Posts contained in the “Culture” category:

Everyday Chemistry

The Beatles' Everyday Chemistry album, on a cassette tape.

A common science fiction plot element is the parallel dimension—a world like ours, but slightly or hugely different than the one we currently exist in and which can only be entered through some sort of portal. (Star Trek really went to town with this, starting with the original series, and then extending it through DS9 and Enterprise.) …read more…

A Guide to Binging Star Trek: The Next Generation Season One

For a long time, I’ve wanted to write an episode-by-episode guide to every Star Trek series out there, with the exception of Discovery, because I haven’t seen that one yet. (And at this point, I don’t plan to, although that could change.) Then I read Max Temkin’s article on how to watch Star Trek: Deep Space Nine …read more…

Math in America

So yesterday, I tweeted this: OMG America, please learn math. — Professor O "Genius Shark"â„¢ (@iswpw) September 4, 2016 Here’s the story behind that tweet: Yesterday I went to Target and bought a few miscellaneous office supplies, because office supplies are good and cheap office supplies are even better. My order came to $3.32. I …read more…

The Self-Confident Man

The man of self-confidence is often a compelling figure. Driven and focused, he is committed to bringing the world into line with his vision of how it should be. He may genuinely believe that his vision for the world is a good one, that the world will be a better place if he can shape …read more…

I never change. I simply become more myself.

Joyce Carol Oates

Published on 12 January 2016 at 7:57 pm

Outrage Monkeys

For some reason, I had bookmarked this page on John Scalzi’s blog, and had completely forgotten about it until the other day, when I reread it and decided to add “outrage monkey” to my glossary page. I have to admit, I completely forgot what he was writing about, until I got to the end where …read more…

We cannot solve our problems with the same thinking we used when we created them.

Albert Einstein

Published on 20 September 2015 at 12:23 pm

An Ewok Riding a DeLorean

I help out in a number of forums online; the two big ones are the WordPress support forums and the Graphene Theme support forum. In general, I enjoy helping people out, partly because I have received a lot of help there myself, and partly because I learn quite a bit that way. But every once …read more…

how to have a good day

I went to the local temple of mass consumption the other day because I needed a few groceries, and I also needed to return some empty soda bottles. I was having an okay day, but was surprised to see that the parking lot was packed. All the big holidays are over, and as far as …read more…