Who or What Was the First Robot? A Debate

The definition of “robot” is quite controversial. The most common definition is that a robot is a machine capable of carrying out complex tasks or series of tasks based on programming from a human. But culturally, and in the science fiction…

Time Travel Roundup

Fittingly, for a year that many of us would like to fast-forward past or, alternatively, rewind and start different, 2020 has ushered in a massive shift in time travel discourse. Time travel into the past, once thought to be theoretically…

Will Ransomware Threaten Municipal Election Security?

Lucas Ropek put up a moderately long piece on Governing last week on the threat of ransomware attacks on state and local government websites, and the specific threat such attacks may pose for elections. Ransomware comes from the world of…

Could Better Communication Fix Tesla’s Troubles?

Public communication is vital to business maintenance, and this importance only increases when a company’s products are on the cutting edge of its field’s technology. Why? Because edgy tech is . . . edgy. It doesn’t always work perfectly the first…

Using High-Speed Rail to Help the Poor

It’s no secret that the U.S. is way behind the rest of the world in scaling its infrastructure. Now, recent news from China seems to have relegated the U.S. even further back. The South China Morning Post reported last month that “China’s…

The Indelible Influence of Asimov: Apple’s Streaming Service Debuts Foundation

It has inspired innovations in sociology and psychology. It has sparked the imagination of liberals like Paul Krugman and conservatives like Newt Gingrich. It even shares credit (or blame) for some of Elon Musk’s innovations. Isaac Asimov’s…

The Impact of Ancient Encryption

Communication is an essential part of humanity, and, presumably, we need to be honest in most of our communicative acts in order for society to function. Yet, dishonest communication has often been a driver of history, and systemic communicative…

Sci-Fi Pets Roundup

In Poor Richard’s Almanack, Benjamin Franklin includes dogs in his list of essentials for a good life. “There are,” he writes, “three faithful friends: an old wife, an old dog, and ready money.” In many science fiction scenarios, spouses and money…

Are We In A Videogame, Or Something Else?

A prominent theme in both science fiction and advanced physics is the possibility that our lives are not truly our lives, that everything we thought was true was an elaborate lie—that this reality is not what we think it is. The most popular…

Furry, Feathered or Otherwise Non-Human Electoral Candidates in Fact and Fiction

Humans have been imagining non-human animals as human for at least 40,000 years and probably longer. The “Lion-Human” of Hohlenstein-Stadel cave in Germany is 32,000 years old. We have invented non-human beings who stand for human traits, and…