Re: The White Tower ... Dark vision and programming dark vision eye-glasses

On 15/08/2026 3:52 PM, Mr. Chang Man-wai wrote:
> On 8/13/2026 9:09 AM, Johann 'Myrkraverk' Oskarsson wrote:
>> I'm now here in alt.magic.history, and we don't confuse fantasy with
>> reality.  We leave that up to trolls in comp.lang.c, and potentially
>> alt.magic but I don't know them yet.
> 
> In another thread, you talked about dark vision.
> 
> If and only if one can build a pair of eye-glasses
> using modern-day computer technology that does dark
> vision, C programming is needed to display what the
> eye-glasses can see using mathematics related to
> graphics. :)
> 

Yes, here in alt.magic.history, we do not confuse fantasy with reality.

I admit I do somewhat conflate the two in alt.fantasy, but that's me
writing fiction, and everyone who reads alt.fantasy knows that fiction
is not reality.

Now, on the subject of dark vision, I do not believe that's done with
the eyes.  Eyes -- as everyone knows -- are light sensors of the bio-
logical type, and don't /sense darkness/.  Now, magical creatures* with
dark vision therefore have to sense their surroundings with some other
organ.  I'm pretty sure that's rare, because bats use sound to navigate
in darkness, and that's not /dark vision/ -- at least in this paper on
magical history.

So, the first step is to either /divine/, or /observe/ some creature of
magical properties apply /dark vision/ in reality.  I do not strictly
mean divination in the magical sense, because if we can imagine some
physical phenomena that measures surroundings without the need of light,
and then create scientific apparatuses to mimic the effect, we are gett-
ing somewhere.  In this sense, I do not believe /night vision goggles/,
even if coded in C -- let's include comp.lang.c in this discussion, may-
be they know -- qualify; if I'm not mistaken, these /night vision gogg-
les/ sense and magnify surrounding background light, and don't work in
total darkness.**  So what we need to do, here in alt.magic.history, is
to read a lot of ancient manuscripts -- this may take centuries as there
are many of them -- to find observations and/or details of how dark vis-
ion is supposed to work, or by complete happenstance, to observe a crea-
ture doing this in reality.

Now, on the observation part, here is a conundrum, how do we observe
someone, or something, /see in the dark/ when we do not?  How would we
know if someone or something is navigating reality without using the
help of eyes?***  I believe this is quite impossible, without direct in-
put from said magical creature, so said magical creature must also be
willing to talk to us in the sciences,**** speak at minimum Ancient
Egyptian, Latin, or a modern language, and be willing to explain what
it's doing.

Now, for people willing to undertake the study of ancient languages to
further the course of alt.magic.history, I heartily recommend

o  https://shop.thegreatcourses.com/latin-101-learning-a-classical-language

o 
https://shop.thegreatcourses.com/decoding-the-secrets-of-egyptian-hieroglyphs

as a place to start.  The latter of these courses is taught by an
eminent scholar of Egyptology, and has his own Wikipedia page to prove
it.  Bob Brier has also written extensively on Ancient Egyptian Magic,
and may be willing to discuss the matter with anyone willing to pay
him.*****

Now, once we have /something/, anything, to emulate with a scientific
apparatus, we can start to discuss programming it in C.  I have a feel-
ing modern scientific devices are programmed mostly in C++, and/or
Python, but that's based on a single data point, and neither of these
programming languages are worth discussing here in alt.magic.history.
So to further the programming effort of alt.magic.history, I do suggest
a book, rather than a video course, on how to to linear algebra on a
/graphical prognostication unit/ -- sometimes confused with /graphical
procrastination unit/ because it's used for games -- which is the foll-
owing.

o  https://www.amazon.com/Learn-OpenGL-programming-step-step/dp/9090332561/

Of course, everyone in comp.lang.c prefers the online edition, which is
freely available -- or was, last time I looked -- but we in alt.magic.
history prefer hardcopies, in case the website will not be around in a
century, or two, or three; or whenever unsaid magical creature is will-
ing to assist in the creation of /dark vision/ goggles.

Now, we turn the matter over to Mr. Chang Man-wai who has graciously
offered to code said goggles, approximately three hundred years from
now.  What do you say?


* For now, let's just assume there is a creature that exists in reality,
and we can apply the label /magical/ to it.

** In the movies, when the lights are turned on, these /night vision go-
ggles/ stop working.  If they were indeed just /measuring darkness/,
they'd probably continue to work properly even in total daylight.
    And now we come to the question of how real /night vision goggles/
are in the movies, vs. reality, because I have never used any of these
devices.

*** Here I include artificial eye implants that have done quite well for
the totally blind as /eyes/.  Please see papers or articles about this
phenomenon, as I will not expand on it here.

**** According to the latest fad in fantasy, this is probably unrealist-
ic expectation.  I refer to the movie /Old Guard 2/ as a typical example
of the expectations of anyone, or anything, having unusual biological
properties.

***** I do not know him personally, only professionally, so cannot say
much more than that.
-- 
Johann | email: invalid -> com | http://www.myrkraverk.com/blog/
I'm not from the Internet, I just work there. | via Easynews.com
https://bsky.app/profile/myrkraverk.bsky.social | for ( ;; ) _:;