@Rosie0u0 I have this very large and surprisingly heavy shin high glass table in the living room. It is the bane of my existence at night. Usually I just cut through the kitchen to avoid it entirely, and to prevent from disturbing the bird.
Ragatha doesn't feel pain because it's thematic to her ragdoll aesthetic, you can throw a ragdoll against walls and off a building but they're a lightweight soft surface so there is no SOLID damage, Ragatha seems to be the "Ragdoll" she can take almost anything and never budge. That's her gimmick you can always sew a ragdoll back together, She feels pain when glitching out because it just feels wrong and not cartoony enough to be ignored, abstraction is whole new kind of pain
I think the thing that keeps getting overlooked is that the world seems designed as a children's vr game. Gooseworks said pain exists but it makes sense that a game meant for kids would have serious limiters and dampeners on the pain one can experience. I think you're right about abstraction. Abstraction isn't in the systems intended design, so there probably aren't pain limiters on it
Gooseworx said they feel pain. I see it as them really feeling pain but they're used to it and each person has something that they can do with minimal pain (if any). I don't think Jax had this reaction because of the lack of oxygen, he could just be hurt because Zooble was crushing his neck or he just panicked. Especially since he made the same face in ep 4 after jumpscaring Pomni
i really like that the concept of pain just varies based on the kind of visual gag theyre trying to convey. it makes it feel that much more nonsensical and cartooney. as for the logic behind it, i think the idea of a mental block, and the whole emotional connection as you mentioned with zooble makes a lot of sense ! i never really thought much about the whole idea of pain in this show so i love how you explained it here ! great video :3
you know what beats me up about all these...only kaufmo and pomni saw the exit and pomni was a newbie so it doesn't really have to do anything with how long you've been there but the others esp kinger that went through so much in a very long time haven't seen any exit doors...what is the true connection degree between kaufmo and pomni ? why are they both clown types and why did pomni appear as soon as kaufmo disappeared and i don't think if they just get replaced because if that was the case, they would've expected kaufmo to abstract because pomni joined in but they were totally surprised so one's appearance wouldn't necessarily mean the other's abstraction.
@R.W.P. i think the fact that after a while the others didn't open up to him anymore and didn't laugh at his jokes kinda made him feel isolated for good and cursed to be abandoned so it had some impact on his abstraction (besides the actual reason for him abstracting is seeing the exit door, obviously.) but i think caine is still lying about the exit
and they only saw the exit door either with caine or without anybody else to show the exit to. in fact, the exit almost didn't appear for anybody else except the clowns. and the clowns alongside with caine are the only ones who have an actual role in a circus (clowns and ringmaster) that could not be a coincidence.
My theory is that the people outside ARE ABLE TO KNOW when someone abstracts and immediately send another one to replace them. Kinger doesn't relaly remember stuff so if he actually saw the exit he couldve just forgotten. The exit was created by Caine, we don't really know how long Kaufmo was in the circus but it probly has more to do with the devs than the actual members of the circus.
Today I realized that the thing Jax's body does when he holds his breath is open his teeth Edit: Jesus Christ ya'll I woke up with 9+ notifications and every one of them was this comment. Scrollling through a majority are pointing out the part in episode three I forgot about where Jax opens his mouth to laugh at Pomni, though he might be holding his breath for a second there while laughing. Some are theorizing if maybe it's due to an emotional response, which would make sense based on when he was choked by Zooble, feeling betrayed. However, I don't know if the laugh was really that high an emotional response, as he messes with and laughs at other people throughout the first 4 episodes, and his teeth don't open in any of them. I saw one reply where they think maybe he can break the 4th wall when holding his breath, which is a pretty neat idea. However, if it really does feel like you're holding your breath irl when holding your breath in the circus, you wouldn't likely be inclined to talk while doing so, maybe it's why he only gets a few words in. These are just the most common and interesting theories I've seen ofc and any and all of us could be completely wrong, but if you have a cool and/or sound idea (that you don't see anywhere else) I'd love to read it!
That doesn't account for episode 3. Plus, he wasn't holding his breath, he was being strangled, which doesn't necessarily require prevention of breathing.
I feel the pain is actually just placebo affect due to them associating what does typically damage/pain the physical body and so they believe they are feeling or going to feel the pain (remembering from being a human before TADC). I also believe they don't feel pain on certain times due to it catching them off guard as they don't realize the threat before it already happens (and because they dont feel pain after noticing the 'injury' they realize they didnt feel any pain which stops them from feeling the pain anyway), also could be due to how unusual the threat and possibly impossible when thought of in the real world which confuses them enough to have them forget the perceived danger to it.
Sorry, I'm honestly not sure about that one. I've tried looking up a word that fits better than placebo in this kind of situation but never found one, even as I've just looked up "necbo" i can't find it's definition. I'm assuming you've found that on some documentary or website tho. Im thinking your probably right though
17 днів тому
@@isukatnames "Nocebo" even has a wikipedia page on it. Placebo where the first syllable is ‘no’.
I think it's basically video game/cartoon logic. They do feel pain, but there aren't any major long-term consequences, and what their body registers as pain varies depending on their avatar.
My theory is there's probably a maximum amount of pain you can feel. You get one pinch or a slight series of even lighter pinches depending on the hazard, unless something bugs out, like with an abstracted, and that varies from a spark from a brief touch to the electric chair when your entire body is messed up. That would be most consistent...
I think its closer to the fact that they feel like they need to hold their breath. its like getting hurt in a dream. you feel it because your mind thinks you feel it rather than it actually causing any physical damage.
My guess is that they only assume they're feeling pain, like how in Kinger's episode, Pomni assumed she would drown if she held her breath for too long but actually had the ability to hold her breath indefinitely when she and Kinger got out of the sewers. When Zooble burned her hand on the stove, she probably got an input that her hand was touching something extremely hot, so her mind assumed she burned her hand, but no lasting damage was actually done, and the same could be applied to Ragatha and all of her accidents. The only exception to this rule would be glitching out, since that would be an attack on her player model's coding, not a stimuli input that the game was programmed to handle.
I imagine pain to them is more discomfort or pressure instead of pain type pain, but that's just me. abstraction is a full on breakdown of body and mind so yeah its a loss of control of everything. ragatha all glitchy was like 95 percent loss of control while pomni only had a tiny bit of loss on her hand
i have a few theories, abstracting and glitching are probably the most painful things that could happen to them, ragatha(a ragdoll) doesn’t feel pain because she’s a ragdoll, they can easily be sewn back together and they are dolls so it’s normal to not feel pain zooble is plastic, so then hot = melting, which is probably why they felt pain while using their spatula hand on the hot surface
The scene that kills me the most from the pilot is when Pomni says "Look at my hand!" to Ragatha. Keep in mind: *only* Pomni's hand is glitched, while Ragatha is glitching *over her entire body*. It's very clear that Pomni is scared, but it goes to show how she prioritizes herself over the others at first.
But at that point, Pomni barely knew them for an hour (maybe even less). They were complete strangers to her, not to mention at the time she was still dubious as to whether or not they were actually real people or just NPCs. Of course she was worried about herself first and foremost, and not some people she barely met (who she wasn't even sure were actually real).
If they expect to feel pain they’ll react like they are in pain. But I think glitches are genuinely painful because they’re not actually supposed to be part of the system.
I think it's runs on cartoon logic where pain is lessen or null. The only reason Ragata feel so much pain is because of the glitches. Her model was not built for it so pain. Her parts are going everywhere on her body where they don't belong so he can probably feel that so pain. Also from my pov when Pomni touch Ragata her body jumped back due to pain but was shocked to see her hand glitching. They still have the mental defense triggers we have have to telling you to breathe and to jump back when you get burned. But that's what I think. But emotionally pain I agree on but I don't see a connection with emotionally pain to physically pain.
I think Pomni actually could have felt pain in ep1, but she mostly didn't register it because of the stress of the situation, it's like you are in an adrenaline-inducing situation, your first reaction is fight, flight or freeze, and than, when the stress subsides a little you seem to notice "oh my God I'm bleeding". Pomni's first day at the circus was one giant, near-death experience (not even mentioning the whole, suddenly being trapped in a video game thing) so it has sense to me. The same goes for episode two when Jax throw her out of the van, she could have felt pain, but was so high on adrenaline in that moment that she didn't fully register it. This does track with your theory of physical pain being connected wth emotional pain, since we see Pomni being constantly anxious, to the point I suspect she has severe anxiety, having signs of depression, not to mention two people she actually made a deeper connection with other than surface level one, like with Ragatha- Kinger and Gummygoo don't even remember that (or at least as far as she knows they don't), plus she is the newest member of the circus, so has the biggest connection with real-world so yeah, I definitely think she feels pain often.
I think Ragatha being hit with a knife in the ‘meet the cast’ video was just because they can’t really die in the circus, And that would normally kill a human being in the real world. Zooble feeling pain when using their arm in ep4 to flip the burgers is probably because human beings can also experience burning themselves. I think glitches are the only actual thing that can severely damage them. And knifes and anything else that would most likely kill you will not in the circus. The abstraction process can also be painful to the humans of the circus as they’ve never experienced anything like it before especially if they were, Like ragatha in the pilot when she was all glitchy and said she was in pain, so obviously things that are new to them or things that won’t ‘kill’ them are the only ways that can probably feel actual pain in the circus or digital world in general
So far, what we know is that real physical pain comes from abstraction glitching. Somehow, that kind of glitching mangles the body to the point it actually messes up whatever they have left of their nervous system. If glitching is painful, imagine how much physical pain someone who abstracted must be feeling. Maybe the fact they become so aggravated is that abstraction adds an excruciating amount of physical pain on top of their emotional pain? And they end up being thrown into the cellar in perpetuity? That's a fate worse than death!!!
I assume they only feel pain in the immediate, but as soon as the thing causing pain stops, the pain stops. because they dont have phyical bodies so there no reason for pain to 'linger'
They only feel genuine physical pain from abstraction... except Zooble for some reason. In fact, in the past few episodes Zooble seems to get a disproportionate and deliberate number of traumatizing things thrown their way. Cain trying to send them up on tailor-made horrific "adventures" that would traumatize them and then making it so they're the only one to feel pain in the "normal" adventure via their new spatula arm. (Note: both of the horror-themed adventures Cain tried to send Zooble on involved chopped-up body parts and body horror.) I almost feel that Zooble may be deeply connected to Cain in some way outside the Circus. Maybe a programmer, or a relative of someone in the Company.
@tomatertate I never said he wasn't. I'm just saying perhaps maybe Zooble is the child of the lead researcher of the company or something and the Circus exists to entertain (or even punish) them.
I don't think Zooble felt actual pain. Rather just very intense heat. And well, if you put your had in really hot water, you would instinctively retract it. Even if you didn't keep it in there long enough to actually feel pain. Pretty much a human instinct, as to avoid the actual pain which would follow. And i think that would have been the case with any of the characters who touched the stove.
I really don’t think that their physical sense of pain has anything to do with emotional triggers. I’m pretty sure that Caine can simply tone down how painful it is to interact with certain objects for safety reasons, and various avatars will feel more or less pain in certain situations based on their apparent physiology. Ragatha experiences the least amount of pain from impact and mutilation, on account of being a ragdoll, but hot things still burn her. Ragatha was feeling so much pain from Kaufmo’s attacks because the abstraction glitch doesn’t have any safety measures and was causing pain in excess of what Caine would usually allow the players to feel.
Then... she should have experienced some degree of pain from immersion in hot oil. But this wasn't the case, though not sure whether pain relief was side effect of the sauce/drug (which somewhat tracks, pain relief medications include hard drugs such as opiates) or because of "cartoon physics"
I wonder if part of it is percieved pain vs undeniable pain? For example, have you ever gotten really invested in playing some sort of game with action elements, and shouted "OW!" when the character onscreen takes damage? Obviously you, the player, felt no pain, but you still had a knee jerk reaction to taking damage and responded as if someone hit you. Now where glitches are concerned for the people within the digital circus, this is probably the closest thing to undeniable physical harm they could experience perhaps. Sure under normal circumstances in an adventure, they can "take damage", but as you said, its not as if their digital bodies show any permanant signs of harm after long. Psychosomatic pain is where your body reacts as if its in pain even though you are not actually hurt, because the beleif is so strong that your body reacts as if under duress, mimicking the sensation you believe is happening. So sure normally they feel pain, but perhaps its only because they beleive it to be so, and is reinforced by the realistic sensation of the circus' programming, as is the case when anyone eats, or experiences some outside source of influence like the mind-altering stupid sauce.
The glitches cause them pain bc jt actually messed with the code of their bodies. Normal happenings during adventures, even if violent, are part of their coding
I've noticed that every character seems to have some kind of power with their bodies and most of them are related to this and even overlap: Gangle can be disfigured as a ribbon, kingers hands can detach but still be in his control, Zooble can change her parts, Pomni can also have her parts stretch, Jax is more unique in being able to take anything he wants from pockets and Ragatha can be abused but come out fine. It makes me think these are intentional to be useful traits for later in the show or even a hint at their mentality with they have felt used and abused in the past. In a way, Ragatha's ability is to just survive abuse as if that is her purpose and maybe that means this is how she felt about herself beforehand in her human life and it reflects in her entrapment in the circus.
Don’t forget that this has inspiration from “I have no mouth but I must scream.” I highly recommend listening to or reading the short story. You can see the parallels of being trapped by an ai. Though Caine isn’t really spiteful like the story. I have a feeling pain might come up again in future episodes. Caine stated he can control everything, does he control what is painful?
I feel like the description of Jax liking to cause trouble because he knows people can't die in the digital world is def there. He's like many UA-camrs online who troll their friends and mess around with them in (sometimes pretty violent) ways, because they know it's not going to cause any real world problems or is just plain funny. Jax messes with people for lack of consequence, especially death. However, the INSTANT consequences are affirmed to be in play, Jax seems to mellow out a ton, being a lot more serious, but still overall friendly when he can be. (Also, him saying "I actually didn't mean to do that", while being visibly surprised and almost looking concerned for Gangle after breaking their mask in the recent episode seems to imply that he does care about the others.)
To me, it seems like whether or not a character in the digital world feels pain depends entirely upon which one the writers think would be funnier at the time. For example, in episode 1, when Pomni tries taking the headset off, she pulls her eye all the way out of its socket, seemingly without it hurting her at all. But later in the same episode, she gets punched in the face by a boxing glove and then walks away with her hand on her cheek as if it hurt her. It's entirely inconsistent and always has been.
They can't physically be harmed, but they can still feel pain. Pain is ultimately just your nerves sending signals to your brain. So if they're receiving those signals, they can still feel pain even if physically they're not harmed. As for the things done to their bodies, they don't have human bodies anymore, and they're bodies are likely maluable in certain ways, like Pomni's is stretchy, Ragatha is stuffing, Zooble is connectable.
I think when it comes to sharp pains there are times you won’t notice it because the cut is that clean. Other ones it adrenaline. We also have to remember they straight up don’t have a human body, no nerves, no cells, just strings of code and data. Further on that, they might have specific events that trigger a “pain code” to fire.
Since the digital circus is rated for all ages, I would expect the sensation of pain to be greatly suppressed or replaced. The more painful something would be, the more suppressed it would be up to being completely muted. Probably. Would help prevent panic attacks from the visuals if the pain is suppressed enough or muted for major damage, but would help "players" avoid touching a hot surface if it stung a tiny bit or was weirdly uncomfortable and the expectation of pain causing them to react.
A fun detail I don't see alot of people talk about is in ep2 Gangle is the driver in the semi truck and in ep4 she got slammed by a Semi truck. Interesting.
Pain, in a real world context, is just your body saying “hey, don’t do that! That damages me!” so since the circus members are capable of abstraction at the height of emotional distress, it makes sense that when they are emotionally upset they also experience physical pain, their bodies are afraid of abstraction, a presumably painful state.
considering how much Ragatha's legs were flailing about in the deep fryer, i feel like she was experiencing some level of pain there, otherwise she would have realized it didn't hurt and calmed down, just like when she got impaled by the spikes of the truck. might be that certain objects or certain locations are capable of causing pain. Like in the Circus, you won't feel pain because it's the main hub of the digital world. But in an adventure world, you might feel more or less pain when the situation calls for it.
My theory is when they glitch,they feel all the pain they were supposed to. Example: lets say in ep 3 ragatha glitched again,she would feel the spikes in her heart and head
I think the amount of pain they all "feel" seems to be based on how "real" they think the world is. Most of the characters react like they're in pain only to realize they're not actually, but Jax in particular doesn't ever react to pain as he even constantly points out "no one can feel the pain anyway". He seemed to be rubbing his back more out of annoyance to indicate to Pomni that "Yeah you pushed me over you klutz". So yeah, in many of these cases, they seem to be phantom pain or reactionary. Though that said I think the glitching was probably genuine pain as like with abstraction and the fear Jax and Zooble had of Caine "punishing" them, it seems they are capable of feeling actual pain if the pain is wired into their avatars whether as a glitch, corruption, or even deliberate malicious code. Zooble saw a glimpse of this when she noticed Caine glitching the room out and genuinely acted scared and then in ep4, told Jax with a straight face essentially "this isn't a game anymore.... Caine can do some serious damage to us if he wants to...." leading to Jax taking her word for it. Gangle was able to punish Jax by dragging him to the room and administering psychological torture to him, but that was the closest he felt to real pain as we can see by his expression when he leaves the room and the flashing masks which could cause epilepsy. Once he got back to his car, he realized that real pain CAN be inflicted on the avatars after all, worrying him heavily about what's to come next. Further Zooble is the only one who seems to have evidence of feeling real pain and not cartoony pain since when she touched the stove, she felt the burn. Zooble is pretty cynical and knows her parts are just arbitrary, but I think her seriously reacting to the heat of the grill may have been what triggered her to say "I don't want to test what Caine can do."
You won't believe me, but i had this EXACT thought while in the shower today, minus the psychological suffering part. The fact that they don't necessarily feel pain but their brains makes them believe they do is a really cool thing to add which also brings the question if they actually feel anything physically, like when Zooble's hand burning in ep 4, did they feel the heat in their hand and that activated their brain to "feel" pain or maybe they didn't but since that would be the logical reaction, their brain kinda activated survival instincts? (weird but the most close way i could find to describe it lmao)
I thinks its just them playing around or something similar because I will scream ow when I get shot in the hand in a VR game even though nothing is there.
The pain from the glitching might be because it's damage to their actual files where their souls are stored. So while everything "physical" is just simulated damage, the glitching is actual damage.
About leaving Ragatha alone. Imagine YOU just see your “immortal” buddy’s butt get completely kicked, while knowing that they have been in the place for a while and know how stuff works here. Now do YOU, a newbie try to attack that same monster or get out while you can?
"Hey, we're 4 episodes in,and I just had a question, do the characters feel pain?" ". . . Yeah. Obviously." Episode 1 Ragatha: I aM iN sO mUcH pAiN. I also hate the whole "AMAZING DIGITAL CIRCUS IS A TRAGEDY" trend. Like, I do get it is also content farming. By UA-camrs that have spoken out against content farming, but anyways. That was established by episode 1, and reinforced from there on. They are not subtle about anything in this show. I love the show. Fanbase is wearing on me a bit, like, these are adults being this slow to the punch. But then again, Kwite yapping about something that isn't new . . . also isn't anything new. And SaberSpark. And . . . a bunch others you all know- Jesus Christ, I need to reconsider my subscriptions . . .
TADC is heavily inspired by I Have No Mouth And I Must Scream, a massive supercomputer, AM, has the real bodies of the last 5 surviving humans and tortures them endlessly over it's hate for humanity. of course they feel pain, it's their actual bodies but AM is a powerful enough machine to eventually heal their wounds or reverse anything it's done to the survivors almost like they were cartoon characters, many of them have forgotten where AM actually comes from TADC Caine is the story's AM but he doesn't make the human "players" suffer out of hate, he's just bad at what he does. their digital bodies are more like cartoons so it'd make sense if they didn't feel pain in a traditional sense. it's more like they expect things to hurt as they are thrown around by the game's terrible physics
While I love the theory, your thumbnail was misleading and made it seem as if Gooseworx had made a comment on it. Please don't do that in the future. You don't _need_ clickbait to survive on UA-cam, just interesting concepts and ideas. I watched the whole thing just because the way you talk has me hooked! You just need a good _enough_ title and thumbnail that most everyone that would've clicked this on the clickbait will click it aswell on a true statement. Your community will appreciate your honesty. (And besides, clickbait has been sort of falling to the wayside on UA-cam as of late. At least in terms of What's Popular.)
Hi, thanks so much for your feedback, I really appreciate it! I wanted to clarify that the screenshot I used is a new one from Gooseworx’s Tumblr, where she confirmed that the circus members do feel pain. You can check it out here: www.tumblr.com/gooseworx/770958308712513536/can-the-circus-residents-die-i-dont-mean I hope this clears things up :)
Honestly it feels like Toon logic. Things are only serious when its not funny
I’d agree
That actually makes a lot of sense.
My thoughts
Tone armour
Pretty much yea
Maybe it’s like when someone bumps into a table in real life. It doesn’t actually really hurt, but instinct makes people say “ow”
I mean, sometimes that hurts.
Wtf that hurts like shit lmao
SO IM NOT CRAZY??
What kind of tables are you people bumping into and how hard are you slamming your body into a table for it to actually be painful? XD
@Rosie0u0 I have this very large and surprisingly heavy shin high glass table in the living room.
It is the bane of my existence at night. Usually I just cut through the kitchen to avoid it entirely, and to prevent from disturbing the bird.
I think glitches are the only real pain they can feel because it's such an alien experience to them.
Ragatha doesn't feel pain because it's thematic to her ragdoll aesthetic, you can throw a ragdoll against walls and off a building but they're a lightweight soft surface so there is no SOLID damage, Ragatha seems to be the "Ragdoll" she can take almost anything and never budge. That's her gimmick you can always sew a ragdoll back together,
She feels pain when glitching out because it just feels wrong and not cartoony enough to be ignored, abstraction is whole new kind of pain
i like ur explanation best
@@CadaverTheRatsame
Yeah, since she's like a plush, she works this way. I like these fun interactions
Ragatha only getting a band aid for a traumatic injury is such a HR response
They just get hurt so often it increases their pain tolerance, they're used to it.
But being abstracted is a different type of pain.
I think the thing that keeps getting overlooked is that the world seems designed as a children's vr game. Gooseworks said pain exists but it makes sense that a game meant for kids would have serious limiters and dampeners on the pain one can experience.
I think you're right about abstraction. Abstraction isn't in the systems intended design, so there probably aren't pain limiters on it
And Pomni pulling her eyes out?
@@Type-osRagatha was clearly boiling
Gooseworx said they feel pain.
I see it as them really feeling pain but they're used to it and each person has something that they can do with minimal pain (if any).
I don't think Jax had this reaction because of the lack of oxygen, he could just be hurt because Zooble was crushing his neck or he just panicked. Especially since he made the same face in ep 4 after jumpscaring Pomni
i really like that the concept of pain just varies based on the kind of visual gag theyre trying to convey. it makes it feel that much more nonsensical and cartooney. as for the logic behind it, i think the idea of a mental block, and the whole emotional connection as you mentioned with zooble makes a lot of sense ! i never really thought much about the whole idea of pain in this show so i love how you explained it here ! great video :3
1:54 turn on subtitles
Underrated comment 😭
The auto-generated subtitles are crazy for that
No
Oh my goodness
Wellp
you know what beats me up about all these...only kaufmo and pomni saw the exit and pomni was a newbie so it doesn't really have to do anything with how long you've been there but the others esp kinger that went through so much in a very long time haven't seen any exit doors...what is the true connection degree between kaufmo and pomni ? why are they both clown types and why did pomni appear as soon as kaufmo disappeared and i don't think if they just get replaced because if that was the case, they would've expected kaufmo to abstract because pomni joined in but they were totally surprised so one's appearance wouldn't necessarily mean the other's abstraction.
They both just happened to see Caine make the exit. The exit was probably what made Kaufmo go insane
@R.W.P. i think the fact that after a while the others didn't open up to him anymore and didn't laugh at his jokes kinda made him feel isolated for good and cursed to be abandoned so it had some impact on his abstraction (besides the actual reason for him abstracting is seeing the exit door, obviously.) but i think caine is still lying about the exit
and they only saw the exit door either with caine or without anybody else to show the exit to. in fact, the exit almost didn't appear for anybody else except the clowns. and the clowns alongside with caine are the only ones who have an actual role in a circus (clowns and ringmaster) that could not be a coincidence.
My theory is that the people outside ARE ABLE TO KNOW when someone abstracts and immediately send another one to replace them. Kinger doesn't relaly remember stuff so if he actually saw the exit he couldve just forgotten. The exit was created by Caine, we don't really know how long Kaufmo was in the circus but it probly has more to do with the devs than the actual members of the circus.
Today I realized that the thing Jax's body does when he holds his breath is open his teeth
Edit: Jesus Christ ya'll I woke up with 9+ notifications and every one of them was this comment.
Scrollling through a majority are pointing out the part in episode three I forgot about where Jax opens his mouth to laugh at Pomni, though he might be holding his breath for a second there while laughing.
Some are theorizing if maybe it's due to an emotional response, which would make sense based on when he was choked by Zooble, feeling betrayed. However, I don't know if the laugh was really that high an emotional response, as he messes with and laughs at other people throughout the first 4 episodes, and his teeth don't open in any of them.
I saw one reply where they think maybe he can break the 4th wall when holding his breath, which is a pretty neat idea. However, if it really does feel like you're holding your breath irl when holding your breath in the circus, you wouldn't likely be inclined to talk while doing so, maybe it's why he only gets a few words in.
These are just the most common and interesting theories I've seen ofc and any and all of us could be completely wrong, but if you have a cool and/or sound idea (that you don't see anywhere else) I'd love to read it!
That makes sense because when Zooble chokes him, his mouth opens trying to get air
@probably_a_fanPFP TWINS :∆
@probably_a_fan Exactly!
But usually you have your mouth closed when holding your breath
That doesn't account for episode 3. Plus, he wasn't holding his breath, he was being strangled, which doesn't necessarily require prevention of breathing.
I feel the pain is actually just placebo affect due to them associating what does typically damage/pain the physical body and so they believe they are feeling or going to feel the pain (remembering from being a human before TADC). I also believe they don't feel pain on certain times due to it catching them off guard as they don't realize the threat before it already happens (and because they dont feel pain after noticing the 'injury' they realize they didnt feel any pain which stops them from feeling the pain anyway), also could be due to how unusual the threat and possibly impossible when thought of in the real world which confuses them enough to have them forget the perceived danger to it.
Would it not be a nocebo?
Sorry, I'm honestly not sure about that one. I've tried looking up a word that fits better than placebo in this kind of situation but never found one, even as I've just looked up "necbo" i can't find it's definition. I'm assuming you've found that on some documentary or website tho. Im thinking your probably right though
@@isukatnames "Nocebo" even has a wikipedia page on it. Placebo where the first syllable is ‘no’.
Oh yeah your right thanks.
The exception would then be the Kauphmo incident which causes actual pain due the the system bugging out.
I think it's basically video game/cartoon logic. They do feel pain, but there aren't any major long-term consequences, and what their body registers as pain varies depending on their avatar.
My theory is there's probably a maximum amount of pain you can feel.
You get one pinch or a slight series of even lighter pinches depending on the hazard, unless something bugs out, like with an abstracted, and that varies from a spark from a brief touch to the electric chair when your entire body is messed up. That would be most consistent...
I think its closer to the fact that they feel like they need to hold their breath. its like getting hurt in a dream. you feel it because your mind thinks you feel it rather than it actually causing any physical damage.
My guess is that they only assume they're feeling pain, like how in Kinger's episode, Pomni assumed she would drown if she held her breath for too long but actually had the ability to hold her breath indefinitely when she and Kinger got out of the sewers.
When Zooble burned her hand on the stove, she probably got an input that her hand was touching something extremely hot, so her mind assumed she burned her hand, but no lasting damage was actually done, and the same could be applied to Ragatha and all of her accidents.
The only exception to this rule would be glitching out, since that would be an attack on her player model's coding, not a stimuli input that the game was programmed to handle.
I imagine pain to them is more discomfort or pressure instead of pain type pain, but that's just me. abstraction is a full on breakdown of body and mind so yeah its a loss of control of everything. ragatha all glitchy was like 95 percent loss of control while pomni only had a tiny bit of loss on her hand
0:58 she didn’t complain cause she doesn’t want to worry people probably
It should be the same as food i guess but Ragatha got the stupid sauce in her eye which seems to have a longer effect which isn't technically hurt
i have a few theories, abstracting and glitching are probably the most painful things that could happen to them, ragatha(a ragdoll) doesn’t feel pain because she’s a ragdoll, they can easily be sewn back together and they are dolls so it’s normal to not feel pain
zooble is plastic, so then hot = melting, which is probably why they felt pain while using their spatula hand on the hot surface
Good theories.
The scene that kills me the most from the pilot is when Pomni says "Look at my hand!" to Ragatha.
Keep in mind: *only* Pomni's hand is glitched, while Ragatha is glitching *over her entire body*. It's very clear that Pomni is scared, but it goes to show how she prioritizes herself over the others at first.
But at that point, Pomni barely knew them for an hour (maybe even less). They were complete strangers to her, not to mention at the time she was still dubious as to whether or not they were actually real people or just NPCs.
Of course she was worried about herself first and foremost, and not some people she barely met (who she wasn't even sure were actually real).
I think there's a threshold of pain the characters are allowed to experience
Sorta like anything that would be fatal just dosent register
yo the lore is so deep it's making me cry ngl
If they expect to feel pain they’ll react like they are in pain. But I think glitches are genuinely painful because they’re not actually supposed to be part of the system.
Who else clicked on the video thinking abt ragatha and the deepfryer
Pomni feel pain when ragatha touches her cause pomni said ouch
Translation: Pomni can feel pain because ragatha touched her (when glitched) and pomni said ouch
I think it's runs on cartoon logic where pain is lessen or null. The only reason Ragata feel so much pain is because of the glitches. Her model was not built for it so pain. Her parts are going everywhere on her body where they don't belong so he can probably feel that so pain. Also from my pov when Pomni touch Ragata her body jumped back due to pain but was shocked to see her hand glitching. They still have the mental defense triggers we have have to telling you to breathe and to jump back when you get burned. But that's what I think.
But emotionally pain I agree on but I don't see a connection with emotionally pain to physically pain.
1:32 it’s just a typical normal everyday thing to be FRIED ALIVE🤣😭
I think Pomni actually could have felt pain in ep1, but she mostly didn't register it because of the stress of the situation, it's like you are in an adrenaline-inducing situation, your first reaction is fight, flight or freeze, and than, when the stress subsides a little you seem to notice "oh my God I'm bleeding". Pomni's first day at the circus was one giant, near-death experience (not even mentioning the whole, suddenly being trapped in a video game thing) so it has sense to me. The same goes for episode two when Jax throw her out of the van, she could have felt pain, but was so high on adrenaline in that moment that she didn't fully register it. This does track with your theory of physical pain being connected wth emotional pain, since we see Pomni being constantly anxious, to the point I suspect she has severe anxiety, having signs of depression, not to mention two people she actually made a deeper connection with other than surface level one, like with Ragatha- Kinger and Gummygoo don't even remember that (or at least as far as she knows they don't), plus she is the newest member of the circus, so has the biggest connection with real-world so yeah, I definitely think she feels pain often.
I think Ragatha being hit with a knife in the ‘meet the cast’ video was just because they can’t really die in the circus, And that would normally kill a human being in the real world. Zooble feeling pain when using their arm in ep4 to flip the burgers is probably because human beings can also experience burning themselves. I think glitches are the only actual thing that can severely damage them. And knifes and anything else that would most likely kill you will not in the circus. The abstraction process can also be painful to the humans of the circus as they’ve never experienced anything like it before especially if they were, Like ragatha in the pilot when she was all glitchy and said she was in pain, so obviously things that are new to them or things that won’t ‘kill’ them are the only ways that can probably feel actual pain in the circus or digital world in general
I think they can only feel pain only in the circus.
So far, what we know is that real physical pain comes from abstraction glitching. Somehow, that kind of glitching mangles the body to the point it actually messes up whatever they have left of their nervous system.
If glitching is painful, imagine how much physical pain someone who abstracted must be feeling. Maybe the fact they become so aggravated is that abstraction adds an excruciating amount of physical pain on top of their emotional pain? And they end up being thrown into the cellar in perpetuity? That's a fate worse than death!!!
Your vids are so helpful and entertaining! Thanks for working so hard on them!
I assume they only feel pain in the immediate, but as soon as the thing causing pain stops, the pain stops. because they dont have phyical bodies so there no reason for pain to 'linger'
They only feel genuine physical pain from abstraction... except Zooble for some reason.
In fact, in the past few episodes Zooble seems to get a disproportionate and deliberate number of traumatizing things thrown their way.
Cain trying to send them up on tailor-made horrific "adventures" that would traumatize them and then making it so they're the only one to feel pain in the "normal" adventure via their new spatula arm.
(Note: both of the horror-themed adventures Cain tried to send Zooble on involved chopped-up body parts and body horror.)
I almost feel that Zooble may be deeply connected to Cain in some way outside the Circus.
Maybe a programmer, or a relative of someone in the Company.
Caine is not a human though, he is an AI and doesn't really exist outside the circus.
@tomatertate I never said he wasn't. I'm just saying perhaps maybe Zooble is the child of the lead researcher of the company or something and the Circus exists to entertain (or even punish) them.
I don't think Zooble felt actual pain. Rather just very intense heat. And well, if you put your had in really hot water, you would instinctively retract it. Even if you didn't keep it in there long enough to actually feel pain. Pretty much a human instinct, as to avoid the actual pain which would follow.
And i think that would have been the case with any of the characters who touched the stove.
I really don’t think that their physical sense of pain has anything to do with emotional triggers. I’m pretty sure that Caine can simply tone down how painful it is to interact with certain objects for safety reasons, and various avatars will feel more or less pain in certain situations based on their apparent physiology. Ragatha experiences the least amount of pain from impact and mutilation, on account of being a ragdoll, but hot things still burn her. Ragatha was feeling so much pain from Kaufmo’s attacks because the abstraction glitch doesn’t have any safety measures and was causing pain in excess of what Caine would usually allow the players to feel.
Then... she should have experienced some degree of pain from immersion in hot oil. But this wasn't the case, though not sure whether pain relief was side effect of the sauce/drug (which somewhat tracks, pain relief medications include hard drugs such as opiates) or because of "cartoon physics"
I wonder if part of it is percieved pain vs undeniable pain? For example, have you ever gotten really invested in playing some sort of game with action elements, and shouted "OW!" when the character onscreen takes damage? Obviously you, the player, felt no pain, but you still had a knee jerk reaction to taking damage and responded as if someone hit you.
Now where glitches are concerned for the people within the digital circus, this is probably the closest thing to undeniable physical harm they could experience perhaps. Sure under normal circumstances in an adventure, they can "take damage", but as you said, its not as if their digital bodies show any permanant signs of harm after long. Psychosomatic pain is where your body reacts as if its in pain even though you are not actually hurt, because the beleif is so strong that your body reacts as if under duress, mimicking the sensation you believe is happening. So sure normally they feel pain, but perhaps its only because they beleive it to be so, and is reinforced by the realistic sensation of the circus' programming, as is the case when anyone eats, or experiences some outside source of influence like the mind-altering stupid sauce.
Squidward: "Nobody has a spatula for a hand!"
Zooble: "Are you kidding me?!"
The glitches cause them pain bc jt actually messed with the code of their bodies. Normal happenings during adventures, even if violent, are part of their coding
My francophone dumb*ss was very confused as to why bread was so important in TADC. Anywasy, great video!
Am I the only one who thinks he looks like he’s floating? Loll😂 4:46
Oh...oh no.
I've noticed that every character seems to have some kind of power with their bodies and most of them are related to this and even overlap: Gangle can be disfigured as a ribbon, kingers hands can detach but still be in his control, Zooble can change her parts, Pomni can also have her parts stretch, Jax is more unique in being able to take anything he wants from pockets and Ragatha can be abused but come out fine.
It makes me think these are intentional to be useful traits for later in the show or even a hint at their mentality with they have felt used and abused in the past.
In a way, Ragatha's ability is to just survive abuse as if that is her purpose and maybe that means this is how she felt about herself beforehand in her human life and it reflects in her entrapment in the circus.
Don’t forget that this has inspiration from “I have no mouth but I must scream.” I highly recommend listening to or reading the short story. You can see the parallels of being trapped by an ai. Though Caine isn’t really spiteful like the story.
I have a feeling pain might come up again in future episodes. Caine stated he can control everything, does he control what is painful?
I feel like the description of Jax liking to cause trouble because he knows people can't die in the digital world is def there. He's like many UA-camrs online who troll their friends and mess around with them in (sometimes pretty violent) ways, because they know it's not going to cause any real world problems or is just plain funny. Jax messes with people for lack of consequence, especially death. However, the INSTANT consequences are affirmed to be in play, Jax seems to mellow out a ton, being a lot more serious, but still overall friendly when he can be. (Also, him saying "I actually didn't mean to do that", while being visibly surprised and almost looking concerned for Gangle after breaking their mask in the recent episode seems to imply that he does care about the others.)
Alright this video is a really good one.
To me, it seems like whether or not a character in the digital world feels pain depends entirely upon which one the writers think would be funnier at the time. For example, in episode 1, when Pomni tries taking the headset off, she pulls her eye all the way out of its socket, seemingly without it hurting her at all. But later in the same episode, she gets punched in the face by a boxing glove and then walks away with her hand on her cheek as if it hurt her. It's entirely inconsistent and always has been.
the way she snaps her hand pack immediately looks like a pain reflex, i just think it wasnt as bad as ragatha because it was only on her hand
They can't physically be harmed, but they can still feel pain. Pain is ultimately just your nerves sending signals to your brain. So if they're receiving those signals, they can still feel pain even if physically they're not harmed. As for the things done to their bodies, they don't have human bodies anymore, and they're bodies are likely maluable in certain ways, like Pomni's is stretchy, Ragatha is stuffing, Zooble is connectable.
I think when it comes to sharp pains there are times you won’t notice it because the cut is that clean. Other ones it adrenaline. We also have to remember they straight up don’t have a human body, no nerves, no cells, just strings of code and data. Further on that, they might have specific events that trigger a “pain code” to fire.
Since the digital circus is rated for all ages, I would expect the sensation of pain to be greatly suppressed or replaced. The more painful something would be, the more suppressed it would be up to being completely muted. Probably. Would help prevent panic attacks from the visuals if the pain is suppressed enough or muted for major damage, but would help "players" avoid touching a hot surface if it stung a tiny bit or was weirdly uncomfortable and the expectation of pain causing them to react.
A fun detail I don't see alot of people talk about is in ep2 Gangle is the driver in the semi truck and in ep4 she got slammed by a Semi truck. Interesting.
Pain, in a real world context, is just your body saying “hey, don’t do that! That damages me!” so since the circus members are capable of abstraction at the height of emotional distress, it makes sense that when they are emotionally upset they also experience physical pain, their bodies are afraid of abstraction, a presumably painful state.
considering how much Ragatha's legs were flailing about in the deep fryer, i feel like she was experiencing some level of pain there, otherwise she would have realized it didn't hurt and calmed down, just like when she got impaled by the spikes of the truck.
might be that certain objects or certain locations are capable of causing pain. Like in the Circus, you won't feel pain because it's the main hub of the digital world. But in an adventure world, you might feel more or less pain when the situation calls for it.
My theory is when they glitch,they feel all the pain they were supposed to. Example: lets say in ep 3 ragatha glitched again,she would feel the spikes in her heart and head
I think the amount of pain they all "feel" seems to be based on how "real" they think the world is. Most of the characters react like they're in pain only to realize they're not actually, but Jax in particular doesn't ever react to pain as he even constantly points out "no one can feel the pain anyway". He seemed to be rubbing his back more out of annoyance to indicate to Pomni that "Yeah you pushed me over you klutz". So yeah, in many of these cases, they seem to be phantom pain or reactionary.
Though that said I think the glitching was probably genuine pain as like with abstraction and the fear Jax and Zooble had of Caine "punishing" them, it seems they are capable of feeling actual pain if the pain is wired into their avatars whether as a glitch, corruption, or even deliberate malicious code. Zooble saw a glimpse of this when she noticed Caine glitching the room out and genuinely acted scared and then in ep4, told Jax with a straight face essentially "this isn't a game anymore.... Caine can do some serious damage to us if he wants to...." leading to Jax taking her word for it. Gangle was able to punish Jax by dragging him to the room and administering psychological torture to him, but that was the closest he felt to real pain as we can see by his expression when he leaves the room and the flashing masks which could cause epilepsy. Once he got back to his car, he realized that real pain CAN be inflicted on the avatars after all, worrying him heavily about what's to come next. Further Zooble is the only one who seems to have evidence of feeling real pain and not cartoony pain since when she touched the stove, she felt the burn. Zooble is pretty cynical and knows her parts are just arbitrary, but I think her seriously reacting to the heat of the grill may have been what triggered her to say "I don't want to test what Caine can do."
...zooble clearly wasn't expecting the frier to hurt so this feels like bogus
1:54 captions
You won't believe me, but i had this EXACT thought while in the shower today, minus the psychological suffering part. The fact that they don't necessarily feel pain but their brains makes them believe they do is a really cool thing to add which also brings the question if they actually feel anything physically, like when Zooble's hand burning in ep 4, did they feel the heat in their hand and that activated their brain to "feel" pain or maybe they didn't but since that would be the logical reaction, their brain kinda activated survival instincts? (weird but the most close way i could find to describe it lmao)
Under one hour people
I thinks its just them playing around or something similar because I will scream ow when I get shot in the hand in a VR game even though nothing is there.
I like to imagine the reason the characters don’t react to pain sometimes is because their used to it.
They seem very fine with the pain tho
I’m mean glichtx did said they can fell pain they just can die
The theory you suggested is a bit fragile imo, but you also casually revealed what it's like when Jax is suffocating
I think they're either somewhat numb or have some fast pain recovery
The pain from the glitching might be because it's damage to their actual files where their souls are stored. So while everything "physical" is just simulated damage, the glitching is actual damage.
About leaving Ragatha alone. Imagine YOU just see your “immortal” buddy’s butt get completely kicked, while knowing that they have been in the place for a while and know how stuff works here. Now do YOU, a newbie try to attack that same monster or get out while you can?
it seems like only certain types of pain hurt. blunt force, heat, and oxygen deprivation
I disagree
A lot of it is phantom pain, some emotional pain, and when they glitch out it hurts severely.
Pretty sure they’re in pain because they’re literally being glitched out of existence
I forgot how bad the animation quality was in the pilot and meet the cast
They all have hapt8c feedback suits on like ready player one
Thought this was talking about the actors, as in the people who voice the charecters
Cool murder drones season 2
"Hey, we're 4 episodes in,and I just had a question, do the characters feel pain?"
". . . Yeah. Obviously."
Episode 1
Ragatha: I aM iN sO mUcH pAiN.
I also hate the whole "AMAZING DIGITAL CIRCUS IS A TRAGEDY" trend. Like, I do get it is also content farming. By UA-camrs that have spoken out against content farming, but anyways. That was established by episode 1, and reinforced from there on.
They are not subtle about anything in this show. I love the show. Fanbase is wearing on me a bit, like, these are adults being this slow to the punch. But then again, Kwite yapping about something that isn't new . . . also isn't anything new. And SaberSpark. And . . . a bunch others you all know- Jesus Christ, I need to reconsider my subscriptions . . .
This Digital Void, like world unoyed, uhhhh I ran out of things to rhyme void with uh lol
Ah yes “pomy”
Don’t you mean Pomni?
No “pomy” 🗿👍🏽
Maybe it's just impact wise.
Wow
TADC is heavily inspired by I Have No Mouth And I Must Scream, a massive supercomputer, AM, has the real bodies of the last 5 surviving humans and tortures them endlessly over it's hate for humanity. of course they feel pain, it's their actual bodies but AM is a powerful enough machine to eventually heal their wounds or reverse anything it's done to the survivors almost like they were cartoon characters, many of them have forgotten where AM actually comes from
TADC Caine is the story's AM but he doesn't make the human "players" suffer out of hate, he's just bad at what he does. their digital bodies are more like cartoons so it'd make sense if they didn't feel pain in a traditional sense. it's more like they expect things to hurt as they are thrown around by the game's terrible physics
I wonder if Gooseworx watches videos like this, and what she thinks of speculation like this...
Oh
“And she didn’t complain at all😊” *ragatha screaming*
What about when an NPC feels pain? Is it just a simulated one or can we accept them as a living beings inside the dijital circus
Phantom sense?
I think AI and "humans" have slightly different rules from each other. As such The Fudge might be able to cause "rea" pain to other AI.
ragata pomy pne zub
Yay! 5:06
Meow
2:34
👀
While I love the theory, your thumbnail was misleading and made it seem as if Gooseworx had made a comment on it. Please don't do that in the future. You don't _need_ clickbait to survive on UA-cam, just interesting concepts and ideas. I watched the whole thing just because the way you talk has me hooked! You just need a good _enough_ title and thumbnail that most everyone that would've clicked this on the clickbait will click it aswell on a true statement. Your community will appreciate your honesty. (And besides, clickbait has been sort of falling to the wayside on UA-cam as of late. At least in terms of What's Popular.)
Hi, thanks so much for your feedback, I really appreciate it!
I wanted to clarify that the screenshot I used is a new one from Gooseworx’s Tumblr, where she confirmed that the circus members do feel pain. You can check it out here: www.tumblr.com/gooseworx/770958308712513536/can-the-circus-residents-die-i-dont-mean
I hope this clears things up :)
(: