Heretic on 2012: Fear people, not God (news video feature)

The young Boston investigative journo Dan Rowinski recently produced this news feature about 2012 (below), as part of his graduate studies at BU.

Dan interviews me (I’m cited as an “apocalyptic expert”), along with Mayan and millennial experts from BU, and end-timers on the street.

I enjoyed watching the piece. The point I make in it is that the risk of chaos in 2012 is very real: not from above, mind you, but from crazy people getting amp’d up with anticipation.

Apocalyptic – 2012 News Feature from Dan Rowinski on Vimeo.

James Cameron's Avatar: Fox's Final Cut?

My prediction: Avatar will be the film that finally undoes the reportedly wicked, egomaniacal, James Cameron, who has yet to make a singe, goddamn, good picture. (Hey, I started hating the guy after Cameron was rumored to be calling Kate Winslet, Kate Weighs-a-Lot.)

My Second Life avatar, Oscar Finsbury, will eat his three-cornered hat, if I am wrong:

Executives at Fox, the company which has put up the majority of the money, are “very scared, nay terrified, that it is all going to go wrong,” one movie insider told me.The question is, has Hollywood’s most monstrous genius finally gone mad?

via Has James Cameron, Hollywood’s scariest man, blown £200 million on the biggest movie flop ever? | Mail Online.

Students of film history will recall the Heaven’s Gate debacle, in which director Michael Cimino demolished United Artists with his own, out-of-control film project.

Now anyone can chill on the bridge

$200 for a bitty piece of wallpaper, but, oh man, I’m tempted.

I’ve been awfully keyed-up over the upcoming Star Trek film, hanging on every scene, in every TV spot.

I hope soon to interview Alan Watt, and other experts on Trek symbolism, to disabuse me of my obsession.

Star Trek Tos Bridge Only Lg Wall Mural is an Urban Collector pre-order. Ever wish you were aboard Captain Kirk’s Enterprise? Now you can with the Star Trek: Bridge Full Wall Mural! Printed on the revolutionary pre-pasted Surestrip material, this extra large, photoreal wall mural puts you in the center of the action, and the backing won’t damage the underlying wall. Measures 6 feet x 10 feet.

via Star Trek Tos Bridge Only Lg Wall Mural at Urban Collector.

Steampunk phone uses punchcards

punkphoneMore Steampunk nonsense, this time from London designer Arthur Schmitt. This concept phone is one you program (i.e., place calls) with punch cards. (A 41, I am old enough to have used the last of these.)

I do like Steampunk’s return-to-tactility ethos, and Unplggd’s suggested term for forward-and-backward oriented design: retro-vation.

We love the creativity and innovation (retro-vation?) that comes from Steampunk modifications to modern technology. Some great ideas come from taking a completely new gadget and making it something that looks like, and in this case sort of works like, something from the 19th century. This steampunk cell phone concept has no display. No 3G. No data plan. No games. It doesn’t even have a dial pad. You make your calls with binary-coded punch cards, steampunk.

via Apartment Therapy Unplugged | Steampunk Cell Phone Takes Tech Backwards

Stanford robots fly "better" than humans

Dvice.com

Smarter than your average carbon-based life form. Photo: Stanford U.

The Sci-Fi Channel blog says that autonomous choppers developed at Standford University are teaching each other to fly better than a human pilot.

The announcement embraces two common subtexts in media coverage of robotic technologies: that robots will soon be our betters, and that they can be trustworthy as they carry out their benign missions overhead.

Stanford says “there is interest in using autonomous helicopters to search for land mines in war-torn areas or to map out the hot spots of California wildfires in real time.”

That kind of language is the military’s way of easing robot killing machines into our consciences. The choppers will follow the Predator into the killing business soon enough.

DVICE: Stanfords robotic helicopters teach each other tricks, fly better than a human
Crazily enough, the helicopters used aren’t fancy at all. They’re just store-bought RC helicopters, with the complex innards added by the Stanford students. The team includes Professor Andrew Ng, graduate students Pieter Abbeel, Adam Coates, Timothy Hunter, Morgan Quigley, and expert remote controller Garett Oku.

Take that, truthers

The Age, with help from a “professional skeptic,” tries to knock-down Sasquatch, UFOs, ghosts, global warming and 9/11 conspiracies — all in one shot. (Click the image, above, to see the article and vid.)

“(The internet) has been the driving force behind a lot of social movements and conspiracy theories,” says the founder of the Skeptic Magazine.

For conspiracy and esoteric researchers, not to mention real cryptozoologists like Loren Coleman (he’s the best in the business), this can be maddening.

By linking charlatans such as Tom Biscardi to those questioning the U.S. government’s stories about 9/11 or global warming, Shermer discredits honest research.

Imperial forces take San Francisco

Great CGI stuff, makes me feel better for moving away from SF, knowing it is clearly now under Imperial occupation.

Also, here’s a chestnut from Alan Watt, last night on RBN, about the “scientific dictatorship,” and its attempts to blind us with science: “When you really see the truth of it all, it’s beyond science science fiction. It’s hell.”

[vodpod id=Groupvideo.1496308&w=425&h=350&fv=]

Sulu no longer solo (officially)

GeorgeTakei.comGeorge Takei and his partner of 21 years were finally able to make it official this week. But the newlyweds may find their good fortune undone in the fall. Anti-marriage activists (perversely calling themselves defenders of the institution) plan to arouse the masses against equality for gays and lesbians, with a ballot measure. — mb

George Takei: Licensed to Wed – E! Online
The Star Trek alum and longtime partner Brad Altman were among the first same-sex couples to obtain licenses in West Hollywood this morning.

“I think it’s a glorious California morning to make history,” the erstwhile Sulu said. “Congratulations to all of us: May equality live long and prosper.”

The 71-year-old actor and his 54-year-old partner have been together for 21 years. Takei said the couple will wed on Sept. 14.

Coffee table for "Alien" lovers

My wife, Lisa, has already spiked this idea for our living room: an Alien-inspired table. I think the most dangerous of this is the giant sheet of glass, unimaginatively plunked on top of a beautiful sculpture made from recycled car and bike parts.

Sadly, this link (see below) links to another, which is unavailable at the moment, as it is getting slammed with traffic. Thanks, Ted! — mb

Alien tables: Not recommended for night time use – SlipperyBrick
These Alien tables are pretty awesome sculptural pieces. If Ripley went into the furniture business, this would naturally be the result. Who wouldn’t love to own one. Thing is, there’s no way this thing is in my house at night. Who wants to walk by this thing in the dark?

"Kirk" calls for depopulation

If Man won’t do it, Nature will, William Shatner says.

(In the Star Trek episode “Mirror, Mirror,” Kirk meets a wicked Spock in a parallel universe. He dissuades his first officer from eradicating an uncooperative humanoid race. Image: StarTrek.com)

from Mark:

Star Trek star William Shatner said last week that the earth is striking back against humans with natural disasters.

“They [people] are pressed together, defecating into the ocean,” said Shatner, who played Captain James T. Kirk in Star Trek. “The earth can’t take it.”

At one point in a long conversation with talk show host Glenn Beck, Shatner decried humankind’s penchant for reproduction. (See clip, and an excerpt from the transcript, below). It is a position he shares with his fellow transhumanist, Max More.

In a strange blurring of real and virtual reality, both Shatner and his Star Trek character are heroes to the transhumanists, who view the human body as limited, imperfect, and in need of artificial augmentation.

The transhumanists also want to bring about “a social order where responsible decisions can be implemented.”

Shatner, a vigorous 74-year-old (he also appears to have been “under the knife”), was on Beck’s show to flog his new autobiography, Up Till Now.

Note: I was a contributing editor to one issue of Glenn Beck’s magazine, Fusion. — mb

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PA2xn35NpdA]

Glenn Beck – Interviews – Shatner v. Glenn
Well, nature, nature eventually will take care of that problem like they did, like nature does with animals. We’re overgrazing. So when deer multiply, when the natural order of things is disturbed and predators are taken away, for example, the deer, they overpopulate, they eat too much of the food and they starve. And we’re going to — if we don’t curb — how do we stop the overpopulation? I guess it’s by education and saying you’ve got to have less children, you can’t have all the children you want anymore. There’s a difference in the world now. Or nature will take care of it.