I share your sentiment. That being said, SLS, as well as a rumoured Russian heavy lift, and to a greater extent SpaceX and Bigelow give me reason for optimism. If you have not already take a look at SpaceX's website, their stated goal of enabling the colonization of Mars figures prominently, even in the job postings.…

That's ridiculous. In Visual effects, salaries range from 35k to hundreds of thousands CAD, the majority of employees are drug users. Granted in this case I mean they smoke pot and drink alcohol, nevertheless these are high functioning, ambitious, hardworking people. Even getting a job in this field requires…

Is having an optimistic view of the future considered naive nowadays? Why can't someone make a science fiction movie with the optimistic wonder of Gene Roddenberry anymore?

I have owned every Nintendo home console since NES. I will more likely than not pass on WiiU. The controller holds little interest for me, the lineup thus far is weak, and the console hardware itself is not something I'd pay full price for.

Jodie Foster was across the board bad in Elyisum. And the accent was atrocious. Direction and writing must have played a part. The Hillary Clinton look was successful enough as a costume design but I think they could have done more. The evolution of fashion seemed a bit tame.

My step-father committed suicide. My mother found him.

I guess this isn't surprising, but why arn't the Inuit tribes which traditionally hunted in the area being consulted? If anyone has a historical claim to the North Pole it ought to be them.

It's pretty ridiculous. I'm just repeating Kim Stanley Robinson here (and he might be repeating someone else) but history has a momentum. For modern people to feel guilt for actions, events, some of which weren't even decisions that occurred hundreds, a hundred, or even half a century ago makes little sense,…

America's heavy lift launcher SLS should be flying within a decade, and if all goes as planned (i.e. it's not canceled) could launch an unmanned Moon flyby within 3 years.

50 years is a long time, and they stopped on purpose. If it was working why would they ever stop? This would never happen in reality. It doesn't make sense. We wouldn't stop until we found a better way to control the situation. A slowing towards the end of this century and reversing through the 2100's seems far more…

I've seen frames range anywhere from 1 minute to hours. And as the power of rendering increases artist take advantage of it. They add displacement, sub surface scattering, large textures, ray traced reflections, fog, etc. There will come a time when CPU's, GPU's, RAM improvments outpace artists perfectionism but it's…

Lame, I had been looking forward to this film ever since I first read the brief synopsis/concept on Spielberg's wikipedia article maybe four years ago.

I'd suggest it's hard science fiction. As far as I understand some of the biological work in the books isn't as accurate (the 'treatment' isn't far fetched, some of the biotech used to terraform might be), some of the knowledge about Mars is outdated (not to a drastic extent though), but the method's of getting there…

Isn't that what Avatar is about? the home tree being a post-singularity luddite supercomputer.

Easily the most realistic depiction of space and it's not even close. Worth seeing on the big screen for that reason alone if that sort of thing interests you.

No it doesn't.

Honestly I didn't understand Stanton's insistance to set it on Mars, we all know Mars isn't at all like this so why not just set it on some random alien world called Barsoom in a solar system somewhere else in the galaxy? It's like setting one of these stories on the Moon or Venus, we know enough about these planets…

Oh I'm just kidding around, don't take this so seriously. Please elaborate though, I know he was involved with that group that was pushing for Immigration reform, I know he's a friend of noted Libertarian Peter Thiel. Thiel has some opinions I detest (i.e. he supports Quebec separatism because he believes it would…

Where's the evidence saying that he's doing one thing and saying another? Look at his record, he starts a rocket company, an electric car company, and a solar panel installation company. While his involvement with SolarCity is marginal in comparison to SpaceX and Tesla Motors all three have went on to major success.…

Hmm, Musk's seems like he's on the Liberatarian Left if anything.