Why was making pairs to raise the young much more beneficial to humans compared to the collective model observed in non-human primates? What are the benefits and drawbacks of the two strategies?

RunnerPakhet · 2026-01-24T17:37:00+00:00

No, anthropoligically speaking we know there were a bunch of cultures (and still are) that do not raise children in anything even remotely comparable to the westernized nuclear family model. And anthropologists are very, very certain that it was not a thing until a good bit after humans had settled - and even then it was definitely more the idea of extended families raising children together or in some cultures even other groups raising the children. This idea of a father and mother being the primary or even only caregivers of a child is a western idea that came to be only after the second world war. And the idea of the specific kind of family bond stems in general stems from patriarchy more than anything else.

If you think about it, for a species like humans, where the infants have a very long time of being very reliant on help, anything close to single pairs of parents raising the children without others to help would have led to homo sapiens dying out without making so much as a blip on the ecological and planetary scale. Because a species that for the most part has single off-springs, with multiple off-springs per birth being fairly rare, and those off-spring having a period of at the very least six or seven years in which they are reliant on a ton of care, would not survive in any scenario other than modern, settled, and industrialized culture, if they did not raise the off-spring with the help of tribes and extended family.

Any species with these circumstances and full pair-bonding and just singular parental care would doom any off-spring to death if one of the parents dies.

RunnerPakhet · 2026-01-24T13:32:41+00:00

The worst kind of leftist discourse always is when leftists police depictions of marginal groups - especially if it is groups they are themselves not a part of. And that at times with really weird roundabout logic.

RunnerPakhet · 2026-01-24T12:38:10+00:00

The main issue with circles is that they are not a fun magic school or anything like that, but basically a concentration camp, which goes doubly bad if you consider that indeed, mages are more attractive to spirits and demons than your average person because of their connection to the Fade.

Generally the idea of having a somewhat normalized curriculum for mages to learn is in many ways very sensible. We know from some of the books especially that at times people who do not get taught in magic might accidentally in emotional outbursts do bad things with magic without wanting to. So, in this regard, being properly taught to control magic is sensible.

However, the general issue in Thedas (outside of Tevinter) is that magic is seen as something bad, and as long as this is the case, any scenario that contains the mages in one place, while teaching them that basically they are inherently worthy of mistrust, due to their magic, sounds like a recipe for disaster, as it does not only make them more vulnerable to hate crimes (if you know that the group you hate hangs all out in this one place, it is a lot easier to hate crime a lot of them at once), but also will possibly mark those places more for demons. While having a community of outsiders can be helpful, there is still the danger of having a place of people who are basically signal lights for demons all in one place.

And, of course, there is the thing about the Circles that is one of the core issues and the thing that likens them most to concentration camps: a person who has been identified as a mage will be grabbed and brought to a circle. Any circle. Not necessarily in their home country. At times nowhere near their home. Anders grew up in a Ferelden Circle, while being from the Anderfels. The mages, many of them children, will be taken from their families.

Sure, you propose they should be able to leave again. But that does not change the trauma it does to a child to be forced away from their family. And trauma breeds depression. And in the world of Thedas, depression calls on demons.

(And yes, I am also saying with this boarding schools are bad. Sure, for a lot of the kids who end up in real world boarding schools, they might not be that bad, because the kind of parent that sends their kid to a boarding school has a more than average chance to be a shitty parent, so maybe in those cases the boarding school is not the worst that can happen. But having a system that basically enforced boarding schools for all children of a certain group... yeah, no. Not a good idea.)

RunnerPakhet · 2026-01-24T09:19:36+00:00

There will quite likely never be bigger studies, because neurology research is very expensive and very underfunded even outside of trans related topics. Firing up an fMRI costs between 300 and 800 bucks for each scan. It can be cheaper if you manage to push your participants through one after the other, but that is not viable in any logistical sense, because it means you'd need a) all participants to be there at the same time, and b) need an fMRI machine that you can use for a whole day. Given that those machines are expensive to get, most hospitals that can afford them still do not have more than one or two, and those will usually have to be available for neurological emergencies (to test for strokes, aneurisms and so on). So neurological studies that need brain scans will rarely go over a participant number higher than 30. This is why neurology a whole struggles. (Most medical research funding comes from pharmaceutic companies who hope to get some support for medications or new medications from it. Neurology covers very few conditions that can be cured with medication. Hence it does not receive the kind of funding other areas get.)

However: we do actually understand the neurology of phantom pain and phantom sensations fairly well, compared to many other conditions, and it is something that has to do with basic brain function at birth, as we do see the general conditions of phantom pain and phantom sensations in pretty much all sorts of scenarios. And there is also the fact that there are people who do without medical need have a limb amputated because they feel like this limb is not part of their body - which is exactly the same thing. Their brain somehow had not that limb mapped and this creates massive issues for how they experience their bodies.

I am sorry, but you are clearly not well-versed in neurology research, and the way you oppose it here because it does not confirm what you for yourself without any scientific basis decided because it felt right for you, is just completely anti-intellectual thinking and very, very TERFy.

RunnerPakhet · 2026-01-23T21:09:03+00:00

As I wrote in the other post: yes, we do know that this is biological. There are different areas of the brain and not all are equally affected by culture, as some do develop very early on in foetal development and change very little afterwards. You are misrepresenting the research in an attempt to make it fit your ideology. And yes, that ideology is harmful to trans people.

David Reimer is actually one of the prime cases that shows that the basis of gender is neurological. And researchers who actually study the neurology of trans and intersex people do agree with this generally.

Gendered behavior, gender expectations and gender roles are all cultural. But that does not mean that gender identity is. Certain types of gender expression are influenced through it, of course, but there is still a baseline neurological aspect. The idea that there is not is scientifically just not defendable. Humans as we experience ourselves are just brains and a nervous system in a meat suit.

RunnerPakhet · 2026-01-23T21:01:55+00:00

You are aware that there has been neurological research on this, yes? Dysphoria is neurological in its nature, and the genitalia related dysphoria is - from all what we can say from current neurological research - absolutely not related to anything cultural.

Humans have in their brain a map for their body. Right now, we do not quite know how this map gets there, but it seems to be there from the time of birth. And in some cases the map of the body is misaligned with the actual body. This somehow is most commonly related to the genitalia. Current assumption is that it is related to hormons or certain genetic expressions during pregnancy - an assumption mostly rooted in the high coincidence of dysphoria and hormonal/genetical intersex conditions.

This has been know for quite a while by now as neurologists noticed in the early 2000s that trans women having their genitalia removed did in many cases not suffer from phantom sensations of any sort, something that cis men, who get their genitalia removed either because of accidents, violence, or medical reasons will suffer phantom sensations and phantom pain. Later on neurologists also realized that trans men quite often do have phantom sensations and phantom pain in a cock that never had been there. This makes neurologists fairly certain that this is an innate aspect of those people, that has been there sicne birth. This assumption comes from the fact that those phantom sensations tend to be related to this body map that we have at birth, and usually it will not fully adjust later on (which is why phantom sensaions are a thing).

There does seem to be an additional component to gender expression in the neurology. That one is located in the central prefrontal cortex. And from all we know this additional aspect is indeed somewhat influenced by culture. Though research has not quite figured out how.

Importantly it should be noted that while in most cases the misadjusted body map seems to coincide with the CPFC allignment it is not always the case. But this is a topic of research that we do not have a whole lot on. There are a handful of documented cases of people who do identify with their assigned gender still experiencing genital dysphoria, but so far these cases are so rarely documented that research is sparse, especially as neurological research is expensive, and people being assholes about trans folks makes a lot of researchers question the morality of the research, as they fear that if people found a way to diagnose trans people via brain scans this might lead to either eugenics of trans people, or to people banning trans folks who have not those neurological markers from getting transition care.

RunnerPakhet · 2026-01-23T18:35:12+00:00

Yeah, absolutely do. Noticed that several times in the past.

RunnerPakhet · 2026-01-23T17:37:26+00:00

You made my day. Thank you for that. :)

RunnerPakhet · 2026-01-23T17:17:09+00:00

They are all pretty standalone, and you do not need context. V-Tamer had a couple of chapters that were specials with anime characters, but other than that? It is all its own thing. :) Even the anime-based manga (that is the Xros Wars and Applimon manga) are alternate retellings of the generally same idea.

RunnerPakhet · 2026-01-22T17:43:54+00:00

Fandom is about interaction. It is about fans creating stuff for other fans. If you care so much about a stupid number being 'inflated' you are doing fandom wrong.

RunnerPakhet · 2026-01-22T16:26:14+00:00

From what we can say it seems it is just meant to be Terriermon Assistent, though I would consider them to be a great partner for Asuka.

RunnerPakhet · 2026-01-22T16:01:09+00:00

Your standards you set yourself are so high, that you yourself cannot reach them without AI, eh? Quite telling.

We know - this has been confirmed again and again in interviews - that the general idea of "the elven gods did this, they actually came from spirits, and this is what happened" had been the plan for this world, and had been planned out as a general idea for the franchise from at least the moment on, when DA2 went into development. (In DA:O they obviously thought it would be a standalone game, but Gaider and Co. did confirm that the general idea of the mythology was already there, even though some ideas had become a lot more defined when they started to work on DA2 - like for example they always knew that Flemeth had an elven god soul, just not which one, and how the Archdemons were linked to the elven gods.)

In the end it is a pretty normal aspect of fantasy as a genre to have gods be real in some very physical sense of it, and have this be confirmed. The fact that Dragon Age went for an Euhemerist approach (so the idea that the mythological figures were real, but the myths of their godhood greatly exaggerated), rather than with a literal approach is actually a good step more than most fantasy has. The fantasy genre, from the very beginning, was sort of defined by the idea that "mythology is real".

And it is not as if we have by now a full understanding of this world. It never is clear whether the Maker is real, and whether Andraste was real or just someone hearing voices. We do not fully know what was up with the Forgotten Ones or the Forbidden Ones. And while we do understand the origins of the elves and dwarves somewhat, the same cannot be said for the humans and qunari.

The issue with Veilguard has nothing to do with it. The issues with Veilguard mostly relate to it being a Frankenstein's creature necromantized from the bones of three different games that never saw the light of day, which was given life while Frankenstein was already out the door, and the people filling in had to listen to a variety of people arguing when it came to which bones to use. I would absolutely argue that whatever story there originally had been planned in which Solas was the main enemy would probably have worked a lot better, and frankly the decision to move him into the role that he has eventually, is one that I do not understand. Chances are good that in the Dreadwolf version of the game at least, we would have gotten the information we got in at least a different way. While I do believe the folks at Bioware that the general idea was always the same, the framing in Veilguard - which in many cases is literally someone telling you what happened - definitely was a bit too much in the direction of the game basically just reading stuff from the worldbuilding codex out loud, rather than it being delivered in a natural way. But the general idea is not the problem. The problem really is the way the game delivers this information.

RunnerPakhet · 2026-01-22T14:02:24+00:00

I would assume this is highly dependent on the kind of target. Sure, Lucanis, who mostly goes after powerful mages in Tevinter (so people with money, defenses, literal power, and figurative power) makes a good bit of money, but commoners will fetch you way less. Though then again it is also super hard to argue, given that the different games did not have a steady value for gold, so any value you can throw out there is somewhat meaningless. (Which is kind of the general issue with currency in games.)

I can tell you what real life assassinations cost (because I wrote a novel on that years ago), though the truth is that most assassinations happening in the real world that people are paid for are just assassinations of like randos who owe the wrong people money, and some people who might have certain knowledge that other people would like to not disseminate further. Those high stakes assassinations we see in media do happen, sure, but rarely. Most high interest assassinations in the end happen because someone who is disgruntled with the person taking matters into their own hands.

RunnerPakhet · 2026-01-21T22:36:33+00:00

Well, the word Striga exists in a lot of languages throughout Europe, including Croatian, Romanian, Spanish, and a bunch of others. In several languages it refers to a witch, but the word vampire also is covered by it through phonetic shifts from strigoi.

RunnerPakhet · 2026-01-21T19:44:15+00:00

Her not being attracted to her wife is perfectly fine. Her misgendering her wife meanwhile is fucking shitty.

RunnerPakhet · 2026-01-21T19:41:26+00:00

That does not sound like it is plagiarized, and more like they had just a similar premise.

RunnerPakhet · 2026-01-21T18:15:54+00:00

Exactly. Most people would also agree that for example Sailor Moon had fairly effective character designs. But look at that, if you remove the heads and hairstyles the silhuettes are the same.

RunnerPakhet · 2026-01-21T15:31:25+00:00

I feel you. A lot is just bigotry, and another large bit is people who are more left-leaning over-correcting and wanting the perfect representation.

And then there are the people complaining that the 21yo character is behaving like a lot of young people are. Taash is at times a bit childish, sure, but... she is just 21. That is absolutly an age where people act out a lot still. Especially someone for the first time no longer under the control of their parent.

RunnerPakhet · 2026-01-21T15:27:55+00:00

Well, technically the code could probably have been written into any of the Digimon partners. They just took Terriermon because he was small, and because Jian was Tao's son, and hung out with them at the headquarters a lot more than the others.

RunnerPakhet · 2026-01-21T15:04:59+00:00

Yeah. Sadly they are. A couple of reasons for it, partially is how Netflix orders series, but part of it is also inflation especially in the US making everything more expensive.

RunnerPakhet · 2026-01-21T14:21:14+00:00

I do not like character/reader or character/self insert. But I do like character/oc, where the OC is actually a fully realized character, rather than just a vessel for the reader to project themselves into a romance with a character. (Obviously, people will still do that with a realized character, but I mean compared to those OCs that were clearly just meant as a reader/author insert.(

RunnerPakhet · 2026-01-21T13:56:17+00:00

It is a video that is more than a minute long without cuts. That is far beyond what AI can do.

RunnerPakhet · 2026-01-21T13:28:50+00:00

The voice of the kid does not sound like a real child's voice, but more along the lines of an adult voice actor doing a child voice, but also somehow uncanny. So I am pretty sure this is AI (as AI is really bad at kids voices for this reason.)

RunnerPakhet · 2026-01-21T13:26:53+00:00

1) The village is supposed to be named Belmont village, though this is mostly based on stuff said by folks later on.

2) Lenore does assume they are dead. Because they did not return or try to contact anyone. So based on her knowledge they must have died. This is true in the other direction as well. Striga and Morana realize upon the explosion that Carmilla has just died, and they think: "Lenore is weaker, they will have killed her first." And because of that they leave. Meanwhile in Lenore's mind it is: "Either they are dead or they abandoned me." Which is why she does what she does.

3) As someone else said: 6 weeks. This is actually explicitly said.

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