An Embarassment to Science

Well, on a more positive note, let's just say this young Engineering Professor is somewhat still evolving, he'll get it right one day...

There is only ONE Spock and that is of course Leonard,

I totally agree, he is sadly missed by millions of fans, including me...

Being 60 plus years old Leadfoot, you probably saw the old black & white "Flash Gordon" when you were younger or I maybe wrong...

Oh I did. But even then I was left disappointed. The rocket exhaust just didn't look right and his relationship with Dale was - cheesy.

You'probably would have felt a bit ripped off seeing graphics like that in Flash Gordon. But I used to love the black and white tv version of Superman(George Reeves) when I was a child, I'd be running down the long drive way trying to fly, so amazing how tv graphics can affect the minds of children. I guess technology has come a long way since you were young, some say quite fast in the past 80yrs or so. I think the creators of Star Trek made some breakthroughs in tv graphics. I wasn't even borned when they made the first one in 1965, I was borned 2yrs later. You would have seen a lot of technological changes from when you were younger...

I think the graphics was the least of Flash Gordons' problems. Even worse was the lack of any worthwhile plot. For example, "Forbidden Planet" released in 1956 had crude special effects but a fantastic plot line and made you think about deeper implications. Disney's "The Black Hole" had great effects and CGI but was an unwatchable piece of crap - no detectable story or plot.

The original Flash Gordon was solid kitch and (I think) gave substance to the word "camp".
MING from MONGO
and a spaceship that flew like a buzzing turd and crashed rather than landed.
I was like 8 when they would show these things on Sat TV in the late 50's and a bunch of us would meet at somebody else's house to watch . I remember getting my first stiffy seeing Dale Arden in one of her flimsy dresses that Ming would make her wear every time hed try to do her. Maybe that was a few years later, cause Flash was on tv till the 70's as saturday trash tv.

Liszt's Les Preludes was among the first orchestral pieces I recall. Heres some Uzbeki kid who conducts the piece the way I LIKE IT , he does it a bit faster than the rest of the big orchestra "maestros" . Liszt always played his music al vivaci

course, the kid needed a better orchestra behind him. I woulda fired the coronets and one or two woodwinds

Amazing how music can trigger memory. I can remember even the hiss and pop on the intro music of my all time favorite from the same era.
Science Fiction Theater. My head plays it whenever I think of the show. Just had to look it up on YouTube to see if that was literally true. Yep, it's all there.

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=uBWPa-Pv-tg

The coronets weren't too much better than what the kid was working with.

If I remember correctly, smell is a good memory trigger.

True, 5th grade is all controlled by the smell of brass and valve oil. Band was the only class I liked. Comes back every time I open the case.

Nice, if you can smell. I pretty much can't, well tested.

I'm keen on visuals and words.

How's your taste buds?

My taste buds are interesting, at least to me. You may have noticed how interested I am in cooking.

I can smell garlic in my face while chopping it.
I cannot smell mercapto ethanol -- my classroom cleared out and I'd no idea why, and slowly followed.
Later I was assigned to be the one to work with it in the hood.
I can't smell gas, in or out of my house. This is part of why I am afraid of fire.
I don't smell roses, much as I have done landscape design.

I cannot detected the smells of many things, and have been tested for all that/ UC Irvine expert.

I understand from many readings in my life that people who can't smell can't taste. Maybe my taste buds are super. I may be able to smell some stuff that reaches my nasal nerve endings, but not much.


My father couldn't smell either.
So, a kind of hereditary anosmia.
This can go with eye trouble, which I have, but experts say that I've not got Usher's syndrome.

On the other hand, I like a lot of food.

That you like a lot of food tells me that you have the ability to taste different tastes - however limited. When we were in Gilroy, my wife and I ate some burgers with garlic - lots of garlic. We couldn't smell it, but the taste was very strong. I'm pretty certain others within close range of us smelled the garlic. It's interesting that you can't smell gas.

also dangerous.

There is much I can't smell, but I am older now and am used to it.

It's sometimes almost funny when I read books, as authors rhapsodize about this and that smells while they establish a scene. I get it, and I don't get it at all.

And he listed a bunch of malfunctions of his olfactory receptor cells.
I wish the old man well, anyways.

Ive often wondered about this. Xmen movies and talks of evolution always seem to move forward. But what if evolution decides its moving forward too fast and resets itself by reverting instead of advancing? Can evolution "short out?"

Actually that is a pretty good point. There is no logical reason why evolution could not go backwards since no one disputes that the vast majority of mutations are not 'forward'.