@allrealelements / allrealelements.tumblr.com
shuri: is calling peter on facetime at 1:30 in the morning
peter, half asleep: shuri you know we live in different time zones, it’s the middle of night here, what’s up??
shuri: there’s just something i need to get off my chest
peter: what??
shuri: rat is short for ratthew
i want to address the point that the redwall creatures seemed like protestants with the fact that this further implies a Mouse Reformation, featuring a mouse dissident and indeed.. a mouse pope
While it is indeed possible that the theology of Redwall had deviated from the dicta of the Mouse Pope (Pope Mus IV), Protestants don’t, as far as I or the internet knows, have much of a monastic tradition, thus proving that they are Catholic and fall under the jurisdiction of the Holy (Mouse) See. In this essay, I will show that Martin the Warrior should have been excommunicated for his heresies
flagrantly disregarding the possibility that the Redwall animals could be Orthodox
Guys they are Anglican, this means not only is there a mouse pope there was a mouse king who really wanted a divorce
At mouse scale, that would be Henry the 1/8th.
this is the only valid speculation thread my post has created
Henry the VIII was 6′2″ and weighed about 200 pounds even in his sprightly, athletic, pre-knee injury incarnation, which would put a to-scale Henry the 1/8th at a frankly terrifying 25 pounds.
Can you imagine being an Elderly Frail Mouse Pope with an enraged 25 pound mouse bearing down on you to question your supreme religious authority? If I had been the mouse pope, there never would have been a reformation, because I would have immediately given Terrifying Colossus Mouse King Henry the 1/8th any annulment he fucking wanted
I’ve been on this hell site for years and this is the first time Redwall fandom discourse has ever popped up on my dash.
I use algorithms called neural networks to write humor. What’s fun about neural networks is they learn by example - give them a bunch of some sort of data, and they’ll try to figure out rules that let them imitate it. They power corporate finances, recognize faces, translate text, and more. I, however, like to give them silly datasets. I’ve trained neural networks to generate new paint colors, new Halloween costumes, and new candy heart messages. When the problem is tough, the results are mixed (there was that one candy heart that just said HOLE).
One of the toughest problems I’ve ever tried? Knitting patterns.
I knew almost nothing about knitting when @JohannaB@wandering.shop sent me the suggestion one day. She sent me to the Ravelry knitting site, and to its adults-only, often-indecorous LSG forum, who as you will see are amazing people. (When asked how I should describe them, one wrote “don’t forget the glitter and swearing!”)
And so, we embarked upon Operation Hilarious Knitting Disaster.
The knitters helped me crowdsource a dataset of 500 knitting patterns, ranging from hats to squids to unmentionables. JC Briar exported another 4728 patterns from the site stitch-maps.com.
I gave the knitting patterns to a couple of neural networks that I collectively named “SkyKnit”. Then, not knowing if they had produced anything remotely knittable, I started posting the patterns. Here’s an early example.
MrsNoddyNoddy wrote, “it’s difficult to explain why 6395, 71, 70, 77 is so asthma-inducingly funny.” (It seems that a 6000-plus stitch count is, as GloriaHanlon put it, “optimism”).
As training progressed, and as I tried some higher-performance models, SkyKnit improved. Here’s a later example.
Even at its best, SkyKnit had problems. It would sometimes repeat rows, or leave them out entirely. It could count rows fairly reliably up to about 22, but after that would start haphazardly guessing random largish numbers. SkyKnit also had trouble counting stitches, and would confidently declare at the end of certain lines that it contained 12 stitches when it was nothing of the sort.
But the knitters began knitting them. This possibly marks one of the few times in history when a computer generated code to be executed by humans.
[Mystery lace - datasock]
[Reverss Shawl - citikas]
The knitters didn’t follow SkyKnit’s directions exactly, as it turns out. For most of its patterns, doing them exactly as written would result in the pattern immediately unraveling (due to many dropped stitches), or turning into long whiplike tentacles (due to lots of leftover stitches). Or, to make the row counts match up with one another, they would have had to keep repeating the pattern until they’d reached a multiple of each row count - sometimes this was possible after a few repeats, while other times they would have had to make the pattern tens of thousands of stitches long. And other times, missing rows made the directions just plain impossible.
So, the knitters just started fixing SkyKnit’s patterns.
Knitters are very good at debugging patterns, as it turns out. Not only are there a lot of knitters who are coders, but debugging is such a regular part of knitting that the complicated math becomes second nature. Notation is not always consistent, some patterns need to be adjusted for size, and some simply have mistakes. The knitters were used to taking these problems in stride. When working with one of SkyKnit’s patterns, GloriaHanlon wrote, “I’m trying not to fudge too much, basically working on the principle that the pattern was written by an elderly relative who doesn’t speak much English.”
Each pattern required a different debugging approach, and sometimes knitters would each produce their own very different-looking versions. Here are three versions of “Paw Not Pointed 2 Stitch 2″.
Once, knitter MeganAnn came across a stitch that didn’t even exist (something SkyKnit called ’pbk’). So she had to improvise. “I googled it and went with the first definition I got, which was ‘place bead and knit’.” The resulting pattern is “Ribbed Rib Rib” below (note bead).
Even debugged, the patterns were weird. Like, really, really nonhumanly weird.
“I love how organic it comes out,“ wrote Vastra. SylviaTX agreed, loving “the organic seeming randomness. Like bubbles on water or something,”
SkyKnit’s patterns were also a pain. Michaela112358 called Row 15 of Mystery Lace (above) “a bit of a head melter”, commenting that it “lacked the rhythm that you tend to get with a normal pattern”. Maeve_ish wrote that Shetland Bird Pat “made my brain hurt so I went to bed.” ShoelessJane asked, “Okay, now who here has read Snow Crash?”
“I was laughing a few days ago because I was trying to math a Skyknit pattern and my brain…froze. Like, no longer could number at all. I stared blankly at my scribbles and at the screen wondering what had happened til somehow I rebooted. Yup, Skyknit crashed my brain.” - Rayn63
On the pattern SkyKnit called “Cherry and Acorns Twisted To”:
“Couple notes on the knitting experience, which while funny wasn’t terribly pleasurable: Because there’s no rhythm or symmetry to the pattern, I felt I was white-knuckling it through each line, really having to concentrate. There are also some stitch combinations that aren’t very comfortable to execute physically, YO, SSK in particular.
That said, I’m nearly tempted to add a bit of random AI lace to a project, perhaps as cuffs on a sweater or a short-row lace panel in part of a scarf, like Sylvia McFadden does in many of her shawl designs. As another person in the thread said, it would add a touch of spider-on-LSD.” -SarahScully
[cherry and acorns twisted to - Sarah Scully]
BridgetJ’s comments on “Butnet Scarf”:
“Four repeats in to this oddball, daintily alien-looking 8-row lace pattern, and I have, improbably, begun to internalize it and get in to a rhythm like every other lace pattern.
I still have a lingering suspicion that I’m knitting a pattern that could someday communicate to an AI that I want to play a game of Global Thermonuclear War, but I suppose at least I’ll have a scarf at the end of it?” -BridgetJ
[butnet scarf - BridgetJ]
There was also this beauty of a pattern, that SkyKnit called “Tiny Baby Whale Soto”. GloriaHanlon managed somehow to knit it and described it as “a bona fide eldritch horror. Think Slenderman meets Cthulu and you wouldn’t be far wrong.”
Other than being a bit afraid of Tiny Baby Whale Soto, the knitters seem happy to do the bidding of SkyKnit, brain melts and all.
“I cast on for a lovely MKAL with a designer I totally trust and became immediately suspicious because the pattern made sense. All rows increase in an orderly manner. There are no “huh?” moments. There are no maths at all…it has all been done for me. I thought I would be happy, yo. Instead, I am kind of missing the brain scrambling and I keep looking for pigs and tentacles. Go figure.” - Rayn63
Check out the rest of the SkyKnit-generated patterns, and the glorious rainbow of weird test-knits at SkyKnit: The Collection and InfiKnit.
There’s also a great article in the Atlantic that talks a bit more about the debugging.
If you feel so inspired (and don’t mind the kind-hearted yet vigorous swearing), join the conversation on the LSG Ravelry SkyKnit thread - many of SkyKnit’s creations have not yet been test-knit at all, and others transform with every new knitter’s interpretation. Compare notes, commiserate, and do SkyKnit’s inscrutable bidding!
Heck yeah there is bonus material this week. Have some neural net-generated knitting & crochet titles. Some of them are mixed with metal band names for added creepiness. Enter your email here to get more like these:
Chicken Shrug Snuggle Features Cartube Party Filled Booties Corm Fullenflops Womp Mittens Socks of Death Tomb of Sweater Shawl Ruins
i love this so much. knit nerds are the best
GUYS I’VE FOUND A VERY IMPORTANT WEBSITE FOR PEOPLE WHO CAN KNIT WITHOUT INJURING THEMSELVES!!!!
i brought my scale mail to a craft meet once and it took approximately 0.001 nanoseconds for some dude to start crocheting them so i imagine this works pretty well too
Ripley’s Believe It Or Not: she cute
today has been rough. hopefully ripley can help ease some of your anxiety and bring a little brightness to your day
if you’re offline or away and i message you something (like a link to a meme or a picture or w/e) honestly just assume that i’m just leaving it there for when you get back and not expecting you to answer straight away. i don’t need you to respond with “hey, sorry, i wasn’t at the computer!” or anything. i was leaving u a gift for later.
I do this all the time on Discord. I’m not expecting a response, I’m just sharing a thing for whenever you happen to see it.
I regularly send my friends memes when I know they’re asleep because I know
they will wake
and then
they will scream
This post, but also when you’re awake and online and even posting. It’s chill! I’m leaving that there for you whenever, that’s the nice thing about technological advancements like instance messaging, it means I can do that without sending you awkward clunky emails, and they DON’T mean we as human beings need to be available to each other immediately! I’m sending you a letter. Take care of it whenever!
whether or not you like pacific rim, you can’t deny it dropped some of the rawest fucking dialogue ever spoken in cinematic history
“fortune favours the brave”??? “numbers are the closest we get to the handwriting of god”??? “TODAY WE ARE CANCELLING THE APOCALYPSE”????? pacrim knew it was extra af and embraced it with open arms
I got to draw mega heracross for the Mexican pokedex by dekoboko, it was really fun!
— Me tocó ilustrar a mega heracross para el pokedex de dekoboko, fue muy divertido!
Concept: Jazz is a model. Discuss.
communication is the foundation
Where are they going? What are they saying?
I don’t even care they just sound so beautiful
they are singing s traveling song
Because sometimes what you need most, especially in the middle of winter, is to see the body language and expressions on the faces of animals experiencing snow for the very first time. Sometimes they’re so excited and eager to play that they can hardly contain it. Sometimes they have no idea what’s suddenly going on and would like to speak to the person responsible. And sometimes it’s somewhere in-between.
Bored Panda assembled a collection of over 25 delightful examples of our furry friends encountering fluffy white snow. Click here to view the rest.
Photos by/via Soren Koch, Tessa.lv photography, morgasmic, Slayer128, rcinferno, Elizabeth Bouras, Bored Panda, please_agree, Cactusy, Medicina, dax268, and savagepirate respectively.
[via Bored Panda]
There is SO MUCH to love here
I can’t pick a favourite
I mean the little black cat making the “OMFG WAT DIS” face is amazing but at the same time you’ve got the Smol Bear that has decided to eat the snow
Or the floofy cat who is just like “WHY EVERYTHING COLD
WHY ME BEANS COLD
I SCREM”
drew some faves
i love how edward elric dresses like the typical anime protag (all black, red cloak w/ huge emblem, tight leather pants, always puts skulls or spikes on everything, huge belt with a chain on it, etc. etc.) but literally everyone else dresses like normal fucking people so he just constantly gets berated for his Shit Awful Taste
cf also everything he makes with alchemy. me at first: “Wow this magic sure has a kind of gothic sensibility with all the dragons and spikes and shit that comes out” me another few volumes in, “Oh, no, Ed’s just… Like That”
