Originally posted by bandicoot:
I love the idea of a penguin-eating Orca (killer whale)! A powerful mammal that lives beneath the Aqua surface.

Love your reasons. I also sugested this to the person running the mascott poll at
http://www.cs.ucr.edu/~kellrott/darwin.html

I thought it would be a good idea beacuse It fits the aqua theme, Is similar to Linux's Penguin, works with a Charles Darwin fish theme and the Demon BDS theme (look up what Orca means in Latin for details) and lets face it Orcas are cool.

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I haven't lost my mind, it's backed up on tape somewhere.

The online Latin dictionary states:
orcus : the Lower World; whale.

For more info on Orcas: http://www.geocities.com/RainForest/...5548/facts.htm

The platypus is nice, but an Orca makes a lot more sense to me.

How about an adorable aqua blue octopus with 10 (X !) arms. They also contain (and squirt ! ) blue ink don't they !

try passer-by's link what a J A C K A S S

(sorry for the OT bit:
Hinson - Just wanted to give a shout of support. I actually disagree with some of your views, and I'm rather wary of any organized religion, but your posts were generally calm and well-reasoned. Certainly more so than the responses they generated. Everyone else has mostly been negative towards you, which I thought was unfortunate. So you go! )

(I also thought that whole discussion, while OT, was more interesting than the mascot one.)

(Oh, and why should the halo be any less offensive than the pitchfork and horns? Hmmmm?)

Anyway. I agree that the platypus would be spiffy if re-worked. It seems a little busy to me. Too many objects and symbols. I just don't know which could be taken out without losing some of the meaning.

I also kinda like the Clarus (it's not "Claris"?)with horns idea. Give him a wry look...

cheers

That jerk!
You could have told me what the link did though, Natro, so I wouldn't have to quit explorer, argh...

The mascot should be Barney. That way it's offensive to everyone! ('xept kids, I guess).

Thanks bandicoot, HAP and passer-by for supporting my suggestion. I have also mention it to the mascot site, and hopefully it will appear as an option when she re-lanches the poll in a few weeks.

Cheers

Gaffa.

Originally posted by Hinson:
HAY, I just had a new idea...

How about this: take the platypus and have him holding the pitch fork behind his back. On the end of the pitchfork is hanging the little horned hat, and in place of the hat over the platypus' head is a translucent blue halo (reminiscent of Aqua)!

...
-Jay

So let me get this straight...

Horns and a pitchfork - possibly offensive religious imagery.

Halo - not offensive religious imagery ?

Surely if there are people who would be offended by 'evil' imagery then there are people who would be offended by 'good' imagery?

You can't have it both ways

I know - use the image of a horned demon nailed to the Aqua blue "X" logo!

The irony of the whole religious discussion is that you're all using Apple computers, with the logo and name being a very obvious tongue-in-cheek reference to the Apple of wisdom from the Biblical myth.

Why don't we see fundy's picketing Apple HQ?

-chris.

My recommendation is for a blue BSD Daemon. It is sort of a genetic deviant from its red BSD roots (a little Darwinian there). Halo's or apples are up to you guys.

As far as demonic undertones, I figure if Duke can have the Bluedevils as their mascot, and they were founded as a Christian institution, it is fine for a non-religious organization to have a similar mascot. By the way, Duke still has an active divinity school.

It is either that, or we can call Steve Jobs and tell him to pack it up and port everything over to SuSe Linux on PPC, so we can have a cute chamileon named Geeko as our command line mascot.

For those criticizing my suggestion (based on my own past arguments) because it includes a halo, note that it ALSO included the horns and pitchfork references as well. Both "good" and "evil" imagery was included, not just one. Thus, it is less likely to offend and much more likely to raise questions about what the imagery actually means (as opposed to using imagery that brings to mind only one pre-established meaning). I was trying to provide a balance that encouraged further thought.

As for the apple logo referring to the Biblical account of the forbidden fruit, I honestly never recognized that connection. If it's true, then I find it pretty sad. Of course, the Bible never specified the fruit to be an apple, and it is not, as "Spheric Harlot" suggested, connected to wisdom. Rather, the forbidden tree was that of knowledge of good and evil. One way to think about it is that (according to Christianity) by disobeying God, Adam and Eve forever differentiated good (by definition, following God) and evil (by definition, opposing God) for all of humanity. By making a choice to partake of the tree of knowledge of good and evil they, according to Christianity, introduced sin, death, desolation, sorry, etc. into the world.

Thus, if the apple is meant to allude to the Bible account, then not only would it be an unwarranted and disrespectful poke at the Christian faith, it would also show quite commonplace ignorance over many Christian teachings. The proper interpretation of such a symbol would be "Apple, the computer that introduced evil to the world."

Now, I'm guessing that some of you out there might actually get a kick out of thinking that your computer choice is also a way to thumb your nose at people of certain faiths; however, I find such a concept to be utterly ill conceived and inappropriate. Do you really think Apple wants to divide people along religious lines? Do you WANT that to be a goal of apple, a personal computer maker??? If so, all I can say is "how sad."


-Jay

"Of course, the Bible never specified the fruit to be an apple, and it is not, as "Spheric Harlot" suggested, connected to wisdom..."

Well, the Bible doesen't say anything about hornes on the Devil or demons either...

thanatos wrote:
"Well, the Bible doesen't say anything about hornes on the Devil or demons either..."

Well, actually, one of the hebrew words that can be rendered "devils" is also the same word for a he-goat. There's more to the origin of the imagery than that, but that Hebrew term gives at least a smattering of a Biblical reference to the imagery--not that the Bible claims that "demons" or "devils" are actually physical creatures that appear as such, but rather it is not too surprising to find the imagery symbolic of the demon concept.

But anyway...


-Jay

Originally posted by Hinson:
For those criticizing my suggestion (based on my own past arguments) because it includes a halo, note that it ALSO included the horns and pitchfork references as well. Both "good" and "evil" imagery was included, not just one.

No, no, no. It's not a question of "good" or "evil". It's a question of being offensive. You yourself implored us seething heathens to open our minds and imagine that there might be someone out there to whom the demonic imagery would be patently offensive. Okay. Accepted. Now you have to understand that a halo, culturally bound to represent the Christian idea of an angel, might be just as offensive. It is imagery associated with one particular belief system. That was the basis for your previous arguments, was it not?

If your basis was instead that the demonic imagery is "bad" and _that_ is why it's offensive, then you're assuming that pitchforks and halos are universally associated with the notions of "evil" and "good." That's also true only with reference to a particular belief system.

If you think it's silly that someone could associate horns and pitchforks with anything other than evil, then I suggest you open your mind. I think it's silly that anyone could be offended by a cartoon mascot. (Take yourself a little less seriously, eh?)

Thus, it is less likely to offend and much more likely to raise questions about what the imagery actually means (as opposed to using imagery that brings to mind only one pre-established meaning). I was trying to provide a balance that encouraged further thought.

I'm not sure I follow you here. It sounds like our little platypus is choosing the halo over the pitchfork. Which is fine, but I'm not sure that it's any less likely to offend. I can easily envision someone taking offense at the use of _any_ symbol appropriated by modern Christianity in an OS mascot.

As for the apple logo referring to the Biblical account of the forbidden fruit, I honestly never recognized that connection.

Um.

This was in your first post:

"I'd say that a the platypus WITHOUT the horns, pitchfork, and forbidden-fruit imagery would be a nice mascot--a little jab at the penguin, and cute to boot."

Am I missing something?

Now, I'm guessing that some of you out there might actually get a kick out of thinking that your computer choice is also a way to thumb your nose at people of certain faiths; however, I find such a concept to be utterly ill conceived and inappropriate. Do you really think Apple wants to divide people along religious lines? Do you WANT that to be a goal of apple, a personal computer maker??? If so, all I can say is "how sad."

I understand that people who are deeply moved by religion are snickered at more often than not these days. This is indeed unfortunate. It's also too bad that Christianity -- in name, not in spirit -- has been the tool of so many destructive forces. That's probably why cynicism is the first response of those who aren't intimately acquainted with it. That and the whole proselytizing bit. Yikes. Creepy. Anyway, I still have to ask how a haloed platypus wouldn't also represent a jab at folks of other faiths, or of a secular bent. Those who are also very sensitive to such imagery, I mean.

How bout a levitating, meditating platypus? Make him a little chubby. Buddhism was a reformation of Hinduism, in a way, right? Darwin is a reformation of Unix... And there were plenty of demons in Hinduism. Naw, probably too obscure a reference. And there's already the Enlightenment window manager.

Hi, pedestrian...

You made some good points and made it clear that I didn't quite explain myself well enough.

First, let me note that my original aversion to the imagery I saw wasn't just focussed on the platypus with the hat--it was actually more focused on the accompanying image of the not really that cute and obviously demonic character standing next to a tree eating an apple. That image may have tainted my impression of the cutter platypus image. However, my overall thinking was that some people who may view these possible mascots will obviously get the wrong idea and could be offended.

Now, you made further reference to my idea of the modified platypus that included a halo. My objection to the other mascots was not simply that they involved offensive images, but rather that they gave the impression that the mascot could erroneously portray anti-religious sentiments as if that were part of the Darwin community. Some people upon seeing the mascots proposed could easily jump to the conclusion that the Darwin people had something against certain religious beliefs.

While my suggestion was an attempt to avoid such quickly drawn conclusions, I do admit that the imagery used was based on views of religion that are largely western oriented. Since that too could, I suppose, put people off, I will simply withdraw my suggestion.

As for my note about the apple=forbidden fruit imagery, it seemed obvious to me that the demon-next-to-tree picture (mentioned above) was portraying a sort of "garden" scene--giving the apple that "forbidden fruit" undertone. If I then erroneously applied that undertone to the platypus image, then I apologize. However, I never considered the idea that at the inception of, as they used to call themselves, Apple Computer Inc., they picked the apple image to use a forbidden fruit metaphor. That is what I meant when I said I hadn't recognized it before--I had never considered the idea that that was Apple's intent.


NOW, forgetting my previous suggestion, I'm starting to warm up to the Orca idea. Nice jab at the penguin, Aqua reference--I can't wait to see some arts renderings (should he be cute? tough? have a penguin flipper hanging out of its mouth? what?)



-Jay



[This message has been edited by Hinson (edited 09-26-2000).]

What, nobody wants to vote for Clarus? Where's the love, people.

Clarus, and her like (the dogcattle) are the Macintosh. The mythic dogcow has been with the Mac OS since the beginning!!

Don't turn your back on the helpless dogcattle, now. Long live Clarus and her kind!!!

<http://developer.apple.com/products/techsupport/dogcow/tn31.html>

Vote Now, vote often!!!

Thanks,

T.S. Roach

I'll submit one:
http://web.feather.net/~strobe/clarus/

In my opinion, the mascot should be a predator of some sort, not some cut n cuddely animal. since the Big thing about Ma OSX is Aqua, a marine predator is in order, preferaly a Shark. th e great white comes to mind, but its too vicious,maybe a blue shark....or even a hammerhead