Jonathan Haidt has done some research on this and it's fascinating.

Actually, it's congress that pushes the DOD to spend money on things it doesn't need.

Yes, but don't sleep on The Dreaming. In it she says something about aboriginals against a Dune backdrop and jerks off a laser!

Maybe someone else can chime in, but I'm pretty sure the uncertainty principle is limited to the position and mass of a particle. I don't think it means you can never actually study stuff.

Spot on. And when people realize that they won't be able to experience the transfer first hand, there won't be much interest in brain uploads. This whole enterprise is motivated by immortality, which it doesn't provide.

Oh God yes. Smartphones and tablets are a musician's best friend. Voice memos for quick idea capture, pictures of equipment settings, Animoog.

Our present science doesn't support the ABILITY to detect life outside our solar system. It's good to be skeptical, but you also have to be honest about our current technical limitations.

Evolution only describes how life changes over time. "The Fittest" only applies to the context of other living creatures. We don't know much about the origin of life.

"honed in on a sun-like star" should be "homed in" #corrections

Way to fold like a cheap camera. Since you seem to have no idea what you're actual argument is, leave the science talk to the grown ups.

NASA is Space X's main customer, so this isn't exactly Taggart Transcontinental.

Unless you're going to actually make that compelling argument, why bring it up?

The MSL is much heavier than Spirit & Opportunity were. Mars has a very thin atmosphere, which makes landing heavy stuff a bummer. This was not a Rube Goldberg machine cooked up to amuse engineers.

We can put things in orbit, just not humans.

You were lucky to have caught the sound check, the actual show was ruined by the collective obnoxiousness of the crowd, the bored bar staff, and security radios going BRKRKRKRKRKRKRKKKKKTTTTT!

Think of it as a history of astronomy up to the late 70's. Don't worry, you wont come out of it with a perverted picture of the universe. Also, some of the episodes have a "Cosmos update" at the end.

Definitely worth watching. It's gratifying on so many levels. Just watch the first episode and you'll get a good idea of whether or not it's your thing.

I haven't kept my toothbrush in my bathroom for years. That ranks up there with putting your bath towel on the toilet while you shower.

You're plea for religious tolerance is commendable. But you can forgive people for being sensitive when this is the same argument that is being made to force ID into high school science (which is not to say that the author harbors those views).