If You Could Have One Superpower…
Posted on 29. Apr, 2009 by The Gimcracker in Blogging
I just installed a new WordPress plugin called Intense Debate. Have you ever posted a comment on Digg.com or some place that has a great comment system that lets you reply to peoples’ comments (comment threading) and rate other comments by voting up or down and wished you could have that on your blog? Well now you can with the click of a button, thanks to Intense Debate.
I want to test it out, but I don’t want to be a loser and post comments on my own blog and have a conversation with myself like a crazy person. So instead I decided I’d be a different kind of loser and beg my reader(s) to comment on this blog post.
I will come up with a topic for us to comment on so at least there is a purpose for commenting on this blog post.
The topic is:
If you could have one superpower, what would it be? Anything goes…
If that’s too cliche, you can alternatively choose this topic:
Who are your top 5 favorite SNL cast members of all time?
Ok, let’s see if we can break this comment system. Go! Now! Type!
Superpower: I think I'd just be ok with invincibility? Like a superman type invincibility. You don't have to worry about getting shot, falling off things, etc. I think that'd take some stress out of your life.
So, you fall off a building and land on your arm at 200 mph. You're invincible, so it doesn't break. BUT… would you still experience the pain of landing on your arm?
Well, yeah it probably still hurts. But I think i'd bruise a little maybe.
Why didn't you reply to my reply? That's the whole reason I installed this whole damn comment system. Don't make me vote you down and/or block your IP address from commenting. Because I HAVE THAT POWER NOW.
This comment system does a very swanky fade from green to blue as my comment is posting. I like it. Very nifty.
I know. It's the only reason I'm replying to your reply.
I want to fly. I know it's a little lame, but seriously, how stinking COOL would that be?
Thanks for using my new comment system! I'll be honest, I voted both of your comments up just so I could push the little green thumbs-up button. Not that they're not deserving of being voted up…
So, flying. That's pretty far up there for me. But I wouldn't stop there. I would expand that super power to include high speeds. I would want to be able to fly faster than the speed of light so I could go anywhere in the universe. So my power would officially be called "Way Faster Than Light Flying Power" or something like that.
Problem with flight being that you would either have to have some sort of limited invincibility, or something like that. Otherwise, you can't really go very fast. Sure, maybe about 20 to 30 mph at low altitudes without too much discomfort, but beyond that you will have to wear thermal clothing with some sort of wind-breaker quality to it, as well as a streamlined helmet…
But heck yeah! Flight? Way awesome…
true, there are a lot of physics strings attached to flying. i was thinking about all the things that could go wrong with flying – the cold of high altitudes and heat of going really fast, the wind in the face, the g-forces involved with going really fast and then stopping/starting abruptly, etc. then i pondered how cool it would be just to be able to fly from my desk chair to the vending machine to buy a code and i realized just that superpower would give me unlimited joy.
Just had to reply to see the whole reply thing.
i'm doing it again too. wow i just noticed the little time indicator for each comment updates automatically w/o a page refresh – ajax style. i was typing and i saw one of the replies above switch from "3 minutes ago" to "4 minutes ago" right before my eyes. nice!
Hrm…
I would probably go for some sort of super intelligence. Like, maybe an IQ of at least 200+ but preferably in the 1000+ range. At least as much intelligence as is possible, meaning, nearly God-like intelligence.
Reason being? I could do anything with that intelligence. Flight? Check. Invincibility? Check. Wolverine-like immune system? Check.
Problems? I might just do nothing. If I had the amount of intelligence that God had, then maybe I'd decide that I should just live exactly like a normal human and not actually help "humanity" in any way. Cure cancer? Well, maybe there's a reason I shouldn't that I don't understand at my current intelligence level. Flight? Well, maybe I'd come to understand it's bad or something and that's why we can't do it. Perhaps, gaining that amount of intelligence I would forsake everything and go live in a stick built hut in the middle of the jungle…
So, that begs the question of do I want to fully understand everything, or would I rather just have Tony Stark like intelligence? Maybe one would be more fun, but the other more eternally fulfilling?
sounds like the whole dr. manhattan quandry to me… very good questions to be answered.
i just figured out the ultimate superpower. it seems like the whole goal of everything is ultimately happiness, right? why are we choosing super powers here – to figure out which would be the coolest and most fun, right? well, if you could have unlimited intelligence as a super power, why not unlimited happiness? i think my ultimate superpower would be to have unlimited happiness in any situation. i don't even know if that makes sense though…
My second choice would be natural energy manipulation and adaptive healing. Like Goku from Dragonball Z. Shoot me in the leg, and when I recover, I will have adapted in a way that if you shoot me again, the bullet will not harm me. Jump off a cliff, and if/when I recover the next jump will not harm me. See, the trick is so push myself to within an inch of death, and when I recover, I can do the same thing over again with no negative impact. Add to this adaptive invincibility the ability to manipulate natural energy fields (the oriental concept of "chi") to the point where I can manifest a large ball of flaming light which I can control and throw at people and destroy planets with, as well as lift myself into the air to fly with (encompassing myself in a buffer bubble so I can flight at any speed safely) and I've got an awesome power. Shoot, maybe this should be my first choice…
My third choice would be that I'd chose perfectly flawless DNA (with flawless cellular reproduction), with an accelerated immune system and cell growth/repair. Sure, I might have to eat more, but is that really bad? Plus I'd never get sick, and if I wanted to get all muscle-y, it'd probably be able to happen fairly quickly. So, in short, I'd like to be wolverine please (or Claire from heroes if you're more familiar with that).