parodeity | subnautica ic inbox 2.0;

[Weird how a kid who never got an education never learned calculus! Dirk doesn't know if Dave will need some more fundamental algebra to back it up or not but they'll get to that with their next books probably. ONCE DIRK HAS EVERYTHING MARKED UP he's going to tally it out, set up an approximate order of progress (obviously one that operates with multiple branching pathways and can therefore response to Dave's specific interests/desires and his speed on various subjects) and then organize the information they need according to these pathways and design lessons/practice materials for what he knows + hand off whatever he doesn't know to Dave's chosen teachers.

Dirk was not even this organized when he taught himself stuff.]

We've done tacos and nachos. Are there any other Cultural Heritage dishes I should catch up on?

[ well it's good to see dirk is taking his parenting duties seriously jesus christ ]

Fajitas? Funnel cakes. That's not a dinner food. Uhhh. Chili is actually our official state dish I think? Chicken fried steak. Cobbler of any fruit variety. Sweet tea. Honestly I can think of so many stereotypical Texan and southern foods if pressed, I guess?

We could... try to do a new one every week. [If Dave is ok with that? If Dave thinks it would be cool.

Dirk is resisting adding those things of self-questioning. He is attempting to get better at this.]

Yeah, that's fine, but like - which off of that list sounds, uh, the most appetizin' to you?

[ the basic problem: he doesn't know wtf to research to cook tomorrow together and so he was trying to foist the issue off on dirk. GOOD JOB, DAVE, probably he could have just, like, explained that. ]

Chili.

[Objective decision based on feeling like he wants that one.]

Chili it is. I'll make sure we have all the stuff by the time it's, like, dinner tomorrow.

[ PROBLEM SOLVED not that it was. really a problem.

ok you know fucking what, dave is just sticking a post it note on the cover of calculus and calling it quits. he knows none of this. ]

That'll be fun. You're probably gonna love calculus. [AND HE CAN TEACH MOST OF IT HOW EXCITING why is he so happy to teach math. because he's a nerd, probably.

Anyway he gives Dave the first of four algebra books: the elementary one. He also moves over the linear, multilinear, and abstract algebra textbooks.

It's fine, Dirk just grabbed five Geometry textbooks for himself.]

[ look it was easier to just mark the entire book than every single chapter...the comment does, however, earn a tiny smile from dave. ]

That's why. [ no explanation given. just. what dirk just said is why...something.

he takes the offered algebra books and will start going through those. this is a Process. ]

[Instead of looking at STUFF ABOUT GEOMETRY Dirk looks at Dave. He is pretty sure it was good—he likes that smile. He does not know what that why is in answer to.

After a moment:]

Why... it's me?

[It feels like narcissism to interpret it that way but he also feels like he shouldn't let his self-loathing affect his ability to understand Dave as ridiculously as it sometimes does.]

Aside from like...our shared stupidity over anythin' emotional. You never make me feel like I'm an idiot when I don't know somethin'.

[ because he DOES feel like an idiot a lot in relation to dirk when they realize they fucked up something that could have been solved easily or they just misunderstood, but - whenever dave admits to not knowing what dirk's talking about or misses a reference, dirk never gives him shit over it. usually he tends to claim dave is smarter than dave considers himself to be, instead. ]

So askin' you to help me with this wasn't really that scary.

[A silence. Then a flicker of something like a smile at the corner of his mouth.]

You just opened yourself up to a vaguely philosopretentious statement on learning and ignorance there.

[That is not what he says. What he says is instead:]

It's nice that we can both ask each other things like that without getting scared.

I feel cheated of my vaguely philosopretentious statement. Pay up?

[ you can't just say you have one and then not say it, dirk. even if dave's little smile morphs into one of his actual ones. ]

It isn't one of my best ones. Not even a drop of irony in it.

[Shameful!!]

Only the willful rejection of knowledge can be condemned. The impossibility of omniscience, on the other hand, is the great gift of the human condition.

Except when it really feels like it isn't. [fuck you sburb and the stupid shit you were arbitrarily vague about]

Yeah, wow, our entire everythin' kinda fucked over that statement, didn't it.

[ hes kind o amused here. ]

Man, I wonder how many philosophers we'd totally fuckin' wreck with just, like, our general lives?

Almost the entire history of world philosophy has been spat on by our existence.

[They really are such asses.]

Allowing for how much I hate not knowing things I need to know, learning is still something I enjoy a lot and see a great deal of value in, and I doubt I'll ever stop doing it. It might be best to designate that one conditionally philosophical.

I suppose I'm...used to not knowin'? A lot of my bullshit relied on, you know, trusting my instincts or myself in various iterations, while havin' basically no details. Or, well - dumb details like how many iterations there were for a certain thing, or stupid shorthand I'd get? But I never knew everythin' and I was used to it. You're more like Rose, I think, in mindin' the uncertainties sometimes.

[ but he does like to know. it's nice. sort of comforting. he didn't know that, before? even before the game and time bullshit, he was in a constant state of flux in regards to what he knew. ]

I don't think I want to stop, either. Although I might change my mind someday about what I want to learn.

Me and Rose definitely agree. There's a difference between not knowing how astrophysics works, which is an opportunity for learning, and not knowing how the fuck I'm supposed to navigate a completely arbitrary game or what the actual purpose of anything in it is, which is annoying as all fuck.

Admittedly, there are some aspects of the game I just don't want to know more about. [Like. The Trickster stuff? He doesn't want to know anything else about that. He's fine in his ignorance. Let him rest.]

We'll have to pass on locking you in as Science Kid For Life. [actually dave as a Science Kid seems hilarious and they need to do more Bill Nye things.] It's sort of a benefit of our immortality. We have literally all the time in the universe to keep learning whatever we want.

Hopefully it will remain irrelevant for the immediate future.

[ JUST HOPEFULLY. ]

And...yeah, that is kind of a cool thing. Textbook me again? I was like, talkin' the other day about maybe picking up languages that are not, like, alien.

Which ones are you thinking about?

[Also he gives Dave THE NEXT IN THE STACK OF ALGEBRA BOOKS wow there's so much algebra. He gets the next geometry one for himself.]

Spanish or Hindi.

[ time to POST IT NOTE THIS SUCKER UP. ]

Probably the latter. I can actually probably handle language studies [ with jake maybe???? he's not sure where they fell on that??? ] on my own. Maybe human languages will be even easier than the alien ones I keep havin' to pick up in self-defense?

One of those is not the expected choice.

[It's the second one??? Because he doesn't know this choice is spurred on by Bollywood Nights with Jake & Dave.]

Human languages are at least guaranteed to use organs for sound production you absolutely have.

Yeah, I would have expected me to know more Spanish, too.

[ he's texan??? it's right down there by mexico. also look dave will keep this secret as long as possible. which...who knows how long it will take dirk to call him on the amber he gave to jake thing. that jake keeps by his bed now i guess. will jake crack and explain. will dirk figure out how much effort went into that? no one knows DAVE'S ALIBI IS ROCK SOLID no it's not ]

Ok, if that was a crack at my Kharaa accent, you can't even make it 'cause yours is basically exactly mine.

Which brings us to wondering why you want to learn Hindi?

[WHEN WILL DIRK KNOW in the dumbest possible way, one day]

It was an objective observation about the difficulties of cross-species communication.

Why wouldn't I want to learn Hindi? Gotta start somewhere in the languages of the world, y'know?

[ honestly who can tell at this rate DAVE'S COMMITTED TO NEEDLESS CAGINESS, because why the fuck wouldn't he. about this thing that 100% doesn't need to be remotely secret. ]

We should learn Spanish though. [ gesturing back and forth between them. ]

Apparently you wouldn't learn Hindi because we're going to learn Spanish.

[The. Two of them? Apparently? Like, Dirk isn't going to disagree. He will sign on to learn this thing he probably doesn't need to know. Why not. But. ???]

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