So… Reality blindness insulates one from the mere concept of weirdness? How does that work? Is Star Wars suddenly viewed as the story of a New Mexico farmboy who meets a Buddhist hermit, goes on a road-trip, and finally meets his estranged Dutch father? Is the Shining merely a tale of marital strife at an isolated hotel? Do nerds even exist anymore? I shudder to think of the mental contortions needed for the reality blind brain to process Doctor Who…
I think Star Wars, The Shining, etc. would be viewed as ever they were because they’re just stories and not real. It’s only the real weird stuff that invokes reality blindness… and deafness as well.
You have a strange assumption that your, yourself, are not reality blind. I assume that we all *are* supposed to be because we haven’t seen *any* of this stuff happen.
True. Each person’s mind only allows them to see or retain what the mind thinks we can handle. It’s the same mechanism that makes you forget traumatic events. Rather than dealing with anything your mind determines is beyond your ability to cope with, it simply shuts things out.
Everything we’ve been taught says that dogs can’t talk. So if most people were to encounter Sweetheart, their brain might either glaze over and not register it at all, or, if they actually tried to process it, it could drive them mad.
True enough. But the working assumption once was that SF fans can handle weirdness better then Mundanes can and I’m still inclined to think that way. So in theory a Fan could process Sweetheart once he made certain that this rather than a hoax was actually what was going on. Which makes me wonder. Star Wars, etc. might still be known to exist but would the reality blindness syndrome process Fans into Mundanes as a way of making them properly “reality blind”? o_O
I would certainly tend to agree that SF fans are more receptive to weirdness.
There may be a distinction in the blindness, where fans would still be fans (i.e. “it would be really cool if this scifi stuff was real!”), because they can process that books and movies are fictional, and therefore acceptable as fiction, but in real life they would become Mundanes. Makes me wonder how long something would have to be an actual reality, or how widespread it would have to become, before Mundanes would accept it as reality. Star Trek TOS foretold a lot of things that are now commonplace, but how would Mundanes have perceived them when they first became reality?
Well, the “truth” here is “true” within the confines of the fictional world — as opposed to Jonah’s first story that he works for the gas company, which is fiction within the fictional world. Where exactly are you figuring “meta” into all that?
But that requires the virus/mass hypnosis/whatever it is to be able to differentiate between truth and fiction, between sincerely saying “I am an Elder God come to make you my fish-wife” and jokingly saying so. Maybe it really is that advanced. Heck, maybe Cerebriac’s been hijacked to project reality blindness. That makes a certain amount of narrative sense. But regardless, it suggests more complexity than was previously implied.
A quick look back at “My House is Me” only confuses things further. On one hand, the Whimsy employee Nick goes out with clearly understands his question about Sweetheart talking, but he later ignores Nick claiming he’s a cyborg helicopter (thought Nick suggests he might be really desperate.) Perhaps I am just misremembering…
That’s exactly right. The woman was able to smell a rat, but otherwise completely oblivious. I think the virus IS able to differentiate. But what is the mechanism?
Or it could be “extra strength” reality blindness, and now people can’t even _conceive_ of weirdness: people saying “I am an Elder God” aren’t a problem because nobody affected would ever think of saying something like that.
(Or it could be that the authors don’t always fully think these things through. But we know that could never happen. 😀 )
If you experience reality blindness, someone who stated that he was an Elder God (or, indeed, any other sort of god) would probably appear to have special cray needs.
That said, this woman has just been told that her visitor is a psychic, and managed to confuse that with being the sort of person she’d invite into her home.
Or maybe it’s the opposite, and whatever it is that has induced the new blindness (I’m not going to call it a virus, because we don’t know yet what mechanism was actually employed) actually shuts down the part of the brain that thinks creatively.
If they can only use the logic center of their brains, without any allowance for anything out of the ordinary, then dogs and tigers can’t talk, the gas company doesn’t do surprise inspections, and “a psychic investigating monsters with my helicopter pal” would be so far off the wall that she would have reinterpreted it as something entirely different that makes sense. Maybe what her brain heard was that Jonah is a journalist investigating household pests with his colleague.
“I know this is hard to understand, but I’m Captain James T Kirk of the spaceship Enterprise! These men are part of my crew! We’re not really here, we’re from the future!”
Do you smell gas or is that me?
So… Reality blindness insulates one from the mere concept of weirdness? How does that work? Is Star Wars suddenly viewed as the story of a New Mexico farmboy who meets a Buddhist hermit, goes on a road-trip, and finally meets his estranged Dutch father? Is the Shining merely a tale of marital strife at an isolated hotel? Do nerds even exist anymore? I shudder to think of the mental contortions needed for the reality blind brain to process Doctor Who…
I think Star Wars, The Shining, etc. would be viewed as ever they were because they’re just stories and not real. It’s only the real weird stuff that invokes reality blindness… and deafness as well.
You just THINK there stories. Reality Blindness and all.
They’re. not there. (Need my morning covfefe)
Despite the full stop, I read “They’re not there” as a sentence and thought it was the reality blindness kicking in.
And it’s evening over here, so I don’t know what my excuse is.
Touche.
You have a strange assumption that your, yourself, are not reality blind. I assume that we all *are* supposed to be because we haven’t seen *any* of this stuff happen.
True. Each person’s mind only allows them to see or retain what the mind thinks we can handle. It’s the same mechanism that makes you forget traumatic events. Rather than dealing with anything your mind determines is beyond your ability to cope with, it simply shuts things out.
Everything we’ve been taught says that dogs can’t talk. So if most people were to encounter Sweetheart, their brain might either glaze over and not register it at all, or, if they actually tried to process it, it could drive them mad.
True enough. But the working assumption once was that SF fans can handle weirdness better then Mundanes can and I’m still inclined to think that way. So in theory a Fan could process Sweetheart once he made certain that this rather than a hoax was actually what was going on. Which makes me wonder. Star Wars, etc. might still be known to exist but would the reality blindness syndrome process Fans into Mundanes as a way of making them properly “reality blind”? o_O
I would certainly tend to agree that SF fans are more receptive to weirdness.
There may be a distinction in the blindness, where fans would still be fans (i.e. “it would be really cool if this scifi stuff was real!”), because they can process that books and movies are fictional, and therefore acceptable as fiction, but in real life they would become Mundanes. Makes me wonder how long something would have to be an actual reality, or how widespread it would have to become, before Mundanes would accept it as reality. Star Trek TOS foretold a lot of things that are now commonplace, but how would Mundanes have perceived them when they first became reality?
Truth is stranger than fiction.
Especially in this universe.
Wouldn’t that be meta fiction?
Well, the “truth” here is “true” within the confines of the fictional world — as opposed to Jonah’s first story that he works for the gas company, which is fiction within the fictional world. Where exactly are you figuring “meta” into all that?
What part of “surprise” was unclear to her?
The plausibility of it
But that requires the virus/mass hypnosis/whatever it is to be able to differentiate between truth and fiction, between sincerely saying “I am an Elder God come to make you my fish-wife” and jokingly saying so. Maybe it really is that advanced. Heck, maybe Cerebriac’s been hijacked to project reality blindness. That makes a certain amount of narrative sense. But regardless, it suggests more complexity than was previously implied.
A quick look back at “My House is Me” only confuses things further. On one hand, the Whimsy employee Nick goes out with clearly understands his question about Sweetheart talking, but he later ignores Nick claiming he’s a cyborg helicopter (thought Nick suggests he might be really desperate.) Perhaps I am just misremembering…
Gah, stupid WordPress… I’m almost certain I responded to Casimir’s comment…
Ah well.
That’s exactly right. The woman was able to smell a rat, but otherwise completely oblivious. I think the virus IS able to differentiate. But what is the mechanism?
Or it could be “extra strength” reality blindness, and now people can’t even _conceive_ of weirdness: people saying “I am an Elder God” aren’t a problem because nobody affected would ever think of saying something like that.
(Or it could be that the authors don’t always fully think these things through. But we know that could never happen. 😀 )
If you experience reality blindness, someone who stated that he was an Elder God (or, indeed, any other sort of god) would probably appear to have special cray needs.
That said, this woman has just been told that her visitor is a psychic, and managed to confuse that with being the sort of person she’d invite into her home.
But original reality blindness isn’t a virus, it’s something that the brain does. All the virus needs to do is activate that function of the brain.
Or maybe it’s the opposite, and whatever it is that has induced the new blindness (I’m not going to call it a virus, because we don’t know yet what mechanism was actually employed) actually shuts down the part of the brain that thinks creatively.
If they can only use the logic center of their brains, without any allowance for anything out of the ordinary, then dogs and tigers can’t talk, the gas company doesn’t do surprise inspections, and “a psychic investigating monsters with my helicopter pal” would be so far off the wall that she would have reinterpreted it as something entirely different that makes sense. Maybe what her brain heard was that Jonah is a journalist investigating household pests with his colleague.
The FNORD Gas Company?
… oh god, I just realized this means Unity can get away with ANYTHING.
Heaven help us if she realizes it too.
If you let her eat brains she will. Don’t know about normal Unity
Yeah, but if normal Unity figures it out, we could all be in trouble. Fortunately, she does have something of a conscience.
Heh, looks like our helicopter pal swears in actual font.
It’s like psychic paper: fill in the acceptable explanation.
“I know this is hard to understand, but I’m Captain James T Kirk of the spaceship Enterprise! These men are part of my crew! We’re not really here, we’re from the future!”
I would think reality blindness would just get Jonah labeled a crazy person with that kind of explanation.
But maybe there’s a lower threshhold…