Humor will not be tolerated!! -Portia

@ Humble Master: Every response that comes to mind looks sarcastic in its hyperbole. Suffice it to say I am impressed with the thoroughness and succinctness of your thoughts. Due to some of my own thoughts on the ideal individual, I'm intrigued by the liminal aspect of the outsider. Would you say they tend to be true neutral, or is that alignment rubric too simplistic?

@ Katya: Looking at Heinlein's list, I'm tempted to lean more toward the collection of cool skills. Perhaps my own bias stepping in, though, says there is an underlying goal but one much more nebulous than I understand your previous post to imply. I'd say the goal would be to be useful in as many situations you find yourself in as possible. Again, it may just be me projecting, but I think the worst realization a man can receive is the one saying "No matter how much it means to you, there is absolutely nothing you can do in this situation. Sit back and watch."

On a similar note stemming from your post, would you say our culture expects women to be more adept a various things than men?

Katya wrote:

Humble Master wrote:These heroes operate outside the bounds of society, but do so in order to protect society. Thus, they may break the rules of established order, but it is for a perceived greater good. Outsider heroes serve as a boundary between order and chaos, savagery and civilization, and possess elements of both.

How similar is this to Neutral Good alignment?

Heh, great minds....

Though you are probably right to go neutral good rather than true neutral.

Tao wrote:@ Katya: Looking at Heinlein's list, I'm tempted to lean more toward the collection of cool skills. Perhaps my own bias stepping in, though, says there is an underlying goal but one much more nebulous than I understand your previous post to imply. I'd say the goal would be to be useful in as many situations you find yourself in as possible.

That makes sense, especially since you can scale those by how often you're likely to be able to run into them and how important it could be to have the skill. (So, the latter criterion points you towards things like knowing CPR and how to change a flat tire, while the former points you towards things like calculating tips in your head.) And maybe you could add another category for "random cool skills" like being able to sing a song in Welsh. But knitting still doesn't rank very high on the list.

Tao wrote:Again, it may just be me projecting, but I think the worst realization a man can receive is the one saying "No matter how much it means to you, there is absolutely nothing you can do in this situation. Sit back and watch."

Very interesting.

Tao wrote:On a similar note stemming from your post, would you say our culture expects women to be more adept a various things than men?

No. Upper class 19th century women, maybe, although I'd say that men in that class and time period were also expected to know a lot of things (probably about horses).

As for our culture, I'd say that women are valued for having various domestic skills (cooking, especially, but also child-rearing, sewing, interior design, fashion, etc.) and men are valued for having handyman skills and—I'm not sure how to phrase this—skills that can "save the day," perhaps? Maybe you could frame it by saying that women are expected to care for people and men are expected to rescue people.

I find this discussion fascinating. Here are some of my favorite interesting lines:

Katya wrote:you can scale those by how often you're likely to be able to run into them and how important it could be to have the skill. (So, the latter criterion points you towards things like knowing CPR and how to change a flat tire, while the former points you towards things like calculating tips in your head.)

I should do that! Make a list of things I ought to know how to do and scale them. And also make a list of things for my future husband to honey-do. You know, while I'm at it.

Tao wrote:Again, it may just be me projecting, but I think the worst realization a man can receive is the one saying "No matter how much it means to you, there is absolutely nothing you can do in this situation. Sit back and watch."

I wouldn't necessarily say that this is the "worst" realization but definitely a difficult one to receive. And more, I think, for men than women (here, I'll project with you). I know that I'm quite willing to sit back if it's established there's nothing I can do, but my dad (and I think my boyfriends, but that gets hazy because they were all like a million years ago) feels like he has to be involved. He embarrasses me and my mom at the doctor's all the time.

Katya wrote:As for our culture, I'd say that women are valued for having various domestic skills (cooking, especially, but also child-rearing, sewing, interior design, fashion, etc.) and men are valued for having handyman skills and—I'm not sure how to phrase this—skills that can "save the day," perhaps? Maybe you could frame it by saying that women are expected to care for people and men are expected to rescue people.

I like this premise but I think often in our culture these days a woman who can "rescue" people is given a lot more attention than one who can bake a perfectly turned-out pie. And vice versa for men. This isn't always true -- the traditional care/rescue patterns are still in place, but there's more merging than there has been in the past.

On a slightly different note, I've wished lately that I could be educated in the early-20th-century manner, like Judy Abbott in Daddy-Long-Legs. She knows everything! Well, I know that competency can't be measured in your formal education but I still think that it could be a good start.

C is for wrote:

Katya wrote:As for our culture, I'd say that women are valued for having various domestic skills (cooking, especially, but also child-rearing, sewing, interior design, fashion, etc.) and men are valued for having handyman skills and—I'm not sure how to phrase this—skills that can "save the day," perhaps? Maybe you could frame it by saying that women are expected to care for people and men are expected to rescue people.

I like this premise but I think often in our culture these days a woman who can "rescue" people is given a lot more attention than one who can bake a perfectly turned-out pie. And vice versa for men. This isn't always true -- the traditional care/rescue patterns are still in place, but there's more merging than there has been in the past.

I guess it also depends on what you define as "our culture." Within Mormon culture, I'd say the traditional patterns are more strongly entrenched.