fishesoutofwater | TEST DIVE #6

Entry tags:

test dive

TEST DIVE #6

PREMISE & NAVIGATION ✦ RULES ✦ MOD CONTACT
TAKEN ✦ RESERVES ✦ APPLICATIONS ✦ HIATUS & DROPS
FAQ ✦ BASE ✦ BIOMES ✦ URSULA ✦ URSULA CONTACT

TEST DIVE MEME

Reserves are OPEN
Applications are OPEN
Check out our ATP/Enable Me meme!

For information about the animals and locations, be sure to check out the BIOME and BASE pages! Note that TDM threads can be used for game canon and AC.

A: There’s a Storm on the Horizon
A brainstorm. On advice about the ingenuity of multi person parties, and from admitted lack of understanding of many needs of organics, URSULA has selected you and a partner (or partners) to go to one of the observatories with food, beds, and recording devices to have a jam session for ideas about missions.

You are not to leave the room until you have some good ones. So get cracking! Start suggesting to one another what the base needs to do.

Or get horribly, horribly sidetracked and possibly a little crazy at being locked up together with the ocean staring at you. Judging.

B: The Abysmal Sea
You’re stranded.

One of the planet’s troublesome signal-interfering pulses has just made your communication devices 100% nonfunctional. No matter how you try to call URSULA for help, she isn’t able to respond. The database strapped to your wrist is just a useless chunk of metal now, leaving you without a useful library of knowledge to survive off. If you were driving any underwater vehicle prior to this point, it’s broken down. And unless you’re a mechanic, it’ll be pretty hard to get it jumpstarted again.

Don’t fret! The communication systems always come online eventually, so if you stay put, it’ll boot back up and give you directions straight back to base so you can finally get home. But can you really afford to stay put? The sunlight’s slowly streaming out of the sky, leaving the waters darker and darker with each passing second. Soon, you won’t be able to see five feet in front of you, and the only warning you’ll get of any approaching threat is through sound, if they even make any.

You have a few choices: take a daring risk and try swimming back to base, but on the off-chance you don’t remember the directions correctly from before you were cut off, you’re going to get even more lost, in the darkness of the night no less. Or, you could huddle in, with any friends if they were unfortunate enough to be with you, and start focusing on getting warm. Because spending the night out here in the vast oceans with the entire world against you is becoming a very, very real possibility.

C: Birdnip
The crew has become very friendly with the local population of birdogs, even going as far as moving a bunch of them to the base. Birdogs are pretty friendly creatures for the most part, and are some of the more tamable ones of the planet. That's why there is surely nothing that might go wrong with these arrangements!

Well. Except for the fact a new fauna that was found in a biome seems to have... well, really excite the birdogs. They're completely running amok, everyone from the kitchen to the swimming pool. URSULA would really appreciate it if you could help calm the poor creatures down before they end up hurting themselves or another crew member.

You probably shouldn't use that plant though.

D: Hunting Trip
The crew has been given a special mission on Mountain Island. While visiting, you were approached by Aurora survivor and fast-food worker Jenn, owner of the adorable tabby cat Glitter. She asks you to hunt a horrorsloth down for her. This particular horrorsloth has a scar across its face in the form of several cat marks which explains why Jenn wants it dead. It has a personal vendetta against Glitter and has already tried to kill her several times. Jenn has been able to heal the injuries so far but she’s worried that next time she won’t be so lucky.

So Jenn gives you anything you want from fellow survivor and Lead Programmer Naoko’s gun supplies and points you into the dangerous jungle forests where the Catkiller spends its time. Do you have what it takes to avoid poisonous tree pods and deadly Shrubbacks? Can you find your way through the dark and twisted woods? Or will you find yourselves hunted by the very creature you are trying to take out?

Do it for Glitter.

E: THE AURORA
Quiet except for the creaks and rumbles as the ship settles and shifts, the sound of Reapers screaming in the distance every so often, the Aurora is a creepy place to visit for a mission. The remains of those crew members not buried, and the belongings of many others, still litter the ship's halls. It might be nice to remove any skeletons you find.

Of course, their misfortune is your opportunity to catch up on some reading, browse whatever video games they left, get medical supplies and enjoy the comforts they no longer need.

But is it possible the Aurora is haunted? Surely not. Except sometimes you might hear voices from far away. It might just be the people you came on board with, unless they're with you. Or it might be a Cave Crawler knocking over some recording device. You're not too scared to check, right?

F: RAINY SEASON
When it rains, it pours. Rainy days tend to be the worst. Although you can go swimming in them, the intense storms of Iniidae stir up shallower waters making them murky and difficult to see through. And what if lightning hit? No one wants the first death to be lightning. Are you going to risk that? Probably. If you do, take care of yourself and bring a buddy!

But if you're the type to hole up in a storm, either by choice or because you were unlucky enough to be out in it, now is a good chance to get creative with your use of time! Maybe a game of charades will brighten up the rainy day? If you're on the base it might be extra crowded today so get to know your neighbors! If you're on an island, you could build a mud castle! Just don't go stircrazy.

BASED ON CODE BY TESSISAMESS AND SUPERSUITS

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

[They tilt their head before sitting down to watch Dirk.]

Why dancing? Can't you dance yourself? Humans love to dance.

[Okay, Enkidu. Enjoy watching a teenager play around with mechanics?]

Because line-dancing skeleton robots at a Halloween party seemed hilarious to me and my bro.

[so here they go]

[Enkidu likes watching him work? It's soothing.]

Well, it's not my place to question it, I suppose. But it seems like such an insignificant purpose for such a fine doll. I'm sure it could be more useful to you.

We repurposed him and the rest of the skeletons. A few are lined up to work the fast food places once we build that part of the carnival.

[Because this base is full of idiots... And this is what they do. Dirk's currently working on let's say another drone. Because he has a problem and it's building drones? No one has stopped him.]

Oh, a carnival. That's nice.

[Enkidu's tone doesn't actually change at all. It stays soft and gentle, not displaying any particular emotion. But it sounds sincere? Dirk should be good at reading monotones.]

Is that what dolls do here? Become repurposed for entertainment?

Do not let my brother hear you calling these dolls.

[Please. It is just one short step from 'puppets.' Dirk can read the monotone to some degree, but a great deal of his gift with reading, for example, Dave's monotone, is understanding Dave as a person. He does not yet understand Enkidu.]

Some of the robots I build do that. Others retain their original function, or have a sufficiently AI that they can mostly do what they want. [Dear sweet LARA. Their pet(??) bot.]

Oh yes, the term is 'robot', isn't it? I forget modern linguistics sometimes. But I see...

[They're still pondering what, exactly, to do with this information.]

...Humans are surprisingly kind to their d—, their robots. Why do you give them room for growth sometimes? Does it make them more efficient? That might make them difficult to manage.

[Also now they're picking up tools Dirk isn't using at the moment and practicing creating them. No... big...]

[Dirk briefly looks up. See what Enkidu is doing.

Well, okay then.]

It seems like you're getting at a particular question that's laying underneath the ones you're asking. Like maybe one about the treatment of AIs as tools versus AIs as people.

[Enkidu seems proud of being able to make them at least.] Oh, yes that's it. I was wondering why some are allowed to be tools and some are treated like humans. Is it just whimsical selection?

It's fairly nuanced, and yes, in some cases it's human whim. The basic idea behind it is that if an AI can be considered sufficiently advanced to think and feel, then it should be treated as sentient and therefore as living. Animals, if not humans, depending on their programming.

The exact point at which 'sentient' is conferred upon the AI is more complicated. I can tell you that the skeleton robots are very basic. They have problem-solving skills but no feelings on anything, and they need me to alter their programming to be capable of acting beyond their original function. They don't learn and have no ability to advance past what they are. They are strictly tools because I designed them that way.

URSULA on the other hand, was designed to learn, grow, feel, and think. From my perspective, she's in every respect a sentient being.

[He talks about it easily and in a calm monotone. It's a matter he has thought about a lot and playing with mechanics isn't enough to make it hard to work through.]

[Wow, he must be very knowledgeable on this subject.]

You must be so wise because you're a creator to these tools. Though I suppose that doesn't always indicate wisdom. [Just. Throwing some mild shade at gods.] Still, from a human, I think it's different to be so invested.

I'm not wise. [Making that clarification straight-up just.] One of the reasons I've thought about it so much is that I made a fuckin' stupid move with AI-creation and have been dealing with the consequences since. A dude should seriously think through the ethical and technical consequences of creating a sentient life before doing it, not in retrospect.

Well, that happens to the best of creators. Sometimes things get out of hand.

And I'm sure that's such a comfort to the creations they fucked over.

[Sarcastic monotone! Does Enkidu's tonal vocabulary extend to sarcastic monotone?]

[Enkidu shakes their head.] Oh, we don't mind so much. It could be much worse.

[Dirk glances at him. Because he is pretty sure he heard that shade.]

You have no criticisms of your creator, or creators, whatsoever.

[HE HAS INFERRED]

I threw a cow at Ishtar. So I suppose I have some grievances.

Nice arm strength though.

[That lift]

Thank you. I take pride in my strength considering what it brought me.

[Cherished friendship! With humanity. And Gil. Both of them.]

And the look on her face was amusing.

[They're almost animated right now.]

[This pile of mud is kinda a shit. Dirk can appreciate it though.]

But Ishtar didn't make you, if we trust a record passed down orally through generations before being transcribed in variant forms. So that doesn't really answer the question.

Well... That's true. And to be honest, I do have some problems. But how do I say it... [Enkidu taps their fingers on the table.] I... am still a tool at the end of the day. Even if I sometimes felt differently, a hammer can't be more than a hammer.

I can see where that worldview might come from, but I can't consider it intellectually sustainable. Why can't a hammer be more than a hammer?

[Pile of mud, meet anti-establishment AI-philosopher.

...Because it's a hammer? If you change it, like taking off the handle, it's not a hammer anymore. It's just a rock. That's even sadder for it.

[Meet a pile of mud.]

It could instead develop laser capacities. And a love of gardening.

[This is reasonable.]

A hammer would be useless for gardening. You'll crush the plants.

[Finally an emotion. Sadness over plants being hammered.]

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject