Hacker News Reader

Comment by moe | Hacker News Reader

   The hardest thing in life to learn is which bridge to cross and which to burn.
   - David Russell

View on HN

Bah.. never burn a bridge, simply don't cross it and find another way across.

  Sometimes you get the best light from a burning bridge.
  - Don Henley

Man! You're like the MacGyver of bridge-related quotes. It's amazing.

  Kind words bridge hearts, but also diamonds, clubs and spades
  - Jack Handey

What deep thoughts by Mr. Handey...

But what happens when the Magog come pouring across it?

(Just wondering.)

Edit: I don't know if people don't get the reference or think I am merely being flippant. I'm not. I don't like burning bridges either. But sometimes I find it is the only way to put an end to a problem situation where the more I try to be polite and all that, the more neurotic and demanding and blood-sucking they become. If someone here knows how to handle that effectively without "burning the bridge", I would love to hear their take on it.

I don't get the reference. The search engines don't turn up anything relevant either.

Andromeda, the TV show. On some episode, on some planet, they build a bridge to the moon and I think somehow also to the future. When they open it, the Magog from the future come pouring out. The Magog are a race that eat humans and also lay their eggs in them and the eggs feed on the (still living) humans until they hatch out. Not exactly pleasant stuff.

Or at least that's what my mangled brain recalls from watching it a zillion years ago.

It was the first thing that came to mind in response to "never burn a bridge". I am disinclined to burn bridges myself. But I find sometimes that trying like hell to avoid burning the bridge just gets me into huge messes that have me wondering if so much politeness, manners, respectfulness and what not is really a good thing. It has helped me make my peace with incidents in my life where other people torched the bridge. At least it's been put to rest.

Edit: Link: http://andromeda.wikia.com/wiki/Abridging_the_Devils_Divide

Actually, a lot of recent horror and sci-fi stuff is lifted from Islamic mythology (which itself is rebranded Jewish, Kanaanite and Babylonian lore.)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gog_and_Magog

The TV show "Supernatural" heavily features themes of spirituality and daemons that are lifted from Islamic culture. The recent remake of Clash of the Titans also feature similar themes; the Jin, desert scorpions, Jin riding camels, etc.

I have no idea if that is where the makers of Andromeda got the name. Sometimes there are bizarre coincidences in life. But thank you for sharing.

I can almost guarantee you it is. The Wikipedia page is not as fleshed as it's supposed to be, but I was raised on the fear of Yagog & Magog and we're told the only thing stopping them from coming out and massacring us all, is the great wall of China (well, not exactly, the myth was developed under a flat-world, so they're "at the edge" of Earth. Nowadays the apologists just say it's the GWoC to keep intellectual consistency, but we all know it's not. By their description, they sound like "unlearned savages" outside the Caliphate, Siberia, South East Asia, and Scandinavia; since the rest of the old world was by then very well explored.)

Just because two things sound alike does not mean they have related origins. I am reminded of this incident: http://www.adversity.net/special/niggardly.htm

I am not saying you are wrong. I am only saying that I have no idea if the writers of the TV series had any knowledge of such myths and drew upon them -- even unintentionally -- or if someone sat down and played around with sounds until they found something "alien" sounding. I had never heard of what you are talking about until you brought it up and I am fairly well read and have had middle-eastern friends. If I had any awareness of such myths prior to making my earlier post, I am sure I would have made some effort to clearly indicate it was a sci-fi reference in order to avoid confusion. As far as I knew, there was only way to interpret the word "magog".

I imagine quite a lot of Americans have no knowledge of these mythologies, which would be good reason to borrow from them as inspiration for sci-fi: It's adequately foreign and unknown that it is "alien" to the general public here and there is rich material to draw upon if you get stuck, material that is sufficiently unknown that most people won't realize you drew on anything and will think you are just really, really creative. I have heard that Japanese fiction often draws on Christian mythology in a similar manner, which makes for some misunderstanding if it later gets translated to English and marketed to the "western" world.

The Bible is widely read in the US.

Yes, I realize that. Presumably there is some disconnect: I said Christian mythology gets used in Japanese fiction, which causes problems when it comes back here where the bible is widely read. Not because Americans don't read the bible but because they do. If non-Christians in a foreign land, speaking a foreign language borrow on Christian imagery for "fluffy" fictional pieces, and it comes back to a culture where Christianity is widespread, it tends to not go over well. I assume the same is true in any comparable situation.

Really baffled by your reply.

Here is the disambiguation page showing the Bible reference along with Andromeda. Compare them:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magog

I think we're just having an academic discussion and citing "prior" sources for the sake of disclosure and intellectual honesty. Hopefully no one is offended by the discovery that their idea of 1st rate sci-fi is rehashed religion, or that their one-true-faith is just pagan lore ;-)

I'm not religious. I'm more familiar with Christian imagery/themes/whatever-you-want-to-call-it in part because I grew up in "The Bible Belt". But it doesn't have the same meaning for me as it would for someone who is actually Christian. I just don't understand why the downvote or the above reply to me informing me the bible is widely read in the US. Total mental disconnect for me. Still scratching my head.

Because it comes off like you're arguing for the unique originality of Andromeda while dismissing any possible "inspirations" for it as unlikely.

It's like arguing that Aslan, the lion from Narnia, is based on Mufasa, the character from Lion King, because they're both lions and both have luxuriously animated manes.

I have no idea where you get that interpretation. I don't know how more clearly I can state that I simply do not know where the name in the series came from. And no one has posted a link to information or given anecdotal evidence that "I saw them say in some interview that it came from...." The disambiguation page you linked to lists a name in the Christian bible and the name of a Canadian city (plus a few other things) in addition to a race on the TV series Andromeda and a name from the Quran. So far, you are suggesting that the series was influenced by the Quran and providing no real evidence of a link. All I am asserting is that I have no idea what influenced the writers of the show. That is the only assertion I have made. I remain baffled as to how that can be misinterpreted and remain baffled by the remark about the bible being widely read in the US, as if I didn't know that.

The comment about the bible was by cema, not mahmud. My impression was that cema interpreted your above comment as saying that people in the US would not respond well to plots based on Christian mythology because it was unfamiliar; when I think you meant that Americans wouldn't respond well to it because they didn't like seeing their sacred stories bastardized by giant stompy robots.

Yes, I realize a different person said it. Yes, I did mean it creates problems when people feel their sacred stories are bastardized -- also that the bastardized stories may use a cool sounding name for a character that has a specific meaning to Christians and this can be confusing to the audience when they don't view it as simply a cool sounding name but, instead, read all kinds of deeper meanings into the character that simply were never intended.

It is ridiculous to think the writers of Andromeda didn't know about Gog & Magog. Repurposing old myths is sci-fi writing 101.

It's ridiculous that I have to defend my statement that I simply do not know what influenced the show while others are not being required to backup their assumption the show was influenced by something specific without providing any actual evidence of it, such as a quote from an interview.

It's also ridiculous that this tangent about Andromeda has grown so long while there has been zero response to my actual on-topic inquiry regarding negotiating with difficult people.

Andromeda could have been the best SciFi show of all time and the ruined it.

The Magog, the Nietzscheans, the hot chicks. That show could have had it all.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com