I'm not forgetting any of those things. But I'm honestly trying to think of a decade where clandestine ops and governments weren't lying to their citizens and I'm drawing a blank. .

The Hunger Games was released in 2008 meaning it was written prior to the economic downturn. Ditto The Road which was published in 2006. BSG (not a book obviously) was made in 2003 but was obviously pitched before that. Shaun of the Dead was released in 2004 with World War Z being published in 2006. The Fallout…

Not sure I quite buy this as a sustained trend. It might be. But Frozen itself is going to throw the whole thing out of whack by being the first Disney film to really generate the kind of buzz from it's soundtrack some of it's older films did. And it's questionable if it was the music or the message at that…

I think it was always something that was meant to be chewed on by the audience. The show (or at least Starfleet's) perspective that ethically you had what was a slippery slope. Human history is full of people "improving" other societies which generally means assimilating or destroying ultimately. You can get into…

Yea, you're right on that. My brain shifts numbers on me sometimes. I added 20 years to those dates.

Except the policymakers we would think of as being behind that revolution were already versed in those theories because of those essays. The founder's speeches reflected those works often at the same level of complexity. You're ignoring that.

I don't want to go too into this too deeply because it's going to get esoteric fast, but you have erased Hobbes, Locke, Kant, and Rousseau to make that claim. Paine is a darling amongst certain types of political thought but he is a very specific flavor. In terms of Social Contract theory he's a very, very minor…

It may not even be education. It may be the reality people lack the time. But if people do lack the time and therefore a representative official is in fact occupying a profession, maybe the public's insistence on a representative "you can have a beer with" is a problem.

Maybe. But the ideas presented were also more complex and nuanced by orders of magnitude if you read them. I'm not even saying that to simplify today's voting public.

It sucks, but it's also reality that the Henson company has been getting cannibalized for years. There is enough creativity and imagination in it to bring us all sorts of things we'd probably want to see. But Disney now owns their most recognizable properties and guys like Brian have also been trying to get smaller…

No doubt.

What's with the Aykroyd hate? This is a legit question since I haven't been paying attention if he's been doing screwy things other than coming up with the concept in the first place.

Not sure I agree, but I can see it.

It's worth noting - Trek had a shared universe albeit one that was never shared cinematically. All five series had a shared timeline and the last three all crossed over. Add to that comics and a book universe. What Trek had historical problems with was making the jump to big screen and translating the ethos of the…

That's partially because if you treat the humanity of the Federation as analogous to humanity today, it has no business being at the head of anything and it becomes dystopian fast. The plot plug Section 31 is really the first step in that direction.

Except the author's point is that Marvel itself was copying Pixar's model. That does not mean that Trek should try it, but it's a valid reason to believe perhaps the writer-centric model that puts a premium on planning might work.

It's not really a tough question if we take your supposition at face value. Deal with the church you've dealt with anti-science Christianity. You're advocating a demonstrably false presumption. Alt Medicine is not driven by Christianity and yet flies in the face of science for as long as its been around. If…

First, let's be realistic. That chunk that you're describing... where exactly do you think they exist? It sounds like you're roundabout describing creationists or Fox News and CNN watchers The problem with all three is, this "debate" has been going on regardless in those mediums whether scientists chose to…

Very simply: validates to whom? The creationists which you already believe are not going to listen? If that's the case, you really couldn't validate them further. Scientifically literate people who wouldn't bother entertaining a theory that is incapable of predicting anything as science in the first place?

Depends. How influential is the person making the claim and how successful are they at spreading the message? One can hold someone in intellectual contempt but still have to deal with the fact that they have sufficient social capital to cause a problem. If you refuse to debate someone that is effectively spreading…