Some stuff to get off my chest...
INTERSTELLAR TRAVEL
Check out a guy named Cameron Smith on YouTube.
Here's a link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CprziVZHqBk
Settle in. It's over an hour long and he's not the most dynamic speaker. But if you want to think seriously about how the human race might colonize planets in solar systems other than our own, this guy has done the initial serious thinking for you.
Some of my favorite science fiction stories have been concerned with generation ships, interstellar conveyances that recognize that sub-light travel between solar systems requires planning for, at the very least, hundreds of years of travel. These works of fiction vary widely thematically. Many end badly or, if they end well, are initially presented to the reader as being a failed project that required saving. Regardless, I think that one of the reasons that I enjoy these stories is that, in order to be serious, they have to take the time to create scenarios that explain the effect on culture of living as isolated populations of humans in a hostile environment.
There are, of course, differences within the genre. In Rendezvous With Rama
by Arthur C. Clark, we're not talking about humans at all, but rather
an apparently uninhabited generation ship from an alien system that
enters our solar system, slingshots around our sun, and leaves for
interstellar space without seeming to pay too much attention to either
our solar system or the humans that were attempting to explore it. Cities in Flight by
James Blish avoids the question of evolving cultures almost entirely by
simply putting bubbles around Earth cities and having them leave Earth
and bop around space as a backdrop for relatively mundane economic and
political story lines. Mundane for hard science fiction fans, anyway. Perhaps the first book that I read that attempts to seriously approach the question of culture on a generation ship is Starship
by Brian W, Aldiss. Oddly enough, it's not the work on which the
Jefferson Starship based their first album, but my love of acid rock is
another story entirely.
Back
to Cameron Smith. This guy has given serious thought to a project that
he admits is a century away from viability. Given the requirements of
establishing a human outpost without the prospect of communication with
the home world more quickly than at intervals of light years apart,
there is much to consider, from genetic diversity to language and
governance and viewscapes and so much more.
Did you know that on a space station with low air pressure and high oxygen content, humans lose the ability to whistle?
Smith
posits that in order to ensure success, a generation ship should carry
40,000 humans plus all of the necessary plants and animals to
approximate human cultural norms. Because, he says, that's one of the
main reasons to embark on such an adventure, to preserve human culture. As I said, he's not a very dynamic speaker, but I find the subject matter
fascinating. See if you do, too.
GUNS
People who don't see the logic of banning high caliber, rapid firing, large magazine rifles are not the type of people to be swayed by logical argument. I therefore try to use their own twisted logic against them. I tell them that their two most sacred mantras in favor of their idea of Second Amendment rights are actually the most persuasive arguments for gun control.
They say: Guns don't kill people. People kill people.
I say: Then explain to me as if we're in kindergarten why you want to make it easier for people who want to kill people to get their hands on the means to kill as many people as they could possibly want to kill. I'll wait.
They say: If you criminalize guns, only criminals will have them.
I say: Good, then the alienated teenager won't have one and the deranged fired worker won't have one and the abusive husband won't have one and toddlers won't have one to accidentally kill a playmate with. If criminals are the only ones with guns, we'll all be safer. Real criminals don't shoot up suburban malls for no good reason. There's no money in it.
There's a logical reason that stricter gun control can be demonstrated to be Constitutional, too. If you happen to be debating about the subject with someone who might be susceptible to a flash of reasonableness now and then, try this...
They say: My Second Amendment rights are enshrined in the Constitution.
You say: Explain to me, like we were in kindergarten, why the right to keep and bear arms is not a part of the First Amendment. Let me suggest that the Founders didn't find it necessary to define or add modifiers to First Amendment rights. Freedom of Speech. of Press. of Religion. By right. Every other right does need and receive appropriate modification. No billeting troops in private homes EXCEPT in times of war. No searches and seizures WITHOUT a warrant. Trials for major crimes can ONLY take place AFTER an indictment. And that's why that pesky phrase about militias is in the Second. It was meant to be there. It modifies the right. Otherwise, that right would be in the First, unmodified. Do you think that the Founders just threw the phrase about militias in the Second for the fun of it? Show me another place in the Constitution where they did something like that. I'll wait.
The Second guarantees that the federal government will not prevent states from forming militias. That was a non controversial statement not so long ago. I believe that it is, to coin a phrase, Original Intent.
D.C STATEHOOD
Speaking of the Constitution, these days it seems as though the Constitution is like the Bible. The folks who talk about it loudest are folks who haven't read it or don't want you to read it.
The Constitution did not create Washington, D.C. The Constitution didn't even require that a federal district be created that would be the seat of American government. The Constitution says that Congress MAY create a federal district. MAY isn't SHALL. It was up to Congress.
And Congress did. And once Congress had, the Constitution says that Congress has EXCLUSIVE authority over ALL of the District. Article 1, Section 8 doesn't require D.C. and does not prohibit Congress from using its legislative authority to make that district a state. That’s what Congress does...legislate. And what Congress giveth, Congress can taketh away.
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