Sermil and the Banter of Randomness: Random Banter #228

[Bartmanhomer]

I remember once asking the GM to nerf a couple of shapeshifting spells so my transgender wizard (FtM) wouldn't have it easy.

I've since tried to stop playing games with magic as easy as D&D, because I find it makes playing a wizard less fun. Plus because I just don't like Vancian Magic, I don't remember any of the wizards in fantasy books I read as a kid needing to memorise spells, and it annoys me that D&D refuses to move away from it (and likely adopt spell points).

Also wow, I'd forgotten just how powerful wizards in Earthsea are, Ged is easily the equal of a mid level D&D wizard at only his late teens. Although it does make for a great story, as his adversaries are either also as incredibly powerful or unable to be defeated via spellcasting (leading up to A Wizard of Earthsea's great ending).

Cool. A transgender wizard. Tell us about your wizard.

[Peelee]

Cool. A transgender wizard. Tell us about your wizard.

There has got to be a better way to phrase that.

[Mystic Muse]

Alright, who had genetically engineered mosquitoes for August?

[DataNinja]

I thought that was just the natural response to decades of games that equated "no customization" with "male"....Isn't that the whole point of having a choice, being able to choose?

*shrug* That probably had something to do with it, increasing female representation. Especially as villains who aren't just 'sexy seductress'.

[Bartmanhomer]

There has got to be a better way to phrase that.

What? He did said a transgender wizard.

[Rater202]

Alright, who had genetically engineered mosquitoes for August?

What's wrong now?

[Mystic Muse]

What's wrong now?

In theory, nothing.

750 million genetically engineered mosquitoes are going to be released in Florida as an alternative to pesticides. In theory, female eggs should die off well before maturity, hopefully preventing the spread of things like Zika, Dengue fever, ETC.

This is all in theory, and I'm expecting something to go catastrophically wrong.

[Bartmanhomer]

In theory, nothing.

750 million genetically engineered mosquitoes are going to be released in Florida as an alternative to pesticides. In theory, female eggs should die off well before maturity, hopefully preventing the spread of things like Zika, Dengue fever, ETC.

This is all in theory, and I'm expecting something to go catastrophically wrong.

What can go catastrophically wrong? It is worse than GMO foods?!

[Peelee]

What can go catastrophically wrong? It is worse than GMO foods!

What, exactly, is wrong with GMO foods?

[Mystic Muse]

[

What can go catastrophically wrong? It is worse than GMO foods!

GMO in regards to food has about as much meaning as 'organic'; practically none without further details.

As for what could go wrong, any number of things. Genetics are finicky at best, and there's no telling what the environmental impact could be.

[Anonymouswizard]

Cool. A transgender wizard. Tell us about your wizard.

I had a wizard. His body was nonstandardly masculine. Specialised in transmutation and tried to use Alter Self to cope with dysmorphia, wanted to learn an instantaneous shapeshifting spell but couldn't. Came from a society with strong gender roles and was on the run. Never actually decided on his dead name.

*shrug* That probably had something to do with it, increasing female representation. Especially as villains who aren't just 'sexy seductress'.

That's a valid option? Most of my female villains are either business people or smugglers.

EDIT: they is preferred, and I had some lovely genetically modified pork the other day. The farmers apparently put millennia into modifying it's genetics.

[Bartmanhomer]

They said they have a character who's a transgender wizard. Anonymouswizard is non-binary so don't use gendered pronouns unless they ask you to.

Singular they are your best bet. Or ask them their preferred pronouns.



GMO in regards to food has about as much meaning as 'organic'; practically none without further details.

As for what could go wrong, any number of things. Genetics is finicky at best, and there's no telling what the environmental impact could be.

He just did (FtM) I thought saying transgender was very appropriate.

And as for the environment. Well, we all know how crazy it is with crazy weather and global warming.

[Mystic Muse]

EDIT: they is preferred, and I had some lovely genetically modified pork the other day. The farmers apparently put millennia into modifying it's genetics.

I deleted my comment because I saw you weren't reacting especially negatively. I just wanted to head things off before things potentially erupted.

I will try to make sure to remember this myself.

[Peelee]

EDIT: they is preferred, and I had some lovely genetically modified pork the other day. The farmers apparently put millennia into modifying it's genetics.

Farmers do it for thousands of years and it's fine, but then we figure out a way to do it faster, more efficiently, and with better outcomes, and suddenly some people get in a tizzy about it. Ain't that just the way?

[Bartmanhomer]

I had a wizard. His body was nonstandardly masculine. Specialised in transmutation and tried to use Alter Self to cope with dysmorphia, wanted to learn an instantaneous shapeshifting spell but couldn't. Came from a society with strong gender roles and was on the run. Never actually decided on his dead name.



That's a valid option? Most of my female villains are either business people or smugglers.

EDIT: they is preferred, and I had some lovely genetically modified pork the other day. The farmers apparently put millennia into modifying it's genetics.

Cool! That's amazing.

[Rater202]

In theory, nothing.

750 million genetically engineered mosquitoes are going to be released in Florida as an alternative to pesticides. In theory, female eggs should die off well before maturity, hopefully preventing the spread of things like Zika, Dengue fever, ETC.

This is all in theory, and I'm expecting something to go catastrophically wrong.

...That sounds like it would drive local mosquito populations extinct, doing irreparable harm to the food chain and thus the biosphere.

What can go catastrophically wrong? It is worse than GMO foods?!

Literally everything is worse than GMO foods, because unless you're allergic GMO is harmless.

To drop the bomb: Literally everything you've eaten is GMO. Even the stuff that claims not to be is the descendant of something that is. Even if you grew it yourself from "organic, non-gmo" seeds, somewhere in it's family tree is an ancestor that was deliberately manipulated by humans to alter it's genes and the course of it's evolution.

People who complain about GMO are 1: Ignorinat of the science. 2: Ignorant of agriculture. or 3: Trying to use fear to manipulate people in the first group in order to sell their own products.

Likewise, organic is mostly meaningless. Unless you're buying from a reputable farmer selling at his stall in the farmer's market, if you're buying organic you're paying more money for an equal or sometimes inferior product.

[Bartmanhomer]

...That sounds like it would drive local mosquito populations extinct, doing irreparable harm to the food chain and thus the biosphere.


Literally everything is worse than GMO foods, because unless you're allergic GMO is harmless.

To drop the bomb: Literally everything you've eaten is GMO. Even the stuff that claims not to be is the descendant of something that is. Even if you grew it yourself from "organic, non-gmo" seeds, somewhere in it's family tree is an ancestor that was deliberately manipulated by humans to alter it's genes and the course of it's evolution.

People who complain about GMO are 1: Ignorinat of science. 2: Ignorant of agriculture. or 3: Trying to use fear to manipulate people in the first group in order to sell their own products.

Likewise, organic is mostly meaningless. Unless you're buying from a reputable farmer selling at his stall in the farmer's market, if you're buying organic you're paying more money for an equal or sometimes inferior product.

Really? No way! How can you really tell if it's GMO foods? :eek'

[Mystic Muse]

Rater, thank you for elaborating.

Bartmanhomer, I hope it didn't come across too much as me lecturing you. I was just trying to help out because being misgendered really sucks for some people.

[Peelee]

Really? No way! How can you really tell if it's GMO foods? :eek'

You really shouldn't be scared of this. Everything has been genetically modified in some way. That's what evolution is - genetic modification. Farmers and agriculturalists use to do this the hard way, which was selective breeding and cultivating for preferred traits. It is a lengthy, difficult process, but it works. A quick and dirty example is corn - corn is a hybrid creation made by selective cultivating, and if all humans suddenly vanished, corn would disappear in about 20 years, because it is not a naturally-occurring crop. It only exists because we created it a long time ago.

Modern science has allowed us to genetically modify foods in significantly more efficient ways. It's faster, we can enhance desirable traits and remove undesirable traits, it can be done on massive scales, it is better all around. Scientists have created wheat that is resistant to drought, which means that it can stave off famines and save millions, if not billions, of lives.

GMOs are a good thing. Everything you have eaten all your life has been a GMO food, you just didn't know it, and it was inefficient GMO. Efficient GMOs are nothing to be scared of, and the only reason people tell you to be scared of them is because, as stated, they don't understand science and so they assume the worst despite having no evidence or reason to do so whatsoever.

[Bartmanhomer]

Rater, thank you for elaborating.

Bartmanhomer, I hope it didn't come across too much as me lecturing you. I was just trying to help out because being misgendered really sucks for some people.

No. I didn't misgender anybody or at least I thought I didn't.

[Anonymouswizard]

Really? No way! How can you really tell if it's GMO foods? :eek'

If it's been domesticated, it's GMO. Here's the Wikipedia page for my favourite GMO product. I mean, not as a foodstuff, but in a 'you're a kitty'! sense.

Honestly the main dangers from GMOs are nothing to do with the item itself, but rather things I really just can't get into.

Also I'm that crazy person who'd GM all children to be intersex (ideally fully functional) and then just let them choose their gender identity, [color=blue]and I've totally not begun writing a SF setting where this is the case[.color]. So I get very excited by advances in GM, because I can't wait until the day it's safe to be used on humanity itself (who has been GMing itself, but even less efficiently than it's livestock and crops).

EDIT: current gender identity: beached whale. Current bits: mind your own business. Okay, I'm agender at the moment and seem to default there most of the time, but who knows, I might be a woman tomorrow.

[Peelee]

If it's been domesticated, it's GMO. Here's the Wikipedia page for my favourite GMO product.

Oooh, good choice!

[Wizard_Lizard]

In theory, nothing.

750 million genetically engineered mosquitoes are going to be released in Florida as an alternative to pesticides. In theory, female eggs should die off well before maturity, hopefully preventing the spread of things like Zika, Dengue fever, ETC.

This is all in theory, and I'm expecting something to go catastrophically wrong.

I mean looking at 2020’s track record... uhh.. can’t we wait till next year?

[Rater202]

Really? No way! How can you really tell if it's GMO foods? :eek'

If you're eating it.

The only food that isn't GMO is food that has never been deliberately altered by human actions.

So basically, if you want to avoid GMO food you need to be living off of while deer and foraged berries. But with wild deer you have no way of knowing if it's got parasites of a disease that might make you sick if you eat it, so...

But you don't need to worry. Whenever someone deliberately makes a deliberate alteration to food plants or animals, they do rigorous testing to make sure it's safe to eat and are very careful to not let anything that hasn't been tested out of the labs.

By the time it makes to the supermarket shelf, it's not any more dangerous than any other food.

[Qwertystop]

...That sounds like it would drive local mosquito populations extinct, doing irreparable harm to the food chain and thus the biosphere.

I recall hearing occasionally that people have done ecological-impact research and found that mosquitos are not actually a crucial part of the food chain, in that everything that eats them also eats plenty of other things and there is similarly no expectation that the removal of mosquitos would increase the population of something else.

Unfortunately I do not have a cite to hand, but it seems at least plausible. Mosquitos do not generally kill what they drink from and I'm not sure how they would crowd out anything else. Spiders and birds and whatever other insectivores are in the area are not generally specialized for mosquito-hunting in particular.

[Bartmanhomer]

If you're eating it.

The only food that isn't GMO is food that has never been deliberately altered by human actions.

So basically, if you want to avoid GMO food you need to be living off of while deer and foraged berries. But with wild deer, you have no way of knowing if it's got parasites of a disease that might make you sick if you eat it, so...

But you don't need to worry. Whenever someone deliberately makes a deliberate alteration to food plants or animals, they do rigorous testing to make sure it's safe to eat and are very careful to not let anything that hasn't been tested out of the labs.

By the time it makes it to the supermarket shelf, it's not any more dangerous than any other food.

Well that a relief. When I first thought about eating GMO Foods I always thought that I will transform into some kind of mutant.

[Rater202]

Well that a relief. When I first thought about eating GMO Foods I always thought that I will transform into some kind of mutant.

That would be a point for GMO. I'd be more likely to eat my broccoli if it let me breathe lightning.

[Peelee]

That would be a point for GMO. I'd be more likely to eat my broccoli if it let me breathe lightning.

You say that, but then you get the ability to breathe lightning and suffocate super fast because not only is there no lightning around, but even if there was you only get a little at a time and you don't more when or where.

[Rater202]

You say that, but then you get the ability to breathe lightning and suffocate super fast because not only is there no lightning around, but even if there was you only get a little at a time and you don't more when or where.

I was assuming breathe lightning like a dragon breathes fires.

[Peelee]

I was assuming breathe lightning like a dragon breathes fires.

Yes, but my way is funnier.