{"id":4376,"date":"2017-11-21T05:00:25","date_gmt":"2017-11-21T13:00:25","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/markreads.net\/reviews\/?p=4376"},"modified":"2017-11-19T19:54:33","modified_gmt":"2017-11-20T03:54:33","slug":"mark-reads-the-science-of-discworld-chapters-44-45","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/markreads.net\/reviews\/2017\/11\/mark-reads-the-science-of-discworld-chapters-44-45\/","title":{"rendered":"Mark Reads ‘The Science of Discworld’: Chapters 44 – 45"},"content":{"rendered":"

In the forty-fourth and forty-fifth chapters of The Science of Discworld,<\/i> it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s time to talk about minds. Intrigued? Then it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s time for Mark to read Discworld<\/i>.<\/p>\n

Roundworld<\/b><\/p>\n

I think each of us has\u00e2\u20ac\u201dat some point in time\u00e2\u20ac\u201dhad that deeply unsettling moment where someone gets us to think about thinking. I had my moment in elementary school, and given that I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m prone to anxiety in all<\/i> things, it immediately sent me into a spiral that last for days. How could I have thoughts in my head? Who was making them? Was it a separate entity? WHY IS HUMAN CONSCIOUSNESS SO TERRIFYING?<\/p>\n

I expected the authors of this to address this more than they did, since it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s such fascinating topic. We as a species are aware<\/i> of our own thought processes, and that\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s so deeply weird. So how did we get to that point? What was consciousness and thought like long, long ago? I am glad, then, that this book didn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t do that thing where intelligence was used as a substitute for being smart, which is something LOTS of people do rather frequently. I love the distinction that intelligence is just \u00e2\u20ac\u0153the ability of the brain to process information.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d I was definitely raised to believe that intelligence was a weapon to be wielded against others, and lord, it was ugly. It didn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t help that I was one of those \u00e2\u20ac\u0153gifted\u00e2\u20ac\u009d children who was enrolled in G.A.T.E. (Gifted and Talented Education) until I was able to Honors and AP classes later on. Those kind of programs instill both a false sense of ego and ability in a person, and they also COMPLETELY RUIN YOUR SELF ESTEEM. Being \u00e2\u20ac\u0153gifted\u00e2\u20ac\u009d didn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t mean that you showed a preternatural ability for applying yourself within certain frameworks, that your mind was able to make connections others couldn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t. No, it was all about performance, and getting high test scores and grades were all that mattered. That meant that once you didn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t<\/i>, it was emotionally devastating.<\/p>\n

It certainly didn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t help all that much, and it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s why I started performing terribly by the time I got to college. When you see intelligence in such a poorly defined manner, you don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t actually prepare yourself for the possibility that there are things you\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re terrible<\/i> at. And it turns out for me, it was 8am Marine Biology, which I failed TWICE in college before I was finally able to get a B. This is coming from someone whose GPA in high school was well over 4.0 and who had gotten straight As with the exception of one<\/i> class.<\/p>\n

I still have tons of anxiety about doing well, but it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s nowhere near as bad as it was when I was growing. It\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s one of the numerous reasons why I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m such a fan of how we are beginning to finally dismantle all the bullshit ableism around the concept of intelligence. Even though I am considered \u00e2\u20ac\u0153intelligent\u00e2\u20ac\u009d because of the way we view intelligence, IT DID NOT HELP ME TO BE TREATED THE WAY I WAS.<\/p>\n

Discworld<\/b><\/p>\n

WHAT THE HELL IS HAPPENING, THIS IS NOT WHAT I EXPECTED AT ALL. Like, I was just<\/i> as shocked as the wizards were by what they found on their little roundworld because what the fuck is happening<\/i>. There\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s another intelligence \u00e2\u20ac\u0153sort of\u00e2\u20ac\u009d like HEX? They built tubes up to a necklace<\/i> that runs around the planet? (Space elevators!!!) And they did this to escape the ice and the asteroids and the vulcanism and HOW DID ALL OF THIS HAPPEN SO VERY QUICKLY? Was does MAET-NANS mean??? What the fuck, why was there a pyramid?<\/i><\/p>\n

I AM SO LOST. i am so VERY VERY LOST.<\/p>\n

https:\/\/youtu.be\/i0jrCmjSBC4<\/p>\n

Mark Links Stuff<\/b><\/p>\n

– My YA contemporary debut, ANGER IS A GIFT<\/a>, is now available for pre-order!\u00c2\u00a0<\/strong>If you’d like to stay up-to-date on all announcements regarding my books, sign up for my newsletter<\/a>! DO IT.<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"