No, it's more about the deception and sheer irresponsibility.

The comparison is to tobacco but I think that asbestos is a better comparison. I mean, if you have to pick just one. When you think about it, there are many examples, and they all come from the same corporate mind-set.

Perhaps it's time to rethink how corporations function.

|Also, there's certainly no need to be disappointed when your invented tech comes out in real life, it just means you're a prophet :p

Only if the prediction comes true after publication. During the first draft - it's kind of awkward. However, I do plan to revisit it, once I'm a better writer.

The other issues was managing scale and travel times. I had not one but three McGuffins going for FTL - and there's good reasons for that - but it made the plot extremely complex and it all came tumbling down around my ears.

Once every couple of days. That seems to be comfortable. If I show up more often, it seems that I'm done too quickly. And I value the slower pace. I did not see that coming, by the way.

these days it hardly seems gradual, but maybe I'm just getting old.

OTO, Toffler kinda predicted this...

Well, certain shamanic aspects forced their way in. Oddly enough. I'm trying to be more lighthearted than Lovecraft. But the primary character becomes fused with a synthetic symbiotic; an artificial organism with magical-seeming powers that even they don't understand. The ignorance seems to be part of the plan, whatever the hell the plan might be. Oh, and the organism essentially gives voice to the host's subconscious.

So, yeah. it's an excuse to talk to myself and hope some pay copy happens.

This was my second shot at an SF story. The first was set in a far far far distant future - and all my incredible futuristic tech kept showing up on TechDirt.

That's what years of "small business conservatives" gets you.

The business.

Right now I'm working a novel that started out as a short story. The idea is simple; it's told (in part) from the perspective of a thumping great deus-ex-machina who is ignorant of their origin or purpose.

This is way above my head, but I've been following the topic to the degree I can. It seems that part of the problem is getting funding to properly test it while controlling for confounding factors and that data is slow to come because vacuum chambers tend to eat their electronics and they have to tune the thruster to have a enough thrust to be detected with the facility they hope to use.

I vaguely understand there's some strange non-linear stuff going on with the power in and the expected thrust and I think from what's said that the shape or nature of the cavity figures in here somehow. I was trying hard, but that's the best I could do. I may well be very smart, but this takes math and facts and stuff. So I'm frustrated. Because the science reporters explaining this don't really. I mean ... I can handle a few lumps in my pablum.

I wish I had the ability to casually throw a few hundred thousand dollars their way in the service of pure curiosity. Never mind what it means for space exploration although that's that's huge if it works. Maybe that's what has everyone scared, because once you are out of the atmosphere - the tech itself doesn't seem to be all that challenging. It's the implications.

But back to the testing and finding out if this is real or not, and what the hell is going on. No matter what the outcome, it has to be fundamentally interesting. You don't generally see a chance to resolve interesting questions like that for sums less than fractions of a gross domestic product. So the most confusing thing to me is why they aren't drowning someone in money.

I've always been quietly amused at the people who seem to completely lose their minds when Occupy is mentioned.

"They didn't achieve anything! They didn't have any focus! No leadership! No goals!"

But this is their achievement. They are everywhere, it seems. It was kind of the Woodstock of politics. And from now on, even if you weren't there, you will have been when it comes time to write the old autobiography.

They figured out how to organize for a particular goal without any hierarchy or any leaders that could be co-opted. I think that's a pretty big deal. And I think that's a big part of the objection - the rejection of structure and hierarchy seems to be viscerally threatening. Honestly, I think that's part of it, because if they were as irrelevant as said - we wouldn't still be talking about them.

Channeling a dead grandmother!

Oh, I hang in a state of constant oscillation between arrogance and self-doubt. But in general, I prefer to be correct and let "right" sort itself out.

But yes, I do get exceptionally annoyed with people who go on and on about things like ... well, 9/11 being an inside job. I consider that one of a range of possibilities - it's clear people had to conspire to make what happened happened - I don't feel that we can be sure about this.

It's kind of like people who talk about UFO's coming from Venus. "When you are unclear about what UFO means, we don't really need to talk about your grasp of the habitability of Venus, do we?"

"Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence"; "assertions made without evidence may be dismissed without proof." There's a considerable number of tools to filter out the bullshit you don't need to deal with.

Not wanting to deal with the remainder, though - well, you may have every right to not deal with it - but not dealing it is rarely the most productive course.

What a fascinating way of looking at the world! More sweet tea?