Posted Thursday, July 16, 2009 by Techskeptic

Welcome Aboard!

You are now seated on the faster touring cruiser in the known universe. This vessel is known as The Skeptica, a Sagan class vessel that can hold thousands of passengers as we take our trip through the known universe.

First we would like to apologize for a number of things. The captain has had a very full schedule and it appears that since this is the only vessel that makes this particular trip, he has needed to limit the number of planets to be the best and most interesting. Unfortunately, when he conferred this issue to the home worlds, it appears that only a few have opened their ports to us. So we will visit those, and hopefully next time things will be a bit more varied.

But enough excuses, Lets go on our journey!

Our first stop is to the Planet Stollznowskiserpakiak. This planet hosted a society vibrant with technology, science, and wondrous works of art for centuries. The humorous and happy denizens of this planet have long been our ally in our quest for understanding reality as it is. Unfortunately, they recently have been invaded by the Rectohaunts. creatures invading orifices where they most certainly don’t belong. We have dispatched some help, but it looks like for the most part they are getting a good handle on the problem themselves.

We certainly don’t want to get caught up in that, so lets move on to our next destination… Slooeyscepsoc!

There is simply no denying that this is a gorgeous world! While the surface is quite barren the seas are teeming with life! There are over 4 million species of creatures here, not including one celled varieties! Much like our own planet, even with so many species, only one of them has developed a consciousness that is advanced enough to communicate with us. These beings are known as the Jurists. This is the best translation we get from their mode of communication, which is a series of bubbles that are read in size of bubble, duration of bubble stream, and velocity of bubbles. It took us about 100 years before we realized that these interesting creatures were sentient. For all that time we just thought they tasted good.

The jurists have an interesting society. Its a pure democracy where everything is decided upon by majority. And when I say everything, I mean everything from the sea crops that they will be pursuing, to the time when they evacuate their Goord bladders. What is more amazing is that for the most part, voting is unanimous! If you look at your personal viewscreeen, you can read what happens when one member of this society questions the biases of the rest of the members.

As we leave you can hear the committee saying “bloob blurg ptblaaaaaP”, which is simply their way of asking us to return soon.

Off to our next destination… LV246!

We are visiting this green and lush world filled with mystic and ancient knowledge. But don’t let the history of this planet fool you. All their mysticism is based around fundamental principles that can be measured and verified for yourself. We are lucky to have access to this planet. The PodBlackians are currently helping the little sweet green creatures, the Bweedles, a childlike race. They have been transported here from their home planet where they have been harmed emotionally and physically, by forces outside of their control. Our visit will be short so that we do not interrupt the transfer of tools and knowledge from the PodBlackians to the Bweedles. They have to do this in secret. The PodBlackians are currently hiding from those very same forces that caused so much damage to the creatures they are helping.

The Skeptica is now coming about and heading to over to the Delta quadrant of the universe. Here we are going to visit an interesting world, Auditant. The coolest thing about Auditant is that despite the fact they have developed tremendously complex and intricate buildings, startling advanced electronics and computer systems, and have pushed science to the limit beyond most other civilizations, they don’t have any written language. Everything they do is perfectly recorded and played back at a later date.

However the Auditants are prolific! Lets stop by one of their auditory arenas. These arenas are shaped like football fields where they lob verbal assaults on their targets. For example in this first match we can see the team HJHOP launch a barrage of searing verbal battering rams on a variety of topics such as a secret society, and some hauntings in one of their provinces. Then you can see the HJHOP team swing around and dive down the format line to score a point by utterly destroying one of the opposing teams biggest windbags who resembles a large pig.

After the match, the winning team has assembled a nice evening with some good music for our pleasure. They are hoping their selection will bring us back on every trip.

The auditants have also asked us to take a look in news feeders (there are only 400,000 of them!). But in particular, they thought we might be interested in seeing how they found out how cultural myths spread and how they get busted up! We are going to move on, be we have downloaded the audio images you your viewscreens so you can hear them at your leisure as we move on to the next stop!

Vitelli, is a barren planet but the only surface species left are quite amazing. They come to the surface to socialize and do nothing else. Eating, caring for children, society building and the general advancement of their civilization all happens underground where there are huge fungal gardens and many varieties of game to catch in the many many miles of caverns available to the inhabitants.

What happened you ask? Its a long story, and the Vitellians are not quick to discuss it, and for all for formidable stature and dexterity, you can watch as the slouch in shame on this topic. Apparently the Vittelians were not always the quick witted creatures you see before you today. There was a time where they assigned the cause of random negative events to members of their own society. So if something bad happened, they would pursue one of their own, and perform any number of horrendous things to them until they were dead. They have sent us a brief history of these events, going over the why, the how and the when. But they have also included data about how some of their early ancestors noticed that perhaps this was not the right course of action.

Leaving planet Vitelli, in a rare fluke of nature, there is another planet in the very same star system with another sentient species. The Mikes live on the rocky planet Jaqsone. These helmeted creatures do everything in pairs. Everything they build, everything that write, everything they destroy, they do it in couples. Recently however, a visitor from another planet came. A great majority of the population of Jaqsone revered this ghost like visitor who taught them new ways of communicating and moving their double jointed bodies.

Unfortunately, the visitor from another planet could not live long in the Jaqsonian atmosphere and he came to an early demise. At this news more aliens came to Jaqsone and tried to cash in on his death. The Mikes would have none of this. They loved their visitor, and didn’t want his memory tarnished by buzzards and swindlers who came later. So they wrote two manifestos on it, you know, because they do everything in twos.

Honestly I don’t know who is in charge of naming planets, but you would think that they didn’t have to repeat things. We have arrived to the planet Jupiter. No, not our Jupiter. This Jupiter is just as large, but its in the Centaurus A galaxy, near the OneBrow Star.

The inhabitants of Jupiter live underwater. They are not large creatures, they are only about 2 meters tall, but they are amazingly dense! If they were on our planet they would each weigh in at 4 metric tons! They are aware that their species is one of the only sentient bottom dwellers in the universe, and therefore, in a half joking manner, refer to themselves as People-from-the-Floor-of-the-Ocean. We just refer to them as Floorians. Its appropriate since they call us Walkers.

This species is incredibly advanced. Our guide is just a slightly-smarter-than-standard working guy there, advising architects and building homes, but look at some of his daily correspondence with his beer drinking colleagues as they discuss they latest philosophical arguments! Note: Floorian beer tastes very similar to urine, I'm sure you wouldn’t want to try either.

You may have thought that after 600 years of reality and game shows on earth we would have pretty much covered everything. But you would be wrong. We are arriving at the planet Cubik. This planet is an enigma all unto itself.

The inhabitants look like spider, but they are quite humorous and friendly. They have been at gaming in various forms for thousands of years. Games are used as demonstrations of love, they are use as acts of war, they are used in political processes. There is no aspect of life that does not involve one form or another of gaming whether it be solitary games or massively multiplayer games. While they have certainly has a couple of centuries of of electronic dabbling, mostly they have stuck to games that require physical interaction. They have built entire societies around games. If you look out your window, you will see the ruins of the old Age of Knights, which involved bigger than life pieces that were played across entire states between mutple opponents. Alas, the age of knights faded away, soon to be replaced by the Age of Colorful board games, The Age of Electronic games, The Video game age and for the last two thousand year they have been in the Game Show Age. Lets try to get a feed…

Ah yes, here we go. Here is a game show where a small band of nonbelievers are pitted against believers of the local religion. In one hour we should be seeing some conversions. I wonder if they have a similar game show where they can get converted back?

Now have a nice surprise for you. We will be visiting Caliban. This planet just opened itself up to us very recently, however its inhabitants have been seen on many other planets for the last few years. That is why we knew they existed. After much encouragement, we are finally able to visit their homeworld.

While they are ferocious warriors they are also adroit thinkers. Most of their written text whether found in the libraries on Caliban or in texts on other planets you will find strong words, sharp tongue and a warlike stance on many subjects. For example, take a look at how they recently shredded some ancient texts that are no longer useful to the society. It comes in six scathing chapters and it is not even done yet! But perhaps you would like to delve into some of their military history? I wouldn’t want these pesky bastards opposing me!

We are wrapping up our journey here, I hope you have been enjoying your travels. Lets stop at a couple of more planets. First lets jaunt over to Bernardin, this planet is home to one and a half evolving minds. I say one and a half because it is clear that there is one at least a brightly colored tentacled soft spoken creatures, the Drewniads. And while there are certainly a multitude of intelligent creatures on this lush planet there is one in particular that resembles our dogs. We are still trying to determine if these creatures are as sentient and intelligent as the Drewniads, and while there is some evidence of it were are still trying to ascertain the range of emotions these creatures feel.

On our last other worldy stop we are going to Sirius the Dog Star. Around it is a small planet discovered quite some time ago. Again, the alert planet namers decided to call this planet Sirius also. Further… the inhabitants? Yeah they are the Sirians. The largest Ocean? Sirius. The largest landmass? Sirius. It goes on and on. Someone really was slacking at their job.

The planet itself is the height of beauty and wonder however. The gorgeous landscapes are so striking they just make you want to get down on your knees and thank the universe for being so wonderful. In fact, the Sirians do exactly that every evening. Its a good break from their daily routine where they are far more serious about what else the universe brings them!

Anyway, the Sirians are a rambling lot. They often have sessions just telling each other what they think the other person doesn’t know. In fact, they’ve got long lists of things that should not be mention because they are bad form. but when they get away from their loquacious vomit, they sometimes write about softer, happier things. Let me give you a recent submission on the Sirian soul.

OK, we are heading back to Earth. We, the crew of the Skeptica have truly enjoyed touring the universe with you and we hope you will return soon and often. Before you leave the vessel, make sure you avoid the drinking the water at the starport. We have new water treatment facilities but we are unsure if they are working properly. Also, as you leave the port, there may be people from a completely different dimension handing you flyers about how to get to their homes. We do not recommend it. As you leave feel free to take one of the touring guides with you.

Captain’s Note: I realize that some of the material presented here may be owned by the artist. If you own any of the pictures or Spore Creatures I have used, please tell me and I will happily apply proper credit or remove them if you wish. I hope you liked how they were used, its for a good cause.

The Next Skeptic’s Circle will be hosted by Beyond the Short Coat on July 30th. Check it out!