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How Will Marriage Equality Change Everything?

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As we approach the legalization of marriage equality on Tuesday in Florida, the third largest state in the US, I’m pulling out my crystal ball to look into the future. Mark and I have been married now for 6 years, and together for almost 23. Marriage really has changed things for us – we feel different together. People treat us differently. When I introduce him as my husband, hardly anyone seems to give it a second thought. I have spent so much energy in the last seven years pushing for LGBT rights and marriage equality. Many in the LGBT community … Read more

The Post-Apocalyptic Diet

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What would we eat in the event of global catastrophe? Two researchers have come up with the answers and let’s just say that it involves plenty of bacterial slime and rats. In a new book titled Feeding Everyone No Matter What, risk researchers have imagined eight scenarios where some calamity destroyed our ability to grow crops. The list includes sudden climate change, super-weeds, super-bacteria, super-pests, super-pathogens, super-volcano eruption, asteroid impact, and nuclear winter.2 The authors of the book, Joshua Pearce at Michigan Technological University and David Denkenberger at the Global Catastrophic Risk Institute, were tired of people imagining apocalyptic scenarios … Read more

Me Me Monday

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Welcome to ME ME MONDAY at our FB discussion group – your chance to pop in and tell us about your latest success. Have a new book or short story coming out? Let us know. Just sell something? Let us know so we can cheer you on. HOW IT WORKS: I’ll pin this topic to the top of our FB discussion page for the day. –Please post your announcement as a separate post, so I can also share it over to our FB page (as opposed to this discussion group). –If you want, send me your book announcement info at … Read more

A Great Lake on Mars?

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NASA has announced a major discovery by the Curiosity rover; water may have been more plentiful on the planet’s surface than previously thought. This could mean that some forms of life existed on Mars millions of years ago. In a news conference earlier this week, lead scientist John Grotzinger said that observations by the rover on its year-long trek across the Gale Crater indicate that the area was likely dotted with rivers, deltas and even a “great lake” in the distant past. Taking soil samples and detailed photos as it made its way towards Mount Sharp, the rover discovered layered … Read more

What If All the Ice Was Gone?

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Two hundred sixty feet of sea level rise. The number is breathtaking, and yet matter-of-fact: It simply describes how much oceans would rise if all of the planet’s great ice sheets — all of Greenland, all of Antarctica — were to melt entirely and fall into the oceans. Nobody thinks this will happen in our lifetimes. However, if we let global warming rip, and move into a hothouse world with enough heat trapped by atmospheric greenhouse gases, it could someday. After all, the planet has been there before — in the late Cretaceous period, some 80 million years ago, sea … Read more

Could Religion Survive Contact With Extraterrestrials?

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I’ll be honest with you: I think it’s extremely unlikely that humanity will ever make contact with intelligent life from another planet. I possess no special expertise on the subject. It’s just that my inveterate skepticism tells me that the stupefying vastness of space combined with the relative rarity of evolution producing species capable of interstellar communication — let alone travel — will make such contact extremely unlikely. My skepticism isn’t widely shared. Aside from the UFO industrial complex and the enormous number of science-fiction novels, films, and television franchises that imagine a universe teeming with technologically advanced civilizations, there … Read more

What’s Next for the Paranormal?

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Hey all, Given that we’re approaching the end of the year, I thought it would be fun to do a few topics on emerging trends for 2015. Since we haven’t done a paranormal topic in a few days, I’d like you to get out your crystal balls (or magic mirrors or scrying ponds) and tell us what you think will be hot in 2015 and 2016 in paranormal circles. Will Zombies continue their shuffle to world domination? Will Vampires swoop in for another kill? Will werewolves shift the conversation back to themselves? Ar will a new paranormal threat manifest in … Read more

News: Would You Go Shopping Underwater?

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Some retailers believe that it’s important to make their stores easy to find. They’ll even pay a premium for space in popular malls or streets with lots of foot traffic. Sony is taking a different approach with its Xperia Aquatech Store, one that definitely does not value convenience and spits on the concept of foot traffic. For one thing, it’s underwater. For another, you have to scuba to get there. On top of that, you have to be invited. This is a marketing gimmick to drive home the point that Sony makes waterproof devices, but it’s an admirably over-the-top (or, … Read more

News: To Mars in 2035?

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NASA announced its plan to send humans to Mars ahead of the first flight test of the space agency’s next-generation Orion spacecraft. As part of its “Next Giant Leap,” the agency detailed its ambitious timeline, which will include a manned mission to an asteroid in the 2020s followed by the first mission to Mars in the 2030s. On Thursday, Orion will take flight in an uncrewed test, traveling 3,600 miles above Earth (by comparison, the International Space Station orbits around 268 miles above Earth). Orion, developed by Lockheed Martin, will launch atop the United Launch Alliance Delta IV Heavy Rocket … Read more