floyd | [2] Er, I was wondering if, maybe, you could see your way to getting Floyd | that Encyclopaedia for me again? Floyd | [3] Oh, nothing. I just wanted to annoy you, actually. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "2" | ||||
Floyd | The librarian glares at you, but heads off to the shelves to fetch the Floyd | book. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "put banana in ink" | ||||
Floyd | You dip one end into the inkwell, and then the other end. It's messy, Floyd | but the result is a rather handsome blue banana. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "w" | ||||
Floyd | You're still waiting for that book. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "z" | ||||
Floyd | Time passes. Or at least, loiters around for a while longer. Floyd | Floyd | The librarian returns and hands the tome to you wordlessly, before Floyd | returning to h/er spot behind the counter. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "w" | ||||
Floyd | You already know the librarian won't let you leave while you've still Floyd | got that Encyclopaedia, so you hand it back to h/er before leaving. Floyd | Floyd | Square Floyd | The square seems somehow madder now the madman has left. Floyd | Floyd | This appears to be the academic quarter of the village, and so may in Floyd | fact be a quadrangle, which is awfully exciting. You know it's the Floyd | academic quarter, because the grass is covered with sprawling young Floyd | people wearing brightly coloured clothes, dreadlocks, and organic Floyd | deodorant. Architecturally and geographically speaking, the buildings Floyd | look like they were placed there by a commitee of village planners Floyd | whose equipment budget stretched only so far as a compass. Three sides Floyd | of the square are complemented by a museum, research institute and a Floyd | library, to the west, north and east respectively. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "n" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Research Institute Floyd | Inside, the Institute is as a marvel of the limits of both modernist Floyd | architecture and the persuasiveness of funding applications. The floor Floyd | of the entrance corridor is covered in sticky linoleum and the walls, Floyd | painted an unpleasant shade of grue, with damp health and safety Floyd | posters. Three doors lead off the corridor, to the north, east and Floyd | west, each with a hand-written notice. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "e" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Colour Lab Floyd | The lab is filled with all manner of scientific equipment. Monitors, Floyd | levers, dials and big red buttons cover the walls, while the room's Floyd | desk -- pushed against the computer stacks on the back wall -- has a Floyd | complicated-looking laptop-printer set-up perched somewhere in the Floyd | middle, surrounded by arcane assemblies of metal and glass, which Mary Floyd | is operating with feverish skill. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "w" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Research Institute Floyd | Inside, the Institute is as a marvel of the limits of both modernist Floyd | architecture and the persuasiveness of funding applications. The floor Floyd | of the entrance corridor is covered in sticky linoleum and the walls, Floyd | painted an unpleasant shade of grue, with damp health and safety Floyd | posters. Three doors lead off the corridor, to the north, east and Floyd | west, each with a hand-written notice. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "s" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Square Floyd | The square seems somehow madder now the madman has left. Floyd | Floyd | This appears to be the academic quarter of the village, and so may in Floyd | fact be a quadrangle, which is awfully exciting. You know it's the Floyd | academic quarter, because the grass is covered with sprawling young Floyd | people wearing brightly coloured clothes, dreadlocks, and organic Floyd | deodorant. Architecturally and geographically speaking, the buildings Floyd | look like they were placed there by a commitee of village planners Floyd | whose equipment budget stretched only so far as a compass. Three sides Floyd | of the square are complemented by a museum, research institute and a Floyd | library, to the west, north and east respectively. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "e" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Philosophy Library Floyd | This is simply a square, book-lined room equipped with a borrowing Floyd | counter, behind which stands a bored-looking librarian, and a few old Floyd | desks. At one of these Karl Marx sits, writing furiously. Floyd | | smartgenes says, "wheres marx" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "give banana to marx" | ||||
Floyd | Karl Marx doesn't seem interested. Floyd | | DavidW says, "Marx is here in the Library." | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "w" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Square Floyd | The square seems somehow madder now the madman has left. Floyd | Floyd | This appears to be the academic quarter of the village, and so may in Floyd | fact be a quadrangle, which is awfully exciting. You know it's the Floyd | academic quarter, because the grass is covered with sprawling young Floyd | people wearing brightly coloured clothes, dreadlocks, and organic Floyd | deodorant. Architecturally and geographically speaking, the buildings Floyd | look like they were placed there by a commitee of village planners Floyd | whose equipment budget stretched only so far as a compass. Three sides Floyd | of the square are complemented by a museum, research institute and a Floyd | library, to the west, north and east respectively. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "n" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Research Institute Floyd | Inside, the Institute is as a marvel of the limits of both modernist Floyd | architecture and the persuasiveness of funding applications. The floor Floyd | of the entrance corridor is covered in sticky linoleum and the walls, Floyd | painted an unpleasant shade of grue, with damp health and safety Floyd | posters. Three doors lead off the corridor, to the north, east and Floyd | west, each with a hand-written notice. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "w" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Bat Lab Floyd | The laboratory is a brightly-lit white chamber, covered wall-to-wall Floyd | in cabinets, posters, and counters covered with disturbing-looking Floyd | instruments. A gigantic model of a bat hangs from the ceiling, Floyd | spinning around gently. A white-haired man is moving fitfully around Floyd | the room, grabbing instruments and examining diagrams, as he proceeds Floyd | to dissect a series of what look worryingly like tiny brains. He's Floyd | muttering something over and over again under his breath: "What is it Floyd | like?" it seems to be. "What is it like? What is it like?" Floyd | | DavidW says, "The banana is for Mary." | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "e" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Research Institute Floyd | Inside, the Institute is as a marvel of the limits of both modernist Floyd | architecture and the persuasiveness of funding applications. The floor Floyd | of the entrance corridor is covered in sticky linoleum and the walls, Floyd | painted an unpleasant shade of grue, with damp health and safety Floyd | posters. Three doors lead off the corridor, to the north, east and Floyd | west, each with a hand-written notice. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "e" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Colour Lab Floyd | The lab is filled with all manner of scientific equipment. Monitors, Floyd | levers, dials and big red buttons cover the walls, while the room's Floyd | desk -- pushed against the computer stacks on the back wall -- has a Floyd | complicated-looking laptop-printer set-up perched somewhere in the Floyd | middle, surrounded by arcane assemblies of metal and glass, which Mary Floyd | is operating with feverish skill. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "give banana to mary" | ||||
Floyd | You flourish the blue banana in Mary's direction. She squints at it, Floyd | seeming a little confused. "There's something very odd about that Floyd | banana," she says. "I think it's blue. You'd better not eat it," she Floyd | counsels, motherly. Floyd | Floyd | "No," you say. "It's a perfectly ordinary yellow banana. Why don't you Floyd | take those goggles off and check?" Floyd | Floyd | "Well, if you're sure, dear, then I suppose I'd better," says Mary, Floyd | fiddling with the strap. "I must have made a mistake in my Floyd | calculations somewhere." Floyd | Floyd | Struggling with them a little, she pulls the goggles from her head. Floyd | Blinking, her jaw drops wide open, and she looks about herself in Floyd | wonderment. "Colours!" she whispers weakly, her knees buckling. "After Floyd | all this time . . . I never knew . . ." She lets out a small, Floyd | satisfied sound -- and faints on the spot. Floyd | Floyd | [Your score has just gone up by five points.] Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "get laptop" | ||||
Floyd | Looking askance at the prone Mary, you regretfully snatch her laptop. Floyd | | DavidW says, "You take her laptop" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "w" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Research Institute Floyd | Inside, the Institute is as a marvel of the limits of both modernist Floyd | architecture and the persuasiveness of funding applications. The floor Floyd | of the entrance corridor is covered in sticky linoleum and the walls, Floyd | painted an unpleasant shade of grue, with damp health and safety Floyd | posters. Three doors lead off the corridor, to the north, east and Floyd | west, each with a hand-written notice. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "s" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Square Floyd | The square seems somehow madder now the madman has left. Floyd | Floyd | This appears to be the academic quarter of the village, and so may in Floyd | fact be a quadrangle, which is awfully exciting. You know it's the Floyd | academic quarter, because the grass is covered with sprawling young Floyd | people wearing brightly coloured clothes, dreadlocks, and organic Floyd | deodorant. Architecturally and geographically speaking, the buildings Floyd | look like they were placed there by a commitee of village planners Floyd | whose equipment budget stretched only so far as a compass. Three sides Floyd | of the square are complemented by a museum, research institute and a Floyd | library, to the west, north and east respectively. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "e" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Philosophy Library Floyd | This is simply a square, book-lined room equipped with a borrowing Floyd | counter, behind which stands a bored-looking librarian, and a few old Floyd | desks. At one of these Karl Marx sits, writing furiously. Floyd | | DavidW says, "And give the laptop to Marx. And get the manifesto." | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "give laptop to marx" | ||||
Floyd | You place the laptop on Marx's desk with a triumphant thunk. The old Floyd | man looks up at you. "Liebling!" he cries, breathless. "Not just a Floyd | typewriter, but a word processor capable of printing multiple copies! Floyd | This will not be forgotten after the revolution! In the meantime, Floyd | please take this precious copy Manifesto," he says, pressing the typed Floyd | manuscript into your hands, "and may it guide you to your unchaining!" Floyd | With these words he turns back to his work and begins typing Floyd | furiously. Floyd | Floyd | [Your score has just gone up by three points.] Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "get manifesto" | ||||
Floyd | You already have that. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "score" | ||||
Floyd | You have scored 41 out of a possible 100 in 706 turns. Jolly well Floyd | done. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "i" | ||||
Floyd | You are carrying: Floyd | a Communist Manifesto Floyd | a broken lantern Floyd | a sack (open) Floyd | a handkerchief Floyd | a qualiascope Floyd | a manual Floyd | file of Platonic forms Floyd | a useless scrap of paper Floyd | a Categorical Imperativator Floyd | a fifty pence piece Floyd | a lighter Floyd | a Chinese key Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "w" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Square Floyd | The square seems somehow madder now the madman has left. Floyd | Floyd | This appears to be the academic quarter of the village, and so may in Floyd | fact be a quadrangle, which is awfully exciting. You know it's the Floyd | academic quarter, because the grass is covered with sprawling young Floyd | people wearing brightly coloured clothes, dreadlocks, and organic Floyd | deodorant. Architecturally and geographically speaking, the buildings Floyd | look like they were placed there by a commitee of village planners Floyd | whose equipment budget stretched only so far as a compass. Three sides Floyd | of the square are complemented by a museum, research institute and a Floyd | library, to the west, north and east respectively. Floyd | | DavidW asks, "Perhaps the manifesto can be given to the burning woman?" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "s" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Village Street Floyd | A church, a theatre, a tavern, a barbershop, a pavement caf? -- their Floyd | various changing forms clutter around, entrances facing out onto what Floyd | seems (most of the time) to be an ordinary village street. Passers-by Floyd | duck in and out of the buildings, stop by the water pump, or carry on Floyd | to a square to the north. No-one, you notice, takes the road south -- Floyd | or heads along the routes east towards the storybook hills or west Floyd | into the fairytale woods. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "e" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Hill Floyd | There's a great pyre here very slowly catching alight. Tied to a stake Floyd | in the centre of the fire is a handsome woman looking deeply Floyd | determined, though you suppose she'd look less composed if the fire Floyd | wasn't so pitifully poor. At the base of the pyre, an imposing, Floyd | bushy-bearded man in an ornate uniform is interrogating her intensely, Floyd | in a way that appears to be making her all the more resolute. Floyd | Floyd | From here, you could head west, back to the village, or further into Floyd | the hills to the north. Floyd | | DavidW asks, "Is she 'chained' at all?" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "give manifesto to woman" | ||||
Floyd | The Martyr doesn't seem interested. Floyd | | DavidW says, "hm. It was a long shot." | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "burn manifesto" | ||||
Floyd | This dangerous act would achieve little. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "i" | ||||
Floyd | You are carrying: Floyd | a Communist Manifesto Floyd | a broken lantern Floyd | a sack (open) Floyd | a handkerchief Floyd | a qualiascope Floyd | a manual Floyd | file of Platonic forms Floyd | a useless scrap of paper Floyd | a Categorical Imperativator Floyd | a fifty pence piece Floyd | a lighter Floyd | a Chinese key Floyd | | smartgenes asks, "was this where we were?" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "w" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Village Street Floyd | A church, a theatre, a tavern, a barbershop, a pavement caf? -- their Floyd | various changing forms clutter around, entrances facing out onto what Floyd | seems (most of the time) to be an ordinary village street. Passers-by Floyd | duck in and out of the buildings, stop by the water pump, or carry on Floyd | to a square to the north. No-one, you notice, takes the road south -- Floyd | or heads along the routes east towards the storybook hills or west Floyd | into the fairytale woods. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "w" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Fairytale Woods Floyd | In the midst of the woods stand a Buddhist monk and a lumberjack Floyd | engaged in a heated discussion as to whether a tree falling down in a Floyd | forest makes a sound if nobody is around to hear it. Their debate is Floyd | punctuated by the occasional felling of a tree at the blade of the Floyd | lumberjack's axe. Floyd | Floyd | The woods become more sinister looking to the west and the village Floyd | street is back to the east. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "w" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Spooky Part of the Woods Floyd | The fairytale woods seem to have shifted imperceptibly into the Floyd | spooky woods you see before you. All around you are brambles, bracken Floyd | and blackened lightning struck trees. Floyd | Floyd | Turning east you can just about make out happier looking trees. All Floyd | that you can see in this part of the woods is a mess of brambles. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "n" | ||||
Floyd | You channel your will to power to summon a path in that direction. Floyd | Sadly, nothing happens: you can't go that way. Floyd | | DavidW says, "well, we can still get the veil from the church." | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "w" | ||||
Floyd | You push your way through the brambles and gingerly descend into the Floyd | dark cave beyond. Floyd | Floyd | Darkness Floyd | The darkness envelops everything. It is the darkness of ignorance. Or Floyd | possibly just an ordinary sort of darkness, but in any case, you won't Floyd | be able to do anything until you bring some sort of light source here. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "e" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Spooky Part of the Woods Floyd | The fairytale woods seem to have shifted imperceptibly into the Floyd | spooky woods you see before you. All around you are brambles, bracken Floyd | and blackened lightning struck trees. Floyd | Floyd | Turning east you can just about make out happier looking trees. All Floyd | that you can see in this part of the woods is a mess of brambles. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "e" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Fairytale Woods Floyd | In the midst of the woods stand a Buddhist monk and a lumberjack Floyd | engaged in a heated discussion as to whether a tree falling down in a Floyd | forest makes a sound if nobody is around to hear it. Their debate is Floyd | punctuated by the occasional felling of a tree at the blade of the Floyd | lumberjack's axe. Floyd | Floyd | The woods become more sinister looking to the west and the village Floyd | street is back to the east. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "n" | ||||
Floyd | You channel your will to power to summon a path in that direction. Floyd | Sadly, nothing happens: you can't go that way. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "s" | ||||
Floyd | You channel your will to power to summon a path in that direction. Floyd | Sadly, nothing happens: you can't go that way. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "e" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Village Street Floyd | A church, a theatre, a tavern, a barbershop, a pavement caf? -- their Floyd | various changing forms clutter around, entrances facing out onto what Floyd | seems (most of the time) to be an ordinary village street. Passers-by Floyd | duck in and out of the buildings, stop by the water pump, or carry on Floyd | to a square to the north. No-one, you notice, takes the road south -- Floyd | or heads along the routes east towards the storybook hills or west Floyd | into the fairytale woods. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "n" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Square Floyd | The square seems somehow madder now the madman has left. Floyd | Floyd | This appears to be the academic quarter of the village, and so may in Floyd | fact be a quadrangle, which is awfully exciting. You know it's the Floyd | academic quarter, because the grass is covered with sprawling young Floyd | people wearing brightly coloured clothes, dreadlocks, and organic Floyd | deodorant. Architecturally and geographically speaking, the buildings Floyd | look like they were placed there by a commitee of village planners Floyd | whose equipment budget stretched only so far as a compass. Three sides Floyd | of the square are complemented by a museum, research institute and a Floyd | library, to the west, north and east respectively. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "n" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Research Institute Floyd | Inside, the Institute is as a marvel of the limits of both modernist Floyd | architecture and the persuasiveness of funding applications. The floor Floyd | of the entrance corridor is covered in sticky linoleum and the walls, Floyd | painted an unpleasant shade of grue, with damp health and safety Floyd | posters. Three doors lead off the corridor, to the north, east and Floyd | west, each with a hand-written notice. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "s" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Square Floyd | The square seems somehow madder now the madman has left. Floyd | Floyd | This appears to be the academic quarter of the village, and so may in Floyd | fact be a quadrangle, which is awfully exciting. You know it's the Floyd | academic quarter, because the grass is covered with sprawling young Floyd | people wearing brightly coloured clothes, dreadlocks, and organic Floyd | deodorant. Architecturally and geographically speaking, the buildings Floyd | look like they were placed there by a commitee of village planners Floyd | whose equipment budget stretched only so far as a compass. Three sides Floyd | of the square are complemented by a museum, research institute and a Floyd | library, to the west, north and east respectively. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "s" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Village Street Floyd | A church, a theatre, a tavern, a barbershop, a pavement caf? -- their Floyd | various changing forms clutter around, entrances facing out onto what Floyd | seems (most of the time) to be an ordinary village street. Passers-by Floyd | duck in and out of the buildings, stop by the water pump, or carry on Floyd | to a square to the north. No-one, you notice, takes the road south -- Floyd | or heads along the routes east towards the storybook hills or west Floyd | into the fairytale woods. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "go church" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Church Floyd | The church appears to have made up its mind about its own interior, Floyd | plumping for a simple majesty in stone and wood. As the door creaks Floyd | gracefully closed behind you, you survey your surroundings: the oak Floyd | pews lining the nave, the beautiful arched stone roof, the carved Floyd | pulpit at the head of the church and, behind it, an enormous tapestry Floyd | depicting -- nothing? Floyd | Floyd | In one of the pews a woman in full bridal gear sits, weeping to Floyd | herself. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "give handkerchief to woman" | ||||
Floyd | (first taking the handkerchief) Floyd | (putting the broken lantern into the sack to make room) Floyd | The bride looks at your proferred hanky, at takes it gratefully. Floyd | Casting the soaked veil aside, she blows her nose with a foghorn Floyd | bellow and looks folornly at the altar. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "talk to her" | ||||
Floyd | After she's fully evacuated her nose into your hanky she hands it back Floyd | to you. You look at it, aghast at the vast quantities of snot therein. Floyd | Floyd | [1] That's OK. You can keep it. Floyd | [2] Best hold on to that. Better now? Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | "Thanks," she says tearfully, and proceeds to snort out an even more Floyd | prolific stream. Floyd | Floyd | [1] You're more than welcome. Do you think it would help to talk about Floyd | what's bothering you? Floyd | [2] Not a problem. Glad to help. If you ever need a shoulder to cry on Floyd | . . . Floyd | [3] Yeah, well. Why the long face, anyway? Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "take veil" | ||||
Floyd | [I need some kind of reaction from you to continue the scene. Enter a Floyd | number, or say REPEAT to reacquaint yourself with your options.] Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | "No," sniffs the bride. "But I'll tell you anyway, if you're that Floyd | interested." Floyd | Floyd | [1] Er . . . Sure! Floyd | [2] Oh, well. I'll just leave you to it then. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | She wipes her cheeks, smearing mascara and blusher, takes a deep Floyd | breath, and begins: Floyd | Floyd | "We'd been engaged for months, and deeply in love for years before. Floyd | We'd prepared for today for weeks and weeks, and it was all meant to Floyd | be so -- so perfect. But I knew something was wrong. There's been Floyd | something wrong with him for a few days now. Ever since he picked up a Floyd | logic textbook. Floyd | Floyd | "He started to get this awkward look in his eyes when we talked about Floyd | the wedding. He'd dodge the subject. But he never said he'd do this! Floyd | Leave me standing at the altar like an unwanted pudding! Floyd | Floyd | "I waited for an hour. The guests all started to leave. His family Floyd | scarpered and mine chased after them. Then it was just me, when his Floyd | best man came and told me what had happened. Floyd | Floyd | "He'd realised he couldn't marry me. The book had told him. Decades of Floyd | the world's most pre-eminent philosophers have said it. He was a Floyd | bachelor. And all bachelors are unmarried men." Floyd | Floyd | The bride sighs, hiccups, and then, just as you think she's about to Floyd | recover, dissolves into another bout of sobbing. You decide that now Floyd | is probably the most tactful time to leave, and vow to be more Floyd | original in your logic examples in future. Floyd | Floyd | [Your score has just gone up by two points.] Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "get veil" | ||||
Floyd | You pick up the veil and wring it out. On examining it, you realise Floyd | that the fine lacework spells out a word: Ignorance. Curiouser and Floyd | curiouser. Um. More curious. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x woman" | ||||
Floyd | She's like a very damp pile of meringues, and she's getting damper by Floyd | the second. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "talk to woman" | ||||
Floyd | You don't think there's much you can do for her at the moment. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "l" | ||||
Floyd | Church Floyd | The church appears to have made up its mind about its own interior, Floyd | plumping for a simple majesty in stone and wood. As the door creaks Floyd | gracefully closed behind you, you survey your surroundings: the oak Floyd | pews lining the nave, the beautiful arched stone roof, the carved Floyd | pulpit at the head of the church and, behind it, an enormous tapestry Floyd | depicting -- nothing? Floyd | Floyd | In one of the pews a woman in full bridal gear sits, weeping to Floyd | herself. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x door" | ||||
Floyd | The heavy wooden portal at the southwest end of the church leads back Floyd | to the village street. It's covered with some very peculiar carvings. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x carvings" | ||||
Floyd | These relief carvings appear to show a sequence of scenes from some Floyd | strange mythology. In the first, a nubile young woman is examining a Floyd | peculiar package laid under a tall tree. In the second, she is wearing Floyd | a short tartan skirt, a snappy blaze and pigtails, and a strapping Floyd | young lad is advancing on her rapidly. In the third, twelve men are Floyd | gathered, six holding hoes and six holding spears, while in the fourth Floyd | one of the spearmen is brutally attacking one of the hoemen. The Floyd | following scenes include floods, burning rains, lots of sex and Floyd | inumerable platypuses. Platypi. The usual myth-fodder. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "n" | ||||
Floyd | You channel your will to power to summon a path in that direction. Floyd | Sadly, nothing happens: you can't go that way. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "w" | ||||
Floyd | You channel your will to power to summon a path in that direction. Floyd | Sadly, nothing happens: you can't go that way. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "e" | ||||
Floyd | You channel your will to power to summon a path in that direction. Floyd | Sadly, nothing happens: you can't go that way. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "search pulpit" | ||||
Floyd | You find nothing of interest. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x pulpit" | ||||
Floyd | An huge oak platform with an overarching sound-board; you imagine a Floyd | preacher could boom out from here. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x board" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x sound board" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | DavidW says, "I'm wondering if we can eat the flying spaghetti monsters." | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x platofrm" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x platform" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "eat spaghetti monster" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | DavidW says, "We'd have to go to Roof to try." | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "s" | ||||
Floyd | You channel your will to power to summon a path in that direction. Floyd | Sadly, nothing happens: you can't go that way. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "s" | ||||
Floyd | You channel your will to power to summon a path in that direction. Floyd | Sadly, nothing happens: you can't go that way. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "out" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Village Street Floyd | A church, a theatre, a tavern, a barbershop, a pavement caf? -- their Floyd | various changing forms clutter around, entrances facing out onto what Floyd | seems (most of the time) to be an ordinary village street. Passers-by Floyd | duck in and out of the buildings, stop by the water pump, or carry on Floyd | to a square to the north. No-one, you notice, takes the road south -- Floyd | or heads along the routes east towards the storybook hills or west Floyd | into the fairytale woods. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "pump about achilles" | ||||
Floyd | You pull the pump's handle, concentrating furiously. You intuit that Floyd | the only way to beat Achilles would be to get a headstart, and the Floyd | only way to do that would be to demonstrate that something about the Floyd | race is unfair. Better have a good look at that racetrack. Floyd | | smartgenes says, "ok we knew about that" | |||
| DavidW says, "yeah" | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "s" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Black Tarmac Road Floyd | You're on a road by the squat concrete hut that contains the Chinese Floyd | Room. In smooth black tarmac, neatly painted with white lines, the Floyd | road stretches north to the village in peculiarly perfect tapering Floyd | perspective. Behind you, to the south, you see the road lead towards Floyd | some queer-looking hedgerows at the base of the crag. To the east, as Floyd | before, stretch the plains to the horizon, with the ocean, behind sand Floyd | dunes, doing likewise to the west. Floyd | Floyd | The remains of a scarecrow droop on a pole here. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "w" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Beach Floyd | You're on the beach, where Zeno has set up a race track between the Floyd | dunes and the sea. Achilles is also here -- sans Tortoise. Floyd | Floyd | The road lies back to the east, while the dune where you found the Floyd | nest is northeast of here. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "accuse achilles" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | DavidW says, "We need the headstart by proving the track is bad." | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "tell achilles about lanes" | ||||
Floyd | Just TALK TO them. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x lanes" | ||||
Floyd | Little more than a few lines in the sand. There's one just by Achilles Floyd | and Zeno and the other terribly, terribly far (it seems) in the Floyd | distance. You can only tell where it is by the flag fluttering away Floyd | there. In between the two, long lines follow the steep curve of the Floyd | beach to mark out two lanes, outside and inside. As the beach takes a Floyd | steep curve for the length of the race track, the inside lane is Floyd | probably a little bit shorter than the outer. Floyd | | DavidW says, "Achilles is just the runner." | |||
| djfletch says (to Floyd), "measure track" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | ||||
| djfletch says (to Floyd), "measure" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | ||||
| djfletch says (to Floyd), "measure lanes" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "x sand" | ||||
Floyd | The sand flows down from the dunes like sugar from a spilt and split Floyd | shopping bag. You bend down and let it run thorugh your fingers in a Floyd | stream of pure romantic clich?. It's astonishingly fine. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "dig in sand" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | smartgenes says, "probably need the golden rule" | |||
| djfletch says (to Floyd), "pace inside lane" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | DavidW says, "I think so, but we can't get it." | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "show track to achilles" | ||||
Floyd | (first taking the race track) Floyd | Philosophers are not yet supermen. Floyd | | ||||
| djfletch says (to Floyd), "x curve" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "paint track" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "point at tracks" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "compare tracks" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | djfletch says, "you would think it would need to know measure as a verb if the ruler was going to work" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "report tracks to zeno" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | DavidW says (to djfletch), "I know." | |||
| djfletch says, "but maybe it is but a talking thing once you have it" | ||||
| DavidW says, "yeah, it could be hidden in the dialogue menu items." | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "w" | ||||
Floyd | You'd only get wet. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "examine track" | ||||
Floyd | Little more than a few lines in the sand. There's one just by Achilles Floyd | and Zeno and the other terribly, terribly far (it seems) in the Floyd | distance. You can only tell where it is by the flag fluttering away Floyd | there. In between the two, long lines follow the steep curve of the Floyd | beach to mark out two lanes, outside and inside. As the beach takes a Floyd | steep curve for the length of the race track, the inside lane is Floyd | probably a little bit shorter than the outer. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "tell zeno about track" | ||||
Floyd | Just TALK TO them. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "talk to zeno" | ||||
Floyd | "What? Oh! Oh, it's you. Fancy another race then, do you?" Floyd | Floyd | [1] Nah, thanks, I'd only get thrashed again. Floyd | [2] Yeah, I think I could give it another shot. Floyd | [3] It's exhausting! Just how long is that track? Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "3" | ||||
Floyd | "Oh, only a millos or so." Floyd | Floyd | [1] Hmm . . . nah, I'll pass this time. Floyd | [2] Phew! Well, I'll still give it another go. Floyd | [3] And had you realised that one lane is just a little bit shorter Floyd | than the other? Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "3" | ||||
Floyd | Zeno's eyes widen, and he glances round at the steeply curving track. Floyd | "Curses!" he says "Quite true! That throws all my my calculations out, Floyd | and renders, I'm terribly sorry, all races completely invalid." Floyd | Floyd | [1] You could just give me -- I mean, the person on the outside lane Floyd | -- a bit of a head start. Floyd | [2] Well, I'm not racing again, I'm afraid. Floyd | | DavidW asks, "oh what's this?" | |||
| smartgenes says, "i dunno i never saw that option b4.." | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | "Why, you're absolutely right! Magnificent! Well, what are you waiting Floyd | for? Line up, you two!" Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "run run run" | ||||
Floyd | At this stage, you don't think your brain can possibly cope with Floyd | issuing any instructions other than GIVE UP or KEEP RUNNING. Floyd | Floyd | With a gleam in your eye, you quickly take your position on the Floyd | outside lane, just 50 podes ahead of Achilles. When Zeno shouts the Floyd | go, you pump your legs away without bothering to look behind you. Floyd | Floyd | When you've reached about halfway down the track, you hear a curse to Floyd | Zeus close behind you. Achilles has made a good deal of headway, but Floyd | something seems to be holding him back. Every time he reaches where Floyd | you've just been, you've managed to make a little further hard Floyd | progress down towards the flag. For each bound he takes, you manage Floyd | another bound -- a smaller, humbler bound -- a little further forward. Floyd | And while you're flagging more than him, and he manages to catch up a Floyd | little further on each bound, he never quite makes it to you. Floyd | Floyd | Now it's just a matter of endurance. You set your head towards the Floyd | flag and keep forging on. It gets closer and closer, with Achilles Floyd | coming up just behind you, a gnat's crotchet away -- and you reach the Floyd | flag! Throwing yourself over the finish line, you grab onto the pole Floyd | and sink to the ground, exhausted. Achilles throws himself down beside Floyd | you, and you both gaze up at the fluttering red flag, with that Floyd | peculiar hole in the centre, waiting for something like breath to Floyd | return to your lungs. | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "run" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | When you finally make it back to Zeno, he is applauding wildly. Floyd | "Magnificent! Magnificent!" Even the deject Achilles is overwhelmed as Floyd | Zeno thrusts the glass trophy into your arms and grabs him by the Floyd | hand. "Now see here, Achilles," he says, drawing complicated equations Floyd | in the sand as Achilles looks on, rapt. Floyd | Floyd | [Your score has just gone up by three points.] Floyd | | djfletch says, "must have changed after we examined the lanes or something" | |||
| DavidW says, "I guess." | ||||
| DavidW says, "x trophy" | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "x trophy" | ||||
Floyd | It's a finely-engraved glass cup with a big bowl. Floyd | | smartgenes says, "i like how you always get some random object you don't want" | |||
| smartgenes exclaims, "just like real life!" | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x bowl" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "look through bowl" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "look through trophy" | ||||
Floyd | You find nothing of interest. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "talk to achilles" | ||||
Floyd | You'd rather not disturb them. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "e" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Black Tarmac Road Floyd | You're on a road by the squat concrete hut that contains the Chinese Floyd | Room. In smooth black tarmac, neatly painted with white lines, the Floyd | road stretches north to the village in peculiarly perfect tapering Floyd | perspective. Behind you, to the south, you see the road lead towards Floyd | some queer-looking hedgerows at the base of the crag. To the east, as Floyd | before, stretch the plains to the horizon, with the ocean, behind sand Floyd | dunes, doing likewise to the west. Floyd | Floyd | The remains of a scarecrow droop on a pole here. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "read trophy" | ||||
Floyd | It's a finely-engraved glass cup with a big bowl. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "n" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Village Street Floyd | A church, a theatre, a tavern, a barbershop, a pavement caf? -- their Floyd | various changing forms clutter around, entrances facing out onto what Floyd | seems (most of the time) to be an ordinary village street. Passers-by Floyd | duck in and out of the buildings, stop by the water pump, or carry on Floyd | to a square to the north. No-one, you notice, takes the road south -- Floyd | or heads along the routes east towards the storybook hills or west Floyd | into the fairytale woods. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "w" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Fairytale Woods Floyd | In the midst of the woods stand a Buddhist monk and a lumberjack Floyd | engaged in a heated discussion as to whether a tree falling down in a Floyd | forest makes a sound if nobody is around to hear it. Their debate is Floyd | punctuated by the occasional felling of a tree at the blade of the Floyd | lumberjack's axe. Floyd | Floyd | The woods become more sinister looking to the west and the village Floyd | street is back to the east. Floyd | | DavidW asks, "So what's the trophy good for?" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "give trophy to lumberjack" | ||||
Floyd | The lumberjack doesn't seem interested. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "give trophy to monk" | ||||
Floyd | The Buddhist monk doesn't seem interested. Floyd | | DavidW asks, "Do we fill it with sand or water?" | |||
| smartgenes asks, "is there water anywhere?" | ||||
| djfletch asks, "hmm, glass to fix the lantern?" | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "e" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Village Street Floyd | A church, a theatre, a tavern, a barbershop, a pavement caf? -- their Floyd | various changing forms clutter around, entrances facing out onto what Floyd | seems (most of the time) to be an ordinary village street. Passers-by Floyd | duck in and out of the buildings, stop by the water pump, or carry on Floyd | to a square to the north. No-one, you notice, takes the road south -- Floyd | or heads along the routes east towards the storybook hills or west Floyd | into the fairytale woods. Floyd | | DavidW says, "Beach" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "n" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Square Floyd | The square seems somehow madder now the madman has left. Floyd | Floyd | This appears to be the academic quarter of the village, and so may in Floyd | fact be a quadrangle, which is awfully exciting. You know it's the Floyd | academic quarter, because the grass is covered with sprawling young Floyd | people wearing brightly coloured clothes, dreadlocks, and organic Floyd | deodorant. Architecturally and geographically speaking, the buildings Floyd | look like they were placed there by a commitee of village planners Floyd | whose equipment budget stretched only so far as a compass. Three sides Floyd | of the square are complemented by a museum, research institute and a Floyd | library, to the west, north and east respectively. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "w" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Museum Floyd | The Odditorium is filled with a crazy array of philosophical exhibits. Floyd | The steward is giving the ship's hull a light dusting. Floyd | | DavidW says, "oh, maybe it fixes the lantern." | |||
| DavidW says, "Hadn't thought of that." | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "give lantern to steward" | ||||
Floyd | (first taking the broken lantern) Floyd | (putting the Communist Manifesto into the sack to make room) Floyd | You've got your hands a bit full. You're going to have to find a sack Floyd | or something if you want to carry any more. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "put lantern in trophy" | ||||
Floyd | You need to be holding the broken lantern before you can put it into Floyd | something else. Floyd | | djfletch says, "if that's what it was missing" | |||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "attach trophy to lantern" | ||||
Floyd | It would be even better with some PVA glue, three yoghurt pots and an Floyd | egg carton but even with just your will-to-create, a broken lantern Floyd | and a priceless glass trophy you are able to fasten together a Floyd | servicible lantern. Floyd | | DavidW says, "whoa" | |||
| smartgenes says, "bit weird" | ||||
| DavidW says, "x lantern" | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "x lantern" | ||||
Floyd | The trophy's glass bowl shields the lantern's wick splendidly. Now you Floyd | just need to light the damn thing. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "e" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Square Floyd | The square seems somehow madder now the madman has left. Floyd | Floyd | This appears to be the academic quarter of the village, and so may in Floyd | fact be a quadrangle, which is awfully exciting. You know it's the Floyd | academic quarter, because the grass is covered with sprawling young Floyd | people wearing brightly coloured clothes, dreadlocks, and organic Floyd | deodorant. Architecturally and geographically speaking, the buildings Floyd | look like they were placed there by a commitee of village planners Floyd | whose equipment budget stretched only so far as a compass. Three sides Floyd | of the square are complemented by a museum, research institute and a Floyd | library, to the west, north and east respectively. Floyd | | DavidW says, "ooh cave" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "s" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Village Street Floyd | A church, a theatre, a tavern, a barbershop, a pavement caf? -- their Floyd | various changing forms clutter around, entrances facing out onto what Floyd | seems (most of the time) to be an ordinary village street. Passers-by Floyd | duck in and out of the buildings, stop by the water pump, or carry on Floyd | to a square to the north. No-one, you notice, takes the road south -- Floyd | or heads along the routes east towards the storybook hills or west Floyd | into the fairytale woods. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "w" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Fairytale Woods Floyd | In the midst of the woods stand a Buddhist monk and a lumberjack Floyd | engaged in a heated discussion as to whether a tree falling down in a Floyd | forest makes a sound if nobody is around to hear it. Their debate is Floyd | punctuated by the occasional felling of a tree at the blade of the Floyd | lumberjack's axe. Floyd | Floyd | The woods become more sinister looking to the west and the village Floyd | street is back to the east. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "cave cave cave" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | smartgenes says, "gotta admit i don't like that 1.. would never have thought of it" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "w" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Spooky Part of the Woods Floyd | The fairytale woods seem to have shifted imperceptibly into the Floyd | spooky woods you see before you. All around you are brambles, bracken Floyd | and blackened lightning struck trees. Floyd | Floyd | Turning east you can just about make out happier looking trees. All Floyd | that you can see in this part of the woods is a mess of brambles. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "w" | ||||
Floyd | You push your way through the brambles and gingerly descend into the Floyd | dark cave beyond. Floyd | Floyd | Darkness Floyd | The darkness envelops everything. It is the darkness of ignorance. Or Floyd | possibly just an ordinary sort of darkness, but in any case, you won't Floyd | be able to do anything until you bring some sort of light source here. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "light lantern" | ||||
Floyd | This dangerous act would achieve little. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "e" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Spooky Part of the Woods Floyd | The fairytale woods seem to have shifted imperceptibly into the Floyd | spooky woods you see before you. All around you are brambles, bracken Floyd | and blackened lightning struck trees. Floyd | Floyd | Turning east you can just about make out happier looking trees. All Floyd | that you can see in this part of the woods is a mess of brambles. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "light lantern" | ||||
Floyd | This dangerous act would achieve little. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "i" | ||||
Floyd | You are carrying: Floyd | a modified lantern Floyd | a veil Floyd | a sack (open) Floyd | a Communist Manifesto Floyd | a qualiascope Floyd | a manual Floyd | file of Platonic forms Floyd | a useless scrap of paper Floyd | a Categorical Imperativator Floyd | a fifty pence piece Floyd | a lighter Floyd | a Chinese key Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "take ighter" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "take lighter" | ||||
Floyd | (putting the veil into the sack to make room) Floyd | Taken. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "burn lantern" | ||||
Floyd | This dangerous act would achieve little. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "light lantern" | ||||
Floyd | This dangerous act would achieve little. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "light lighter" | ||||
Floyd | This dangerous act would achieve little. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "light lantern with lighter" | ||||
Floyd | The lantern lights! You jump around gleefully for a few moments, Floyd | before recovering your sobriety. Floyd | Floyd | [Your score has just gone up by three points.] Floyd | | smartgenes says, "grr" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "w" | ||||
Floyd | You push your way through the brambles and gingerly descend into the Floyd | dark cave beyond. Floyd | Floyd | Plato's Cave Floyd | The lantern's dim glow casts shadows across the walls of the cavern, Floyd | which, oddly, seems not so much collossal as contrived. Raising the Floyd | lantern, you read an etching over the eastern entrance to the cave: Floyd | "Property of Plato." Casting it around, you notice a gap in the walls Floyd | of the cavern that leads down further into the cave system. Floyd | Floyd | Bizarrely, chained down in the centre of the cave are a group of Floyd | wasted-looking humans. They make no reaction to your stumbling Floyd | entrance, save to stare intently at the shadows you are casting on the Floyd | wall. Feeling a little sheepish, you make a bunny shadow-picture for Floyd | them, it being the only one you can remember. They fail to smile. Floyd | | smartgenes says, "gotta spell colossal right if you want to reference colossal cave" | |||
| DavidW says, "Chained people. Try the manifesto." | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "x people" | ||||
Floyd | The denizens sit with their legs and necks chained so they cannot turn Floyd | their heads from the shadowy forms in front of them. Their ears are Floyd | covered in thick earmuffs and on their faces lie expressions devoid of Floyd | all curiosity. Floyd | | DavidW says, "ooh, earmuffs!" | |||
| DavidW says, "We want those for the lumberjack!" | ||||
| smartgenes says, "after all that were right about the muffs" | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "get muffs" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "get earmuffs" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "show manifesto to people" | ||||
Floyd | (first taking the Communist Manifesto) Floyd | (putting the lighter into the sack to make room) Floyd | The denizens of Plato's Cave seems to take no notice. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "give manifesto to people" | ||||
Floyd | It would be terribly cruel to incite them to cast off the shackles of Floyd | their oppression when they're sitting impotent in locked chains. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "remove chains" | ||||
Floyd | (first taking the chains) Floyd | Philosophers are not yet supermen. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "unlock chains" | ||||
Floyd | What do you want to unlock the chains with? Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "x chains" | ||||
Floyd | The chains link every one of the denizens, locking them tightly in Floyd | place. They come together into one giant padlock. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "x padlock" | ||||
Floyd | This padlock looks like it eats other locks for breakfast. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "i" | ||||
Floyd | You are carrying: Floyd | a Communist Manifesto Floyd | a lit lantern (providing light) Floyd | a sack (open) Floyd | a lighter Floyd | a veil Floyd | a qualiascope Floyd | a manual Floyd | file of Platonic forms Floyd | a useless scrap of paper Floyd | a Categorical Imperativator Floyd | a fifty pence piece Floyd | a Chinese key Floyd | | McMartin says, "I love this game so much." | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "talk to people" | ||||
Floyd | You saunter up to one of the denizens and tap one of them on the Floyd | shoulder. Floyd | Floyd | [1] Hello? Floyd | [2] (leave) Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | "What?" says the denizen, "you'll have to speak up!" Floyd | Floyd | [1] Hello? Floyd | [2] I said, "HELLO!" Floyd | [3] Oh, never mind. . . Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "2" | ||||
Floyd | "Hello," replies the denizen. You resolve to speak a little louder Floyd | from now on. Floyd | Floyd | [1] Love the earmuffs. They really complement the shackles. Floyd | [2] Nice cave -- I like what you've done with the place. Floyd | [3] What's the shadow play you're watching? Floyd | | DavidW asks, "Earmuffs, remember?" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | Two of the denizens give a look that would usually accompany a cursory Floyd | glance around in less cervical-rotational-inhibited examiners. One Floyd | says, "What earmuffs?" Floyd | Floyd | [1] The ones your wearing. Floyd | [2] Ah, my mistake: I must be mistaking a mass case of advanced Floyd | ear-hair growth with earmuffs. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | "I don't know what you're talking about," three of them say in unison. Floyd | Given the differing inflection, they may not all have been replying to Floyd | the same remark. Floyd | Floyd | [1] So . . . quite the cave system you've got here. Floyd | [2] Cute manacles. Are they one-cuff-chains-all, or do they come in Floyd | different sizes? Floyd | [3] Are those shadows playing the Importance of Being Earnest on the Floyd | wall over there, or is it Deformed Rabbit? Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "2" | ||||
Floyd | "I see no such thing!" replies one of the cave dwellers. "Nothing Floyd | chains us here," rejoinders another. Floyd | Floyd | [1] How do explain the fact that you can't move? Floyd | [2] Clearly the entire back catalogue of a bondage shop has been Floyd | wasted on you if you don't even realise it's there. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | "Oh, alright," admits one of them, "maybe we're a little chained up. Floyd | It's not as if there's anything more inteesting to see behind us." Floyd | Floyd | [1] Other than the world of real forms as opposed to the shadow world Floyd | you see before you? Floyd | [2] What about colours and three dimensional objects? Floyd | [3] There are many wondrous things out there -- like talking Floyd | scarecrows, burning windmills and friendly barbers. Floyd | | Lionheart asks, "Say, how do these denizens look to the qualiascope?" | |||
| smartgenes says, "lol at 3" | ||||
| Lionheart says, "So starved of experience of experience" | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | The denizens of the cave don't seem to heed your word, dismissing such Floyd | things as metaphysical illusions. Floyd | Floyd | [1] How do feel about sitting in a dank little cave? Floyd | [2] Do you spend all your time watching shadows, or is it only when Floyd | adventurers come by with sources of light? Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "2" | ||||
Floyd | "What shadows?" asks a denizen to your left, her eyes affixed on the Floyd | shadow play on the wall. Floyd | Floyd | [1] The ones you're watching -- shapes caused by objects partially Floyd | blocking a source of light. Floyd | [2] What else do you call the display you're watching? Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | "What we're watching," explains one of the denezins, "is the world go Floyd | by. This is reality." Floyd | Floyd | [1] This isn't reality, it's the semblance of reality. Floyd | [2] You're glued to an illusion. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | The denizens don't seem to listen, preferring simply to continue to Floyd | stare at the shadows on the wall. Floyd | Floyd | [1] So. . . nice cave system you've got here. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | "What cave?" three of them chant from somewhere around the back row. Floyd | The one you were addressing continues to stare ahead. Floyd | Floyd | [1] This cave. You know, the one you're sitting in. Floyd | [2] My mistake, your cold damp dark cavernous environ isn't a cave. Floyd | It's a foreshortened underground tunnel. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | The denizen that you were originally addressing expresses his Floyd | disbelief in mutters. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "talk to people" | ||||
Floyd | There's nothing else worthwhile to say to the denizens. They're still Floyd | chained to the cave floor, watching the shadow play. Floyd | | smartgenes says, "hmm hope i didn't mess up the convo" | |||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "unlock padlock with key" | ||||
Floyd | (first taking the Chinese key) Floyd | (putting the Communist Manifesto into the sack to make room) Floyd | That doesn't seem to fit the lock. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "burn padlock" | ||||
Floyd | This dangerous act would achieve little. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "unlock padlock with manifesto" | ||||
Floyd | (first taking the Communist Manifesto) Floyd | (putting the Chinese key into the sack to make room) Floyd | That doesn't seem to fit the lock. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "pick lock" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "hit padlock" | ||||
Floyd | You consider taking all your frustration out on the innocent, but your Floyd | anger soon subsides. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "eat padlock" | ||||
Floyd | (first taking the padlock) Floyd | Philosophers are not yet supermen. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "l" | ||||
Floyd | Plato's Cave Floyd | The lantern's dim glow casts shadows across the walls of the cavern, Floyd | which, oddly, seems not so much collossal as contrived. Raising the Floyd | lantern, you read an etching over the eastern entrance to the cave: Floyd | "Property of Plato." Casting it around, you notice a gap in the walls Floyd | of the cavern that leads down further into the cave system. Chained Floyd | down in the centre of the room, eyes affixed on your shadow playing on Floyd | the wall, are the denizens of this cave. You make a bunny Floyd | shadow-picture for them. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "find a telephone booth" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | DavidW says, "oh, the cave goes further." | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "d" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Dank Catacomb Floyd | You crawl resolutely down into a dank catacomb, pausing only to scrape Floyd | wumpus dung from your feet. Here in the catacombs a horde of Floyd | chattering bats fly amidst the staligmites and staligtites. Floyd | Floyd | One bat, looking particularly melancholy, hovers for a moment in front Floyd | of your face. "I hate my life," it says, before fluttering sadly off. Floyd | | DavidW says, "oh, a bat." | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "follow bat" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | DavidW says, "heh, wumpus dung" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "listen" | ||||
Floyd | The bats chitter and chatter, and would chutter as well, if it didn't Floyd | sound so silly. Floyd | Floyd | You hear a bat circling above you humming a brutal-sounding song to Floyd | itself. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "talk to bat" | ||||
Floyd | "My, my, don't you look tasty," chatter the bats chitteringly. Floyd | Floyd | [1] Why, thank you. Floyd | [2] I never foresaw the day when I'd be chat-up by bats. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "2" | ||||
Floyd | A bat flies out from the group and droops dejectedly off a staligmite Floyd | near you. "I'd savour it and leave before they savour you." Floyd | Floyd | [1] Savour me? I'm not going to be eaten am I? Floyd | [2] You seem a tad melancholy. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "2" | ||||
Floyd | "You would be too," the bat cries, "if the bloody secrets of your Floyd | tortured soul were ignored by all the reputable philosophy journals." Floyd | Floyd | [1] Reputable philosophical journals? Pardon? Floyd | [2] That's a very strange thing to be upset about. Floyd | [3] Do explain. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "3" | ||||
Floyd | The bat blinks sadly at you, brushing its fringe away from its eyes Floyd | with a sweep of its tattered wing. "It's like this," it begins, in a Floyd | voice resonant with murky emotion. "All the journals care about is Floyd | zombies, zombies, zombies. None of them care to investigate the Floyd | deepest, darkest revelations of the deep, dark mind of the vampire Floyd | bat. No-one understands us! Nobody cares! Floyd | Floyd | [1] Well, I'm a philosopher -- perhaps I could spread the word? Floyd | [2] Yes, I can certainly see how that would be pertinent to Floyd | philosophy. Floyd | [3] Gosh, that is tragic. Please do unclasp the bosom of your secret Floyd | soul to me. Floyd | | smartgenes says, "haha" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | The bat hops towards you a little hopefully. "Really?" it says. Floyd | "Really?" It looks down at its claws. "I've written a book, you know," Floyd | it whispers. "An autobiography. It has poems in it. Not that Floyd | publishers do anything other than reject it. But perhaps . . . perhaps Floyd | . . . ?" It looks towards you expectantly. Floyd | Floyd | [1] Oh, go on, give it here. Floyd | [2] A vampire bat's verse autobiography? I'm positively quivering with Floyd | excitement. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | The bat pulls a tiny book from behind its wings and drops it to the Floyd | ground in front of you with a little whimper. "Thank you," it says Floyd | breathily, its fringe drooping lower and lower. "I'm going to go and Floyd | feed on some virgins now to assuage my insatiable homicidal appetite Floyd | for human blood. Thanks for listening." It takes off in an excited Floyd | flurry and chitters away. Floyd | Floyd | [Your score has just gone up by two points.] Floyd | | DavidW says, "ok, book to Nagel." | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "get book" | ||||
Floyd | (the bat's autobiography) Floyd | (putting the Communist Manifesto into the sack to make room) Floyd | Taken. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "e" | ||||
Floyd | You channel your will to power to summon a path in that direction. Floyd | Sadly, nothing happens: you can't go that way. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "search stalagtites" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "u" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Plato's Cave Floyd | The lantern's dim glow casts shadows across the walls of the cavern, Floyd | which, oddly, seems not so much collossal as contrived. Raising the Floyd | lantern, you read an etching over the eastern entrance to the cave: Floyd | "Property of Plato." Casting it around, you notice a gap in the walls Floyd | of the cavern that leads down further into the cave system. Chained Floyd | down in the centre of the room, eyes affixed on your shadow playing on Floyd | the wall, are the denizens of this cave. You make a bunny Floyd | shadow-picture for them. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "u" | ||||
Floyd | You channel your will to power to summon a path in that direction. Floyd | Sadly, nothing happens: you can't go that way. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "e" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Spooky Part of the Woods Floyd | The fairytale woods seem to have shifted imperceptibly into the Floyd | spooky woods you see before you. All around you are brambles, bracken Floyd | and blackened lightning struck trees. Floyd | Floyd | Turning east you can just about make out happier looking trees. All Floyd | that you can see in this part of the woods is a mess of brambles. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "e" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Fairytale Woods Floyd | In the midst of the woods stand a Buddhist monk and a lumberjack Floyd | engaged in a heated discussion as to whether a tree falling down in a Floyd | forest makes a sound if nobody is around to hear it. Their debate is Floyd | punctuated by the occasional felling of a tree at the blade of the Floyd | lumberjack's axe. Floyd | Floyd | The woods become more sinister looking to the west and the village Floyd | street is back to the east. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "e" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Village Street Floyd | A church, a theatre, a tavern, a barbershop, a pavement caf? -- their Floyd | various changing forms clutter around, entrances facing out onto what Floyd | seems (most of the time) to be an ordinary village street. Passers-by Floyd | duck in and out of the buildings, stop by the water pump, or carry on Floyd | to a square to the north. No-one, you notice, takes the road south -- Floyd | or heads along the routes east towards the storybook hills or west Floyd | into the fairytale woods. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "n" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Square Floyd | The square seems somehow madder now the madman has left. Floyd | Floyd | This appears to be the academic quarter of the village, and so may in Floyd | fact be a quadrangle, which is awfully exciting. You know it's the Floyd | academic quarter, because the grass is covered with sprawling young Floyd | people wearing brightly coloured clothes, dreadlocks, and organic Floyd | deodorant. Architecturally and geographically speaking, the buildings Floyd | look like they were placed there by a commitee of village planners Floyd | whose equipment budget stretched only so far as a compass. Three sides Floyd | of the square are complemented by a museum, research institute and a Floyd | library, to the west, north and east respectively. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "w" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Museum Floyd | The Odditorium is filled with a crazy array of philosophical exhibits. Floyd | The steward is giving the ship's hull a light dusting. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "e" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Square Floyd | The square seems somehow madder now the madman has left. Floyd | Floyd | This appears to be the academic quarter of the village, and so may in Floyd | fact be a quadrangle, which is awfully exciting. You know it's the Floyd | academic quarter, because the grass is covered with sprawling young Floyd | people wearing brightly coloured clothes, dreadlocks, and organic Floyd | deodorant. Architecturally and geographically speaking, the buildings Floyd | look like they were placed there by a commitee of village planners Floyd | whose equipment budget stretched only so far as a compass. Three sides Floyd | of the square are complemented by a museum, research institute and a Floyd | library, to the west, north and east respectively. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "n" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Research Institute Floyd | Inside, the Institute is as a marvel of the limits of both modernist Floyd | architecture and the persuasiveness of funding applications. The floor Floyd | of the entrance corridor is covered in sticky linoleum and the walls, Floyd | painted an unpleasant shade of grue, with damp health and safety Floyd | posters. Three doors lead off the corridor, to the north, east and Floyd | west, each with a hand-written notice. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "w" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Bat Lab Floyd | The laboratory is a brightly-lit white chamber, covered wall-to-wall Floyd | in cabinets, posters, and counters covered with disturbing-looking Floyd | instruments. A gigantic model of a bat hangs from the ceiling, Floyd | spinning around gently. A white-haired man is moving fitfully around Floyd | the room, grabbing instruments and examining diagrams, as he proceeds Floyd | to dissect a series of what look worryingly like tiny brains. He's Floyd | muttering something over and over again under his breath: "What is it Floyd | like?" it seems to be. "What is it like? What is it like?" Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "give book" | ||||
Floyd | (the bat's autobiography to Nagel) Floyd | You grab Nagel as he passes you, heading for the cabinets. "Here," you Floyd | say. "I thought you might like this." Floyd | Floyd | He looks down at the book, wide-eyed. "Never . . . " he says. "Never Floyd | in all my days . . . How did you get this?" Floyd | Floyd | "Just chatted to them, really," you reply. Floyd | Floyd | "Interesting," he says, already frantically flipping through the Floyd | pages, waving a hand around the laboratory. "And I thought that all we Floyd | could do was study them like this. But now . . . oh now . . . please, Floyd | would you leave me with this? And would you look after these keys for Floyd | me? They were given to me to look after by some old man in a toga when Floyd | he saw how much time I spent in the caves gathering specimens. But I Floyd | shan't need . . . to go there . . . any more . . . " Floyd | Floyd | He drifts off into his own world, absorbed entirely by the book. You Floyd | grab the bunch of keys from his outstretched hand, wondering what they Floyd | could possibly open. Floyd | Floyd | [Your score has just gone up by three points.] Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "x keys" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "i" | ||||
Floyd | You are carrying: Floyd | a bunch of keys Floyd | a lit lantern (providing light) Floyd | a sack (open) Floyd | a Communist Manifesto Floyd | a Chinese key Floyd | a lighter Floyd | a veil Floyd | a qualiascope Floyd | a manual Floyd | file of Platonic forms Floyd | a useless scrap of paper Floyd | a Categorical Imperativator Floyd | a fifty pence piece Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "e" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Research Institute Floyd | Inside, the Institute is as a marvel of the limits of both modernist Floyd | architecture and the persuasiveness of funding applications. The floor Floyd | of the entrance corridor is covered in sticky linoleum and the walls, Floyd | painted an unpleasant shade of grue, with damp health and safety Floyd | posters. Three doors lead off the corridor, to the north, east and Floyd | west, each with a hand-written notice. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "s" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Square Floyd | The square seems somehow madder now the madman has left. Floyd | Floyd | This appears to be the academic quarter of the village, and so may in Floyd | fact be a quadrangle, which is awfully exciting. You know it's the Floyd | academic quarter, because the grass is covered with sprawling young Floyd | people wearing brightly coloured clothes, dreadlocks, and organic Floyd | deodorant. Architecturally and geographically speaking, the buildings Floyd | look like they were placed there by a commitee of village planners Floyd | whose equipment budget stretched only so far as a compass. Three sides Floyd | of the square are complemented by a museum, research institute and a Floyd | library, to the west, north and east respectively. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "s" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Village Street Floyd | A church, a theatre, a tavern, a barbershop, a pavement caf? -- their Floyd | various changing forms clutter around, entrances facing out onto what Floyd | seems (most of the time) to be an ordinary village street. Passers-by Floyd | duck in and out of the buildings, stop by the water pump, or carry on Floyd | to a square to the north. No-one, you notice, takes the road south -- Floyd | or heads along the routes east towards the storybook hills or west Floyd | into the fairytale woods. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "w" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Fairytale Woods Floyd | In the midst of the woods stand a Buddhist monk and a lumberjack Floyd | engaged in a heated discussion as to whether a tree falling down in a Floyd | forest makes a sound if nobody is around to hear it. Their debate is Floyd | punctuated by the occasional felling of a tree at the blade of the Floyd | lumberjack's axe. Floyd | Floyd | The woods become more sinister looking to the west and the village Floyd | street is back to the east. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "w" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Spooky Part of the Woods Floyd | The fairytale woods seem to have shifted imperceptibly into the Floyd | spooky woods you see before you. All around you are brambles, bracken Floyd | and blackened lightning struck trees. Floyd | Floyd | Turning east you can just about make out happier looking trees. All Floyd | that you can see in this part of the woods is a mess of brambles. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "w" | ||||
Floyd | You push your way through the brambles and gingerly descend into the Floyd | dark cave beyond. Floyd | Floyd | Plato's Cave Floyd | The lantern's dim glow casts shadows across the walls of the cavern, Floyd | which, oddly, seems not so much collossal as contrived. Raising the Floyd | lantern, you read an etching over the eastern entrance to the cave: Floyd | "Property of Plato." Casting it around, you notice a gap in the walls Floyd | of the cavern that leads down further into the cave system. Chained Floyd | down in the centre of the room, eyes affixed on your shadow playing on Floyd | the wall, are the denizens of this cave. You make a bunny Floyd | shadow-picture for them. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "unlock lock" | ||||
Floyd | What do you want to unlock the padlock with? Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "with the keys of course" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "unlock padlock with bunch" | ||||
Floyd | You find the right key amonst the bunch to unlock the unwieldy padlock Floyd | and it opens with a satisfying click. None of the denizens seem to Floyd | notice. Floyd | | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "get earmuffs" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | smartgenes says, "quite a few typos and spelling mistakes throughout the game" | |||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "give manifesto to people" | ||||
Floyd | (first taking the Communist Manifesto) Floyd | (putting the bunch of keys into the sack to make room) Floyd | You hand the closest denizen the Communist Manifesto and wait while Floyd | she reads it outloud to the other. You go for a quick nap through the Floyd | bits about modes of production and different kinds of bourgoisie, Floyd | waking up in time for the end: Floyd | Floyd | "Workers of the world unite!" a denizen exclaims, getting into the Floyd | spirit of things, "You have nothing to lose but your chains!" Floyd | Floyd | "You know, I think she's right," pipes up another at the back. Floyd | Floyd | "I agree!" shouts another. Floyd | Floyd | "Wait a second," one says, "we're not workers. We've never done a Floyd | day's work in our lives!" Floyd | Floyd | "Yes, Ted, but the oppression of the owners of the means of production Floyd | clarifies and sharpens the class divide," explains the reader, "so as Floyd | members of the collective oppressed classes we're made de facto Floyd | working class." Floyd | Floyd | The voice known as Ted considers this for a moment, and then shouts, Floyd | "Those thieving capitalist bastards! Let's go knock some heads!" With Floyd | frantic calls for revolution and a classless society the denizens cast Floyd | off their chains, and earmuffs, and storm outside in an angry mob. Floyd | Floyd | [Your score has just gone up by five points.] Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "take earmuffs" | ||||
Floyd | Taken. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "SAVE" | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "cf10" | ||||
Floyd | Enter saved game to store: Ok. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "x earmuffs" | ||||
Floyd | Big furry earmuffs. A pair of them! They look like they'd induce a Floyd | blissful silence for the wearer. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "e" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Spooky Part of the Woods Floyd | The fairytale woods seem to have shifted imperceptibly into the Floyd | spooky woods you see before you. All around you are brambles, bracken Floyd | and blackened lightning struck trees. Floyd | Floyd | Turning east you can just about make out happier looking trees. All Floyd | that you can see in this part of the woods is a mess of brambles. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "e" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Fairytale Woods Floyd | In the midst of the woods stand a Buddhist monk and a lumberjack Floyd | engaged in a heated discussion as to whether a tree falling down in a Floyd | forest makes a sound if nobody is around to hear it. Their debate is Floyd | punctuated by the occasional felling of a tree at the blade of the Floyd | lumberjack's axe. Floyd | Floyd | The woods become more sinister looking to the west and the village Floyd | street is back to the east. Floyd | | DavidW says, "lummmm berrrr jackkkk" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "give earmuffs to lumberjill" | ||||
Floyd | You can only do that to something animate. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "give earmuffs to lumberjack" | ||||
Floyd | You give the earmuffs to the lumberjack and the Buddhist monk. They Floyd | put them on nice and snug and you give them the thumbs up and step Floyd | back. The lumberjack takes a swing at the nearest tree, felling it Floyd | with one hit. "Wow," says the lumberjack a little louder than usual, Floyd | "I didn't hear that fall in the slightest!" Floyd | Floyd | "Aha!" exclaims the Buddhist, "so your premise that a tree always Floyd | makes a sound when it falls is undermined!" Floyd | Floyd | The lumberjack sighs. "I was uncorrect in my presumptitions, here -- Floyd | take my axe." Floyd | [Your score has just gone up by five points.] Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "e" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Village Street Floyd | A church, a theatre, a tavern, a barbershop, a pavement caf? -- their Floyd | various changing forms clutter around, entrances facing out onto what Floyd | seems (most of the time) to be an ordinary village street. Passers-by Floyd | duck in and out of the buildings, stop by the water pump, or carry on Floyd | to a square to the north. No-one, you notice, takes the road south -- Floyd | or heads along the routes east towards the storybook hills or west Floyd | into the fairytale woods. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "i" | ||||
Floyd | You are carrying: Floyd | an axe Floyd | a lit lantern (providing light) Floyd | a sack (open) Floyd | a bunch of keys Floyd | a Chinese key Floyd | a lighter Floyd | a veil Floyd | a qualiascope Floyd | a manual Floyd | file of Platonic forms Floyd | a useless scrap of paper Floyd | a Categorical Imperativator Floyd | a fifty pence piece Floyd | | DavidW says, "Kill the zombie!" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "e" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Hill Floyd | There's a great pyre here very slowly catching alight. Tied to a stake Floyd | in the centre of the fire is a handsome woman looking deeply Floyd | determined, though you suppose she'd look less composed if the fire Floyd | wasn't so pitifully poor. At the base of the pyre, an imposing, Floyd | bushy-bearded man in an ornate uniform is interrogating her intensely, Floyd | in a way that appears to be making her all the more resolute. Floyd | Floyd | From here, you could head west, back to the village, or further into Floyd | the hills to the north. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "e" | ||||
Floyd | The hill's too steep to descend in that direction. Floyd | | DavidW says, "here" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "kill zombie in furious frenzy" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "kill him now" | ||||
Floyd | I only understood you as far as wanting to kill the Zombiefinder Floyd | General. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "kill him with the axe matey" | ||||
Floyd | I only understood you as far as wanting to kill the Zombiefinder Floyd | General with the axe. Floyd | | DavidW says, "extra words don't help" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "kill him with axe" | ||||
Floyd | When he's not paying attention, you viciously dispatch the zombie Floyd | Zombiefinder with your axe. Afterwards, you roll the unsightly mess Floyd | off the hill. There's nothing like a decapitated zombie to ruin an Floyd | otherwise pleasant hilltop vista. Floyd | Floyd | You move to untie the martyr for truth, but she'll have none of it, "I Floyd | can untie myself, thank you very much. I'm not some damsel in Floyd | distress, I'll have you know." Floyd | Floyd | [1] I know, I know. Just trying to help. Floyd | [2] Well, you certainly look like one . . . Floyd | Floyd | [Your score has just gone up by five points.] Floyd | | smartgenes says, "just wanted to milk the occasion" | |||
| DavidW says, "The sun's going down." | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "2" | ||||
Floyd | "Either way," she says, untying herself with a few wrenches at her Floyd | ropes, "My thanks for proving me right. And, I suppose, as you've done Floyd | something for me, I suppose the only consistent behaviour is for me to Floyd | give you something in return." Floyd | Floyd | Climbing down from the now redundant pyre, she hands you a small box Floyd | that had been concealed about her person. Floyd | Floyd | "Now inside this hermetically-sealed box," she says, "is the thing. Floyd | The only thing that's truly consistent. If you ever need to dispel a Floyd | dangerous illusion or establish a firm and coherent grounding, open Floyd | this box. But it'll only work once. As soon as anyone senses the Floyd | thing, it'll just become shrouded in appearance like everything else. Floyd | So I suggest you only open this box when you really, really need it." Floyd | Floyd | With these words she disappears towards the village, leaving you alone Floyd | with the final product of what can only be described as a viciously Floyd | convoluted object-puzzle quest. You only hope it's worth it. Floyd | | DavidW says, "I haven't eaten in hours." | |||
| Lionheart says (to smart), "No problem" | ||||
| smartgenes says, "ah this is what mcmartin meant" | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "get box" | ||||
Floyd | You already have that. Floyd | | DavidW says, "hm. yeah, we'll need to be extra careful with it." | |||
| smartgenes asks, "what's left? time to go into the maze?" | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "score" | ||||
Floyd | You have scored 69 out of a possible 100 in 838 turns. Jolly well Floyd | done. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "i" | ||||
Floyd | You are carrying: Floyd | a wooden box (closed) Floyd | an axe Floyd | a lit lantern (providing light) Floyd | a sack (open) Floyd | a bunch of keys Floyd | a Chinese key Floyd | a lighter Floyd | a veil Floyd | a qualiascope Floyd | a manual Floyd | file of Platonic forms Floyd | a useless scrap of paper Floyd | a Categorical Imperativator Floyd | a fifty pence piece Floyd | | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "thank you" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | DavidW says, "We've done nothing with the forms." | |||
| smartgenes asks, "where did we get ;em?" | ||||
| DavidW says, "But maybe the forms and invite are red herrings." | ||||
| Lionheart says, "I think most of the prizes are superfluous" | ||||
| smartgenes asks, "can we swop that object too?" | ||||
| smartgenes says, "that was one of three remember" | ||||
| Lionheart says, "The third and last time we didn't get a choice, and got the tickets we needed for a puzzle" | ||||
| DavidW says, "The thing is, we haven't gained anything but points and this box from last time." | ||||
| smartgenes says, "the box might dispel the time machine illusion" | ||||
| Lionheart says, "It seems to me the tickets may well be the only important item" | ||||
| smartgenes says, "and there is a set of keys" | ||||
| DavidW asks (of smartgenes), "You think the time machine is an illusion?" | ||||
| smartgenes says, "what else could it be" | ||||
| DavidW says, "A time machine." | ||||
| smartgenes asks, "i mean what else could the illusion be?" | ||||
| djfletch says, "it's not obvious if the box would do anything to the time machine, but I can't think of much else to try" | ||||
| DavidW says, "There could be an illusion past the time machine." | ||||
| smartgenes says, "69pts - then the veil & the cube" | ||||
| smartgenes says, "and the first room" | ||||
| djfletch says, "oh did you try eating a spaghetti monster yet" | ||||
| DavidW says, "no, not yet." | ||||
| smartgenes says, "80ish points maybe" | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "l" | ||||
Floyd | Hill Floyd | The hill is now fairly pleasant, though the pyre is still smouldering Floyd | softly away. Floyd | Floyd | From here, you could head west, back to the village, or further into Floyd | the hills to the north. Floyd | | DavidW says, "I suggested it, but we haven't tried yet." | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x pyre" | ||||
Floyd | An impressive mound of wood built up around the central stake, it's Floyd | catching alight slowly. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "get stake" | ||||
Floyd | Philosophers are not yet supermen. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x stake" | ||||
Floyd | Rather wooden. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "touch fire" | ||||
Floyd | You feel nothing unexpected. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "take wood" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | smartgenes says, "i don't think there's any other puzzles left" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "w" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Village Street Floyd | A church, a theatre, a tavern, a barbershop, a pavement caf? -- their Floyd | various changing forms clutter around, entrances facing out onto what Floyd | seems (most of the time) to be an ordinary village street. Passers-by Floyd | duck in and out of the buildings, stop by the water pump, or carry on Floyd | to a square to the north. No-one, you notice, takes the road south -- Floyd | or heads along the routes east towards the storybook hills or west Floyd | into the fairytale woods. Floyd | | DavidW says, "well, if we save, we can try the tower again." | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "s" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Black Tarmac Road Floyd | You're on a road by the squat concrete hut that contains the Chinese Floyd | Room. In smooth black tarmac, neatly painted with white lines, the Floyd | road stretches north to the village in peculiarly perfect tapering Floyd | perspective. Behind you, to the south, you see the road lead towards Floyd | some queer-looking hedgerows at the base of the crag. To the east, as Floyd | before, stretch the plains to the horizon, with the ocean, behind sand Floyd | dunes, doing likewise to the west. Floyd | Floyd | The remains of a scarecrow droop on a pole here. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "s" | ||||
Floyd | Striking out south towards the castle, you soon realise what it is Floyd | that lurks so strangely at the base of the crag. As the rock looms Floyd | over you like ten tonne weight over a hapless clown, the road becomes Floyd | a pebbly path leading into what is clearly an enormous maze. Floyd | Floyd | Outside the Maze Floyd | You're standing at the entrance to a vast maze built of hedges that Floyd | tower six feet above you. The path seems extravagantly narrow, as if Floyd | the designer wanted to prepare the unwary adventurer from the outside. Floyd | Above the entrance is a painted wooden sign. It looks important. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "SAVE" | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "cf11" | ||||
Floyd | Enter saved game to store: Ok. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "s" | ||||
Floyd | You step tentatively into the maze, looking askance at the lump of Floyd | lead. Approaching a moral dilemma, it starts whirring wildly, and Floyd | glowing cracks in the cube appear. It begins to unfold into an Floyd | astonishingly complex device -- an array of dishes and balances, with Floyd | an arrow mounted on top. With little else to do you follow the arrow Floyd | past the dilemma. And then past the next -- and the next. Moral Floyd | dilemmas seem not to be dilemmas at all before its power, and soon you Floyd | emerge from the maze, breathless, at the foot of the crag that looms Floyd | over this land. Floyd | Floyd | A winding path leads up the side of the crag, and you follow it, Floyd | huffing and puffing, until you reach the top. Here, looming Floyd | dangerously atop the already looming crag, sits a gigantic loom. No, a Floyd | gigantic castle -- you were confused for a minute there. Behind you, Floyd | this crazy world stretches out below. You take a deep breath. You Floyd | feel, somehow, that you are near your goal -- whatever that may be.. Floyd | Floyd | At the Foot of an Ivory Tower Floyd | You are in a paved courtyard before the castle. Here, true to form, an Floyd | ivory tower towers above you, the result of a billion poaching Floyd | expeditions or more. Similarly true, a guard guards the broad stairs Floyd | leading up to the tower. Floyd | Floyd | Below you is the vertiginous path down the side of the crag -- and Floyd | below that stretches the world. The strangest thing of all, however, Floyd | is the faint and ominous organ music on the periphery of your hearing. Floyd | Floyd | [Your score has just gone up by three points.] Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "s" | ||||
Floyd | You channel your will to power to summon a path in that direction. Floyd | Sadly, nothing happens: you can't go that way. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "u" | DavidW says, "u" | |||
Floyd | You step up to the steps, whistling. The guard, clanking in her Floyd | armour, steps resolutely in front of you. Floyd | Floyd | "No!" she says, pre-empting the merry greeting you had planned. "I Floyd | shan't let you past. For I know that I am a guard and that guards Floyd | guard, and thus I will guard this tower from you. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "throw veil at guard" | ||||
Floyd | (first taking the veil) Floyd | (putting the axe into the sack to make room) Floyd | You've got your hands a bit full. You're going to have to find a sack Floyd | or something if you want to carry any more. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "again" | ||||
Floyd | (first taking the veil) Floyd | (putting the wooden box into the sack to make room) Floyd | You pick the veil up again. How tedious. Floyd | Floyd | You look shiftily from side to side, and when you assure yourself that Floyd | nobody is watching, you cast the veil over the guard's helmet. For Floyd | several long moments you wait. Hesitantly, you put a foot past the Floyd | guard. She doesn't move. Floyd | Floyd | "Hello?" you whisper. Floyd | Floyd | "Excuse me, I seem to be completely ignorant to who I am and why I am Floyd | here," she replies. "Can you help me?" Floyd | Floyd | [1] A living statue, your job is to keep still and quiet all day. Floyd | [2] You're a guard -- you're guarding these stairs from me passsing Floyd | [3] You're Bishop Berkeley and you're on your way to the tavern to Floyd | give a lecture on Idealism. Floyd | [4] You're a mild mannered accountant by day, but by night you don a Floyd | cape and fight crime. Floyd | [5] You're a very charitable person who would never dream of impeding Floyd | someone's progress up some stairs. Floyd | [6] You're an itinerant farm-hand who dreams of one day owning their Floyd | own farm with rabbits and alpaca, but deep down you know it'll never Floyd | happen. Floyd | [7] You write Thus Spoke Zarathustra fan-fiction and go to heavy metal Floyd | concerts. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | "That sounds nice, but if it's all the same to you," she says, "I'm Floyd | just going to stand here until I've got things figured out for Floyd | myself." Floyd | Floyd | [Your score has just gone up by two points.] Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "u" | ||||
Floyd | You clamber up the stairs and through into the tower. The ivory wall, Floyd | eased by its last descent, crashes down behind you before you can do Floyd | anything. This is it, then. Floyd | Floyd | First Chamber Floyd | Perfectly round and with walls of glistening ivory, this is definitely Floyd | more of a chamber than a room. A huge sheet of ivory blocks the exit Floyd | archway, while opposite it sits an ivory-panelled door, with a Floyd | definite sense of being heavily locked about it. Through this door Floyd | come the strains of atmospheric organ music you heard earlier, a Floyd | little clearer, and a little more foreboding. Floyd | Floyd | None of this is the most striking thing about the chamber, however. Floyd | The most striking thing is the fact that in the centre of the room Floyd | buzz thousands of bees, all hovering stationary in a curiously-shaped Floyd | cloud. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "insert fifty" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "put fifty in slot" | ||||
Floyd | You insert the fifty pence piece into the slot, and instead of the Floyd | usual clunks and whirrings of machinery, you hear a series of buzzes Floyd | and organic-sounding thuds. Finally, a key drops into the little tray Floyd | at the bottom of the machine. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "get key" | ||||
Floyd | Which do you mean, the first key or the Chinese key? Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "first" | ||||
Floyd | Taking care not to disturb the bees, you pick up the key. Floyd | Floyd | [Your score has just gone up by three points.] Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "unlock door" | ||||
Floyd | What do you want to unlock the firstdoor with? Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "first" | ||||
Floyd | You unlock the door and open it, trembling with trepidation. Through Floyd | the door lies another ivory staircase -- a spiral staircase which Floyd | winds upwards towards another chamber. Floyd | Floyd | Second Chamber Floyd | You are only a little surprised to find that this chamber is almost Floyd | entirely identical to the first, with the same stairs leading down and Floyd | the same huge door, but for two minor details: firstly, the Floyd | atmospheric organ music is ever so slightly louder; secondly, the Floyd | machine in the centre of the room is both not made of bees and clearly Floyd | a time machine. The clue is in the words "Time Machine" engraved on Floyd | its casing. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "score" | ||||
Floyd | You have scored 77 out of a possible 100 in 856 turns. Jolly well Floyd | done. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "i" | ||||
Floyd | You are carrying: Floyd | a first key Floyd | a lit lantern (providing light) Floyd | a sack (open) Floyd | a wooden box (closed) Floyd | an axe Floyd | a bunch of keys Floyd | a Chinese key Floyd | a lighter Floyd | a qualiascope Floyd | a manual Floyd | file of Platonic forms Floyd | a useless scrap of paper Floyd | a Categorical Imperativator Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "unlock door" | ||||
Floyd | What do you want to unlock the seconddoor with? Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "bunch" | ||||
Floyd | (first taking the bunch of keys) Floyd | (putting the first key into the sack to make room) Floyd | That doesn't seem to fit the lock. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "unlock door" | ||||
Floyd | What do you want to unlock the seconddoor with? Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "first key" | ||||
Floyd | (first taking the first key) Floyd | (putting the bunch of keys into the sack to make room) Floyd | That doesn't seem to fit the lock. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x box" | ||||
Floyd | It's a smooth and very plain wooden box, with the mysterious words Floyd | "Ding an Sich" inscribed on the lid. The martyr for truth told you to Floyd | open it when you really needed to dispel an illusion. Is that time now Floyd | . . . ? Floyd | | smartgenes says, "it does look a bit like time machine" | |||
| smartgenes says, "ding achine" | ||||
| smartgenes says, "oh dear" | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x machine" | ||||
Floyd | A feat of elaborate steelwork has wrought this magnificent device. Floyd | There's what looks like a control booth perched in a torturous Floyd | assembly of elaborate mechanics, as beautiful as they are strange. Floyd | There's a red fake leather seat inside the booth, which rather spoils Floyd | the image, as does the mouldy newspaper sitting on it. The chrome Floyd | dials inside the booth are pretty nice, though. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "enter box" | ||||
Floyd | That's not something you can enter. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "enter machine" | ||||
Floyd | You clamber into the Time Machine and perch on the red seat. Floyd | Floyd | Second Chamber (in the Time Machine) Floyd | This chamber is exactly like the one below it but for two minor Floyd | details: firstly, the atmospheric organ music is ever so slightly Floyd | louder; secondly, the machine in the centre of the room is both not Floyd | made of bees and clearly a time machine. The clue is in the words Floyd | "Time Machine" engraved on its casing. Floyd | | ||||
| djfletch says (to Floyd), "forwards" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "i" | ||||
Floyd | You are carrying: Floyd | a first key Floyd | a lit lantern (providing light) Floyd | a sack (open) Floyd | a bunch of keys | ||||
| Gerynar arrives, full of neither funk nor fun. | ||||
Floyd | a wooden box (closed) Floyd | an axe Floyd | a Chinese key Floyd | a lighter Floyd | a qualiascope Floyd | a manual Floyd | file of Platonic forms Floyd | a useless scrap of paper Floyd | a Categorical Imperativator Floyd | | DavidW says, "If you want to use the box, you need to open it." | |||
| smartgenes says, "yeah i know" | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "open box" | ||||
Floyd | You make to open the box, and then remember the martyr's instructions: Floyd | Floyd | "If you ever need to dispel a dangerous illusion or establish a firm Floyd | and coherent grounding, open this box. But it'll only work once. As Floyd | soon as anyone senses the thing, it'll just become shrouded in Floyd | appearance like everything else. So I suggest you only open this box Floyd | when you really, really need it." Floyd | Floyd | Are you sure you want to open it now? | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "no" | ||||
Floyd | You decide to leave the box closed for now. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "open box" | ||||
Floyd | You make to open the box, and then remember the martyr's instructions: Floyd | Floyd | "If you ever need to dispel a dangerous illusion or establish a firm Floyd | and coherent grounding, open this box. But it'll only work once. As Floyd | soon as anyone senses the thing, it'll just become shrouded in Floyd | appearance like everything else. So I suggest you only open this box Floyd | when you really, really need it." Floyd | Floyd | Are you sure you want to open it now? | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "yes" | ||||
Floyd | You eagerly open the box and look inside it. There is what appears to Floyd | be . . . what can only be described as a thing. You have no idea what Floyd | to do with it. It just sits there, in the box, thing-like. At least, Floyd | that's how it seems to you. There is the vague sense about the thing Floyd | that there's something more to it, something you can't get at -- but Floyd | all you seem to have is what appears to be -- a thing. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x thing" | ||||
Floyd | It's some thing or other, it appears. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "look" | ||||
Floyd | Second Chamber (in the Time Machine) Floyd | This chamber is exactly like the one below it but for two minor Floyd | details: firstly, the atmospheric organ music is ever so slightly Floyd | louder; secondly, the machine in the centre of the room is both not Floyd | made of bees and clearly a time machine. The clue is in the words Floyd | "Time Machine" engraved on its casing. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "get thing" | ||||
Floyd | (putting the first key into the sack to make room) Floyd | Taken. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x thing" | ||||
Floyd | It's some thing or other, it appears. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "put thing in machine" | ||||
Floyd | Dropped. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "look" | ||||
Floyd | Second Chamber (in the Time Machine) Floyd | This chamber is exactly like the one below it but for two minor Floyd | details: firstly, the atmospheric organ music is ever so slightly Floyd | louder; secondly, the machine in the centre of the room is both not Floyd | made of bees and clearly a time machine. The clue is in the words Floyd | "Time Machine" engraved on its casing. Floyd | Floyd | In the Time Machine you can see the thing. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "get thing" | ||||
Floyd | Taken. Floyd | | DavidW asks, "Unlock the seconddoor with it?" | |||
| smartgenes says, "the thing from uranus" | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "out" | ||||
Floyd | You get out of the Time Machine. Floyd | Floyd | Second Chamber Floyd | This chamber is exactly like the one below it but for two minor Floyd | details: firstly, the atmospheric organ music is ever so slightly Floyd | louder; secondly, the machine in the centre of the room is both not Floyd | made of bees and clearly a time machine. The clue is in the words Floyd | "Time Machine" engraved on its casing. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "unlock door with thing" | ||||
Floyd | That doesn't seem to fit the lock. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "eat thing" | ||||
Floyd | That's plainly inedible. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x machine" | ||||
Floyd | A feat of elaborate steelwork has wrought this magnificent device. Floyd | There's what looks like a control booth perched in a torturous Floyd | assembly of elaborate mechanics, as beautiful as they are strange. Floyd | There's a red fake leather seat inside the booth, which rather spoils Floyd | the image, as does the mouldy newspaper sitting on it. The chrome Floyd | dials inside the booth are pretty nice, though. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "get newspaper" | ||||
Floyd | (putting the thing into the sack to make room) Floyd | Taken. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "read it" | ||||
Floyd | It's a rather damp and extremely boring edition of The Times from Floyd | 1957. The only interesting item in it is a piece about an ongoing Floyd | unsolved crime -- the theft of a priceless paracentric key from the Floyd | key exhibition at the International House of Keys, loaned to the Floyd | museum by the H.G Wells Reenactment Society. Floyd | Floyd | The one witness to the theft, a recently-engaged young security guard, Floyd | said "I don't know how the bugger snuck past me -- all I know is, Floyd | there was a flash of light from the exhibition room, the alarm goes Floyd | off, I rushes in, and he clunks me one. Don't know what with, but it Floyd | laid me out for hours -- I was lucky he didn't have a proper weapon Floyd | with him." Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "take skull" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "take qualiascope" | ||||
Floyd | (putting the newspaper into the sack to make room) Floyd | Taken. Floyd | | smartgenes says, "the paracentric key from the museum" | |||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "look through qualiascope at thing" | ||||
Floyd | The scene through the qualiascope is rendered in monochrone, Floyd | indicating a complete absence of consciousness. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "turn on machine" | ||||
Floyd | That's not something you can switch. Floyd | | smartgenes asks, "maybe the key we need is in the museum?" | |||
| djfletch says (to Floyd), "get in machine" | ||||
Floyd | You clamber into the Time Machine and perch on the red seat. Floyd | Floyd | Second Chamber (in the Time Machine) Floyd | This chamber is exactly like the one below it but for two minor Floyd | details: firstly, the atmospheric organ music is ever so slightly Floyd | louder; secondly, the machine in the centre of the room is both not Floyd | made of bees and clearly a time machine. The clue is in the words Floyd | "Time Machine" engraved on its casing. Floyd | | ||||
| djfletch says (to Floyd), "back" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | ||||
| djfletch says (to Floyd), "go to 1957" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "score" | ||||
Floyd | You have scored 77 out of a possible 100 in 883 turns. Jolly well Floyd | done. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "mcfly away" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "listen" | ||||
Floyd | The sound of passing time. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "listen to music" | ||||
Floyd | The organ music is very forboding. Floyd | | DavidW says, "The article in the newspaper is about a theft of a key, probably *us* stealing the key." | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "follow music" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "dials" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "x dials" | ||||
Floyd | (the workings) Floyd | Terrifyingly complicated; you'd rather not touch them. Floyd | | smartgenes says, "bad if we have to work backwards from clue given at end" | |||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "machine" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "x machine" | ||||
Floyd | A feat of elaborate steelwork has wrought this magnificent device. Floyd | There's what looks like a control booth perched in a torturous Floyd | assembly of elaborate mechanics, as beautiful as they are strange. Floyd | There's a red fake leather seat inside the booth, which rather spoils Floyd | the image. The chrome dials inside the booth are pretty nice, though. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "x control booth" | ||||
Floyd | The booth contains a red fake leather seat from which some chrome Floyd | dials can be reached. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x seat" | ||||
Floyd | It looks like it was purloined from an American 1950"s diner. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x thing" | ||||
Floyd | It's some thing or other, it appears. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "chrome dials" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "x booth" | ||||
Floyd | The booth contains a red fake leather seat from which some chrome Floyd | dials can be reached. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "x chrome dials" | ||||
Floyd | The three dials are highly polished and highly mysterious. They could Floyd | affect space-time co-ordinates or they could regulate the air Floyd | conditioning. Each seems to serve a different function: the leftmost Floyd | is a two-way switch, the middle one seems to be able to be set to a Floyd | wide range of possible points, and the rightmost looks like some kind Floyd | of timer. Floyd | | DavidW says, "oho. 'chrome dials' as a phrase." | |||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "turn switch" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "flip switch" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x dials" | ||||
Floyd | (the workings) Floyd | Terrifyingly complicated; you'd rather not touch them. Floyd | | DavidW says, "let's restore the box" | |||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "x timer" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | Gerynar asks, "shouldn't you be in the control booth to use the controls?" | |||
| DavidW says, "yes, but I want to restore anyway" | ||||
| smartgenes says, "we didn't know there were controls till right now" | ||||
| smartgenes says, "as you need "chrome dials" not dials" | ||||
| Gerynar sits back to watch | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "restore" | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "cf11" | ||||
Floyd | Enter saved game to load: Ok. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "l" | ||||
Floyd | Outside the Maze Floyd | You're standing at the entrance to a vast maze built of hedges that Floyd | tower six feet above you. The path seems extravagantly narrow, as if Floyd | the designer wanted to prepare the unwary adventurer from the outside. Floyd | Above the entrance is a painted wooden sign. It looks important. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "s" | ||||
Floyd | You step tentatively into the maze, looking askance at the lump of Floyd | lead. Approaching a moral dilemma, it starts whirring wildly, and Floyd | glowing cracks in the cube appear. It begins to unfold into an Floyd | astonishingly complex device -- an array of dishes and balances, with Floyd | an arrow mounted on top. With little else to do you follow the arrow Floyd | past the dilemma. And then past the next -- and the next. Moral Floyd | dilemmas seem not to be dilemmas at all before its power, and soon you Floyd | emerge from the maze, breathless, at the foot of the crag that looms Floyd | over this land. Floyd | Floyd | A winding path leads up the side of the crag, and you follow it, Floyd | huffing and puffing, until you reach the top. Here, looming Floyd | dangerously atop the already looming crag, sits a gigantic loom. No, a Floyd | gigantic castle -- you were confused for a minute there. Behind you, Floyd | this crazy world stretches out below. You take a deep breath. You Floyd | feel, somehow, that you are near your goal -- whatever that may be.. Floyd | Floyd | At the Foot of an Ivory Tower Floyd | You are in a paved courtyard before the castle. Here, true to form, an Floyd | ivory tower towers above you, the result of a billion poaching Floyd | expeditions or more. Similarly true, a guard guards the broad stairs Floyd | leading up to the tower. Floyd | Floyd | Below you is the vertiginous path down the side of the crag -- and Floyd | below that stretches the world. The strangest thing of all, however, Floyd | is the faint and ominous organ music on the periphery of your hearing. Floyd | Floyd | [Your score has just gone up by three points.] Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "u" | ||||
Floyd | You step up to the steps, whistling. The guard, clanking in her Floyd | armour, steps resolutely in front of you. Floyd | Floyd | "No!" she says, pre-empting the merry greeting you had planned. "I Floyd | shan't let you past. For I know that I am a guard and that guards Floyd | guard, and thus I will guard this tower from you. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "throw veil at guard" | ||||
Floyd | (first taking the veil) Floyd | (putting the axe into the sack to make room) Floyd | You've got your hands a bit full. You're going to have to find a sack Floyd | or something if you want to carry any more. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "again" | ||||
Floyd | (first taking the veil) Floyd | (putting the wooden box into the sack to make room) Floyd | You pick the veil up again. How tedious. Floyd | Floyd | You look shiftily from side to side, and when you assure yourself that Floyd | nobody is watching, you cast the veil over the guard's helmet. For Floyd | several long moments you wait. Hesitantly, you put a foot past the Floyd | guard. She doesn't move. Floyd | Floyd | "Hello?" you whisper. Floyd | Floyd | "Excuse me, I seem to be completely ignorant to who I am and why I am Floyd | here," she replies. "Can you help me?" Floyd | Floyd | [1] A living statue, your job is to keep still and quiet all day. Floyd | [2] You're a guard -- you're guarding these stairs from me passsing Floyd | [3] You're Bishop Berkeley and you're on your way to the tavern to Floyd | give a lecture on Idealism. Floyd | [4] You're a mild mannered accountant by day, but by night you don a Floyd | cape and fight crime. Floyd | [5] You're a very charitable person who would never dream of impeding Floyd | someone's progress up some stairs. Floyd | [6] You're an itinerant farm-hand who dreams of one day owning their Floyd | own farm with rabbits and alpaca, but deep down you know it'll never Floyd | happen. Floyd | [7] You write Thus Spoke Zarathustra fan-fiction and go to heavy metal Floyd | concerts. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | "That sounds nice, but if it's all the same to you," she says, "I'm Floyd | just going to stand here until I've got things figured out for Floyd | myself." Floyd | Floyd | [Your score has just gone up by two points.] Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "u" | ||||
Floyd | You clamber up the stairs and through into the tower. The ivory wall, Floyd | eased by its last descent, crashes down behind you before you can do Floyd | anything. This is it, then. Floyd | Floyd | First Chamber Floyd | Perfectly round and with walls of glistening ivory, this is definitely Floyd | more of a chamber than a room. A huge sheet of ivory blocks the exit Floyd | archway, while opposite it sits an ivory-panelled door, with a Floyd | definite sense of being heavily locked about it. Through this door Floyd | come the strains of atmospheric organ music you heard earlier, a Floyd | little clearer, and a little more foreboding. Floyd | Floyd | None of this is the most striking thing about the chamber, however. Floyd | The most striking thing is the fact that in the centre of the room Floyd | buzz thousands of bees, all hovering stationary in a curiously-shaped Floyd | cloud. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "put coin in slot" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | DavidW says, "fifty" | |||
| Lionheart asks, "If you're redoing that scene, why do you keep choosing 1?" | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "put fifty in slot" | ||||
Floyd | You insert the fifty pence piece into the slot, and instead of the Floyd | usual clunks and whirrings of machinery, you hear a series of buzzes Floyd | and organic-sounding thuds. Finally, a key drops into the little tray Floyd | at the bottom of the machine. Floyd | | DavidW says (to Lionheart), "I was wondering the same thing." | |||
| Lionheart says, "Instead of trying the other dialog options" | ||||
| smartgenes says, "bcos 1 is obviously what she needs to stay still" | ||||
| smartgenes says, "the others wouldn't be in line with what she does" | ||||
| DavidW says, "You don't know." | ||||
| smartgenes says, "she will say hang on that doesn't sound right or something" | ||||
| DavidW says, "She could leave." | ||||
| Lionheart says, "I think she'd give that "stand here and figure it out for myself" response in any case" | ||||
| Lionheart asks, "But why not find out?" | ||||
| smartgenes says, "don't think so" | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "restore" | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "cf11" | ||||
Floyd | Enter saved game to load: Ok. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "s" | ||||
Floyd | You step tentatively into the maze, looking askance at the lump of Floyd | lead. Approaching a moral dilemma, it starts whirring wildly, and Floyd | glowing cracks in the cube appear. It begins to unfold into an Floyd | astonishingly complex device -- an array of dishes and balances, with Floyd | an arrow mounted on top. With little else to do you follow the arrow Floyd | past the dilemma. And then past the next -- and the next. Moral Floyd | dilemmas seem not to be dilemmas at all before its power, and soon you Floyd | emerge from the maze, breathless, at the foot of the crag that looms Floyd | over this land. Floyd | Floyd | A winding path leads up the side of the crag, and you follow it, Floyd | huffing and puffing, until you reach the top. Here, looming Floyd | dangerously atop the already looming crag, sits a gigantic loom. No, a Floyd | gigantic castle -- you were confused for a minute there. Behind you, Floyd | this crazy world stretches out below. You take a deep breath. You Floyd | feel, somehow, that you are near your goal -- whatever that may be.. Floyd | Floyd | At the Foot of an Ivory Tower Floyd | You are in a paved courtyard before the castle. Here, true to form, an Floyd | ivory tower towers above you, the result of a billion poaching Floyd | expeditions or more. Similarly true, a guard guards the broad stairs Floyd | leading up to the tower. Floyd | Floyd | Below you is the vertiginous path down the side of the crag -- and Floyd | below that stretches the world. The strangest thing of all, however, Floyd | is the faint and ominous organ music on the periphery of your hearing. Floyd | Floyd | [Your score has just gone up by three points.] Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "u" | ||||
Floyd | You step up to the steps, whistling. The guard, clanking in her Floyd | armour, steps resolutely in front of you. Floyd | Floyd | "No!" she says, pre-empting the merry greeting you had planned. "I Floyd | shan't let you past. For I know that I am a guard and that guards Floyd | guard, and thus I will guard this tower from you. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "throw veil at guard" | ||||
Floyd | (first taking the veil) Floyd | (putting the axe into the sack to make room) Floyd | You've got your hands a bit full. You're going to have to find a sack Floyd | or something if you want to carry any more. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "again" | ||||
Floyd | (first taking the veil) Floyd | (putting the wooden box into the sack to make room) Floyd | You pick the veil up again. How tedious. Floyd | Floyd | You look shiftily from side to side, and when you assure yourself that Floyd | nobody is watching, you cast the veil over the guard's helmet. For Floyd | several long moments you wait. Hesitantly, you put a foot past the Floyd | guard. She doesn't move. Floyd | Floyd | "Hello?" you whisper. Floyd | Floyd | "Excuse me, I seem to be completely ignorant to who I am and why I am Floyd | here," she replies. "Can you help me?" Floyd | Floyd | [1] A living statue, your job is to keep still and quiet all day. Floyd | [2] You're a guard -- you're guarding these stairs from me passsing Floyd | [3] You're Bishop Berkeley and you're on your way to the tavern to Floyd | give a lecture on Idealism. Floyd | [4] You're a mild mannered accountant by day, but by night you don a Floyd | cape and fight crime. Floyd | [5] You're a very charitable person who would never dream of impeding Floyd | someone's progress up some stairs. Floyd | [6] You're an itinerant farm-hand who dreams of one day owning their Floyd | own farm with rabbits and alpaca, but deep down you know it'll never Floyd | happen. Floyd | [7] You write Thus Spoke Zarathustra fan-fiction and go to heavy metal Floyd | concerts. Floyd | | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "2" | ||||
Floyd | "Really?" she asks. Floyd | Floyd | "No!" you quickly reply, "I was only joking." Floyd | Floyd | "Well, if it's all the same to you," she says, "I'm just going to Floyd | stand here until I've got things figured out for myself." Floyd | Floyd | [Your score has just gone up by two points.] Floyd | | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "undo" | ||||
Floyd | At the Foot of an Ivory Tower Floyd | [Previous turn undone.] Floyd | | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "3" | ||||
Floyd | "That sounds nice, but if it's all the same to you," she says, "I'm Floyd | just going to stand here until I've got things figured out for Floyd | myself." Floyd | Floyd | [Your score has just gone up by two points.] Floyd | | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "undo" | ||||
Floyd | At the Foot of an Ivory Tower Floyd | [Previous turn undone.] Floyd | | smartgenes says, "nice.." | |||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "7" | ||||
Floyd | "That would certainly explain the suit of armour," she says, a little Floyd | perturbed, "but if it's all the same to you I'm just going to stand Floyd | here until I've got my head straight." Floyd | Floyd | [Your score has just gone up by two points.] Floyd | | smartgenes says, "i would be a harsher implement-or" | |||
| DavidW says, "heh" | ||||
| Lionheart says, "Ha ha" | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "undo" | ||||
Floyd | At the Foot of an Ivory Tower Floyd | [Previous turn undone.] Floyd | | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "6" | ||||
Floyd | "That sounds nice, but if it's all the same to you," she says, "I'm Floyd | just going to stand here until I've got things figured out for Floyd | myself." Floyd | Floyd | [Your score has just gone up by two points.] Floyd | | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "undo" | ||||
Floyd | At the Foot of an Ivory Tower Floyd | [Previous turn undone.] Floyd | | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "5" | ||||
Floyd | "That sounds nice, but if it's all the same to you," she says, "I'm Floyd | just going to stand here until I've got things figured out for Floyd | myself." Floyd | Floyd | [Your score has just gone up by two points.] Floyd | | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "undo" | ||||
Floyd | At the Foot of an Ivory Tower Floyd | [Previous turn undone.] Floyd | | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "4" | ||||
Floyd | "That sounds nice, but if it's all the same to you," she says, "I'm Floyd | just going to stand here until I've got things figured out for Floyd | myself." Floyd | Floyd | [Your score has just gone up by two points.] Floyd | | Lionheart says, "Okay, carry on" | |||
| smartgenes says, "yes sir" | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "u" | ||||
Floyd | You clamber up the stairs and through into the tower. The ivory wall, Floyd | eased by its last descent, crashes down behind you before you can do Floyd | anything. This is it, then. Floyd | Floyd | First Chamber Floyd | Perfectly round and with walls of glistening ivory, this is definitely Floyd | more of a chamber than a room. A huge sheet of ivory blocks the exit Floyd | archway, while opposite it sits an ivory-panelled door, with a Floyd | definite sense of being heavily locked about it. Through this door Floyd | come the strains of atmospheric organ music you heard earlier, a Floyd | little clearer, and a little more foreboding. Floyd | Floyd | None of this is the most striking thing about the chamber, however. Floyd | The most striking thing is the fact that in the centre of the room Floyd | buzz thousands of bees, all hovering stationary in a curiously-shaped Floyd | cloud. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "put fifty in slot" | ||||
Floyd | You insert the fifty pence piece into the slot, and instead of the Floyd | usual clunks and whirrings of machinery, you hear a series of buzzes Floyd | and organic-sounding thuds. Finally, a key drops into the little tray Floyd | at the bottom of the machine. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "the beeees the beeeeesss" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "get key" | ||||
Floyd | Which do you mean, the first key or the Chinese key? Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "the first one natch" | ||||
Floyd | I only understood you as far as wanting to get the first key. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "get first" | ||||
Floyd | Taking care not to disturb the bees, you pick up the key. Floyd | Floyd | [Your score has just gone up by three points.] Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "unlock padlock with first" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | DavidW says, "door" | |||
| DavidW says, "not padlock" | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "unlock door with first" | ||||
Floyd | You unlock the door and open it, trembling with trepidation. Through Floyd | the door lies another ivory staircase -- a spiral staircase which Floyd | winds upwards towards another chamber. Floyd | Floyd | Second Chamber Floyd | You are only a little surprised to find that this chamber is almost Floyd | entirely identical to the first, with the same stairs leading down and Floyd | the same huge door, but for two minor details: firstly, the Floyd | atmospheric organ music is ever so slightly louder; secondly, the Floyd | machine in the centre of the room is both not made of bees and clearly Floyd | a time machine. The clue is in the words "Time Machine" engraved on Floyd | its casing. Floyd | | smartgenes says, "the clue" | |||
| smartgenes says, "it repeats the clue is in the words when inside" | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "take newspaper." | ||||
Floyd | (putting the first key into the sack to make room) Floyd | Taken. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "read it" | ||||
Floyd | It's a rather damp and extremely boring edition of The Times from Floyd | 1957. The only interesting item in it is a piece about an ongoing Floyd | unsolved crime -- the theft of a priceless paracentric key from the Floyd | key exhibition at the International House of Keys, loaned to the Floyd | museum by the H.G Wells Reenactment Society. Floyd | Floyd | The one witness to the theft, a recently-engaged young security guard, Floyd | said "I don't know how the bugger snuck past me -- all I know is, Floyd | there was a flash of light from the exhibition room, the alarm goes Floyd | off, I rushes in, and he clunks me one. Don't know what with, but it Floyd | laid me out for hours -- I was lucky he didn't have a proper weapon Floyd | with him." Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "enter machine" | ||||
Floyd | You clamber into the Time Machine and perch on the red seat. Floyd | Floyd | Second Chamber (in the Time Machine) Floyd | This chamber is exactly like the one below it but for two minor Floyd | details: firstly, the atmospheric organ music is ever so slightly Floyd | louder; secondly, the machine in the centre of the room is both not Floyd | made of bees and clearly a time machine. The clue is in the words Floyd | "Time Machine" engraved on its casing. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "x leftmost dial" | ||||
Floyd | A minus sign is etched above the dial to the left, and a plus sign to Floyd | the right. It's currently turned to the right. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x centre" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "x middle dial" | ||||
Floyd | There's a scale etched around the dial, with an M with a line above it Floyd | at one end. Leading clockwise up to that are various other letters, Floyd | with no pattern to them as far as you can see. The dial's currently at Floyd | the far anti-clockwise end of the scale. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "turn m clockwise" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "turn middle dial clockwise" | ||||
Floyd | The dial seems rather stiff. With an effort you can get it to snap Floyd | further along the scale so that it points at an L, but it budges no Floyd | further for now. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "turn middle dial clockwise" | ||||
Floyd | You give the middle dial an extra twist and force it to the far end of Floyd | the scale, pointing somewhere near the final M. Floyd | | smartgenes says, "m-l-m" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x right dial" | ||||
Floyd | There are no marks on this dial whatsoever that indicate its function, Floyd | apart from a pointer etched on its surface. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x pointer" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | djfletch says, "L as in 50? so maybe L and minus to go fifty years back" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x chrome dials" | ||||
Floyd | The three dials are highly polished and highly mysterious. They could Floyd | affect space-time co-ordinates or they could regulate the air Floyd | conditioning. Each seems to serve a different function: the leftmost Floyd | is a two-way switch, the middle one seems to be able to be set to a Floyd | wide range of possible points, and the rightmost looks like some kind Floyd | of timer. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "turn middle dial clockeise" | ||||
Floyd | I only understood you as far as wanting to turn the middle dial. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "oops" | ||||
Floyd | Think nothing of it. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "turn middle dial clockwise" | ||||
Floyd | It's already turned as far as it will go. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "turn middle dial anticlockwise" | ||||
Floyd | With a hearty whack you knock the dial so that it points somewhere in Floyd | the region of the first L again. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "sit down" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "sit seat" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "go machine" | ||||
Floyd | You clamber into the Time Machine and perch on the red seat. Floyd | Floyd | Second Chamber (in the Time Machine) Floyd | This chamber is exactly like the one below it but for two minor Floyd | details: firstly, the atmospheric organ music is ever so slightly Floyd | louder; secondly, the machine in the centre of the room is both not Floyd | made of bees and clearly a time machine. The clue is in the words Floyd | "Time Machine" engraved on its casing. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x words" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | smartgenes asks, "pull the switch?" | |||
| DavidW asks, "What's the left set at?" | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "turn dial minus" | ||||
Floyd | Which do you mean, the leftmost dial, the middle dial or the rightmost Floyd | dial? Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "leftmost dial" | ||||
Floyd | I only understood you as far as wanting to turn the leftmost dial. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "turn leftmost dal" | ||||
Floyd | I only understood you as far as wanting to turn the leftmost dial. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "set letmost dial to minus" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "turn leftmost left" | ||||
Floyd | I only understood you as far as wanting to turn the leftmost dial. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "turn leftmost dial anticlockwise" | ||||
Floyd | Just try turning it instead. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "set leftmost to minus" | ||||
Floyd | No, you can't set that to anything. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "turn leftmost dial" | ||||
Floyd | You flick the dial to point at the minus sign. Floyd | | smartgenes says, "now what" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "out" | ||||
Floyd | You get out of the Time Machine. Floyd | Floyd | Second Chamber Floyd | This chamber is exactly like the one below it but for two minor Floyd | details: firstly, the atmospheric organ music is ever so slightly Floyd | louder; secondly, the machine in the centre of the room is both not Floyd | made of bees and clearly a time machine. The clue is in the words Floyd | "Time Machine" engraved on its casing. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "e" | ||||
Floyd | You channel your will to power to summon a path in that direction. Floyd | Sadly, nothing happens: you can't go that way. Floyd | | DavidW asks, "So, [minus][fifty] ... and turn the rightmost now?" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "open door" | ||||
Floyd | You push and pull at the door, but it won't budge -- it's firmly Floyd | locked. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "in" | ||||
Floyd | You channel your will to power to summon a path in that direction. Floyd | Sadly, nothing happens: you can't go that way. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "enter machine" | ||||
Floyd | You clamber into the Time Machine and perch on the red seat. Floyd | Floyd | Second Chamber (in the Time Machine) Floyd | This chamber is exactly like the one below it but for two minor Floyd | details: firstly, the atmospheric organ music is ever so slightly Floyd | louder; secondly, the machine in the centre of the room is both not Floyd | made of bees and clearly a time machine. The clue is in the words Floyd | "Time Machine" engraved on its casing. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "turn right dial" | ||||
Floyd | You turn the rightmost dial clockwise and release it -- with a ticking Floyd | noise it begins to turn itself back the other way. When it reaches its Floyd | starting point there is a sharp ringing noise and -- Floyd | Floyd | You sit back as the time machine hums and whistles into life. The Floyd | brass railing starts to shiver and shake and somewhere in the depths Floyd | of the engine something goes "meow" in a fuzzy sort of way and a Floyd | bright light washes over the booth. The day turns to night and then to Floyd | day and back at ever-increasing speeds. After about eighteen thousand, Floyd | two hundred and fifty flashes you arrive in the past. Floyd | Floyd | Around you appears to be a night-darkened museum exhibition. A clock Floyd | on the wall, its hands simulacra of keys, indicates the time (or Floyd | perhaps the simulacrum of time) to be 9:58. Given that the time Floyd | machine doesn't seem to move spatially, the Ivory Tower must have been Floyd | the International House of Keys some fifty years previously, or so the Floyd | banner on the wall suggests. Floyd | Floyd | In the centre of the exhibition is a case displaying a key loaned by Floyd | the H.G. Wells Reenactment Society. It has the number "2" engraved on Floyd | it. With your axe to hand, you smash the case and grab the key. Floyd | Floyd | Immediately a heinous wailing fills the room, and lights flash in Floyd | burning red -- the alarms have been set off! A security guard rushes Floyd | in and rugby-tackles you. In defense you lash out with the axe, and to Floyd | your horror the guard's head separates from his shoulders in a Floyd | graceful arc of blood. The severed head, carried forward by its own Floyd | momentum, smacks you in the chops -- and your horror is compounded by Floyd | the fact that you immediately recognise -- though younger than you Floyd | knew him -- your own grandfather. Floyd | Floyd | You barely have time to contemplate the fact that you have Floyd | successfully broken the entire universe before you wink out of Floyd | existence, along with the rest of all creation. Floyd | | djfletch says, "heh" | |||
| djfletch says, "I bet this is where we need the magic box thing" | ||||
| smartgenes says, "umm" | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "undo" | ||||
Floyd | Second Chamber Floyd | [Previous turn undone.] Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "open box" | ||||
Floyd | You make to open the box, and then remember the martyr's instructions: Floyd | Floyd | "If you ever need to dispel a dangerous illusion or establish a firm Floyd | and coherent grounding, open this box. But it'll only work once. As Floyd | soon as anyone senses the thing, it'll just become shrouded in Floyd | appearance like everything else. So I suggest you only open this box Floyd | when you really, really need it." Floyd | Floyd | Are you sure you want to open it now? | DavidW says, "I guess we should leave the axe behind." | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "no" | ||||
Floyd | You decide to leave the box closed for now. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "drop axe" | ||||
Floyd | (first taking the axe from the sack) Floyd | (putting the newspaper into the sack to make room) Floyd | Dropped. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "turn right dial" | ||||
Floyd | You turn the rightmost dial clockwise and release it -- with a ticking Floyd | noise it begins to turn itself back the other way. When it reaches its Floyd | starting point there is a sharp ringing noise and -- Floyd | Floyd | You sit back as the time machine hums and whistles into life. The Floyd | brass railing starts to shiver and shake and somewhere in the depths Floyd | of the engine something goes "meow" in a fuzzy sort of way and a Floyd | bright light washes over the booth. The day turns to night and then to Floyd | day and back at ever-increasing speeds. After about eighteen thousand, Floyd | two hundred and fifty flashes you arrive in the past. Floyd | Floyd | Around you appears to be a night-darkened museum exhibition. A clock Floyd | on the wall, its hands simulacra of keys, indicates the time (or Floyd | perhaps the simulacrum of time) to be 9:58. Given that the time Floyd | machine doesn't seem to move spatially, the Ivory Tower must have been Floyd | the International House of Keys some fifty years previously, or so the Floyd | banner on the wall suggests. Floyd | Floyd | In the centre of the exhibition is a case displaying a key loaned by Floyd | the H.G. Wells Reenactment Society. It has the number "2" engraved on Floyd | it. You grab the nearest thing to hand -- a huge replica padlock -- Floyd | and with it smash the display the case, grabbing the key. Floyd | Floyd | Immediately a heinous wailing fills the room, and lights flash in Floyd | burning red -- the alarms have been set off! A security guard rushes Floyd | in and rugby-tackles you. Quickly you lash out with the novelty Floyd | padlock, knocking the guard unconscious. Casting the padlock from you, Floyd | you hop into the booth and set the dials to the present day. Floyd | Floyd | Safely back in the second chamber, you clamber out of the Time Machine Floyd | and give it a quick kick. Floyd | Floyd | [Your score has just gone up by three points.] Floyd | | Lionheart says, "f drop axe" | |||
| smartgenes says, "ah we did have a clue not to take the axe from teh newspaper" | ||||
| DavidW asks, "We can take the axe again, now, though, I suppose?" | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "get axe" | ||||
Floyd | (putting the second key into the sack to make room) Floyd | Taken. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "out" | ||||
Floyd | You get out of the Time Machine. Floyd | Floyd | Second Chamber Floyd | This chamber is exactly like the one below it but for two minor Floyd | details: firstly, the atmospheric organ music is ever so slightly Floyd | louder; secondly, the machine in the centre of the room is both not Floyd | made of bees and clearly a time machine. The clue is in the words Floyd | "Time Machine" engraved on its casing. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "unlock door" | ||||
Floyd | What do you want to unlock the seconddoor with? Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "second" | ||||
Floyd | (first taking the second key) Floyd | (putting the axe into the sack to make room) Floyd | You unlock the door and open it, trembling with trepidation. Through Floyd | the door lies another ivory staircase -- a spiral staircase which Floyd | winds upwards towards another chamber. Floyd | Floyd | Third Chamber Floyd | A third ivory-walled room identical to the first to -- a doorway Floyd | behind leading down to another chamber, and a door leading to what you Floyd | can only assume to be another spiral staircase, and a bizarre machine Floyd | in the centre of the room. Floyd | Floyd | Here, though, the organ music has grown even more ominous. Thunderous Floyd | chords and trembling pipes reverberate throughout the room through the Floyd | door. If ever music issued a warning of impending climax, this music Floyd | does more. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "score" | ||||
Floyd | You have scored 80 out of a possible 100 in 881 turns. Jolly well Floyd | done. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x machine" | ||||
Floyd | As with the Time Machine, this device has its name engraved on the Floyd | casing in a large copperplate font -- "Turing Machine", it says. Again Floyd | similarly, there's some kind of booth in the machine, complete with Floyd | fake red leather seat. This booth lacks the steampunk wizardry of the Floyd | Time Machine -- there's simply a glowing screen with a keyboard in Floyd | front of it. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "think about turing" | ||||
Floyd | Alan Turing (1912 - 1954) was an English mathematician and logician Floyd | (and also, importantly, a cryptographer whose work on the Enigma Floyd | machine in WWII proved essential) whose lasting legacy is in computer Floyd | science and artificial intelligence. Turing's ideas on the Floyd | functionality of computers are still central today, while his theories Floyd | and tests for artificial intelligence are widely influential. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x screen" | ||||
Floyd | You can't get a proper look at it without getting in the booth. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "listen" | ||||
Floyd | It occurs to you for the first time that somebody must actually be Floyd | playing this organ music -- a thought even more ominous than the music Floyd | itself. Floyd | | Lionheart says, "This looks like a job for the thing" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "get in booth" | ||||
Floyd | You get into the machine and sit on the seat. The computer screen in Floyd | front of you is displaying the word "Hello!" in garish green type, Floyd | inviting a response. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x screen" | ||||
Floyd | The computer screen is displaying a message in bright green letters. Floyd | "Hello!" it says. There's a little > symbol beneath that. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x keyboard" | ||||
Floyd | You can't get a proper look at it without getting in the booth. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "type hello" | ||||
Floyd | The screen goes blank for a moment, and then another message appears: Floyd | "That's what you think passes for a human-sounding response, is it? Floyd | Hmm. What's your name, anyway?" Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "type hello" | ||||
Floyd | The screen goes blank again and, sure enough, another message flashes Floyd | up: "Oh, really? Well, if you say so. And what are you doing here? You Floyd | know, what's your quest, sort of thing?" Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "undo" | ||||
Floyd | Third Chamber Floyd | [Previous turn undone.] Floyd | | smartgenes asks, "my quest is for the holy grail?" | |||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "type floyd" | ||||
Floyd | The screen goes blank again and, sure enough, another message flashes Floyd | up: "Oh, really? Well, if you say so. And what are you doing here? You Floyd | know, what's your quest, sort of thing?" Floyd | | DavidW asks, "truth?" | |||
| smartgenes says, "give it a save" | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "SAVE" | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "cf12" | ||||
Floyd | Enter saved game to store: Ok. Floyd | | DavidW says, "I think we're questing for truth and reality." | |||
| smartgenes asks, "reason?" | ||||
| DavidW says, "perhaps" | ||||
| djfletch says, "loot" | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "truth" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | DavidW says, "home" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "type truth" | ||||
Floyd | The screen now says: "If it weren't so demeaning, I'd write "lol". But Floyd | it is, so I shan't. Right. Last question: What's the fiftieth digit Floyd | after the decimal place of pi?" Floyd | | DavidW asks, "who cares?" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "3" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | DavidW says, "type it" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "type 3" | ||||
Floyd | There's a very long wait before the screen responds. Eventually, it Floyd | displays a final message: "Oh, alright. That's a fairly human Floyd | response, I suppose. You pass. Have a key." As you finish reading Floyd | this, there's a swish electronic noise, a hitherto-unseen panel opens Floyd | up, and a key falls onto the floor. You pick it up, as the panel Floyd | closes into invisibility again, and the screen winks out. Floyd | Floyd | [Your score has just gone up by three points.] Floyd | | smartgenes says, "thank you google" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "unlock door" | ||||
Floyd | What do you want to unlock the thirddoor with? Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "third" | ||||
Floyd | (the third key) Floyd | You unlock the door and open it, trembling with trepidation. Through Floyd | the door lies another ivory staircase -- a spiral staircase which Floyd | winds upwards towards another chamber. Floyd | Floyd | Fourth Chamber Floyd | The organ playing is deafening here. It's echoing around the curved Floyd | ivory walls, its descending scales and dark figures amplified and Floyd | multiplying, a dense wall of foreboding music. The doorway and stairs Floyd | behind you seem terribly inviting -- if you had any excuse to leave Floyd | her, any unfinished business, you would scamper downstairs now. Floyd | Otherwise -- another door lies on the other side of the chamber. Floyd | Floyd | But there is another machine between you and that door. And looking in Floyd | that machine, you almost flee straight away: sitting on the red fake Floyd | leather seat, wearing a peculiar helmet, is a grinning skeleton. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x helmet" | ||||
Floyd | A large metal helmet, with a vizor and ear-plugs, attached to the Floyd | casing of the machine by a long rubber cord. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x skeleton" | ||||
Floyd | The yellowed and wasted skeleton is grinning broadly -- or perhaps Floyd | that's just the effect of your skin dissolving into dust and your Floyd | clothes into rotted rags about you. It's slumped in the machine, Floyd | wearing a large metal helmet which covers most of its skull -- a vizor Floyd | over its eye sockets, plugs in its ear holes, even a cord leading into Floyd | its mouth -- leaving exposed only that awful, leering smile. Floyd | Floyd | The skeleton also seems to be clutching a peculiar hat in its bony Floyd | hand. Floyd | | smartgenes says, "lol we have to plug in" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "get hat" | ||||
Floyd | Better leave it -- it's all there is to identify the poor adventurer Floyd | by. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "x hat" | ||||
Floyd | It looks like the kind of cap worn by the nomads of Afghanisan to you. Floyd | Presumably the skeleton -- when it was still an adventurer -- removed Floyd | it to put on the helmet. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x hat" | ||||
Floyd | It looks like the kind of cap worn by the nomads of Afghanisan to you. Floyd | Presumably the skeleton -- when it was still an adventurer -- removed Floyd | it to put on the helmet. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "x machine" | ||||
Floyd | As with the previous machines, there's an engraving -- "Experience Floyd | Machine" -- and a fake red leather seat. The only visible electronics, Floyd | however, is a strange sort of headset, currently being worn by a Floyd | rather happy-looking skeleton. Floyd | | smartgenes asks, "we need to wear a hat?" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "wear earmuffs" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "i" | ||||
Floyd | You are carrying: Floyd | a third key Floyd | a second key Floyd | a lit lantern (providing light) Floyd | a sack (open) Floyd | an axe Floyd | a newspaper Floyd | a first key Floyd | a wooden box (closed) Floyd | a bunch of keys Floyd | a Chinese key Floyd | a lighter Floyd | a qualiascope Floyd | a manual Floyd | file of Platonic forms Floyd | a useless scrap of paper Floyd | a Categorical Imperativator Floyd | | DavidW says, "I think we need to wear the helmet." | |||
| smartgenes says, "save :-)" | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "SAVE" | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "cf13" | ||||
Floyd | Enter saved game to store: Ok. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "wear helmet" | ||||
Floyd | (first taking the large metal helmet) Floyd | You pick up the helmet -- it's heavier than it looks -- and settle it Floyd | on your head. You adjust the vixor and ear-plugs and, feeling a little Floyd | awkward, put the little wired tab in your mouth. You wait expectantly Floyd | for a moment, and then your ears are filled with the most beautiful Floyd | voice you have ever heard. "Welcome," it says, in tones so perfect you Floyd | could almost weep. Floyd | Floyd | And then, suddenly, your every sense and emotion is awash with Floyd | feeling. Joyous, exquisite pleasure -- your every desire feels Floyd | fulfilled, your every need met. Your are euphoric, overcome. Floyd | Floyd | The joy continues, and continues, and continues. Floyd | Floyd | Forever. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | *** Death by Simulated Bliss *** Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | You have scored 83 out of a possible 100 in 900 turns. Jolly well Floyd | done. Floyd | Floyd | Would you like to RESTART, RESTORE a saved game or QUIT? | smartgenes says, "lol" | |||
| DavidW says, "undo and open the box." | ||||
| smartgenes says, "probably the best death ever" | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "undo" | ||||
Floyd | > Fourth Chamber Floyd | [Previous turn undone.] Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "open box" | ||||
Floyd | You make to open the box, and then remember the martyr's instructions: Floyd | Floyd | "If you ever need to dispel a dangerous illusion or establish a firm Floyd | and coherent grounding, open this box. But it'll only work once. As Floyd | soon as anyone senses the thing, it'll just become shrouded in Floyd | appearance like everything else. So I suggest you only open this box Floyd | when you really, really need it." Floyd | Floyd | Are you sure you want to open it now? | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "yes" | ||||
Floyd | You eagerly open the box and look inside it. There is what appears to Floyd | be . . . what can only be described as a thing. You have no idea what Floyd | to do with it. It just sits there, in the box, thing-like. At least, Floyd | that's how it seems to you. There is the vague sense about the thing Floyd | that there's something more to it, something you can't get at -- but Floyd | all you seem to have is what appears to be -- a thing. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "get thing" | ||||
Floyd | (putting the second key into the sack to make room) Floyd | You've got your hands a bit full. You're going to have to find a sack Floyd | or something if you want to carry any more. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "wear helmet" | ||||
Floyd | (first taking the large metal helmet) Floyd | You pick up the helmet -- it's heavier than it looks -- and settle it Floyd | on your head. You adjust the vixor and ear-plugs and, feeling a little Floyd | awkward, put the little wired tab in your mouth. You wait expectantly Floyd | for a moment, and then your ears are filled with the most beautiful Floyd | voice you have ever heard. "Welcome," it says, in tones so perfect you Floyd | could almost weep. Floyd | Floyd | And then, suddenly, your every sense and emotion is awash with Floyd | feeling. Joyous, exquisite pleasure -- your every desire feels Floyd | fulfilled, your every need met. Your are euphoric, overcome. Floyd | Floyd | The joy continues, and continues, and continues. Floyd | Floyd | Forever. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | *** Death by Simulated Bliss *** Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | You have scored 83 out of a possible 100 in 902 turns. Jolly well Floyd | done. Floyd | Floyd | Would you like to RESTART, RESTORE a saved game or QUIT? | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "undo" | ||||
Floyd | > Fourth Chamber Floyd | [Previous turn undone.] Floyd | | Lionheart says (to smartgenes), "What do you mean, the correct answer would be 0." | |||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "take thing" | ||||
Floyd | (putting the third key into the sack to make room) Floyd | Taken. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "put thing in machine" | ||||
Floyd | You put the thing into the Experience Machine. Floyd | | smartgenes asks, "o?" | |||
| DavidW says, "uhhh" | ||||
| Alex says (to smartgenes), "Awwwk! Word on the street is that O is part of 'no'. So which part of 'no' don't you understand." | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "take thing" | ||||
Floyd | Taken. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x dials" | ||||
Floyd | Terrifyingly complicated; you'd rather not touch them. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x machine" | ||||
Floyd | As with the previous machines, there's an engraving -- "Experience Floyd | Machine" -- and a fake red leather seat. The only visible electronics, Floyd | however, is a strange sort of headset, currently being worn by a Floyd | rather happy-looking skeleton. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "get skeleton" | ||||
Floyd | As you touch the skeleton, it slumps awkwardly out of the Machine and Floyd | collapses, amid a cloud of choking dust, into a pile of bones on the Floyd | floor of the chamber, clattering hollowly on the ivory. The headset Floyd | swings down and bounces folornly on the end of its cord. There's an Floyd | awkward silence. Floyd | Floyd | "Sorry about that," you say. Floyd | | smartgenes says, "haha" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x headset" | ||||
Floyd | A large metal helmet, with a vizor and ear-plugs, attached to the Floyd | casing of the machine by a long rubber cord. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "wear earplugs" | ||||
Floyd | (first taking the large metal helmet) Floyd | You pick up the helmet -- it's heavier than it looks -- and settle it Floyd | on your head. You adjust the vixor and ear-plugs and, feeling a little Floyd | awkward, put the little wired tab in your mouth. You wait expectantly Floyd | for a moment, and then your ears are filled with the most beautiful Floyd | voice you have ever heard. "Welcome," it says, in tones so perfect you Floyd | could almost weep. Floyd | Floyd | And then, suddenly, your every sense and emotion is awash with Floyd | feeling. Joyous, exquisite pleasure -- your every desire feels Floyd | fulfilled, your every need met. Your are euphoric, overcome. Floyd | Floyd | The joy continues, and continues, and continues. Floyd | Floyd | Forever. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | *** Death by Simulated Bliss *** Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | You have scored 83 out of a possible 100 in 909 turns. Jolly well Floyd | done. Floyd | Floyd | Would you like to RESTART, RESTORE a saved game or QUIT? | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "undo" | ||||
Floyd | > Fourth Chamber Floyd | [Previous turn undone.] Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "look" | ||||
Floyd | Fourth Chamber Floyd | The organ playing is deafening here. It's echoing around the curved Floyd | ivory walls, its descending scales and dark figures amplified and Floyd | multiplying, a dense wall of foreboding music. The doorway and stairs Floyd | behind you seem terribly inviting -- if you had any excuse to leave Floyd | her, any unfinished business, you would scamper downstairs now. Floyd | Otherwise -- another door lies on the other side of the chamber. Floyd | Floyd | But there is another machine between you and that door, with a sorry Floyd | looking pile of bones beside it. Floyd | | DavidW asks, "Are you trying to wear the earmuffs?" | |||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "listen" | ||||
Floyd | The organ music is deafening now. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "put thing in helmet" | ||||
Floyd | That can't contain things. Floyd | | smartgenes says, ";it mentions unfinished business" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "d" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Third Chamber Floyd | A third ivory-walled room identical to the first to -- a doorway Floyd | behind leading down to another chamber, and a door leading to what you Floyd | can only assume to be another spiral staircase, and a bizarre machine Floyd | in the centre of the room. Floyd | Floyd | Here, though, the organ music has grown even more ominous. Thunderous Floyd | chords and trembling pipes reverberate throughout the room through the Floyd | door. If ever music issued a warning of impending climax, this music Floyd | does more. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "d" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Second Chamber Floyd | This chamber is exactly like the one below it but for two minor Floyd | details: firstly, the atmospheric organ music is ever so slightly Floyd | louder; secondly, the machine in the centre of the room is both not Floyd | made of bees and clearly a time machine. The clue is in the words Floyd | "Time Machine" engraved on its casing. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "d" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | First Chamber Floyd | Perfectly round and with walls of glistening ivory, this is definitely Floyd | more of a chamber than a room. A huge sheet of ivory blocks the exit Floyd | archway, while opposite it sits an ivory-panelled door, with a Floyd | definite sense of being heavily locked about it. Through this door Floyd | come the strains of atmospheric organ music you heard earlier, a Floyd | little clearer, and a little more foreboding. Floyd | Floyd | None of this is the most striking thing about the chamber, however. Floyd | The most striking thing is the fact that in the centre of the room Floyd | buzz thousands of bees, all hovering stationary in a curiously-shaped Floyd | cloud. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "d" | ||||
Floyd | There's no way through the ivory sheet. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x sheet" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | djfletch says, "bah, I thought we could have survived by holding the thing" | |||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "x ivory sheet" | ||||
Floyd | The archway is blocked by an impenetrable sheet of ivory. There's no Floyd | going back. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "i" | ||||
Floyd | You are carrying: Floyd | the thing Floyd | a lit lantern (providing light) Floyd | a sack (open) Floyd | a third key Floyd | a second key Floyd | an axe Floyd | a newspaper Floyd | a first key Floyd | a wooden box (open but empty) Floyd | a bunch of keys Floyd | a Chinese key Floyd | a lighter Floyd | a qualiascope Floyd | a manual Floyd | file of Platonic forms Floyd | a useless scrap of paper Floyd | a Categorical Imperativator Floyd | | smartgenes says, "havent tried that" | |||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "rub thing" | djfletch says, "look at the fourth door - maybe the point is we should ignore the machine" | |||
Floyd | Ay, there's the rub. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "u" | ||||
Floyd | You push and pull at the door, but it won't budge -- it's firmly Floyd | locked. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "unlock door" | ||||
Floyd | What do you want to unlock the firstdoor with? Floyd | | DavidW says, "we're in the wrong room" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "first" | ||||
Floyd | (first taking the first key) Floyd | (putting the thing into the sack to make room) Floyd | Through the door lies another ivory staircase -- a spiral staircase Floyd | which winds upwards towards another chamber. Floyd | Floyd | Second Chamber Floyd | This chamber is exactly like the one below it but for two minor Floyd | details: firstly, the atmospheric organ music is ever so slightly Floyd | louder; secondly, the machine in the centre of the room is both not Floyd | made of bees and clearly a time machine. The clue is in the words Floyd | "Time Machine" engraved on its casing. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "unlock door" | ||||
Floyd | What do you want to unlock the seconddoor with? Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "second" | ||||
Floyd | (first taking the second key) Floyd | (putting the first key into the sack to make room) Floyd | Through the door lies another ivory staircase -- a spiral staircase Floyd | which winds upwards towards another chamber. Floyd | Floyd | Third Chamber Floyd | A third ivory-walled room identical to the first to -- a doorway Floyd | behind leading down to another chamber, and a door leading to what you Floyd | can only assume to be another spiral staircase, and a bizarre machine Floyd | in the centre of the room. Floyd | Floyd | Here, though, the organ music has grown even more ominous. Thunderous Floyd | chords and trembling pipes reverberate throughout the room through the Floyd | door. If ever music issued a warning of impending climax, this music Floyd | does more. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "unlock door with third" | ||||
Floyd | (the third fake red leather seat) Floyd | (first taking the third fake red leather seat) Floyd | Philosophers are not yet supermen. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x machine" | ||||
Floyd | As with the Time Machine, this device has its name engraved on the Floyd | casing in a large copperplate font -- "Turing Machine", it says. Again Floyd | similarly, there's some kind of booth in the machine, complete with Floyd | fake red leather seat. This booth lacks the steampunk wizardry of the Floyd | Time Machine -- there's simply a glowing screen with a keyboard in Floyd | front of it. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "unlock door" | ||||
Floyd | What do you want to unlock the thirddoor with? Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "third key" | ||||
Floyd | (first taking the third key) Floyd | (putting the second key into the sack to make room) Floyd | Through the door lies another ivory staircase -- a spiral staircase Floyd | which winds upwards towards another chamber. Floyd | Floyd | Fourth Chamber Floyd | The organ playing is deafening here. It's echoing around the curved Floyd | ivory walls, its descending scales and dark figures amplified and Floyd | multiplying, a dense wall of foreboding music. The doorway and stairs Floyd | behind you seem terribly inviting -- if you had any excuse to leave Floyd | her, any unfinished business, you would scamper downstairs now. Floyd | Otherwise -- another door lies on the other side of the chamber. Floyd | Floyd | But there is another machine between you and that door, with a sorry Floyd | looking pile of bones beside it. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "get thing" | ||||
Floyd | (putting the third key into the sack to make room) Floyd | Taken. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "wear helmet" | ||||
Floyd | (first taking the large metal helmet) Floyd | You pick up the helmet -- it's heavier than it looks -- and settle it Floyd | on your head. You adjust the vixor and ear-plugs and, feeling a little Floyd | awkward, put the little wired tab in your mouth. You wait expectantly Floyd | for a moment, and then your ears are filled with the most beautiful Floyd | voice you have ever heard. "Welcome," it says, in tones so perfect you Floyd | could almost weep. Floyd | Floyd | And then, suddenly, your every sense and emotion is awash with Floyd | feeling. Joyous, exquisite pleasure -- your every desire feels Floyd | fulfilled, your every need met. Your are euphoric, overcome. Floyd | Floyd | The joy continues, and continues, and continues. Floyd | Floyd | Forever. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | *** Death by Simulated Bliss *** Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | You have scored 83 out of a possible 100 in 926 turns. Jolly well Floyd | done. Floyd | Floyd | Would you like to RESTART, RESTORE a saved game or QUIT? | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "undo" | ||||
Floyd | > Fourth Chamber Floyd | [Previous turn undone.] Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "eat thing" | ||||
Floyd | That's plainly inedible. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "put thing in mouth" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x thing" | ||||
Floyd | It's some thing or other, it appears. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "open thing" | ||||
Floyd | That's not something you can open. Floyd | | ||||
| djfletch says (to Floyd), "x fourth door" | ||||
Floyd | The huge, ivory-panelled door, is adorned with an intricate-looking Floyd | lock. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "touch thing" | ||||
Floyd | You feel nothing unexpected. Floyd | | ||||
| djfletch says (to Floyd), "x lock" | ||||
Floyd | The huge, ivory-panelled door, is adorned with an intricate-looking Floyd | lock. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "squeeze thing" | ||||
Floyd | You're certainly in a tight squeeze, but that won't get you out of it. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "listen to thing" | ||||
Floyd | The organ music is deafening now. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "unlock door with thing" | ||||
Floyd | That doesn't seem to be something you can unlock. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "smell thing" | ||||
Floyd | There's a disturbing musty smell in the air. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "unlock lock with thing" | ||||
Floyd | That doesn't seem to be something you can unlock. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "rub thing" | ||||
Floyd | Ay, there's the rub. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "x box" | ||||
Floyd | It's a smooth and very plain wooden box, with the mysterious words Floyd | "Ding an Sich" inscribed on the lid. The martyr for truth told you to Floyd | open it when you really needed to dispel an illusion. Is that time now Floyd | . . . ? Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "wave thing" | ||||
Floyd | You look ridiculous waving the thing. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "wear thing" | ||||
Floyd | You can't wear that! Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "think about thing" | ||||
Floyd | Your philosophical studies don't seem to have taught you anything Floyd | about that. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "think about ding an sich" | ||||
Floyd | "Ding an sich" is Kant's German term meaning "the thing in itself". A Floyd | thing in itself is something independent of awareness -- it is core to Floyd | Kant's philosophy that we live in a world of appearances, the Floyd | appearances created by a discursive mind which shapes them according Floyd | to its own innate mental categories, but that "beneath" this world of Floyd | appearances lies the world in itself, about which we can know nothing Floyd | but that it exists. Floyd | Floyd | This distinction, also known as that between "phenomena" and Floyd | "noumena", has been enormously influential. In epistemology, it Floyd | overturned the rationalist/empiricist debate, by implying that we can Floyd | only know the empirical world (and not the ideal truths of Floyd | rationalism), but also by adding that we must know that empirical Floyd | world rationally. The idea that there is a world of subjective Floyd | awareness fed into later debates in philosophy of mind, while the idea Floyd | that the world of appearances is discursively created led the way for Floyd | the postmodern and post-structuralist revolution in philosophy, which Floyd | dismantled philosophical dogmas and preconceptions as being culturally Floyd | and linguistically specific, and which implied that all knowledge is Floyd | to some extent chosen, discursively determined by interpreting minds. Floyd | Floyd | That revolution, as well as more analytic attacks on Kant's Floyd | philosophy, has served to help undermine the phenomenal/noumenal Floyd | distinction in the first place. Is there really a world of appearances Floyd | present in consciousness? Is there really a world in itself Floyd | independent of experience? These questions are the foundation of Floyd | metaphysics to this day. Floyd | | smartgenes says, "well done" | |||
| djfletch says (to Floyd), "put helmet on thing" | ||||
Floyd | You need to be holding the large metal helmet before you can put it on Floyd | top of something else. Floyd | | ||||
| djfletch says (to Floyd), "put thing in helmet" | ||||
Floyd | That can't contain things. Floyd | | ||||
| djfletch says (to Floyd), "get helmet" | ||||
Floyd | You pick up the helmet -- it's heavier than it looks -- and settle it Floyd | on your head. You adjust the vixor and ear-plugs and, feeling a little Floyd | awkward, put the little wired tab in your mouth. You wait expectantly Floyd | for a moment, and then your ears are filled with the most beautiful Floyd | voice you have ever heard. "Welcome," it says, in tones so perfect you Floyd | could almost weep. Floyd | Floyd | And then, suddenly, your every sense and emotion is awash with Floyd | feeling. Joyous, exquisite pleasure -- your every desire feels Floyd | fulfilled, your every need met. Your are euphoric, overcome. Floyd | Floyd | The joy continues, and continues, and continues. Floyd | Floyd | Forever. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | *** Death by Simulated Bliss *** Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | You have scored 83 out of a possible 100 in 945 turns. Jolly well Floyd | done. Floyd | Floyd | Would you like to RESTART, RESTORE a saved game or QUIT? | ||||
| djfletch says (to Floyd), "undo" | ||||
Floyd | > Fourth Chamber Floyd | [Previous turn undone.] Floyd | | ||||
| djfletch says (to Floyd), "fasten thing to helmet" | ||||
Floyd | You bang them together, without noticeable effect -- though you do Floyd | momentarily consider founding a samba band. Floyd | | DavidW says, "ah" | |||
| DavidW says, "oh, that didn't work, I guess." | ||||
| smartgenes says, "there was a game in the olden days where the final entry was "disbelive illusion"" | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "disbelieve illusion" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "wake up" | ||||
Floyd | If only it were that simple. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "disbelieve illusion" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "dispel illusion" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "score" | ||||
Floyd | You have scored 83 out of a possible 100 in 947 turns. Jolly well Floyd | done. Floyd | | smartgenes says, "still another 17" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "push machine" | ||||
Floyd | Philosophers are not yet supermen. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "move it" | ||||
Floyd | Philosophers are not yet supermen. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "think about existence" | ||||
Floyd | Your philosophical studies don't seem to have taught you anything Floyd | about that. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "go machine" | ||||
Floyd | Now vacated by its former occupant, you climb into the machine. There Floyd | really is nothing here but the helmet, attached to the machine's Floyd | casing by a long rubber cord. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x cord" | ||||
Floyd | A large metal helmet, with a vizor and ear-plugs, attached to the Floyd | casing of the machine by a long rubber cord. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "cut cord" | ||||
Floyd | You just make a cutting comment instead, which is about as useful. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x vizor" | ||||
Floyd | A large metal helmet, with a vizor and ear-plugs, attached to the Floyd | casing of the machine by a long rubber cord. Floyd | | ||||
| djfletch says (to Floyd), "cut cord with axe" | ||||
Floyd | I only understood you as far as wanting to cut the large metal helmet. Floyd | | ||||
| djfletch says (to Floyd), "hit machine with axe" | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "pray" | ||||
Floyd | God is dead. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "i" | ||||
Floyd | You are carrying: Floyd | the thing Floyd | a lit lantern (providing light) Floyd | a sack (open) Floyd | a third key Floyd | a second key Floyd | a first key Floyd | an axe Floyd | a newspaper Floyd | a wooden box (open but empty) Floyd | a bunch of keys Floyd | a Chinese key Floyd | a lighter Floyd | a qualiascope Floyd | a manual Floyd | file of Platonic forms Floyd | a useless scrap of paper Floyd | a Categorical Imperativator Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "extinguish light" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "put helmet on qualiascope" | ||||
Floyd | You need to be holding the large metal helmet before you can put it on Floyd | top of something else. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "extinguish lantern" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "put qualiascope in helmet" | ||||
Floyd | You need to be holding the qualiascope before you can put it into Floyd | something else. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "read newspaper" | ||||
Floyd | It's a rather damp and extremely boring edition of The Times from Floyd | 1957. The only interesting item in it is a piece about an ongoing Floyd | unsolved crime -- the theft of a priceless paracentric key from the Floyd | key exhibition at the International House of Keys, loaned to the Floyd | museum by the H.G Wells Reenactment Society. Floyd | Floyd | The one witness to the theft, a recently-engaged young security guard, Floyd | said "I don't know how the bugger snuck past me -- all I know is, Floyd | there was a flash of light from the exhibition room, the alarm goes Floyd | off, I rushes in, and he clunks me one. Don't know what with, but it Floyd | laid me out for hours -- I was lucky he didn't have a proper weapon Floyd | with him." Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "x qualiascope" | ||||
Floyd | It's covered in a hundred nozzles, dials and buttons; you daren't Floyd | press a single one of them. There's a bit that looks like it's Floyd | definitely meant to be an eyepiece, though. Floyd | | smartgenes says, "when did it mention qualiascope" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x eyepice" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | smartgenes says, "oh thats that thingamijig" | |||
| Lionheart says, "Perhaps we need to use the loud music in some way to disturb us out of the illusion." | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "think about thing" | ||||
Floyd | Your philosophical studies don't seem to have taught you anything Floyd | about that. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "listen" | ||||
Floyd | The organ music is deafening now. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "listen to music" | ||||
Floyd | The organ music is very forboding. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "follow music" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | ||||
| djfletch says (to Floyd), "burn machine" | ||||
Floyd | This dangerous act would achieve little. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "put hands on ears" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "l" | ||||
Floyd | Fourth Chamber (in the Experience Machine) Floyd | The organ playing is deafening here. It's echoing around the curved Floyd | ivory walls, its descending scales and dark figures amplified and Floyd | multiplying, a dense wall of foreboding music. The doorway and stairs Floyd | behind you seem terribly inviting -- if you had any excuse to leave Floyd | her, any unfinished business, you would scamper downstairs now. Floyd | Otherwise -- another door lies on the other side of the chamber. Floyd | Floyd | You're in the Experience Machine. It's an uncomfortable booth, Floyd | containing only a strange metal helmet, with a sorry looking pile of Floyd | bones beside it. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "walk through wall" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "x wall" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "e" | ||||
Floyd | You'll have to get out of the Experience Machine first. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "open door" | ||||
Floyd | You push suspiciously against the ivory door. Sure enough, it eases Floyd | open -- it wasn't locked! You take a regretful look at the pile of Floyd | bones on the floor and make your way up the spiral stairs as the organ Floyd | music fills your ears. Floyd | Floyd | As you step into the next chamber, a huge wall of ivory crashes down Floyd | behind you, blocking the doorway. You, however, are too transfixed by Floyd | the sight before you to even turn round. Floyd | Floyd | A vast organ fills much of this chamber, its huge bank of ornate pipes Floyd | reaching higher than you can see. But even this, the biggest organ you Floyd | have ever seen, is made to seem like a child's electronic keyboard by Floyd | the figure that sits at it, back to you, playing the keys with vast, Floyd | gnarled hands. It is a hulking brute of a figure, wearing a thick Floyd | black cloak that ripples and flows as the figure plays and plays. Floyd | Floyd | Hearing the crash of the ivory wall, the figure pauses in its playing. Floyd | Notes ring around the chamber as it pulls itself to its feet, casting Floyd | the cloak to the ground and turning round. Floyd | Floyd | It is a hideous fiend. Two twisted horns sprout from its forehead; its Floyd | skin is a burning red; its huge body taut with bulging muscle and its Floyd | black-bearded face a picture of evil. It speaks, in a voice dark and Floyd | deep: Floyd | "Welcome." Floyd | Floyd | [1] Er . . . Hello. Floyd | [2] Wait a minute: top of a tower, climactic organ music, evil villain Floyd | . . . This is a d?noument, isn't it? Floyd | [3] Horns, check. Red skin, check. Point beard, check. Bulging muscles Floyd | ready to crush pun humans, check. You're an evil demon, aren't you? Floyd | [4] (whimper) Floyd | Floyd | [Your score has just gone up by five points.] Floyd | | smartgenes says, "lol.. good thinking" | |||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "3" | ||||
Floyd | The demon roars with laughter. "Correct, my fine young adventurer!" he Floyd | bellows. "I am the Evil Demon, and this is my realm. How do you find Floyd | it?" Floyd | Floyd | [1] It's . . . very nice. Floyd | [2] Awful. I've been nearly gored by a unicorn, trodden in philosopher Floyd | vomit, watched my mother almost get incinerated, and been emoted to by Floyd | vampire bats. And that's your fault, I find now, is it? Floyd | [3] I didn't find it, it found me. What's all this about? Floyd | | smartgenes says, "started with a scarecrow ending with the wizard of Oz on his organ" | |||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "3" | ||||
Floyd | "Slow down, my hasty young friend," chides the demon mockingly. Floyd | "First, I must know: I have carefully crafted this world to be Floyd | confounding to your every sense, bedazzling to your mind and Floyd | befuddling to your wits. Now tell me: was it not good?" Floyd | Floyd | [1] Yes, good, very good. Can I go now? Floyd | [2] If by "good" you mean "mind-numbingly sadistic", then yes, it was Floyd | good. Floyd | [3] No, it was utterly horrible! Are you telling me you created this Floyd | whole place? Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "2" | ||||
Floyd | "Indeed I do," replies the demon. "My thanks for your compliment. Now: Floyd | to the fun! Floyd | Floyd | [1] Fun? Fun? What fun? Floyd | [2] Wait, wait! Why me? Floyd | [3] Sure, fun: but first I have to know: Where is this place? What am Floyd | I doing here? Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "3" | ||||
Floyd | The demon smiles. "This is not a where," he says enigmatically. "Where Floyd | you are, I do not know. This world -- this world is but an illusion of Floyd | your mind. My powers of creation are but these: to control your every Floyd | sensation, to sustain the representation of life in your Floyd | consciousness. I am your world. Floyd | Floyd | And now I will be your death. We must duel! Floyd | Floyd | [1] This is a duel for my life, right? Floyd | [2] (fight him) Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | "No," says the demon. "This is a duel to your death. Fight!" Floyd | Floyd | [1] (fight him) Floyd | | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | The demon snaps his fingers -- his cloak and the organ behind him Floyd | vanish with a sulphurous crack. He stands, all-powerful, staring you Floyd | down. Floyd | Floyd | Not knowing what else to do, you lower your head and charge at him, Floyd | screaming. Your eyes closed, you fail to see where you're going and, Floyd | as he dodges easily out of the way, you smack straight into the ivory Floyd | wall. As you reel back in a daze, staggering, the demon soars above Floyd | you, fire flaring from his fingertips and smoke pouring from his Floyd | nostrils. The chamber fills with his laughter. Floyd | Floyd | The demon extends his hand, and an enormous fireball careers towards Floyd | you. You roll to the side just in time as the fireball crashes into Floyd | the ivory floor, scorching the tiles. Floyd | | smartgenes says, "uh-oh-spagheeti-ohs" | |||
| djfletch says (to Floyd), "throw thing at demon" | ||||
Floyd | You throw it at the demon, but he just catches it in his fist and Floyd | crumbles it into dust. Floyd | Floyd | The demon crashes to the ground, the shockwaves throwing you against Floyd | the wall. You pick yourself up to your feet as the demon soars back Floyd | into the air. Floyd | | ||||
| djfletch says (to Floyd), "undo" | ||||
Floyd | Final Chamber Floyd | [Previous turn undone.] Floyd | | Lionheart says, "Prolly opened it too soon" | |||
| DavidW says, "I guess we're supposed to open the box here, then." | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "kiss demon" | ||||
Floyd | It wouldn't be any use! Floyd | Floyd | The demon crashes to the ground, the shockwaves throwing you against Floyd | the wall. You pick yourself up to your feet as the demon soars back Floyd | into the air. Floyd | | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "eat demon" | ||||
Floyd | (first taking the Evil Demon) Floyd | Philosophers are not yet supermen. Floyd | Floyd | The demon swoops down at you and smacks you with a huge clawed fist. Floyd | You crash against the wall once more with the force of the blow. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "wake" | ||||
Floyd | If only it were that simple. Floyd | Floyd | The demon conjures up an ethereal wind which launches you into the Floyd | air, before dispelling it again and dropping you onto the ground with Floyd | a sickening thud. Floyd | | djfletch says, "yeah, might have to go back" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "west" | ||||
Floyd | You channel your will to power to summon a path in that direction. Floyd | Sadly, nothing happens: you can't go that way. Floyd | Floyd | The demon lands in front of you and stares you in the eyes. There is a Floyd | dreadful pause as you fall into the glowing hollows of his pupils, and Floyd | then he punches you square in the stomach. As you collapse you think Floyd | you hear the sound of ribs breaking. Floyd | | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "down" | ||||
Floyd | You are unable to descend by the fourthdoor. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "scream" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "talk to demon" | ||||
Floyd | You're in a supernatural battle to the death, or at least to the Floyd | post-Cartesian deconstruction -- you don't think you'll be able to Floyd | just talk the Demon out of it. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "open eyes" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "kill demon with axe" | ||||
Floyd | You charge at the demon, swinging your axe wildly into the air. He Floyd | grabs your wrist, snaps it, takes the axe, and brings it crashing down Floyd | on your skull. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | *** Death by Demonic Illusion *** Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | You have scored 88 out of a possible 100 in 974 turns. Jolly well Floyd | done. Floyd | Floyd | Would you like to RESTART, RESTORE a saved game or QUIT? | smartgenes says, "lol death by demonic illusion" | |||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "undo" | ||||
Floyd | > Final Chamber Floyd | [Previous turn undone.] Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "disbelieve illusion" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | ||||
| djfletch says (to Floyd), "touch thing" | ||||
Floyd | You feel nothing unexpected. Floyd | | ||||
| djfletch says (to Floyd), "get thing" | ||||
Floyd | You already have that. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "ignore illusion" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "i" | ||||
Floyd | You are carrying: Floyd | the thing Floyd | a lit lantern (providing light) Floyd | a sack (open) Floyd | a third key Floyd | a second key Floyd | a first key Floyd | an axe Floyd | a newspaper Floyd | a wooden box (open but empty) Floyd | a bunch of keys Floyd | a Chinese key Floyd | a lighter Floyd | a qualiascope Floyd | a manual Floyd | file of Platonic forms Floyd | a useless scrap of paper Floyd | a Categorical Imperativator Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "think about demon" | ||||
Floyd | The Evil Demon rules over Western philosophy. He is one of the first Floyd | thought experiments in its Modern period, devised by Descartes, the Floyd | Father of Modern Philosophy. Floyd | Floyd | Descartes set out to determine what he could know using only the Floyd | powers of his own rationality. He reasoned thus: there could be an Floyd | Evil Demon controlling every aspect of my experience. Everything I Floyd | think I know could be a false impression created by an Evil Demon to Floyd | fool me. So what can I know by the use of reason alone? Descartes's Floyd | first thought was that he knew with utter certainty that we was Floyd | thinking -- for even if he only thought he was thinking, even if the Floyd | Evil Demon was fooling him into thinking, that was still a thought. He Floyd | could not doubt he was thinking, because doubt was a thought. So he Floyd | was thinking. Cogito, ergo sum -- popularly translated as "I think, Floyd | therefore I am". Floyd | Floyd | Descartes continued to think a lot more than that, but perhaps you'd Floyd | better just think about this for a moment. First thought: this Floyd | devision of what we reason and what we experience has ruled over much Floyd | of Western philosophy. But why is reason more certain than experience? Floyd | Couldn't the Evil Demon fool us into thinking that we were certain of Floyd | our rationality as well? Couldn't we just as well think that direct Floyd | experience, sitting safe in memory, is more reliable than waffly Floyd | rationality? Second thought: how does Descartes get from the neat Floyd | proof that he is thinking to the idea that he definitely exists? What Floyd | about thought proves existence? Isn't just the humbler "Cogito" by Floyd | itself better? Third thought: What do we mean by thoughts? Floyd | Floyd | There are huge questions even at the very root of the founding ideas Floyd | of our philosophy. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "hit demon with newspaper" | ||||
Floyd | I only understood you as far as wanting to hit the Evil Demon. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "think about me" | ||||
Floyd | Your philosophical studies don't seem to have taught you anything Floyd | about that. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "cogito ergo sum" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "think" | ||||
Floyd | What is it you want to THINK ABOUT? Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "iam" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "think about thinking" | ||||
Floyd | Your philosophical studies don't seem to have taught you anything Floyd | about that. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "think i am" | ||||
Floyd | I only understood you as far as wanting to think. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "think about i am" | ||||
Floyd | Your philosophical studies don't seem to have taught you anything Floyd | about that. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "think about thought" | ||||
Floyd | Your philosophical studies don't seem to have taught you anything Floyd | about that. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "stop thinking" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "meditate" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "pray" | ||||
Floyd | God is dead. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "sleep" | ||||
Floyd | You want to wake up from this nightmare, not fall asleep in it. Floyd | | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "give helmet to demon" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | djfletch says, "restore and try not opening the box until we are fighting" | |||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "think about cogito, ergo sum" | ||||
Floyd | Your philosophical studies don't seem to have taught you anything Floyd | about that. Floyd | | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "look at demon through qualiascope" | ||||
Floyd | I only understood you as far as wanting to look at the Evil Demon. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "think about cogito" | ||||
Floyd | Your philosophical studies don't seem to have taught you anything Floyd | about that. Floyd | | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "look through qualiascope at demon" | ||||
Floyd | It wouldn't be any use! Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "thing about cogito ergo sum" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "think about cogito ergo sum" | ||||
Floyd | Your philosophical studies don't seem to have taught you anything Floyd | about that. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "i think therefore i am" | ||||
Floyd | I only understood you as far as wanting to take inventory. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "think therefore i am" | ||||
Floyd | I only understood you as far as wanting to think. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "look through qualiascope at me" | ||||
Floyd | That sounds like a terrific idea -- if only you had a qualiascope. Floyd | | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "throw axe at demon" | ||||
Floyd | (first taking the axe) Floyd | (putting the thing into the sack to make room) Floyd | You throw it at the demon, but he just catches it in his fist and Floyd | crumbles it into dust. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "take qualiascope" | ||||
Floyd | Taken. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "laugh at demon" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "look through qualiascope at me" | ||||
Floyd | Strangely enough, when pointed at oneself, the eyepiece turns Floyd | transparent and the world appears as normal. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "mock demon" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "sing" | ||||
Floyd | The hills are alive. Which in any other context would be positively Floyd | terrifying, but it's only the sound of music. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "deny demon" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "wear qualiascope" | ||||
Floyd | You can't wear that! Floyd | | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "play organ" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "ignore demon" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "look through qualiascope at demon" | ||||
Floyd | It wouldn't be any use! Floyd | | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "burn demon" | ||||
Floyd | It wouldn't be any use! Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "dance" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "damn demon" | ||||
Floyd | I only understood you as far as wanting to damn. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "think about reason" | ||||
Floyd | Your philosophical studies don't seem to have taught you anything Floyd | about that. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "think about philosophy" | ||||
Floyd | Your philosophical studies don't seem to have taught you anything Floyd | about that. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "sit down" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "ask demon for weapon" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | smartgenes asks, "restore and try the box?" | |||
| DavidW says, "I guess" | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "talk to demon" | ||||
Floyd | You're in a supernatural battle to the death, or at least to the Floyd | post-Cartesian deconstruction -- you don't think you'll be able to Floyd | just talk the Demon out of it. Floyd | | Lionheart says, "Yeah I'm out of silly ideas to try" | |||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "fly" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | djfletch says, "yes, we must have to use it here somehow, and maybe opening it is the important thing" | |||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "swim" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "there is no spoon" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "pray" | ||||
Floyd | God is dead. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "xyzzy" | ||||
Floyd | A hollow voice says, "There are no obligatory Adventure references in Floyd | this game." Floyd | Floyd | There is a long pause. Floyd | Floyd | "Oh, bugger." Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "turn off computer" | ||||
Floyd | That's either not here, or carelessly undescribed by the fickle Floyd | creators of this world. Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "plugh" | ||||
Floyd | A hollow voice says, "There are no obligatory Adventure references in Floyd | this game." Floyd | Floyd | There is a long pause. Floyd | Floyd | "Oh, bugger." Floyd | | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "plover" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "summon unicorn" | ||||
Floyd | Your desire has passed beyond meaning. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "shit" | ||||
Floyd | Quite. Floyd | | DavidW says, "restore already" | |||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "kill me" | ||||
Floyd | You consider taking all your frustration out on the innocent, but your Floyd | anger soon subsides. Floyd | | smartgenes asks, "what number?" | |||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "RESTORE" | ||||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "cf13" | ||||
Floyd | Enter saved game to load: Ok. Floyd | | Lionheart says, "That wasn't apt" | |||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "l" | ||||
Floyd | Fourth Chamber Floyd | The organ playing is deafening here. It's echoing around the curved Floyd | ivory walls, its descending scales and dark figures amplified and Floyd | multiplying, a dense wall of foreboding music. The doorway and stairs Floyd | behind you seem terribly inviting -- if you had any excuse to leave Floyd | her, any unfinished business, you would scamper downstairs now. Floyd | Otherwise -- another door lies on the other side of the chamber. Floyd | Floyd | But there is another machine between you and that door. And looking in Floyd | that machine, you almost flee straight away: sitting on the red fake Floyd | leather seat, wearing a peculiar helmet, is a grinning skeleton. Floyd | | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "i" | ||||
Floyd | You are carrying: Floyd | a third key Floyd | a second key Floyd | a lit lantern (providing light) Floyd | a sack (open) Floyd | an axe Floyd | a newspaper Floyd | a first key Floyd | a wooden box (closed) Floyd | a bunch of keys Floyd | a Chinese key Floyd | a lighter Floyd | a qualiascope Floyd | a manual Floyd | file of Platonic forms Floyd | a useless scrap of paper Floyd | a Categorical Imperativator Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "get skeleton" | ||||
Floyd | As you touch the skeleton, it slumps awkwardly out of the Machine and Floyd | collapses, amid a cloud of choking dust, into a pile of bones on the Floyd | floor of the chamber, clattering hollowly on the ivory. The headset Floyd | swings down and bounces folornly on the end of its cord. There's an Floyd | awkward silence. Floyd | Floyd | "Sorry about that," you say. Floyd | | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "get box" | ||||
Floyd | (putting the second key into the sack to make room) Floyd | You've got your hands a bit full. You're going to have to find a sack Floyd | or something if you want to carry any more. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "get bones" | ||||
Floyd | Philosophers are not yet supermen. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "pull cord" | ||||
Floyd | Philosophers are not yet supermen. Floyd | | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "drop second, third" | ||||
Floyd | second key: (first taking the second key from the sack) Floyd | (putting the third key into the sack to make room) Floyd | Dropped. Floyd | third key: (first taking the third key from the sack) Floyd | Dropped. Floyd | | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "get box" | ||||
Floyd | Taken. Floyd | | DavidW asks, "why are you wasting time? What are you doing?" | |||
| Lionheart says, "We'll need the box" | smartgenes says, "he's making sure we have the box in hands i guess" | |||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "u" | ||||
Floyd | You push suspiciously against the ivory door. Sure enough, it eases Floyd | open -- it wasn't locked! You take a regretful look at the pile of Floyd | bones on the floor and make your way up the spiral stairs as the organ Floyd | music fills your ears. Floyd | Floyd | As you step into the next chamber, a huge wall of ivory crashes down Floyd | behind you, blocking the doorway. You, however, are too transfixed by Floyd | the sight before you to even turn round. Floyd | Floyd | A vast organ fills much of this chamber, its huge bank of ornate pipes Floyd | reaching higher than you can see. But even this, the biggest organ you Floyd | have ever seen, is made to seem like a child's electronic keyboard by Floyd | the figure that sits at it, back to you, playing the keys with vast, Floyd | gnarled hands. It is a hulking brute of a figure, wearing a thick Floyd | black cloak that ripples and flows as the figure plays and plays. Floyd | Floyd | Hearing the crash of the ivory wall, the figure pauses in its playing. Floyd | Notes ring around the chamber as it pulls itself to its feet, casting Floyd | the cloak to the ground and turning round. Floyd | Floyd | It is a hideous fiend. Two twisted horns sprout from its forehead; its Floyd | skin is a burning red; its huge body taut with bulging muscle and its Floyd | black-bearded face a picture of evil. It speaks, in a voice dark and Floyd | deep: Floyd | "Welcome." Floyd | Floyd | [1] Er . . . Hello. Floyd | [2] Wait a minute: top of a tower, climactic organ music, evil villain Floyd | . . . This is a d?noument, isn't it? Floyd | [3] Horns, check. Red skin, check. Point beard, check. Bulging muscles Floyd | ready to crush pun humans, check. You're an evil demon, aren't you? Floyd | [4] (whimper) Floyd | Floyd | [Your score has just gone up by five points.] Floyd | | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "2" | ||||
Floyd | "Hah!" laughs the demon. "By and by, no doubt. But first: How do you Floyd | find my realm?" Floyd | Floyd | [1] It's . . . very nice. Floyd | [2] Awful. I've been nearly gored by a unicorn, trodden in philosopher Floyd | vomit, watched my mother almost get incinerated, and been emoted to by Floyd | vampire bats. And that's your fault, I find now, is it? Floyd | [3] I didn't find it, it found me. What's all this about? Floyd | | DavidW says, "yes, but it's not like the demon kills us instantly." | |||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | The demon chuckles once more at your response. "I somehow doubt you've Floyd | found it so, as you've got this far. Tell me, did you not find it all Floyd | at all strange?" Floyd | Floyd | Before you can respond he continues: "Of course you did. I designed it Floyd | to be so. I have carefully crafted this world to be confounding to Floyd | your every sense, bedazzling to your mind and befuddling to your wits. Floyd | Now do tell me: was it not good? Floyd | Floyd | [1] Yes, good, very good. Can I go now? Floyd | [2] If by "good" you mean "mind-numbingly sadistic", then yes, it was Floyd | good. Floyd | [3] No, it was utterly horrible! Are you telling me you created this Floyd | whole place? Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "3" | ||||
Floyd | "In a manner of speaking," answers the demon, his wrath mounting. "But Floyd | enough talk -- to the fun! Floyd | Floyd | [1] Fun? Fun? What fun? Floyd | [2] Wait, wait! Why me? | ||||
| Lionheart says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | [3] Sure, fun: but first I have to know: Where is this place? What am Floyd | I doing here? Floyd | Floyd | "Why, the d?noument," answers the demon. "The final duel!" Floyd | Floyd | [1] Wait, wait! First I have to know: Where is this place? What am I Floyd | doing here? Floyd | [2] This is a duel for my life, right? Floyd | [3] (fight him) Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "1" | ||||
Floyd | The demon smiles. "This is not a where," he says enigmatically. "Where Floyd | you are, I do not know. This world -- this world is but an illusion of Floyd | your mind. My powers of creation are but these: to control your every Floyd | sensation, to sustain the representation of life in your Floyd | consciousness. I am your world. Floyd | Floyd | And now I will be your death. We must duel! Floyd | Floyd | [1] This is a duel for my life, right? Floyd | [2] (fight him) Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "2" | ||||
Floyd | The demon snaps his fingers -- his cloak and the organ behind him Floyd | vanish with a sulphurous crack. He stands, all-powerful, staring you Floyd | down. Floyd | Floyd | Not knowing what else to do, you lower your head and charge at him, Floyd | screaming. Your eyes closed, you fail to see where you're going and, Floyd | as he dodges easily out of the way, you smack straight into the ivory Floyd | wall. As you reel back in a daze, staggering, the demon soars above Floyd | you, fire flaring from his fingertips and smoke pouring from his Floyd | nostrils. The chamber fills with his laughter. Floyd | Floyd | The demon extends his hand, and an enormous fireball careers towards Floyd | you. You roll to the side just in time as the fireball crashes into Floyd | the ivory floor, scorching the tiles. Floyd | | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "open box" | ||||
Floyd | You remember what the martyr said -- that the power of the Ding an Floyd | Sich will dispel all illusion -- and wrench the box open. Floyd | Floyd | Immediately the room is filled with an extraordinarily bright light Floyd | pouring forth from the box, which is quaking in your grasp. You cast Floyd | it to the ground, and it skids along the ivory towards the Demon, Floyd | showering sparks in all directions. Floyd | Floyd | You look up at the Demon's stricken face -- he is gasping, his eyes Floyd | bulging -- he is clawing himself away from the burning light. You Floyd | shield your eyes from the sight, but you can still hear his hellish Floyd | bellows -- they echo round the chamber, growing louder and louder, and Floyd | all you can hear is the noise and the light is burning through your Floyd | eyelids . . . | ||||
| Lionheart presses the large red button on the FREE DONUTS machine. Within seconds, the room is flooded with a thousand tiny, happy donuts, running about your feet in an exuberant dance of freedom. They then disappear as quickly as they had arrived. | ||||
| smartgenes says (to Floyd), "look" | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Suddenly all is quiet and still. You open your eyes. The demon has Floyd | vanished -- and so has the box. There is a dull, whistling sound. The Floyd | walls of the ivory chamber, you realise, look wrong -- thin, weakened Floyd | somehow. They are growing strangely transparent, but instead of the Floyd | blue skies beyond there's a strange darkness. You look down, and Floyd | realise that the same is happening to the floor beneath your feet. Floyd | Floyd | Soon the ivory tower has vanished entirely. You're falling, and Floyd | beneath you you see the lights of the village wink out one by one. The Floyd | now-dark ocean is rolling up the beach, and the plains seem to be Floyd | melting away. You feel the air rushing by as the rocky ground comes Floyd | rapidly up to meet you, ready to crush your helpless body. The end is Floyd | coming. | ||||
| Lionheart presses the yellow enter button. | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | . . . | smartgenes says, "uh-oh" | |||
| Lionheart presses the yellow enter button. | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | . . . ugh . . . | ||||
| Lionheart presses the yellow enter button. | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | . . . bleurgh . . . | ||||
| DavidW presses the yellow enter button. | ||||
Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | You didn't expect the afterlife to smell vaguely of vomit, which was Floyd | the first clue. When you opened your eyes and realised that the dull Floyd | pressure on your noise was due to the way it was squashed into the Floyd | scratchy carpet, that was the second clue. The third was when you Floyd | rolled over and saw your own bedroom ceiling. Floyd | Floyd | Your own blessed room. Your own blessed hangover. Your own blessed Floyd | dried pool of sick lying beside you. Floyd | Floyd | You pull yourself gingerly to your feet. You're still wearing your Floyd | watch -- and it's telling the time and date you'd expect it to. For a Floyd | moment you worry you're going to be late for the morning's lecture, Floyd | and the wild dreams of the night are already fading from memory. Then Floyd | you remember: term's over. You've nothing to do but lie around all day Floyd | long, recovering from the previous festivities. And then, tonight, Floyd | with your classmates, you fully intend to start a fantastic bonfire, Floyd | and burn every single one of your lecture notes. Floyd | Floyd | You realise you're still gripping something in your hand. You open it Floyd | -- and there it is, lying in your palm. A tiny key, with a little Floyd | Chinese symbol engraved on it. Floyd | Floyd | You look at it for a while, and then go to fetch a mop and bucket. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | *** You have won *** Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | You have scored 98 out of a possible 100 in 909 turns. Jolly well Floyd | done. Floyd | Floyd | Would you like to RESTART, RESTORE a saved game or QUIT? | djfletch says, "wooo" | |||
| DavidW says, "yay" | ||||
| smartgenes asks, "2pts off?" | ||||
| DavidW says, "I guess we missed something somewhere." | ||||
| Lionheart says, "Guess we missed an optional thing." | ||||
| DavidW says, "Maybe there was a way to save both the bishop and mom." | ||||
| DavidW says, "That was a very strange game." | ||||
| smartgenes says, "great game though, especially the dialogue" | ||||
| smartgenes says, "the puzzles were a bit unconvincing at times, but like the set-pieces at the end" | ||||
| Lionheart says, "Kind of deficient in the input it accepted, but the dialogue was well done" | ||||
| DavidW says, "bit odd to have a deus ex machina, though, for a end battle in a game that's about philosophy." | ||||
| DavidW says, "yeah, it could've been lots better in recognizing synonyms." | ||||
| smartgenes says, "it didn't quite fulfil the philosophy aspect" | ||||
| smartgenes says, "as it was qite fetch-quest in the middle point" | ||||
| djfletch says, "there was a ton of material that didn't all translate well into being puzzles" | ||||
| DavidW says, "hm. We never did anything useful with the women in the tavern booth; maybe that's where our missing 2 points are." | ||||
| djfletch says, "still good fun though" | ||||
| djfletch says, "hmm yeah, we just talked to them" | ||||
| smartgenes asks, "it was like 8 hours was it?" | ||||
| DavidW says, "almost that, yeah" | ||||
| smartgenes says, "and it was getting more & more intersting towards end" | ||||
| DavidW says, "I want to bugger off and make a sandwich or two." | ||||
| smartgenes says, "sleep.. it's 2:45am here" | ||||
| djfletch says, "yup" | ||||
| djfletch says, "bye all" | ||||
| smartgenes says, "gnight all" | ||||
| DavidW says, "Thanks everyone. It's been fun." | ||||
| smartgenes says, "yep :-D" | ||||
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