The Digital School by milakovacev

WHAT IS SPACE? Poem

DOOKIES

Limits of virtual space

SPACE TRAVELLERS

BOSSY BEN

Story

Real space boundaries

REAL VS. VIRTUAL

GAMES

What is it?

DIGITAL STORIES Funny submissions

Draw you room Crossword puzzle

TIME’S UP

Text with Kant

MESSY MACIE

ENDLESS SPACE

ROBOTIC ROB

SPACE IS

Framing and composing

Virtual relationships

Where does it end?

Poem

GROUP 13 BEYOND OUR SENSES Animal fun facts

Artem Alexandrov - 1298992 Cristina Nistor - 1298860 Marianna Angelini - 1380249 Mila Kovacev - 1322680

What is Space? Is Space inside or outside? Is it narrow or is it wide?

poem

Is Space the same as the Sky, Or does the Sky on top of Space lie? Does Space stretch beyond the stars, Or can it be measured in Ares? Is Space transparent, Or is it, to you, apparent? Is Space heavy or light? Is it dark or is it bright? Does space sit in a frame, And what is its name? Must Space be real, An environment you can feel? Or can it be imagined and surreal?

Eh...

Pff, those are just some balls of gas and rock, space is much more.

What’s up?

Space... But I am too young to go there

What? But what more can it be?

You want to go to space, dont you? Now, what if I told you, that we are in space right now?

Stars are beautiful, but not nearly as interesting as space itself!

We are all travelling through it every day, all our lives! We are all spacemen!

See, “space” is a very important word. A difficult word. We use it when we see an empty drawer, to ask where we can sit, and yes, we use it for stars and all that...

Is this grass space then?...

It’s a long story! Do you have time now?

YES! All of it is space. Space is in your head too!

Yes, I finished all my homework... Let’s go on an adventure!

We are preparing for take off!

Yes, but where? Just hang on tight!

“You want to go to outer space, right? But how do you know that the outer space even exists? How do you know that it's real?” Kid had seen the outer space many times. It was his lifelong passion to travel there. “I've seen it in books, video games, documentaries, and movies. The planets, with their distinctive patterns and colours, ﬂoating around the dark void.”

“So, you have seen images of the universe. But have you ever tasted the outer space? Have you smelled it or walked through it with your own feet?”

Kid was getting upset. “Of course I didn't! I told you that I haven't been there yet!”

“Well, this means that the outer space is

virtual space

for you, at least for

now...”

Kid was confused now. “Virtual? What do you mean? Is the outer space only on the screen?” “Yes, right! But virtual space is more than a screen. Let me explain. Real space is the space we walk through, the space we see, hear, smell, touch, and taste stuﬀ in. Virtual space is the space we can see but not walk through. We can only imagine ourselves walking through the virtual space. Maybe you imagined to be Neil Armstrong when he walked on the moon. For him, outer space was a real space. But for you, Kid, the outer space is virtual.”

Are the spaces represented below Kid and the philosopher know by putting an right answer!

? What do you think? Let into the box you think is the

They’re actually all virtual! Why? Because all of the images shown on the other page are representations of the real thing... just a drawing in the magazine. Get it?

Looks as if it’s almost real, heh? But can you smell the grass? Is it a real picture on a wall or a virtual hilly sunny landscape? Or an image of a real one?

And does this even matter if we are in the picture, too? 9

Kid was even more confused. “So now that everything in school is on the screen... does it mean school is not real?!” Kid was not completely wrong. The digital screen is virtual space, the trickiest of them all. It's not as simple as a painting on a wall. The digital space on the screen has tabs and windows, and doors, and apps and videocalls to connect places together. For kid, the digital space felt more and more like a maze.

“But, if you could jump into your screen, walk through the video call, and enter your friend's room during digital school, would it then become real?”

So, digital space can be confusing, also when we talk about it. Did you ever experience a funny situation where digital and real things are misunderstood? Check out some funny stories we heard and send us yours! Last Christmas, I told my parents I wanted a mouse as a gift. I was very excited to receive it, but then... I opened my package under the Christmas tree and I was shocked to ﬁnd a squeaking mouse jumping out!

I told my teacher I could not attend the class because my windows crashed...The teacher got worried that I would get a cold from the broken windows and she delivered a sweater at my door!

For a group project, I told my classmate that I uploaded the essay on the cloud. She told me she spent the whole day staring at the clouds but she could not ﬁnd it...

Do you also have a funny experience to share? send your story to +31 629375931 11

Macie was always messy. Her socks never matched, and her shoes were always muddy. She forgot her homework often but was always ready, with excuses plenty. “My mom put it in a frame” she would conﬁdently claim. Macie was Kid’s best friend, although this was hard to understand. Macie and Kid were the opposite. The only thing they had in common was their incredible imagination skills, which they used to travel through space, and which boredom kills.

Macie’s room was always a disarray. “Be careful where you step, Kid”. She would say. Paint brushes everywhere, and the smell of wet paint lingered in the air. Macie was always up to something interesting. “Let’s build a city!” she would shout excitedly.

Once school went online, Kid was shocked! Macie, the messy girl he knows was not messy at all. Her carpet was bare for the ﬁrst time ever, and her shelves were cleared up, for the better. What happened to Macie? Wondered Kid. Did she become tidy like he did? In fact, Macie did not change at all. Her room was still not clean, it was just not visible on the screen. Paint brushes were everywhere and there was still the smell of paint in the air. But none of this was captured by the webcam - Macie’s composing was all a big scam. Her excuses did not vanish, they only got more slick, as she would claim: “I can’t show you my homework, my mouse doesn’t click!”. All this made Kid realise, that what is visible on the display, is what one chooses to portray.

Kid wasn’t very happy about Macie’s scam. If SHE, his best friend, was able to hide her true personality, what else were people able to hide?! Kid stared into space silently, without a smile. “Why are you so upset, Kid? What is on your mind?” asked the Philosopher. Kid was thinking about his new classmate, Rob, whom he never met in real life, but seemed quite friendly. “There is something weird about Rob's attitude during digital school. He rarely talks, and when he does, his voice was very ﬂat – almost metallic. He never gets oﬀ his chair to grab something in the room. He is always sitting upright, without moving, even during breaks when we are all catching up among classmates. Maybe he is just a bit awkward, and he needs to get used to our class, I don't know...” Kid and Rob met daily online - after class - to build their wonderful Minecraft world. They started from nothing, only green land to claim and wild animals to tame. Day by day, they built more and more sturdy buildings, and massive fortresses, and splendid monuments. They built the most wonderful cities they could think of. Rob and Kid wished Minecraft was a real world to live in. “I like Rob, it's fun to play with him and he has a funny sense of humor, but I'm not sure if I can consider him a real friend. What if Rob, like Macie, is hiding something? Maybe something bigger? His own identity?! How can I be sure Rob is a real person, instead of... a VERY realistic robot?!

The Philosopher quietly interrupted Kid’s worried ﬂow of thoughts: “Have you studied the human body in school? And how the brain controls all your movements through string-like cells called neurons? Did your teacher explain how many of these little neurons your body contains, which send little signals to billions of nerves through our body?” “Ehm... yes, but I don’t remember much, it was complicated.” Kid liked science, he found it fascinating. But the science teacher was soooo booooring, Kid would often ﬁnd himself asleep on his keyboard during the online lessons. “As you learn in science class, these neurons and nerves are so many that it is hard to visualise. They are all doing their specialized job, continuously. They are so many, that you would need a huuuge computer to control it and make it the same as a real person, like you. So, even with the advanced technology we have today, it is almost impossible to reproduce a real, breathing and thinking body. But maybe you are right, maybe this new world of online meetings brings mysteries we could never imagine.”

“Exactly! - shouted Kid, in a mix of excitement and disappointment – So I need to ﬁnd out if Rob is a robot or not!” “What if Rob has the same thoughts about you? You might also be a robot for him, if he only sees you through the screen. What if you actually are a robot but you don't know it? Would it matter?”

Mantis Shrimps have 16 cones in their eyes. We have only three. This means they can see colours that are invisible to us. What a crazy world they see!

Spiders have a very sensitive sense of touch. They can feel the tiniest movements and vibrations around them.

Humpback whales produce sounds that travel as far as 16,000 km! Some of the frequencies are so low, we cannot hear them. Imagine talking to a friend far away through clicks and moans nobody else understands! 16

The African Elephant can smell water up to 19 km away! Their sense of smell is 5 times as powerful as ours. Imagine being able to smell so well! Perhaps it wouldn’t be such a great thing...

Cows have 2.5 times more taste buds than we do. This helps them identify toxic plants.

Honey bees have a sense that we don’t have. They can sense magnetic ﬁelds, making them excellent navigators. Imagine having an internal GPS... no more Google maps! Each animal experiences the world completely diﬀerently. A space that is dull and empty looking to you, may be full of sounds that you can’t hear, smells that you can’t smell, and things you cannot see. The fact that we cannot sense things doesn’t mean they aren’t there. They are just not a part of our real space. 17

IIt was a sunny Friday afternoon, and our teacher decided to have us bake some for the weekend. I was very excited because my brother and I love peanut butter chocolate cookies! I’ve never made them before, so I had to pay very close attention. I put my apron and my Chef’s hat on. The internet was rather slow, but I didn’t really care - I was ready to bake some delicious cookies! “Ok, kids, ﬁrst you will need to combine butter, sugar, salt, and soda”. In a cookie? This will be the best dessert ever! “Now, kids, if you like peanuts, it’s time to add peanut to your mixture.” One single I guess peanuts have a really strong taste, you don’t need more than that. “To spice it up, now add some

”

I love lemons, so I added two of them instead of one. I didn’t know they melt in the oven, though.

Our teacher ran us through the whole recipe, and everything seemed like it was going smoothly. I couldn’t wait to get a taste of this cookie! Our teacher sometimes had a spooky voice that I couldn’t understand, but I found it quite funny.

The last step was baking my cookies. I was told to put them in the oven for 20 minutes. Those were the looongest 20 minutes of my entire life. When the timer went oﬀ, I knew it was ﬁnally time to get a taste of my cookies. I opened the oven door, and under all the steam and the smoke, I saw my cookies.

Dookies

Or maybe I should call them

The lemons didn’t melt, the soda made my cookie explode and it didn’t even taste like peanut butter. It barely even tasted like a cookie. It was bitter and sour at the same time and hard like a rock.

In the end, everyone showed their results. All my classmates have made beautiful, delicious- looking cookies, but when I showed mine, everyone started laughing. I had no idea why my cookies looked so different, I followed the same instructions as everyone else. After our class, our teacher sent us the recipe so we can bake the cookies again, whenever we want to. When I read through it, I finally figured out my mistakes. It turned out that my internet connection was to blame for my teacher’s robot voice. It was also to blame for cutting some important words out! If I were there in person to everything, my cookies would’ve turned out delicious. 19

“AAARRRGHH!” shouted Ben, as he entered the room. “Why do you ALWAYS make such a mess?” he asked Kid angrily. “What do you mean a mess?” asked Kid. “Are you joking? Your blocks are scattered all over the ﬂoor. How am I meant to have a class now?” Ben screeched. “Actually, my city Stripeville, is not messy one bit. It is completely ordered. Can’t you see?” argued Kid. “Anyway, why are you so bossy, Ben?” he added. “And what do you need all this space for?”.

Bossy Ben

“I am older than you. My school is more important. You have 5 minutes to get out of here, or else your ‘Whatevercity’ will be gone” stated Ben, with a proud grin on his face. “Stop being so bossy, Ben!” shouted dad from the hallway. “Kid’s school is as important as yours. Now keep it down both of you, I am trying to work here” he said, as he shut the door of Ben’s and Kid’s room. “Give me some SPACE!” shouted Ben. “I can’t give you space” replied Kid. “Space is not a thing to give”. “Let me put it in simple words. I do not want to see your face.” Ben replied slowly with a mocking tone. He really hasn’t a clue about the concept of space, thought Kid.

The next day was pet day, the first one ever. Students could finally show their pets in front of their cameras and introduce them to their friends. Kid’s family had only one - a dog named Sausage. “Breakfast is ready!” shouted dad from the kitchen. The smell of sausages and eggs filled the air - Kid’s favourite.

Sausage wasn’t complaining either. “Can this day get any better?!” Kid screamed happily, as he ran into the kitchen holding a piece of paper in his hand. “What’s that?” asked dad. “My speech about Sausage”. Replied Kid, and immediately began reading it out: “Hello everyone, this is Sausage. Naturally, she is a sausage dog and her favourite food is sausa-” “Sausage is mine for the day” interrupted Ben, as he entered the kitchen late, as always. 21

“SAYS WHO?!” Kid asked aggressively, as he ran over to sausage, who was calmly waiting to be fed. Ben followed instantly. They began pulling poor sausage, as they argued who will show her off for pet day. “ENOUGH!” shouted dad. “Either you both don’t get to show her, or you figure out a compromise”. He said. “Why do we have to share everything?” Kid asked frustratingly. “How about a round of rock, paper, scissors?” suggested Ben. Although he usually lost, Kid agreed, feeling today was his lucky day. To his disappointment, Kid lost. The day was not so lucky after all. “I have an idea!” shouted Ben with excitement. “Let’s use your silly blocks to build a wall in the middle of the room. That way, I can finally have my own peace.” He said. Kid immediately agreed, as he was still angry with Ben for taking Sausage. “But it’s got to be exactly half” he responded sternly. 22

As they were building the colourful wall, they began to realise that they like spending time together after all. “I’m sorry you didn’t get to show Sausage today.” Apologized Ben. “That’s OK” replied Kid. “What do you think about knocking this wall down?” asked Kid, as he was placing the last block on top of the tall structure. “5, 4, 3...” Ben started the countdown. They smashed the wall down with excitement. “that was fun” they said simultaneously. Later that evening, Kid had homework to do, but Ben was keen on playing his drums. “Flick!” He threw the drumsticks in the air and they whacked Kid, who was trying hard to ignore the loud noises his brother was making. “GIVE ME SOME SPACE!!!” shouted Kid, with a small smirk on his face he was ﬁnally able to use his broher’s famous phrase!

The space inside your room is framed by walls, now focus on it. What is inside your room? What is hanging on the walls? What is lying on the ﬂoor? What is next to you, and what is far away in the room?

But the space in your room is not all the space you see. If you focus your gaze outside through the window frame, there is a whole world to draw. How far can you see?

Look up the hidden words! LEFT, RIGHT, UP and DOWN

T R

U Y

E I

C W

T D L

S J X

W P B

O E

A M

CAUSE

DIGITAL 25

EFFECT

E U

S S

O E

P F

M R

O B

C T

Y P

Y Z

A O

VIRTUAL

ENDLESS

COMPOSE

FRAME

SENSES

SPACE

REAL

BOUNDARY

LIMIT

Oh Kid, I have a very important online meeting now! Hey, what is it about time you wanted to tell me?

I just don’t have the time for it now!

Tell you what, I will call my good old friend, he will tell you all about time, it is his thing really anyways.

Hi! The Philisopher said you could tell me all about time?

Ah, yes. Time... that’s what I am known for... Do you remember what he taught you about space? Yes! Space is all the relations between the objects around us. Oh, and between us and objects too! Very well! Now, if you think about it, the time is the changes in those relations. Objects that don’t move stay as they are, and we would not be able to tell if they were sitting there for an hour or a week, see? But as the objects start to move, the relations change, and we see this change as a passing of time. I don’t get it... The time doesn’t stop if we stand still, right? I believe that time is something within us, not objects.. It is not a property of the object to change with time, but it is our way of understanding how objects can change into something else.

Ah, so that is like space, just our way of seeing the world! And what is that thing about the changes and the passing of time? OK, tell me about your school day yesterday. Oh, it was such a long one... We had maths the whoooole morning, and our teacher was just showing us how to solve these equations on the screen. Then Macie had something else to do in the break, so I could not call her, and I was just looking outside the window... Good. Now, tell me about a good day that you had at school last year. Oh, school was so much fun then! You’d arrive to the class, join a group of your mates talking. Now, people just join the call and you never know if they are ‘there’, see? Then our teacher started the lesson, and Macie would show up late. Our maths teacher was always furious at her! I would chat to Macie after the teacher let her go, and we make fun of it. And then, DZZZING, the lesson is over so quickly. Fun times!

See how there are many things happened in the physical school before the lesson even started? You chatted to friends, then Macie showed up. Now, there are just fewer interactions around you. You sit in your room, in which objects do not change, and stare at the screen. No chitchat and making fun of the teacher. So, since the time is about the changes in objects, if the objects do not change much, the time draaaags on for you, see? Ah, that makes sense! Time flies when you’re having fun, and quietly sitting in an empty room is no fun! Exactly! Now, like you said, what is also interesting about time is that it is, like space, just a way of thinking about the world around us to make sense of it. And we are born with this idea. We may be the only animals that understand it naturally! Really? How? Try this with your dog. If you roll a ball next to it, Sausage will probably run after it. It doesn’t care about why the ball was rolling. Now, if that was you, you would likely look the other way to see where it came from. Notice the difference? Yeah, dogs are not very interested in why the ball was there, I have never thought about that... Exactly! They are only interested in the effect! And we humans are naturally interested in why that ball appeared in the first place, we are searching for the cause! We always want to know what happened, but also why that happened.

Seeing the world around us - organised in time - helps to form these connections - the effect is always following the cause in time. Take a look at these images.

Which one is the cause and which one is the effect?

This is simple! The apple falling down - that is the cause of the boy rubbing his head - that’s the effect!

Good! The order of events is clear here. Now, let’s see what you think of this one.

Hm, but this one can be either way, right? A chick can grow into a chicken, and a chicken can lay an egg... Exactly! This event is an example of a causality dilemma. The chicken and the egg can both be the cause and the effect.

Finally, what do you think of this one?

Hmm... I don’t get how they connect. And a rabbit with a parachute?! Cute, heh? But yes! It’s absurd, it does not follow the rules of causality, and that’s why you’re confused! Ah! That’s why people get confused when they don’t find a cause, I get it now!

Exactly! Now you understand why time is so important. It tells us what is possible and what isn’t.

Ah Kid, there you are! I am just out of that meeting. Wow, it must have lasted the whole afternoon!

I learned so much with Mr. Kant, ALL there is about time! It was so much fun! But you must have been away for less than an hour!

Oh I don’t know. It felt much longer, it was sooo boring...

Do you want to know something interesting?

Of course!

Did you know we all have a magical place inside our brain called logical space? Think about it like a big box that you always carry with you. Every time you experience something, the lesson you just learned jumps into the box, helping you make sense of the world. What happens when the box becomes full? The box never gets full, it expands with every new discovery. For example, the first time you held an egg in your hand when you were a baby, you had no idea that if you dropped it on the floor, it would break… until you dropped it for the first time.

But I was so young, I can’t even remember that day.

Exactly! That fact hopped into your logical space box without you even realising. All these discoveries, big or small, end up in your box. This space also helps you to make judgements. If your brother Ben comes to you and says: “Did you know that we and rest of the universe, actually live inside a hedgehog?”, you would be a bit sceptical about it, am I right?

Definitely! I would rather believe my teachers and the scientists! They know more than my bossy brother.

That box full of facts that you gather throughout life helps you chose who to believe. The more you learn about the world around you, the bigger the box becomes. Did you know that the Greeks used to think gods and goddesses above the sky were responsible for every natural event, even the creation of the world? But because humans continued to explore the outer space and expand their logical space, they moved on from those ideas. 31

Now, let's go back to the original thing you called space. What do you think is out there?

Well, planets and stars and other galaxies, maybe some aliens. I hope not... I'm quite afraid of them.

Great answer! But what do you think is beyond all those galaxies? What lies at its borders? How does the space end? Or does it end?

I'm not too sure. I've never been there and I don’t think anyone has.

You’re completely right! Even though we know a lot more about the world now compared to a thousand years ago, we are still far away from knowing everything. Why are we alive? What happens after we die? where or how does the space end? These are questions we might never find answers to.

Space, as we, humans, define it, is infinite. Limitless. The space in a room is defined by walls. Beyond those walls there's a park defined by a fence. Countries are defined by invisible boarders. We can go on like this until we get to the universe. What are its borders? Maybe it's a sphere. Or a sphere inside a sphere, or a cube, but what is beyond that? Probably some other space that we didn't discover yet. As Kant already told you, we will keep exploring further… it’s our nature.

I hope I’ll be able to make a cool discovery like that one day.

Promise me you’ll never take the world for granted and you’ll always remain curious.

I promise! 33

Space is so much more than what I imagined!

Kid, never grow out of asking questions!

Thank you.

Space is... Space is a concept so vast, I am very glad you asked. Although it may sound silly, Space is nothing really. Space only becomes a thing, When it contains something. If you can’t imagine a Trongadace, You can’t imagine empty space. But there are spaces you can envision, With quite good precision. These many diﬀerent spaces, Appear in all sorts of places. Some are real, others not But they are all we’ve got. They help us understand, This world so grand. Sometimes they get confusing, But that is what’s amusing. The more your brain you nourish, The more your space will ﬂourish If you’re struggling to follow, Don’t worry…it’s a lot to swallow.