Well, I don't think the idea is to beam the energy to Earth as sunlight. I assume they're collecting electricity to power whatever fantastic devices have been invented between now and then.

That article is terrific.

Well, I raised it in the controversy paragraph, but the Wikipedia article mostly glosses over the issue.

Picard: Another inverse tachyon pulse? Dammit, LaForge, that's your solution to everything!
Data: In fairness, captain, that has solved every problem the Enterprise has ever encountered.
Picard: Touché.

Even so. A sphere surrounding the sun at Earth's orbit is roughly a hundred quadrilion square miles of surface area, if I'm doing the math right. Given the mass of Saturn, that's about 500 trillion kilograms per square mile… actually I guess that works out. Let's build this thing!

It's a problem in many, many fields. Someone spends decades becoming an expert in one particular field, and then assume they're now an expert in every field.

Not with that attitude.

There aren't a finite number of sci-fi ideas that can be explored. We can debate the theoretical possibilities of the Dyson sphere and still demand hoverboards. It's 2015, dammit!

You're absolutely right. This is some primo weed. Nice score, man.

One objection that I'm surprised doesn't get raised anywhere here is, how do you get enough material to build something a million or so times bigger than the Earth? Is there enough matter in the solar system to build a Dyson sphere big enough that it doesn't get melted by the sun?

Tossed a floater right over the plate for you guys. Glad someone took a swing.

Buckaroo Banzai Against the World Crime League was my second choice. I went with Trek because there's a decent chance that one could actually happen.

That's actually pretty accurate.

Did any communist ever get into power who *wasn't* a right-wing totalitarian at heart?

> This hole didn't go very deep.

Che killed members of a brutal dictatorship who were considered war criminals by Castro's government. I'm not saying that's not worse than giving people a fair trial, but that's not the same thing as murdering civilians (which Batista's government did do frequently).

Well, "uncontroversial at the time" means that the Cuban population strongly supported the executions, and anyone else in Guevera's position probably would have done the exact same thing due to public pressure. Not trying to defend Guevera, but I do think the historical context is important. I didn't go into more…

I only didn't include Klaus Barbie this week because I wrote about him last week - that was the connection to this week's article. However, one thing I've learned after a year and a half of Wiki Wormholes is that nearly every topic leads back to Hitler eventually. He's like a genocidal Kevin Bacon. Or, I should say,…

I don't pick the time the article posts, but I assume our schedule's off because of MLK Day.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying Stalin was someone to cozy up to. But it seems to me that escalating tension served the people in power on both sides more than easing tension would have. It's always easier to stay in power (in either country) when there's an Evil Empire people need to be protected from.