Talita really went Godzilla on this place.
Transcript
Bip: Instead you'd rather dodge sharp metal?
Talita: I had tin snips and didn't expect to revisiting. Go plug in already, wiseass.
She kneels down in front of one of the console cabinets with a pair of needle nose pliers. The electrician worm climbs out to the end of one of the front loader's arms, carrying a cable jack. It plugs this into a port on the side of a console.
Bip: Ugh, avian programming. I hate base 8.
Talita: Yeah well… If you’d rather work these itty bitty avian switch boards instead…
She pushes up the sliding cover on the console cabinet to reveal the tiny rows of switches, breakers, and controls.
Bip: Ew. No.
Talita: Let me know when you’re ready and I’ll start turning the plant back on.
The plant is shown from outside at a distance in the junkyard. Quietly, the lights next to its door turn back on.
33 thoughts on “Runaway to the Stars: Page 169”
Nikki
I find it kinda funny out of all the various species and such in this comic, the electrician worm is probably the most gender.
Gar G
Ugh, Avians xD
Hunter
I love the detail that Talita has to use a pair of tweezers to operate the switchboard XD
tyrone
What a nice orderly fuse-box…..Which reminds me of the “Horror” that waits, since years, in the garage where the 3-phase line comes in..
Vinemaple
Yeah, come to think of it, it’s a little surprising that avian cable management can NOT look like a hospital’s IT room
Lilith
If I remember correctly centaur vision is pretty heavily focused towards long range vision. I wonder how easy it is for her to work on close up stuff without her glasses like the switchboard?
hessian
iirc, her exosuit has built in lenses for her!
Light_In_The_Fog
That makes sense since she doesn’t have her glasses on in the suit
Arcstone
I see.
Yeah that makes more sense.
Gar G
Dang, didn’t even think of that
Not only is it incredibly teeny tiny for her but ordinarily it’d all be a big blurry mess for her too!
Arcstone
Oh damn, that switchboard has gotta be a nightmare for her without glasses on.
AnaKaye
Her suit helmet has vision correction built-in.
Zuorai
Does the helmet window have some built in lense that matches her prescription?
Arcstone
I’m gonna guess the lower part of the visor works like a lens, and the upper part doesn’t.
That way she can probably just tilt her head back a bit for close vision, and forward a bit for far vision.
Planetfall
I mean, the utility worms are perfect for the tiny switchboards no? Bip is being quite the drama ruler.
Chase Wanderstar
*Drama Douchebag. Because Bip is so sarcastic it borders on asshole. Also alliteration.
pelya
Hey, Talita also has 8 fingers, which would naturally be base-8 for the simplest form of finger counting. Are centaurs count on fingers in enlightened binary, for base-256? Or maybe base-16 for one hand?
bramble
Talita was raised by humans, though. Biology might influence what sort of mathmatical system a sophont society develops, but the system’s still cultural. She’d have been educated in base 10 as a kid.
theplushfrog
I don’t think anyone has done a study on if having a number of fingers that isn’t 10 affects how you learn to count, but generally I’d think the effect would be minimal on humans, no idea how it affects alien psychology of course. Math is pretty based in cultural learning, rather than biology for us at least.
cinna
Yeah, I’d bet that “we use base 10 because 10 fingers” feels like such a logical hypothesis because fingers are very often the first thing we’re taught to count, so we immediately form the association between fingers and counting.
Using fingers to represent quantities of different items is a more abstract concept that takes a bit longer to learn, though. There’s a link between finger counting and improved math test scores, BUT at least a couple of studies have shown that this isn’t any more effective than using manipulable objects as tokens to count with, and most kids will naturally use both.
That is to say, I also don’t think the exact amount of fingers one has would have much effect on learning to count, since it’s kind of arbitrary what we actually use to keep track of quantities. Fingers are just convenient since they’re always available. Plus, hands generally feel incredibly important to humans.
Light_In_The_Fog
I would guess its mostly what you’re taught with, since theres way more number systems than just base 10 that humans have used. I bet talita is just better with base 10 and base 2 because those are the things she uses in her everyday life.
J
Well, there’s actually a few cultures around the world where the number system changes a lot – and the bases change too, even in humans. so, one way of counting on fingers is using your thumb to point to the segments of your 4 fingers (3 on each segment, 4 fingers, so instead you count to 12, not 10. do on both hands, and you can count to 144!) there’s other cultures, like the pre-colombian counting system that the mayans used, which was base 20 (fingers AND toes!), or counting to 27 used by the people of the sybil valley (pointing to different parts of the body, like the elbow, ear, etc). so your body does affect the way you count, but it definitely doesn’t limit how you count it, it really is more of a cultural thing.
DasGanon
What? No she’s an engineer. It’s why she was counting in Binary earlier.
(Also being that it’s the glorious machine numbers, it’s biology agnostic too which would work for alien species as well as non-typs, so non zero chance she was taught to do it that way by her foster program)
Bright
Humans have used base-8 mathematical systems. IIRC they were used and are still used on various Pacific Islands. The theory for humans using base-8 is people who do a lot of net making count the spaces between their fingers instead of the actual fingers since they’re using that part of their hand for the majority portion of the task. Wonder if there are centaur clans which use base-6 or base-12 via the same logic.
Vinemaple
Chibified worm standing upright on the tractor’s front bumper in panel 4… Bip just has to emote to the limit of their ability, whatever they’re doing, I love it!
Guest
I love how easily Talita and Bip are getting on.
Vinemaple
Now that I know half-closed nicitating membranes are a Centaur neutral expression, and we have the laugh and much earlier moments of vulnerability with Bip, I’m wondering if Talita is to some degree “unmasking” around Bip, abandoning the more performative parts of her body language around someone she’s realized won’t automatically misinterpret them.
blythe
Talita is still making a human expression here. Centaurs emote with their true eyelids, not their nicitating membranes.
Vinemaple
Ah, so the nicitating membrane comes down from the top of the eye, and Talita uses it instead of her creepy-to-humans sideways eyelids? That checks out. I’ve always been a bit confused about that, I had to look it up just now
Vinemaple
Found the reference, you’re 100% right https://jayrockin.tumblr.com/post/656710875472920576/ive-noticed-that-as-well-as-having-approximations#notes
Matt
If I may: Looking at those switchboards, how good is avian dexterity anyway? :3 Considering their “finger” layout looks like they have much less rotational freedom than our (or Talita’s!) thumbs have, and then the whole “long talons” thing going on. Do they use grasping tools for finer manipulation of things, like these switchboards?
evileeyore
Considering that an avian hand is about the same size as two of Talita’s fingers, I figure the needlenose pliers Talita is using is probably a fine approximation of their finger tips.
Ruby
Maybe avians also use their beaks?