". Many people believe that these ring sightings are, in fact, smoke rings that form naturally (like the one at the top of this post) and from a distance appear to be ships."

@Murray Hewitt: Ok, I'll make one reply here, but I'm not gonna get drawn into a long tit-for-tat internet argument here. Reasons for thinking our physics is off: the discovery of the sterile neutrino throws the Standard Model out the fucking window. Quantum mechanics has yet to be reconciled with large scale physics…

Interesting read. It sucks that your father was born into the culture he was given his proclivities. Perhaps in a 150 years he'll be remembered as a pioneer in some some dusty exopolitics tome. More likely, if his ideas prove correct, then the best to hope for is that his work will prove useful.

@Murray Hewitt: The average astronomer is well versed in the physics that make the idea of alien abduction highly unlikely This is a logical fallacy. Specifically, the probabilistic version of a modus tolens syllogism. Fact is, we simply have no way to judge how probable or improbable alien visitation is. If it…

Well, if transtemporal perception is possible, it certainly would be pretty strongly selected for reacting to anything having to do with sex, so that's at least consistent.

I laughed my ass off at homer on the Chutes and Ladders board.

As appealing as your idea of replacing urban antennas with fountains is, there's one major problem with it: power. Water's freakin' heavy! It's gonna take a hell of a lot of juice to shoot it into the air. Retrofitting existing fountains might be cool, though.

@albinobluesheep: You just the the top of your stream to be higher than the height you need for a certain frequency range. So, yeah, the top end is bouncing up and down, but it shouldn't matter if your pumps are high enough.

@gobofraggle: Red's antagonist's efforts to deceive her was a major section of the story. "Don't ever look in this room!" will provoke a strong curiosity in _any_ human, smart or stupid, young or old, and a fair likelyhood of disobeying. Jack, with his unsophisticated country ways, _was_ easily fooled; his naivete has…

Good story, pretty art, but there's no need to read it more than about once a year. At least that way you get a story.

@Byers: Sigh. The fact that I disagree with you does not mean that I don't understand the source material. I've tried to maintain a civil tone, discussing the artwork, while you've discussed my intelligence, the "maturity" of the conversation, ignored my arguments, and generally not been a party to productive…

@Byers: I did provide argument Re: Pan's Labyrinth, and it did not involve infallibility. As diallo expands further below, it's a pivotal moment in the movie that only makes sense if the girl is a moron. There is no explanation for her actions in terms of motivation or story logic. And the ending was a complete cop…

Oh, I am SO there! But they better keep the boobs and ultraviolence, gorramit!

Ok, is NO one gonna say anything? Am I really gonna have to be the one who has to say it? Really? *sigh*

@Strakus: Here, here! The mini series kicked my ass and I was thinking about it the whole time I read this article.

"At present, nobody knows for sure if antimatter falls up or down." Wait, what? When did that happen? I thought gravity treated anti-matter the same as matter. Hrm. I guess... if one takes the concept of anti-matter as time reversed normal matter, then... huh. That is a REALLY weird idea.

@bowen13: They aren't. They destroy each other pretty quickly. But it takes 142 nanoseconds to happen. In the meantime, the two orbit each other like a binary star (but with various quantum effects so the analogy only goes so far).

I loved Young's laughing breakdown. I thought it a great moment that showed us just _how_ far he's gone.

Lathe of Heaven? Really?! Come on now, the acting was wooden, the dialog stilted, special effects were laughable, and all of the characters were dreadfully unsympathetic. If this is what it looks like when LeGuinn is involved, I'm thinking I should check-out sci-fi's "Earthsea".

Stay away from Soylent Green? Why? I love it! But then, I guess it is a matter of.... personal taste...