36 Comments

John trying to do a learnding.

The Megatainment suits they’re wearing seem kinda light. As if they’re just shirts.

Huh. I actually *don’t* know any *good* books on general knowledge. The encyclopedia is often wrong and very dry.

It likely depends on what is meant by the enquiry. A good read vs a good source of data. The encyclopaedia is excellent at the latter, and crap at the former. Bill Bryson’s library is likely a good start for general knowledge. Maybe start with “The Mother Tongue: English and How It Got That Way” so you can understand more fully the rest of what you’re reading? Then Hawking’s “A Brief History of Time” as a starter. Move forwards from there. It’s probably worth picking up “The Miniature Guide to Critical Thinking: Concepts & Tools” before you go too far, so you can evaluate the incoming sources of information.

P.S. And yes, while there are plenty of errors and errata for an encyclopaedia, it is still a good starting point and is reasonably correct. (good enough for base knowledge, not for resolving expert level disputes)

“Make me smart overnight!”

Sorry, John. It doesn’t work quite like that.

To be fair that wasn’t the question. But also, “teach me something overnight,” might. It depends on how fast one reads and if the reader revisits the material in a studious fashion to retain what they learned.

So I had never heard of “general knowledge” as a topic of books. I was going to ask about it here when I realized that I have Google; so I looked it up, and apparently its a pretty big topic of discussion. I was pleasantly surprised to see some of my favorite nonfiction come up (“How To Read A Book” should have a whole class devoted to it and the topics surrounding it in like middle school) but also super pumped to find other nonfiction that is good for people like me: heavy readers who aren’t academics and aren’t necessarily pursuing a deep knowledge but do want to go a little deeper than just surface awareness.

Been reading the comic for about a decade, but this is my first comment – just wanted to say thanks for making it. Reading it on M/W/F nights is a highlight of my bedtime ritual!

I mean this as a positive thing but-

I give up.

Please, if you would, Jackie, tell me WHERE the term, “so turns the wheel”, comes from?

I’ve looked for it on google, + their hits on the term are all over the map- from ancient…yule-like poems, to an old book that Amazon [tm] doesn’t bother to describe, to Walt Whitman-like poems.

Please tell me where that’s from.
I’m dying to know. :D

Nowhere, it’s just a thing I wrote. The concept of a cyclical universe or system is pretty common. A few people have been reminded of A Song Of Ice & Fire where the idea of destroying the system is often referred to as “breaking the wheel”, but in acuality I was thinking of a line from a song ‘the wheel in the sky keeps on turning’. I’m not sure if anyone else has ever phased the concept in exactly this way other than me, but I’m sure similar phrases appear in many other works.

Thanks!

Here is a poem, with [so turns the wheel], in it.
I don’t know the age of this poem. Ithink it is about the fall.

So Turns the Wheel, by Gloria Carpenter

Oh, some may see this sight as autumn’s blood,
beginnings of an end as scarlet spreads,
asplash beneath her feet, her dress in shreds,
surrendering a spill wherein she stood.
Her limbs exposed, so fragile, bare of bud,
attired in remnants, thinly hanging threads,
now shiver-clinging, soulful bowing heads,
as memories release in wistful flood.
It is a time for strength, a time between,
when scarcity of warmth brings wintry feel.
Still beauty graces silhouette, serene,
for stark reality cannot conceal
a sweep of crimson complements the green;
as opposites attract, so turns the wheel.

“The wheel weaves as the wheel wills” Yeah, don’t remember where that’s from, either.

That one, at least, I can answer. That is from Robert Jordan’s Wheel of Time series.

Also (since I’m actally commenting here for the first time), let me just say that I am loving this comic. Every character feels like a real person, if you know what i mean…

Obi Wan Kenobi as The Old Librarian from The Pagemaker; the Cybertron Special Edition

Pardon me while I clean up after my nerdgasm. …

Google-fu is failing me. Is this… is it not a thing? If it isn’t, can you make this thing?

It feels like something you might find in-universe in _Ready Player One_.

Is anyone else stoked and itchy to see ‘Free Guy’?

This comic is still going? Wow! I don’t think I’ve read it since 2014! Congratulations on being one of the long-runners! I need to get caught up again, see you in a few days!

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published.