this post was submitted on 27 Dec 2025
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Science Memes

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[–] DahGangalang@infosec.pub 84 points 3 months ago (1 children)

Because I recently rediscovered this, sharing here:

All right," said Susan. "I'm not stupid. You're saying humans need... fantasies to make life bearable."

REALLY? AS IF IT WAS SOME KIND OF PINK PILL? NO. HUMANS NEED FANTASY TO BE HUMAN. TO BE THE PLACE WHERE THE FALLING ANGEL MEETS THE RISING APE.

"Tooth fairies? Hogfathers? Little—"

YES. AS PRACTICE. YOU HAVE TO START OUT LEARNING TO BELIEVE THE LITTLE LIES.

"So we can believe the big ones?"

YES. JUSTICE. MERCY. DUTY. THAT SORT OF THING.

"They're not the same at all!"

YOU THINK SO? THEN TAKE THE UNIVERSE AND GRIND IT DOWN TO THE FINEST POWDER AND SIEVE IT THROUGH THE FINEST SIEVE AND THEN SHOW ME ONE ATOM OF JUSTICE, ONE MOLECULE OF MERCY. AND YET—Death waved a hand. AND YET YOU ACT AS IF THERE IS SOME IDEAL ORDER IN THE WORLD, AS IF THERE IS SOME...SOME RIGHTNESS IN THE UNIVERSE BY WHICH IT MAY BE JUDGED.

"Yes, but people have got to believe that, or what's the point—"

MY POINT EXACTLY.

--Terry Pratchett, Hogfather

[–] zea_64@lemmy.blahaj.zone 41 points 3 months ago (3 children)

I actually would prefer people see them as ideals rather than unchanging facts of the universe, because unchanging facts don't require you to fight to keep them like ideals do, and I'm tired of hearing diatribes about the world being just instead of people actually making it just.

[–] BeardedGingerWonder@feddit.uk 16 points 3 months ago (1 children)
[–] Quetzalcutlass@lemmy.world 7 points 3 months ago (1 children)

THERE'S NO JUSTICE. THERE'S JUST US.

[–] Samskara@sh.itjust.works 2 points 3 months ago (1 children)

A sense and need for justice might be genetic in humans.

[–] rockerface@lemmy.cafe 11 points 3 months ago

The universe might not care, but we do. And that is the entire point indeed.

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[–] TheTechnician27@lemmy.world 70 points 3 months ago* (last edited 3 months ago) (1 children)

NDT's not even going to mention that Santa probably solved or approximately solved the traveling salesman problem for a complete graph of several hundred million vertices embedded in a spherical topology?

[–] _stranger_@lemmy.world 33 points 3 months ago

I suppose if he's magic he doesn't need to solve anything.

[–] Eheran@lemmy.world 43 points 3 months ago (2 children)

Ffs that guy is annoying. Did not even do the math, which should have told him that hypersonic does not even scratch the surface unless he has an extremely wide drop-off region.

[–] TomMasz@piefed.social 20 points 3 months ago (2 children)

I thought he could have been the next Carl Sagan, but instead, he's that guy you never invite to parties.

[–] spamfajitas@lemmy.dbzer0.com 16 points 3 months ago

I dunno about you, but I'm not sure if I'd have invited Carl Sagan either...it'd take him ~13.8 billion years just to get dessert ready.

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[–] Jason@feddit.uk 19 points 3 months ago (1 children)

I can't believe you're really taking his comment seriously?! He made a post about Santa's reindeer and sleigh vaporizing due to the speed of travel. It's supposed to be absurd, not a science lesson.

It's a little ironic that you say NDT is annoying for his joke while complaining that his math (from a joke) does'nt make sense.

[–] Mulligrubs@lemmy.world 13 points 3 months ago (1 children)

See? Eheran GOT YOU. He knew that Tyson was joking, so he played it straight and made you look like a dupe!

Oh wait, you're doing the straight man switcheroo, I've been bamboozled again.

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[–] Samskara@sh.itjust.works 30 points 3 months ago (1 children)

Santa is a shared delusion running on people’s minds in a distributed fashion, known in magic occult spheres as an egregore. All of those minds then manifest Santa by their own deeds and the spread of Santa memes. Santa‘s sled is everywhere at once as the sequence of delivered packages doesn’t matter. One Santa manifested everywhere through human thought and action.

[–] otacon239@lemmy.world 11 points 3 months ago (2 children)

Isn’t this how gods worked in Terry Pratchett’s books?

[–] TheRealKuni@piefed.social 17 points 3 months ago* (last edited 3 months ago) (1 children)

No, but it is basically how Santa worked, as seen in Hogfather.

Gods are a species that become more powerful the more worshippers they have and essentially powerless when they have no followers, as seen in Small Gods.

[–] BeardedGingerWonder@feddit.uk 5 points 3 months ago (1 children)

Wasn't the Hogfather an old winter god?

[–] TheRealKuni@piefed.social 4 points 3 months ago

Maybe? It’s been a while.

[–] nezrock@lemmy.dbzer0.com 8 points 3 months ago (1 children)

You're thinking of American Gods by Gaiman.

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[–] Tikiporch@lemmy.world 21 points 3 months ago
[–] halvar@lemy.lol 18 points 3 months ago (1 children)

On one of our Christmas themed university events this year there was a physics teacher who calculated how many reindeers would Santa need if we assume the friction vaporizes each one at a certain rate. Like if Santa had a line of 42000 reindeers in front of his sleigh he could go around the earth once before the last one turned medium rare.

[–] Alcoholicorn@mander.xyz 9 points 3 months ago* (last edited 3 months ago)

Ablative reindeer.

This is one of those things that would require experimental verification, you can't calculate the rate the charred outer layers are lost. Has there been any research on hypersonic meat?

[–] baggachipz@sh.itjust.works 13 points 3 months ago (2 children)

I know I’m “not cool” and a “booger man” because of what I’m about to say, but NDT just likes to post fun stuff. He’s not being serious and he’s not being a know-it-all. Does anyone here read his books or listen to his podcast? He has a damn comedian on for every episode.

[–] boonhet@sopuli.xyz 8 points 3 months ago

But did you know that in the mirror, you can only kiss yourself on the lips?

[–] Tikiporch@lemmy.world 6 points 3 months ago (1 children)

I'm only half joking when I say, thank you for your bravery.

[–] DragonTypeWyvern@midwest.social 2 points 3 months ago* (last edited 3 months ago)

I find it very interesting that the Internet turned on Neil around when he was posting pro-vaccine messages in a pandemic

I also find it interesting that Redditors didn't notice he is their personality type and turned on him on cue

[–] taiyang@lemmy.world 12 points 3 months ago (1 children)

Y'all don't get it. Santa is a hive mind parasite that embeds itself in people and takes over at the later months of the year. It tends to hibernate the rest of the year although much like pollen, it seems to be waking earlier and earlier.

[–] atomicorange@lemmy.world 7 points 3 months ago (2 children)

Climate change is causing Christmas creep? It’s worse than we thought!!

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[–] Una@europe.pub 10 points 3 months ago* (last edited 3 months ago) (1 children)

No because santa is a quantum being, he is in a superposition of being in every single house in the world and if someone sees him than only 1 house gets presents. Or something like that, I don't know quantum physics.

[–] crocat@lemmy.blahaj.zone 9 points 3 months ago

We can test this by putting two chimneys close together and seeing if we get a diffraction pattern of presents and coal.

[–] Typhoon@lemmy.ca 9 points 3 months ago

Santa likes rich kids more than poor ones.

[–] silver_wings_of_morning@feddit.dk 6 points 3 months ago (1 children)

It's a clever quantum operation where all the houses are entangled in a superposition and moved into a state where all the presents are delivered. So when one kid opens the present the state collapses and all the presents are delivered.

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[–] unknown1234_5@kbin.earth 6 points 3 months ago

i mean if the sleigh is designed properly it would be fine, it just the reindeer that need the magic and they have to have it in the first place to pull the sled.

[–] Fizz@lemmy.nz 6 points 3 months ago

Santa is not magic hes just really locked in and his reindeer are built different.

[–] carotte@lemmy.blahaj.zone 6 points 3 months ago

clown-to-clown conversation

[–] WanderingThoughts@europe.pub 5 points 3 months ago

The answer is most likely "the speedforce". The amount of handwaving used to justify going fast in these movies are overwhelming.

[–] HappySkullsplitter@lemmy.world 5 points 3 months ago (1 children)

Christmas is a federal holiday now too

So, it's for everyone now. Not just Christians

Way more presents than in Tyson's original calculation

[–] NigelFrobisher@aussie.zone 3 points 3 months ago

Typical overreach from Canberra!

[–] Etterra@discuss.online 5 points 3 months ago (1 children)

Magic is copium for people who can't accept or understand reality.

[–] MeThisGuy@feddit.nl 7 points 3 months ago

that's religion

[–] MisterFrog@lemmy.world 5 points 3 months ago (2 children)

Soft magic systems aren't any fun. Change my mind.

Christianity, stranger things and paranormal activity are equally as uninteresting to me because it's "because I said so". Boooooooo, come up with some rules for your world.

Can we make a new category of fiction called "supernatural" SEPARATE from sci-fi and fantasy? Thanks, that would be nice.

[–] my_hat_stinks@programming.dev 2 points 3 months ago (1 children)

"Magic system" is a bit of an oxymoron imo. The problem with having hard rules for magic is that that's not magic, that's science. You just end up with a world with slightly different physical laws.

Technology can be interesting on its own but a deep understanding of the underlying mechanics kills the magic. A rock that lets you talk with someone over great distance is magic but if you explain it as manipulating imperceptible vibrations in the air you just have a radio.

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[–] DragonTypeWyvern@midwest.social 2 points 3 months ago (1 children)

Bro do you criticize The Epic of Gilgamesh for being a pre-Tolkien world building standard too? You have to judge these fantasies in context

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[–] I_Has_A_Hat@lemmy.world 4 points 3 months ago

Lazy ass parents not bothering to update the believability of Santa Claus. Just say there are multiple Santa's all around the globe that work together. That's why Santa sometimes looks different when you see him at different places. That's why there can be a Black Santa, or Asian Santa.

[–] thatradomguy@lemmy.world 3 points 3 months ago
[–] OldGrayDog@lemmynsfw.com 2 points 3 months ago

Santa's sleigh has a warp drive which creates a warp bubble around the sleigh and the reindeer, which allows him to fold space time, this is the magic that enables him to deliver all those presents in one night.

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