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Author Archives: dan
The Goose’s Wing is finished!
“What man-made machine will ever achieve the complete perfection of even the goose’s wing?” – Abbas ibn Firnas I finished that alt-hist short story! It’s a nice, hefty 8,300 words long, and will probably end up a little longer. In … Continue reading
The Chinese Roman Empire
Okay. I swear I am only going to spend half an hour on this. NOT ALL DAY. NO SIR! So here we go. According to this very reliable historical document, the city of Lomes (L. Loumasia) was settled by Chinese … Continue reading
The Guns of the Commonwealth
A new althist idea: compromise forestalls the Civil War and allows slavery, but non-slave statesjoin Canada.
Learning Kalispel: phonotactics and sentence structure
Back again with more lessons on the Kalispel language. The workbook is getting into some simple questions and answers, so this time I can talk about what I think might be Kalispel sentence structure. I won’t know if I’m right … Continue reading
The Goose’s Wing: Early uses of gliders
Gliders were originally used for spectacles in praise of their patrons. But there was also growing demand for gliders for purposes religious and practical (message delivery). Higher demand for silk lead to better-established trade routes with Arabia, which lead to slightly lower silk prices. When … Continue reading
Future English
I’ve been thinking a lot about the next 150 years of the English language for The Centuries Unlimited. And then there was that “spelling pronunciation” post on tumbler that got me and some other people talking… And before you know … Continue reading
Posted in Language is Great!, Wonderful, Awful Ideas
Tagged Language, The Centuries Unlimited
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Japanese Phrasal Verbs?
I was going to write this week about Kalispel numbers, but yesterday I learned something interesting in Japanese class. I already knew the verb hikkosu (引っ越す*; to move house), but yesterday I learned the verb ikineku (生きねく; to survive something**) … Continue reading
Welcome to Проект Спек
https://danbensen.tumblr.com/post/162702361405/интервью-с-дэниелом-бенсеном
Humans are to zebras as giant floating brain-jellyfish are to humans
https://danbensen.tumblr.com/post/162663268025/viergacht-danbensen-showerthoughtsofficial Ooh! Ooh! Okay. Creature idea! A giant floating brain-jellyfish that can move very slowly but across any terrain. In the past, they crafted darts which they threw with great distance and accuracy, but in the past 10,000 years they … Continue reading
Posted in Wonderful, Awful Ideas
Tagged fantasy, science fiction, speculative biology
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Learning Kalispel: Orthography
Okay, I had a dream in Kalispel Salish* last night, which I guess is a signal I need to talk about it. It all started when I found this webpage of the Kalispel Tribe which has both written and recordings … Continue reading
