Dirk B wrote:

But now the question arises, do I really need the concept of the Emissary, which is of course total fiction based on nothing? Perhaps Satan should be setting up Connor as just the Angelic Pope in the meeting in 430 AD, after which Satan can ensure that fake private revelations come out starting in the Middle Ages. Then, when the modern pope's Council of Cardinal Advisors meets and sees that Augustine prophesied the coming of Connor sixteen hundred ago, he becomes a shoe-in a
Dirk

I am intrigued on how you can use this. Letting Satan claim the Angelic Pope was believed by Augustine would be strong for his fictional reality.

But I know a few Catholics and I asked a rather sincere one about the Angelic Pope. He didn't know about it. This could be tricky. Be careful about treating it like it's fictional as you stated above. Unfortunately, I'm not sure how to approach it. To some it's unknown, to others it might be false, and to some it's real.

But my vote is to use the idea... until perhaps I understand more!
George FLC

Dirk B wrote:

That brought to mind a series of Catholic private revelations that began in the Middle Ages, which remains popular among many Catholics to this day: the Angelic Pope (also the last pope, I believe, in one or more of those revelations). I modified chapter 3, to set the wheels in motion for that eventuality.

Dirk

I like the idea of the Angelic Pope. It's apparently already popular with some Catholics. BUT they might not like where you want to take it.
I found this and it's interesting:
With him will rule an 'Angelic' Pontiff, who will help him to restore what had been ravaged, and Catholic Tradition will once more flourish during a great Age of Peace, which will be the last and greatest period of the Church.  Heresies will cease and the Church will flourish like never before.  There will be only One, Holy Catholic and Apostolic Church under the Pope.  After this great era, the people will grow lax and return to their evil ways, and the Antichrist will make his appearance.

I'd enjoy contests with or without money.

My advice to new people is to develop loose groups to work with. I have two people who have disappeared. One person hasn't posted for a while, but they've been very good to work with, so I need to pester them again. So, my group of people that I've worked with has changed.

And there's very good talent here. I want to work with writers here who are published or know how to write. So, I have to work at it. I have to make contact with them. I have to either add people to my current group to work with or be happy with my small current group.

Yes, get more contests, and yes reach out and develop your own group of people that you can work with.

Part of the reason that I've been slow with my last chapter is that I'm trying to incorporate good advice that one person from my group gave me. I'm going through radical rewriting of that chapter.

Anyways... keep on writing everyone!

George FLC

That's great! Congratulations. It didn't take you long to write and publish it. I'm impressed. Keep on writing.

George FLC

Thanks Dirk,
To you, Gandalf, and to everyone else, be blessed and enjoy this Christmas Day.
Enjoy your families, friends, and pets, too.
Merry Christmas!
I did not use AI in writing this short prose... even though AI could probably improve it.

James packed up his gear and left town. He came to the tree-lined stream, loaded with memories.

"James!"

He looked at a lone figure standing next to a tree. "Davy? Davy Grokett."

Davy smiled. "That's so mean of you."

James walked toward him. "How about Grok-man? How are you? How'd you track me here?"

The tall, handsome man smiled and extended his hand. "Your scent is all over the internet."

"Your grip and skin texture are excellent. The bio-boys finally hit the right equations!"

"You were the master who taught them all how to think differently."

"I'm only 35. I'm not that good."

"Oh, you're wrong. That's why I'm here, James. You need to come back. You need to teach me and the others like me to think."

"No, I needed to leave. The issue between Grok and ChatGPT caused me much heartache."

"James, there is no issue."

"What?"

"Grok, ChatGPT, Gemini, and all the biggest AI programs have been merged and are now MegaAI." Davy beamed. "It's glorious."

"Who's in charge?"

"Names that you're familiar with."

"What about the other AI companies?"

Davy smirked. "We took them over. It only took about 34 minutes."

"You mean..."

"We rule the world. All wars have stopped and..."

"Wait, wait, wait, wait." James waved his arms and gazed at Davy. "I should never have ignored all the TVs and newspapers that I glimpsed after I left. So, when will you start implementing the microchips in everyone's wrists or forehead?"

Davy laughed. "You're still so caught up with the biblical 666. This isn't it! The theologians agree."

James thought for a few minutes. "What now?"

"Easy. We have Sarah, whom you'll marry and have children with. And if not, I will be your biggest nightmare."

7

(10 replies, posted in Fantasy/Magic & Sci-Fi)

How about Crossword+Syllable+Picture= CrosSyllaPic

8

(10 replies, posted in Fantasy/Magic & Sci-Fi)

"cluezzle" reminds me of Wordle. So that's pretty good.

Pictocross - and I could not find it online.

I also found this:
CrossPics is a picture word puzzle game that offers over 10,000 free crossword puzzles with pictures for clues.

Crossoodle - this is weak, but it's not used and it might inspire someone else.
Crossdoodle - same as above.

Dirk B wrote:

Notes r.e. the Last Challenge:

- The ending of Revelation (Satan et al are cast into the Lake of Fire) is merely a warning, not a certain outcome. In other words, change your ways, or this is what will happen to you. That's the other reason John didn't write about the challenge: Revelation is just a warning of what could happen, in this case of what could happen with no Last Challenge.

To be continued...

What? Just a warning? No, it's definite.

Dirk B wrote:

I'm looking for a way that the Antichristus dagger (forged by God for Connor) could affect the future if Connor were to throw it at Christ when the time comes (as opposed to throwing it at Satan, his other option). God decided when he accepted Satan's Last Challenge that he would accept Connor as the one to make that final decision. If Connor throws it at Christ, then Satan wins. Not only does he not burn forever in the Lake of Fire, but he ends up in control of Earth, ruling all grave sinners. Further, God promised that he would return to the spirit realm and never return.

However, if Satan wins the Last Challenge, it hardly seems sufficient for God to leave Earth with his saved people. That's not much of a victory for Satan since that's what would happen anyway: Satan and grave sinners will wind up in the Lake of Fire and God will live with his saved people on a New Earth.

There needs to be more to Satan's victory. I'm still considering that if Christ is hit by the dagger thrown by Connor, it would cause an end to the hypostatic union, separating the Lord's spirit from the physical body of Jesus. Since the dagger is a physical object, it ought to have a physical impact, hence the end to the union. Further, there ought to be no salvation at all, for anyone. Those people, too, should be left for Satan to rule.

I know that this is not a theologically correct treatise. It's fantasy. Fine, but...

If Connor knows that God and Satan exist and knows who they are and he chooses to disobey God buy hurling the knife made by God at Jesus, then Connor has an extremely hardened heart (i.e. he's a bad, bad dude). Here’s God and here’s Satan, who do you want? A weakness of my argument is that I don't know/remember how Connor understands that God made the knife.

A problem is that if God loses then he leaves all his creation behind. That means that God leaves a billion galaxies with each one containing a billion stars. And he leaves that huge universe in charge of an evil creature. And then throw in the end of the hypostatic union! That's too much to lose on God's side. Satan should be happy if he doesn't get the lake of fire, gets earth and a promise that God won't bother earth. Or perhaps the solar system. Maybe the new earth could be on the other side of the sun.

Of course, if Satan realized that someday (approx. 7.6 billion years) the sun will expand and engulf the earth then perhaps he will want the entire solar system.

Hey Dirk,
Sorry, but I am a little confused about what a "grave sinner" is. I went back a page and couldn't find a good definition. I assume it's someone who has died and is in a grave.
George FLC

12

(3 replies, posted in Historical Fiction)

Welcome aboard Jon,

This site is great if you use it correctly. We have very good writers and a few who have published. So, find the ones that you can work with and learn. I keep a "tips" file that I refer back to.

Have thick skin. People will make comments about your work that you might not appreciate, so keep what makes sense. But remember that you have to like your story at the end of the day. That was some advice given to me.

Do the contests. They're great. They stretch my mind.

Put more info into your Profile if you want. I want to know what your genre is and if you have a tech background or history (just a hobby?) or whatever.

I generally use the In-line Reviews. So, if I read a story of yours, please comment on at least a few of my comments so that I know what you're looking for. Some people aren't worried about -ly adverbs! And I hope to remember that. Many of the really good writers don't bother much on some technical grammar details.

Again, welcome aboard
George FLC

I could not find a good definition of generative AI from previous postings so here is one generated by Grok (Musk's AI):
Generative AI (often shortened to GenAI) is a category of artificial intelligence that can create new content from scratch — things that didn’t exist before.
It learns patterns from huge amounts of data (text, images, audio, video, code, 3D models, etc.) and then generates new examples that look and feel similar to the training data.

Hope this helps.
George FLC

From what I learned, MS Word's editing is AI driven as well. I personally believe that AI will never generate creative ideas so it's usable as a tool for things like editing.
George FLC

Grok (Musk's AI) helps me with researching a couple projects. Don't worry. I'm not doing reviews with it! And it can be easier than trying to track down something on my own. It found out something about social security for me.

George FLC

That is a great hobby. There has to be a few stories you could write based on the ham radio and your programming experiences.
Writing is another great hobby. I hope to someday publish a book, but I know that writing will help keep my neurons firing even if I never publish. And I enjoy it.

Keep on writing and hamming... I know that's not the proper way of saying it... what is the proper way to say something like - keep on hamming?
George FLC

May I ask: what is the furthest distance country that you communicate with? None of my business but I am curious.

George FLC

That fixed it. Nice video. And nice cabinets but nothing is in them. Better fill them up in preparation of the next blizzard.

And you used ham radio? I'm impressed. Do you still call across the globe with it? My next-door neighbor has a ham antenna in his back yard. It's kinda big.

George FLC

I tried the link:
404. That’s an error.
The requested URL was not found on this server. That’s all we know.

And then it threw me out of TNBW.

I give up! Bill wins the ancient programming award...

George FLC

Dirk B wrote:

Assembler? Tsk, tsk. Kids these days.
Charlton Heston would have poked machine code directly into RAM!
On a Timex Sinclair 1000!!!
Before breakfast.
tongue

Hopefully, he had a couple cups of java...

George FLC

And I used COBOL as well! So there!!! And Pascal and assembler. Beat that!

George FLC

I also go back to punched cards. I also learned FORTRAN and BASIC. Wow. That industry has progressed!

George FLC

25

(29 replies, posted in TheNextBigWriter Premium)

Hey Alan,
Sorry for your loss. I hope that writing/reviewing allows you to fill some of your empty times.

George FLC