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Root of all evil in General
*i
The Establishment
Member # 6
 written Saturday, January 29 2005 08:44 Profile #188
quote:
If science were necessarily atheistic, then why have the best scientists often been religious?
Since when do those who practice science have to represent a monlithic only science and no other belief system world view? The personal convictions of those who practice science does not equate to the value system of science itself. Science is an abstract concept much in the way democracy is. It exists irrelevant of the belief systems of those who practice it.

Although there are theistic scientists who see beauty in the order of the universe as evidence and confirmation of their faith, most of them understand that science can never prove god. They know enough to separate out beliefs from the science they do. Although one may confirm the other, they recognize this as a belief not founded by science itself, but personal convictions.

Although you will see many scientists use these nebulous words saying the "mind of god" or something to that nature. Usually the god which they refer is the abstract god, some mysterious and undetectable being outside of realm of the universe.

So I ask you to back up your assertion. Which modern scientists do you refer and what evidence do you have that they were strong believers in a higher power and not some abstract diestic sense? How representative is this of the totality of the scientific community?

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Your flower power is no match for my glower power!!
Posts: 3726 | Registered: Tuesday, September 18 2001 07:00
Root of all evil in General
*i
The Establishment
Member # 6
 written Friday, January 28 2005 20:23 Profile #179
Hallucinations or other types of mental tricks are are not all that extreme. Like it or not, the brain is not a precision instrument and is prone to distortion especially under extreme circumstances.

That being said, we should look at sheer numbers. We know that dillusions can happen, but how often do they happen. Now I do not have the statistic in front of me, but I have heard that 1% of the population suffers from some degree of skitzophrenea.

Let us use this marker for overall psychological disorders and be generous and say that 0.01% of the population would suffer from a severe enough disorder (not skitzophrenea) to induce some hallucination without impacting the totality of their lives.

Out of the six billion people currently on this planet (not factoring all humans that have existed in written history), we still get 600,000 people on this planet who would have some experience where their brain was fooled. The human mind has a tendency of pulling from common cultural experiences or things familiar to us. Therefore, it is not unreasonable to assume that a fair percentage of these would attribute it to some religious experience.

Looking at this number with my generous assumptions factored in, this shows that there should be no shortage of people with divinely inspired stories to tell. Sorry to say, but the argument of "I know lots of people with similar experiences" therefore it demonstrates there should be something out there is dubious looking at sheer numbers of people with psychological disorders. I will add that by disorder it does not have to be debilitating, it just indicates any deviation where the brain imagines things as truth.

With this in mind, let us look at a big picture philosophical argument. Let us look at both sides:

1) Attribute this to a psychological effect. We know a little bit about the brain, enough to know dillusions are possible. This is a well established medical fact. There would be no need to invent new aspects to the universe.

2) We believe that there is a divine component to these. This statement can neither be proven nor disproven. More importantly it requires us to accept truths which have not yet and probably cannot ever be observed or replicated.

If we pick option 2, we essentially have to add an invisible, undetectable dragon into the equation. We must make up new laws for our universe. Option 1 does not require any of this. Following the principle of Occam's Razor, we should pick option 1.

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Your flower power is no match for my glower power!!
Posts: 3726 | Registered: Tuesday, September 18 2001 07:00
Root of all evil in General
*i
The Establishment
Member # 6
 written Friday, January 28 2005 16:51 Profile #175
quote:
Originally written by The Creator:

You argue he was hallucinating - after all, he was under a lot of stress. I prefer the more straightforward explanation.
The more straightforward explanation is that he was hallucinating. It does not require us to posit anything outside of what we know from established neuroscience. The existence of supernatural forces in this case would provide an unnecesary complexity for this scenario.

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Your flower power is no match for my glower power!!
Posts: 3726 | Registered: Tuesday, September 18 2001 07:00
Blades of Geneforge in Geneforge Series
*i
The Establishment
Member # 6
 written Friday, January 28 2005 06:43 Profile #24
quote:
Originally written by Zorro:


I don't mean this post as a flame against those who hold low opinions of Jeff. I'm just curious as to their motivation.
There are a lot of little things over many, many years to those who have been around. It mostly centers around broken promises and arrogant responses. Here are a few key issues:

1) Primarily, failure to fix bugs inherent in Blades of Exile. The product is advertised to have features that are broken. Imagine if you bought a car with air conditioning, but when you turn it on it just blows hot air. When asked to do anything about it, Jeff is unapologetic.

2) The "annual" scenario design contest was only hosted once. More were promised if participation was good. Participation was great, but it was "too taxing" on their employees. Offers by the community to help were shot down. To his credit, he will sometimes begrudgingly give a prize out to for the unofficial community contests.

3) Complete and total neglect of the Blades of Exile scenario tables. Designers put a lot of work into their scenarios and would like to have their work displayed and fairly evaluated.

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Your flower power is no match for my glower power!
Posts: 3726 | Registered: Tuesday, September 18 2001 07:00
Blades of Geneforge in Geneforge 2
*i
The Establishment
Member # 6
 written Friday, January 28 2005 06:43 Profile #24
quote:
Originally written by Zorro:


I don't mean this post as a flame against those who hold low opinions of Jeff. I'm just curious as to their motivation.
There are a lot of little things over many, many years to those who have been around. It mostly centers around broken promises and arrogant responses. Here are a few key issues:

1) Primarily, failure to fix bugs inherent in Blades of Exile. The product is advertised to have features that are broken. Imagine if you bought a car with air conditioning, but when you turn it on it just blows hot air. When asked to do anything about it, Jeff is unapologetic.

2) The "annual" scenario design contest was only hosted once. More were promised if participation was good. Participation was great, but it was "too taxing" on their employees. Offers by the community to help were shot down. To his credit, he will sometimes begrudgingly give a prize out to for the unofficial community contests.

3) Complete and total neglect of the Blades of Exile scenario tables. Designers put a lot of work into their scenarios and would like to have their work displayed and fairly evaluated.

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Your flower power is no match for my glower power!!
Posts: 3726 | Registered: Tuesday, September 18 2001 07:00
Script Errors and Design Etiquette in Blades of Avernum Editor
*i
The Establishment
Member # 6
 written Wednesday, January 26 2005 15:02 Profile #1
You should always try to prevent errors. Do it the right way.

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Your flower power is no match for my glower power!
Posts: 3726 | Registered: Tuesday, September 18 2001 07:00
Script Errors and Design Etiquette in Blades of Avernum
*i
The Establishment
Member # 6
 written Wednesday, January 26 2005 15:02 Profile #1
You should always try to prevent errors. Do it the right way.

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Your flower power is no match for my glower power!
Posts: 3726 | Registered: Tuesday, September 18 2001 07:00
Outdoor signs don't work. in Blades of Avernum
*i
The Establishment
Member # 6
 written Sunday, January 23 2005 13:54 Profile #3
Except that some people still observe this bug in the most recent version.

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Your flower power is no match for my glower power!
Posts: 3726 | Registered: Tuesday, September 18 2001 07:00
Blades of Geneforge in Geneforge Series
*i
The Establishment
Member # 6
 written Sunday, January 23 2005 09:01 Profile #16
quote:
Originally written by The1Kobra:

Well, I think that a BOG should be made ASAP. (Moslty because I want to make some scenerios, but knowing my level of competance they will be rated 0 out of 5)
The GF Campaign Editor has many of the same features as BoA. It does not have the "real time" animation, but meh. If you want to download scenarios, get Blades of Avernum. There is really no need for a GF Campaign Editor right now. Also, Jeff has clearly stated he will not release another scenario editor for a VERY long time (think 5 years time scale) because of the sheer daunting effort it takes.

Yes, GF does have a primitive campaign editor. It is not ready for the level of a consumer product. There are many clues to this effect if you look at the graphics file. You will see a lot of "symbolic" graphics representing actual pieces of terrain. Besides that, Jeff has stated that one exists somewhere. Don't look for it, because it is not public, and you probably would not want to use it even if you found it.

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Your flower power is no match for my glower power!
Posts: 3726 | Registered: Tuesday, September 18 2001 07:00
Blades of Geneforge in Geneforge 2
*i
The Establishment
Member # 6
 written Sunday, January 23 2005 09:01 Profile #16
quote:
Originally written by The1Kobra:

Well, I think that a BOG should be made ASAP. (Moslty because I want to make some scenerios, but knowing my level of competance they will be rated 0 out of 5)
The GF Campaign Editor has many of the same features as BoA. It does not have the "real time" animation, but meh. If you want to download scenarios, get Blades of Avernum. There is really no need for a GF Campaign Editor right now. Also, Jeff has clearly stated he will not release another scenario editor for a VERY long time (think 5 years time scale) because of the sheer daunting effort it takes.

Yes, GF does have a primitive campaign editor. It is not ready for the level of a consumer product. There are many clues to this effect if you look at the graphics file. You will see a lot of "symbolic" graphics representing actual pieces of terrain. Besides that, Jeff has stated that one exists somewhere. Don't look for it, because it is not public, and you probably would not want to use it even if you found it.

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Your flower power is no match for my glower power!!
Posts: 3726 | Registered: Tuesday, September 18 2001 07:00
Outdoor signs don't work. in Blades of Avernum
*i
The Establishment
Member # 6
 written Sunday, January 23 2005 08:53 Profile #1
Unfortunately it is a sporatic problem and has no real fix yet. This is, right now, on the community bug list which will probably be submitted around the release of GF 3. Of course, you are free to e-mail Jeff about this issue.

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Your flower power is no match for my glower power!
Posts: 3726 | Registered: Tuesday, September 18 2001 07:00
Max Light Radius? in Blades of Avernum Editor
*i
The Establishment
Member # 6
 written Saturday, January 22 2005 15:28 Profile #1
Sounds like something that should be included in the docs. I'll add it to the bugs list.

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Your flower power is no match for my glower power!
Posts: 3726 | Registered: Tuesday, September 18 2001 07:00
Max Light Radius? in Blades of Avernum
*i
The Establishment
Member # 6
 written Saturday, January 22 2005 15:28 Profile #1
Sounds like something that should be included in the docs. I'll add it to the bugs list.

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Your flower power is no match for my glower power!
Posts: 3726 | Registered: Tuesday, September 18 2001 07:00
Blades of Geneforge in Geneforge Series
*i
The Establishment
Member # 6
 written Saturday, January 22 2005 09:47 Profile #7
Right now my primary criticism is the lack of default graphics because of the intrinsic difficulty with making them. Every GF game has increased the number available. Hopefully, we will eventually get more, but as it stands now, there is not much we can really do outside basic GF adventures.

quote:
blades of geneforge should come before geneforge 4 because exile games 1,2,3, blades and that is the same avernum.
Yes, just because it has been done this way in the past, means we should do it now even though the circumstances are vastly different.

[ Saturday, January 22, 2005 09:48: Message edited by: *i ]

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Your flower power is no match for my glower power!
Posts: 3726 | Registered: Tuesday, September 18 2001 07:00
Blades of Geneforge in Geneforge 2
*i
The Establishment
Member # 6
 written Saturday, January 22 2005 09:47 Profile #7
Right now my primary criticism is the lack of default graphics because of the intrinsic difficulty with making them. Every GF game has increased the number available. Hopefully, we will eventually get more, but as it stands now, there is not much we can really do outside basic GF adventures.

quote:
blades of geneforge should come before geneforge 4 because exile games 1,2,3, blades and that is the same avernum.
Yes, just because it has been done this way in the past, means we should do it now even though the circumstances are vastly different.

[ Saturday, January 22, 2005 09:48: Message edited by: *i ]

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Your flower power is no match for my glower power!!
Posts: 3726 | Registered: Tuesday, September 18 2001 07:00
BoA Bugs v1.1 in Blades of Avernum Editor
*i
The Establishment
Member # 6
 written Saturday, January 22 2005 08:32 Profile #2
Okay, I understand now and checked, yes, this is indeed a bug. I will add it to the v1.2 list.

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Your flower power is no match for my glower power!
Posts: 3726 | Registered: Tuesday, September 18 2001 07:00
BoA Bugs v1.1 in Blades of Avernum
*i
The Establishment
Member # 6
 written Saturday, January 22 2005 08:32 Profile #2
Okay, I understand now and checked, yes, this is indeed a bug. I will add it to the v1.2 list.

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Your flower power is no match for my glower power!
Posts: 3726 | Registered: Tuesday, September 18 2001 07:00
More Original BoA Graphics in Blades of Avernum
*i
The Establishment
Member # 6
 written Saturday, January 22 2005 08:31 Profile #5
They look more amphibious to me. Although I suppose amphibians are probably "between" (using that term loosely) reptiles and fish on the evolutionary scale. Makes sense since they can breed underwater.

Very, very good. It's nice to have Slith graphics in the third dimension.

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Your flower power is no match for my glower power!
Posts: 3726 | Registered: Tuesday, September 18 2001 07:00
BoA Bugs v1.1 in Blades of Avernum Editor
*i
The Establishment
Member # 6
 written Friday, January 21 2005 07:13 Profile #0
* Set status switches bless/curse and shield/weaken stats when is_forced is one.
* Internal varables such as "shop" or "pay" should be listed in either the Documentation or Appendicies.
* Outdoors signs don't work sometimes.
* If cursed items are placed on ground/in a container in the editor, they lose their cursed ability.
* The town status calls appear to be broken
* Enter-combat-end-combat bug: you can get placed in totally nonsensical locations. If you enter and then end combat immediately, you get placed one space forward. This allows you to skip special rectangles extremely easily.
* The call move_to_new_town can't be called from an INIT_STATE, a START_STATE, a creature script, or a terrain script, even if you distance the call from the state with set_state_continue, run_town_script, or run_scenario_script.
* Beam projectors malfunction wildly in close quarters, next to walls, in varying heights, etc.
* When a PC is next to a spot and you look at that spot, you search the spot. As far as I can tell, if the joined NPC is next to a spot, however, you don't search the spot. I'm not sure if this is a bug or just an intentional stupid thing.
* On Win98, crashes have been observed when monsters use missile attacks.
* Sometimes searchable terrain breaks. For certain terrain with the searchable and container attribute, they are only searchable if there is something inside the container.

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Your flower power is no match for my glower power!
Posts: 3726 | Registered: Tuesday, September 18 2001 07:00
BoA Bugs v1.1 in Blades of Avernum
*i
The Establishment
Member # 6
 written Friday, January 21 2005 07:13 Profile #0
* Set status switches bless/curse and shield/weaken stats when is_forced is one.
* Internal varables such as "shop" or "pay" should be listed in either the Documentation or Appendicies.
* Outdoors signs don't work sometimes.
* If cursed items are placed on ground/in a container in the editor, they lose their cursed ability.
* The town status calls appear to be broken
* Enter-combat-end-combat bug: you can get placed in totally nonsensical locations. If you enter and then end combat immediately, you get placed one space forward. This allows you to skip special rectangles extremely easily.
* The call move_to_new_town can't be called from an INIT_STATE, a START_STATE, a creature script, or a terrain script, even if you distance the call from the state with set_state_continue, run_town_script, or run_scenario_script.
* Beam projectors malfunction wildly in close quarters, next to walls, in varying heights, etc.
* When a PC is next to a spot and you look at that spot, you search the spot. As far as I can tell, if the joined NPC is next to a spot, however, you don't search the spot. I'm not sure if this is a bug or just an intentional stupid thing.
* On Win98, crashes have been observed when monsters use missile attacks.
* Sometimes searchable terrain breaks. For certain terrain with the searchable and container attribute, they are only searchable if there is something inside the container.

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Your flower power is no match for my glower power!
Posts: 3726 | Registered: Tuesday, September 18 2001 07:00
BoA Bugs in Blades of Avernum Editor
*i
The Establishment
Member # 6
 written Friday, January 21 2005 07:05 Profile #22
quote:
Originally written by Where twilight lies upon the knees:

Actually, there is one thing I noticed which is not strictly speaking a bug as such, but rather an annoyance that you can avoid if you know about it. The floor/terrain outside the town boundaries uses the last row of squares inside the town boundaries and repeats it forever in line of sight.

This means that, when placing frills, you have to watch out that no frills are placed in the outermost rows, because the effect will be a long row of the same frill continued as far as the eye can see (looks highly artificial).

The problem is mostly with the "Place Random Frills" option, which has to be followed by a manual sweep of the outer rows. Perhaps this effect could be modified to only affect the area two squares in from the town boundary...
There is an option to correct this in the Town Details window. It is something about Town Boundary Floor or something to that effect. Set it to be just plain grass and this problem should go away.

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Your flower power is no match for my glower power!
Posts: 3726 | Registered: Tuesday, September 18 2001 07:00
BoA Bugs in Blades of Avernum
*i
The Establishment
Member # 6
 written Friday, January 21 2005 07:05 Profile #22
quote:
Originally written by Where twilight lies upon the knees:

Actually, there is one thing I noticed which is not strictly speaking a bug as such, but rather an annoyance that you can avoid if you know about it. The floor/terrain outside the town boundaries uses the last row of squares inside the town boundaries and repeats it forever in line of sight.

This means that, when placing frills, you have to watch out that no frills are placed in the outermost rows, because the effect will be a long row of the same frill continued as far as the eye can see (looks highly artificial).

The problem is mostly with the "Place Random Frills" option, which has to be followed by a manual sweep of the outer rows. Perhaps this effect could be modified to only affect the area two squares in from the town boundary...
There is an option to correct this in the Town Details window. It is something about Town Boundary Floor or something to that effect. Set it to be just plain grass and this problem should go away.

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Your flower power is no match for my glower power!
Posts: 3726 | Registered: Tuesday, September 18 2001 07:00
Tarl Kudrick's Scenario Passwords in Blades of Exile
*i
The Establishment
Member # 6
 written Monday, January 17 2005 13:04 Profile #1
Would it be possible to preserve this anywhere? Alexandria comes to mind, but perhaps we should have a listing somewhere of listings.

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Your flower power is no match for my glower power!
Posts: 3726 | Registered: Tuesday, September 18 2001 07:00
Avernum 3 picture 4900 corrupt? in Tech Support
*i
The Establishment
Member # 6
 written Saturday, January 15 2005 16:02 Profile #1
The best thing is to e-mail Jeff Vogel at this point.

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Your flower power is no match for my glower power!
Posts: 3726 | Registered: Tuesday, September 18 2001 07:00
New Quests in Blades of Avernum
*i
The Establishment
Member # 6
 written Saturday, January 15 2005 10:50 Profile #4
Rentar-Ihrno

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Your flower power is no match for my glower power!
Posts: 3726 | Registered: Tuesday, September 18 2001 07:00

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