Oddly enough, if you look at the Prophecy in terms of science fiction, it’s not too bad. Star-lifting is a thing, and a Singularity of any type would look awfully apocalyptic to a civilization in medieval stasis.
scary things which had heard of David Criswell’s ideas about star lifting.
Is long for “Harry James Potter Evans Verres”. Of course, he gave plausible explanation for why it couldn’t refer to him at the time, and all he had to go on was the letter s, so of course that hypothesis wouldn’t have elevated itself to his attention at the time.
I believe in general Internet parlance its usage is closest to A, and more rarely C. Obviously, since A could be made about pretty much anything, it is typically restricted to “the concept exists, and is acknowledged by a sufficient number of people” (e.g. “Rule 34 is a thing”).
And since the phrase “is a thing” is acknowledged by many people, we could say that “is a thing” is a thing. Unfortunately, “”is a thing” is a thing” is not yet a thing.
Saying “x is a thing” is a way of reminding people of a relevant concept that may have been overlooked. Whether it’s an actual physically existing thing or not depends on context.
Oddly enough, if you look at the Prophecy in terms of science fiction, it’s not too bad. Star-lifting is a thing, and a Singularity of any type would look awfully apocalyptic to a civilization in medieval stasis.
Star lifting is not only a thing, it’s a thing that has been mentioned in HPMOR… by Harry… in response to Trelawney’s prophecy.
Chapter 21, after Trelawney says “HE IS COMING. THE ONE WHO WILL TEAR APART THE VERY—” and is whisked away:
Pointing out the obvious, but
Is long for “Harry James Potter Evans Verres”. Of course, he gave plausible explanation for why it couldn’t refer to him at the time, and all he had to go on was the letter s, so of course that hypothesis wouldn’t have elevated itself to his attention at the time.
Question: what does it mean to say “X is a thing”?
Does it mean:
A) The concept exists? (e.g. Unicorns are a thing)
B) The concept may not exist yet, but it could exist? (E.g. lunar colonization is a thing; but unicorns are not a thing.)
C) the concept actually exists (Space stations are a thing.)
I believe in general Internet parlance its usage is closest to A, and more rarely C. Obviously, since A could be made about pretty much anything, it is typically restricted to “the concept exists, and is acknowledged by a sufficient number of people” (e.g. “Rule 34 is a thing”).
And since the phrase “is a thing” is acknowledged by many people, we could say that “is a thing” is a thing. Unfortunately, “”is a thing” is a thing” is not yet a thing.
“”is a thing” is a thing” is a thing in sense C.
Saying “x is a thing” is a way of reminding people of a relevant concept that may have been overlooked. Whether it’s an actual physically existing thing or not depends on context.
Context dependent, and possibly the distinction between the three is not really a thing.