Tag Archives: brain blog

BRAIN BLOG: Laser vs. Plasma, Sword Battle of Doom!

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Star Wars Laser Swords
Original Star Wars concept art by Ralph McQuarrie

1 STARKILLER AND HIS TRUSTY LAZERSWORD

Stories abound on the internet these days about early drafts of the original Star Wars trilogy. Lucas made the move from Starkiller to Skywalker, from Bogan to The Dark Side, and since when is Biggs Luke’s brother? But most importantly for this essay, he went from Lazersword to Lightsaber, (check out starwarz.com for more). Both of which are terrible misnomers, even though the latter is far cooler sounding. Unfortunately both regular light and light amplified by the stimulated emission of radiation are completely useless as a weapon, or a tool, or anything beyond a fancy colored flashlight for finding your way through a dense jungle cavern. So let’s do this . . .
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BRAIN BLOG: Time Travel and Thermodynamics

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Time Travel White

1 WHERE WE’RE GOING, WE DON’T NEED ROADS . . .

Hollywood seems to be a huge fan of veering off into no-man’s land when time travel is involved. From flux capacitors to spinning egg timers on a string they would have you believe that “All of the silly details to time travel have already been accounted for, surely then you need only believe the premise of the story!” Perhaps that is indeed the case. Maybe we should believe in the science of a flux capacitor, an ancient staff, a metal box with washers glued to it, or a giant spinning EM quantum field generator. They sound science-y don’t they? I mean, the writers must have had the decency to look into these theories before taking the leap onto the silver screen. . . right?
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THE SCI-FI PODCAST EP 7: Marvel Cinematic Universe, Phase 2 including Avengers: Age of Ultron (2015) and Ant-Man (2015)

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MCU Phase 2Welcome to The SciFi Podcast, a wretched hive of scum and villainy a podcast focused on in-depth discussion of all things Science Fiction. The SciFi Podcast features three hosts—Mattroid, Solo, and Station!—and frequent guests. Each episode we look at a science fiction theme or franchise and take the discussion where no show has gone before.

On this episode of The SciFi Podcast, SpaceWolf returns for a Considering the Sequels style show to discuss the entire second phase of the Marvel Cinematic Universe including a feature review of Avengers: Age of Ultron (2015) with special guest Wildman Willis Wheeler, as well as a feature review of Ant-Man (2015)! We’ll also be bringing you more MCU mini-reviews of Iron Man 3 (2013) and Thor: The Dark World (2013) and Captain America: The Winter Soldier (2014) and Guardians of the Galaxy (2014) and our Top 3 MCU film lists.

Theme music courtesy of I Hear Sirens, featuring Matt on bass and Liz on keyboard. Hear more of I Hear Sirens ethereal, instrumental, post-rock at BandCamp. Podcast production and art by SpaceWolf who can be found podcasting at Movie Stream Cast and Horror Movie Podcast. You can also follow him on Twitter @IcarusArts.

Show notes after the jump.
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BRAIN BLOG: The Physics of Ant-Man or The Science of Small

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The Physics of Ant ManArtwork by the very talented Rodolfo Reyes via the Poster Posse

1 THE SCIENCE OF SMALL

Shrinking ourselves down to the size of an ant has long been a popular theme in science fiction. Movies such as Honey I Shrunk the Kids, Innerspace, Fantastic Voyage, The Incredible Shrinking Woman, and many more have depicted shrinking in various forms or another, all culminating in the same result; I was big, now I’m small. But how realistic is this? Have these movies portrayed the science of small correctly, or are there scientific issues far beyond what is portrayed on the silver screen?

To address these questions and more, we will take a look at the 2015 release of Marvel’s Ant-Man and the modern physical laws that come into play in the movie.
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