Pheaturing Ethan Siegel

Rabbit. Hey, kids, welcome to the Phile for a Thursday. How are you? If you're one of those people who can't handle holiday music being played before Thanksgiving, November 1st probably isn't a fun day for you. Even though it low key feels like it was just summer, Halloween has come and gone and it's time to buy a warm coat and get festive. Just last night, we were all dressed up in fun costumes with falling leaves, pumpkins and all that is autumn, but today is November 1st whether we're feeling it or not. Get ready for Thanksgiving, this year is flying by!
Another year, another white person making their Halloween costume needlessly racist. It's really not that complicated, white people can totally dress as black celebrities if they want, they just shouldn't wear blackface. You can dress in a Beyoncé outfit go the whole nine yards without painting your face black and turning it into a minstrel show. But sadly, this year Missouri-based nurse and her husband took the low road with blackface imitations of Beyoncé and Jay Z. When Shelbi Elliot-Heenan and her husband Jasmond Heena decided to dress as Beyoncé and Jay Z this year, they truly made the least effort while creating the maximum offensive effect. Neither of them put together outfits that look remotely like anything Jay Z and Beyoncé have worn, and they both went out in complete blackface, with Jasmond taking the minstrel show reference a step further with pink painted lips. See for yourself...

Needless to say, shortly after Shelbi posted the photo of them on her Facebook, they spread beyond her small circle. The hospital she worked at, Saint Luke's, quickly launched an investigation. Shortly after the photo made the rounds, Saint Luke's decided to terminate Shelbi and released an official statement about the matter. "While it is against Saint Luke’s policy to comment on specific personnel matters, we can confirm that this individual is no longer a Saint Luke’s employee. Saint Luke’s is deeply committed to our culture of diversity and inclusion. It is fundamental to who we are as an organisation and we vigorously protect it on behalf of all our patients and employees and expect those who represent us to do the same." Shelbi's swift consequences have certainly provided a bit of schadenfreude for all of the people who've been explaining why blackface is racist yearly.
I have one word for Shelbi upon hearing of her fired status: BYE.
It might seem redundant for a Fox News Barbie such as Tomi Lahren to put on a costume, but the perky cheerleader for making America a white ethno-state got into the Halloween spirit! Tomi Lahren's Halloween costume is a massive self-own and a real treat. Timmy decided to reference a photo from over a year ago, and her reenactment is accidentally very insulting to Trump.

It's been a long year. Just in case you forgot about this outrage cycle from May 2017 (it's soooooooo 78 crises ago), Kathy Griffin pretended to decapitate Trump and she lost her job co-hosting CNN's New Year's Eve party because of it. Two hours later, the "dumb, racist, and talentless hack" had a clapback, and it's okay.

Other than the obvious irony of violent imagery, Timothée's costume raises a few questions. It is unclear whether we are supposed to see Tami's recreation through the lens of someone with Trump Derangement Syndrome. Is she making fun of people who think Trump is a clown? What does she mean by depicting Trump as a clown? The object of the parody appears to be Trump, rather than Kathy. There are definitely ways to have made this send-up clearer and funnier. While it's certainly accidental... considering the fact that she is paid to hype up Trump on state TV... it is a powerful repudiation of the president. She ain't the sharpest tool.
If you think you've already dated a ghost because someone never texted you back, think again. A woman in England named Amethyst Realm, 30, who you might remember from explaining how she was going to have a phantom baby with her Australian ghost lover, has just officially announced her engagement. If you're thinking "damn, I'm not even engaged, and this woman found a spiritual being to put a ring on it" you're not alone. Remember, there are plenty of ghosts in the sea? Realm, who works as a spiritual healer, previously described her relationship with spirits with "iTV This Morning." Realm met her lover not on Tinder or at a bar, but on a walk in Australia. Assuming he would be like one of the other twenty spirits she's dated and literally ghost her, she was surprised when she felt him join her on the plane back to England. She claims she cannot see "him," but rather feels his presence, even once joining the "Mile High Club" with him in a plane bathroom. Realm claims that during a stroll through caves in Somerset, England's Wookey Hole, the spirit proposed when the words, "will you marry me?" echoed through the caves. She told The Sun, "There was no going down on one knee... he doesn’t have knees! But for the first time, I heard him speak. It’s hard to explain but, until that point, his words were inside my head. But, on that day, the words were outside. I could actually hear his voice and it was beautiful. Deep, sexy and real.” While they're still in the process of choosing a ring, Realm hopes the stone will be her namesake: an amethyst. The ceremony will be a "handfasting" pagan ritual, where both of their hands are tied together as a symbol of their union, "somewhere on the English countryside." He doesn't have knees, but he has... hands? According to Realm, her family approves of the unconventional couple. “My family are quite alternative, so anything I do or say doesn’t faze them." As for her phantom husband-to-be, who according to a medium Realm has dated in three past lives, Realm said, “I’m so happy to have found him. I know in my heart that he’s the one for me.
A creative pyromaniac in Lafayette, Indiana successfully pulled the fire alarm at school... not with his hand, but with his piss. The Lafayette Journal & Courier reports that a 12-year-old peed on an electrical outlet last Friday at his middle school, and it either started a fire or generated enough smoke because the alarm did indeed go off. The boy was arrested, taken to juvenile probation intake offices, and accused of "criminal recklessness." Lafeyette Fire Investigator Todd Trent is mystified by the physics of how the kid managed to set the fire. "Trent said that would not be possible if the boy was standing upright. But neither is it likely that the urine hitting from that angle would have soaked into the outlet to create enough heat to cause a fire, Trent said, adding that the case remains under investigation," the Journal & Courier reports. Hopefully the po-po can crack the case of the pee-pee.
It's official, we have a Halloween winner. A little girl name Maya in Southbay Village, Philippines has the most adorable and horrifying costume of the year. Trick-or-treating with her own head on a platter, 2-year-old Maya has been scaring people all day.

The best part is, her "neck" doubles as a basket for all her candy, which is essentially the "this dress has pockets" feeling of the Halloween costume world. Maya's mom, Krystel Hwang, confessed on Instagram that she made the costume for her daughter, and that no children were harmed in the creation. Maya was joined by her sister, who dressed as a butcher. They killed it! Congratulations on winning Halloween, Maya. For everyone else, good luck trying to beat that. Maybe if we all put our "heads" together...
I love dogs, but some dogs sure can be assholes. Like this one...

If he could talk he'd say, "Thank you for this nice new chew toy!" If I had a TARDIS I would go back to 1945 and and watch German soldiers react to footage of Concentration Camps...

They look sad, right? Or embarrassed? So, parents, do your kids ever think like this?

I bet they are from Alabama. So, the Aquaman movie comes out soon and I wasn't sure I wanted to see it until I saw this screenshot from it...

Now I definitely wanna see it. Okay, it's Thursday... you know what that means...

WTF? I have no idea what to say about that. Now from the home office in Port Jefferson, here is...

Top Phive Things You Use Or Enjoy You Need To Thank A Jew For

5. The polo vaccine

4. Levi's jeans

3. Teddy bears

2. Batman

And the number one thing you might use or enjoy that you need to thank a Jew for is...

1. Latex condoms

Huh? That's a Mindphuck? Hmmmm. Anyway, moving on... it's time to talk football with my good friend Jeff.

Me: Hey, Jeff, welcome to the Phile. How are you? Did you dress up for Halloween this year? I was the Riddler. 

Jeff: Always good to be back on the Phile! I'm doing alright. How about you? Funny you should mention a DC Villain because I was a DC Hero. I was the fastest man alive! I was the Flash! 

Me: Cool. Okay, before we talk about football, let's talk the World Series. You must be excited the Red Sox won, right? 

Jeff: Of course I was excited to watch the Red Sox win the World Series. To go 86 years without a championship and then to have 4 in the last 14 years? That's damn near a dynasty! 

Me: Did you watch that whole third game with the 18 innings? That's a crazy long game. Can you imagine a football game being that long? 

Jeff: Unfortunately no, I didn't make it through that game. It's the only game I didn't stay up for. I went to bed in the 10th. That was just a long game! And can't believe they had to play the next day! 

Me: Okay, so, I have to say I was watching the series and one thing annoyed the shit outta me... this! 

Me: What the hell? What's the story about him standing like that and staring? Does it annoy you as well? 

Jeff: Craig Kimbrel does that motion as a way to psyche out his opponents. He's staring them down right before he walks the bases loaded before getting the outs for the save. The stare doesn't bother me, the walking the bases loaded does! 

Me: Still annoying. Okay, on to football... what NFL stories do you have this week? The only one I really have is the Rams got booed at their own stadium as Packers fans turned L.A. Coliseum into Lambeau Field. 

Jeff: The biggest news of the week is the Browns once again fired their head coach as well as their offensive coordinator. The defensive coordinator will take over the team. The Browns are a better team then they were last year which isn't saying much since they went 0-16. A few more trades went down at the trade deadline but nothing that I would call ground breaking. Still, more trades this year then I can remember in any other year. 

Me: Britain took over another team... 

Jeff: I could see myself being a fan of the Whiskey Growlcats. Mostly because of the name! 

Me: Okay, so, how did we do last week? I know the Giants lost real bad. 

Jeff: So I have good news and I have bad news. Well, it depends on who you ask. For me it was an excellent week going 2-0 with a Steeler win. For you? Well you went 0-2 with the aformentioned Giants loss. So you still lead. By one point. Again, the only reason it's so close is the Steelers first place record as opposed to the last place Giants record. 

Me: Ugh! Okay, let's do this week's pics... I say Saints by 5 and Redskins by 1. What do you say? 

Jeff: My picks are Chiefs by 9 and Panthers by 3. 

Me: Okay, then, I will see you back here next Thursday. 

Jeff: See you next week!

If you attempt to rob a bank you won't have any trouble with rent/food for the next ten yeas whether you're successful or not.

A majority of the modern world has come to accept that women are not only funny, but they're also terrifying human beings who are capable of vicious clap-backs if you don't laugh at their jokes.

Haha. I'm laughing. Now for some sad news...

Willie McCovey 

January 10th, 1938 — October 31st, 2018 

Some people called him "the scariest hitter of all time." I'm sticking with "Big Willie." 

Whitey Bulger 

September 3rd, 1929 — October 30th, 2018 

He died doing what he loved: Participating in a murder.

Phact 1. The Dwarf Planet Pluto has a five moon celestial system comparable to our own earth and moon, except Charon (Pluto’s first moon) is so big it forces the center of gravity away from the planets, thus causing them to spin around a random point in space. 

Phact 2. Theoretically humans can survive on just the diet of potatoes and butter. 

Phact 3. Neil Patrick Harris earned $210,000 per episode of "How I Met Your Mother," while the rest of the main cast earned $120,000 per episode. 

Phact 4. Snooker player Ronnie O’Sullivan was accused of disrespect by an opponent for using his opposite hand to take a shot. To prove he wasn’t bringing the game into disrepute, he played three frames with his left-hand against a former world championship runner-up, winning all three. 

Phile 5. Deer antlers are the fastest growing tissue on Earth and are capable of expanding an inch every two days during their velvet stage. 

Today's pheatured guest is an American theoretical astrophysicist and science writer, who studies Big Bang theory. His book, "Treknology: The Science of Star Trek from Tricorders to Warp Drive" is the 89th book to be pheatured in the Phile's Book Club. Please welcome to the Phile... Ethan Siegel.

Me: Hello, Ethan, welcome to the Phile. How are you? 

Ethan: Well, thank you. It's my pleasure to be here on the Peverett Phile. 

Me: So, first of, I have to ask, what's with the blue dress? 

Ethan: I'm a hairy fairy. 

Me: Ummm... okay. Ethan, where are you from originally? 

Ethan: The Bronx, but I love in Toledo in Washington now. 

Me: Alright. Your book "Treknology: The Science of Star Trek from Tricorders to Warp Drive" is the 89th book to be pheatured in the Phile's Book Club. So, I take it you're a "Star Trek" fan, am I right? What about the show did you like? 

Ethan: You know, I think anyone who has watched an episode of "Star Trek" or has seen it immediately gets this feeling the future can be wonderful but it's up to us to make it so. I got into "The Next Generation" when I was a kid and I just thought it was wonderful. There was this vision of a future that was filled with humanity and exploring the stars. But it wasn't just ship based technology like warp drive and impulse engines that made it so fascinating, it was all the ways that people's daily lives with medicines and communications that all sort of different aspects of our lives were connected by technology. 

Me: So, how did the book come about, Ethan? 

Ethan: As we've grown I guess it's been thirty years since "The Next Generation" came out so many of these technologies that seemed like pipe dreams are absolutely on their way or already here as actual real technology. So, I think this is just naturally what comes about in someone's mind. There's a new "Star Trek" series that just came out last year and when we look back at the original series when something like a sliding door was novel. We could see you know we've come so far with the prospects of these technologies that are still seemingly so far in the future, what are the physical possibilities. what are the technical advances we made and what are we looking at? So many of these have come to fruition already... how many are going to be fruition within our lifetime? 

Me: I don't know. So, what are some of things people use now in real life that were first on the show?  

Ethan: Well, some of them are from so long ago. You might remember in the original series Captain Kirk and the original Enterprise crew had their handheld flip communicators and arguably those were the direct inspiration of the very first flip cell phone that people used. The design of them was based on what they saw on the "Star Trek" communicator. I already mentioned sliding doors but there are so many things that come about that were directly inspired by "Star Trek." In "The Next Generation" there was Geordi La Forge who was a blind man but was able to see through an addition of a visor and they actually developed a technology known as a "hat pack" where people can put a device on their head, over their eyes and when they turn their head visual information that their eyes can't see gets fed into their mind and suddenly they can see again. 

Me: I don't believe that. I need to Google that. What else, Ethan? 

Ethan: All sort of things... the ability to control robots with our mind, the ability to interface with prosthetics, these are something's that "Star Trek" just envisioned as an off-hand thing. Here we are and that's real today. Ideas of a replicator that could make full concoctions for you it's part of our reality in 3D printing. If you put the right foods into a food stock you can literally 3D yourself a pizza. So, I think it's not just the idea of soaring to the stars but how actually technology effects our day to day life, "Star Trek" has been an inspiration for a long, long time. 

Me: I haven't seen the "Star Trek" TV shows in a long time, but I vaguely remember something called a tricorder. What was that and is that something that is possible now? 

Ethan: They certainly did. What they said a tricorder would need to do was perform a whole series of biological functions. We have a few things that we have a one off device for like if you're a diabetic we can test your glucose level with one such device. They have these individual test cases for what they want to do. But what a tricorder could do is it could monitor a whole slew of your vital signs in one single hand held device. Do you remember there was sometimes an additional attachment that people would scan, that there was a scanner hooked up to a tricorder to give a medical readout? It's one of the quickest and expedient ways for even someone who had basic knowledge of how such device worked. They could obtain all sort of useful information about a person, how they were doing and if they were stable or in serious condition. Something like that is not decades and decades away, something like this we have a number of about a dozen diagnostic tests simply by scanning a person's body with a handheld device we can accumulate information, Some of them still require blood draws, some require a cellular material but others could be tested just by remote monitoring of a person. That's really incredible. 

Me: I love and don't mind getting shots, I actually like it, but I know a lot of people don't like it. I'm surprised there's not a way for the same results to happen without getting a needle in the arm, or ass or anywhere. What do you think? 

Ethan: It's funny you say that, Jason. That is a technology that we have actually have used. We have a hypospray that is real. Only due to the fact we used them for a mass vaccination. When they need to vaccinate a large group of people rapidly against something that they think is an epidemic. This remote sort of airgun that is called a jet-injector actually exists. The only reason it is not more widespread used is we haven't yet mastered a jet-injection that will be powerful enough to go through clothing, to go through skin, to go onto the blood stream that won't splash back genetic material, or blood, or something that will out you at risk of infection. That's the only batteries left and people are still working on that so hypospray's are an actual technology that we've actually developed. If we could get past this last safety hurdle you won't get pricked again... even though you'd like to. 

Me: Haha. Is there any technology in "Star Trek" that you don't ever see happening, apart from warp drive, whatever that is? 

Ethan: The one that I'm skeptical about is teleportation. There's this idea of transporting something that is taking apart atom by atom, molecule by molecule reconstructed. In theory we can learn the quantum state of every particle in one location and disassemble it and reassemble it in another location. I don't think this is impossible because it's physically impossible. Although it might be a long way off, I fear it maybe impossible because of this ethical question that we shutter to ask ourselves. What would be the result of I took your body, if I took all the particles in your body, deconstructed you, particle by particle and constructed you particle by particle somewhere else. You know there's nothing special about protons and neutrons or electrons or these subtonic particles make up protons and neutrons, they're identical to one another, they're indistinguishable for one another. If I took all the atoms in your body and replaced them with identical atoms you would never know it, you would be no different. We know this because if I took a look at your body ten years ago versus now, they'd be no atoms in your body that were the same from that time til now. So, this makes me wonder of I did this to myself or we did this to anyone, we took ourselves apart after scanning everything in, and reconstructed us you'd that be like creating an entirely new person and murdering the original? 

Me: That's a good point. Did "Star Trek" ever question this kind of thing? 

Ethan: The one thing I love about "Star Trek" is they did wrestle with these ethical questions. This may be the most ethical one of all. In the "Star Trek" prequel "Enterprise" Captain Archer said that he wouldn't put his dog through a transporter because he wouldn't trust it would be the same dog on the other side. Right now I think if we were to develop transport technology I wouldn't want to use it on any human beings at all. There's a big difference between cut and paste and copy, paste and delete the original. I don't want any of us to be the deleted original. 

Me: Not all technology is going to work well, Ethan. Technology sucks a lot. Haha. Are their any technologies that are never gonna happen because technology fails sometimes? 

Ethan: I think it's important to realize science and technology really do progress one step at a time. Often what we view as the biggest failures are also the biggest learning experiences we have. One of the technologists we have right on the cusp of coming into existence is synthahol. It is the idea that you can take something that has all of the positive affects of alcohol, the feeling of euphoria, the increased confidence, the happiness, the feeling you can do pretty much anything, being the best version of yourself, without any of those negative affects. Without dehydration, without the hangover, without the dead brain cells, without losing your dinner because you drank too much. The ability to sober up in an instant. That's sort of the dream of anyone whose ever partake in, and yet that's right on the cusp of existing. Not because we finally think we cracked it, because we developed this whole class of drugs that are related to valium that has some of the side effects that we recognize that they are these receptors, combined with receptors that we want to inhibit, that we want to be able to unbid to from. So, I would say it's so easy to look at of to fails or there's a risk of failure, and this is a big deal, and we'll never achieve it. But I think it's more optimistic and more realistic to look at our failures as learning opportunities. When we do learn why did it fail we also learn how we can do better. So, yes, there will be accidents while we develop these technologies and there will be failures along the way but the big thing we have to look forward to when we understand how it works, what goes into it, we could engineer a solution that will be as close to foolproof as our universe will allow. 

Me: How far away is traveling farther into space than we have done? 

Ethan: You know that's one of the most powerful things we can actually imagine. If you talk about chemical based rockets, like rocket fuel, you know Einstein's E=Mc2, this tells you for any amount of math how much energy you can conceivably get out of it. With chemical based rockets we are lucky of we get a 1000% efficiency of it. Most of that energy never gets liberated, it's the change of the chemical bond in the electron structure of these atoms that causes a reaction. With nuclear fuel we do a little bit better, we can get up to almost 1%, we can get between a tenth of a percent and a whole percent. If you had anti-matter matter reaction, a particle high matter and a particle of matter colliding together then 100% of that mass gets converted into pure energy not only could you go farther, faster, you could do it with lighter payloads. This would be the real dream, the real way to make it happen is with anti-matter inhalation. Now we know how to make anti-matter, collide things together at high enough energies, and every once in awhile you get spontaneous creation of matter and anti-matter. If you isolate matter you can peel it off with a magnetic field and isolate, then you can store it. We've been doing that with particle accelerators for decades. Recently one of the tremendous advances that happened we've bright together an anti-proton and positron, which is the anti-matter version of an electron, we've slowed them down and got them to bind together and we created neutral anti-matter for the first time. We have created anti-atoms and we've been able to not only measure properties of them to find them to behave exactly like we expect but we've even been able to store it up to about twenty minutes at a time before it accidentally runs into some matter and go away. Now a fuel atoms is a long way away from having enough anti-matter to use as a fuel source we've demonstrated it's possible. If you look where we were twenty-five years ago to where we are today there's no reason to believe we won't have an appreciable amount, even if it's just nano-grams of anti-matter safely stored somewhere twenty-five years in the future. This is something that is not only possible but we are working on making it practically useful today. 

Me: Man, you just gave me a fucking migraine Ethan. Haha. Okay, so, what about a holo-deck? With virtual reality can it happen, right?

Ethan: This is absolutely a fascinating possibility. Holo technology is something that we looked to at what a wonderful possibility that would be. When you think about a holo-deck you think not about just sights and sounds but actually being able to have an immersive experience where you can touch things, and feel like there's this whole world around you. Virtual reality is a huge part of it, but the most fascinating things that came about with it is how we are incorporating with so many other fences into it. It's not just sights and sounds but you can actually have tactile feedback there. They've developed virtual reality systems where you can play games where you can try and catch what looks like falling raindrops with your hand and you can actually feel the water even though there's no water there. By using a combination of pressure waves, of sights and sounds and a 3D immersive experience, you can actually begin to get the inklings of simulated reality of what it'll be like. This is again the case of the technology is emerging, where we can say you know, twenty or thirty years ago all you had were those little red vector graphics games that you would stick your head in. Yes, that true holo-deck experience is still a long way away but between all the things we have been able to manufacture like physical androids, advances in artificial intelligence, between machine learning and predicted algorithms and between the different ways of tactile feedback we've been able to engineer there's no reason to think this is absolutely not on the horizon. 

Me: Wha about phasers? They are real I think, am I right? 

Ethan: It is true. There are a number of different approaches to phasers. Some of them are very simple contact like tasers but most of them are really fascinating. My favorite one that I think is the closest we actually have is a two phase weapon. First phase does fires just this brief plasma out there. What it does it creates his ionize trail of atoms through air. You get this ionization trail and then you send this another pulse that when you have this ionized column like a lightning strike you can send electricity through it. What they do is they send something that travels down this path made towards your target and when the energy arrives you get this explosive concussive burst that can knock a target off its feet or can completely incapacitate a person. That's the ultimate idea of a phaser to me, it's not just a vaporizing weapon although it does have a kill setting, the idea that in a non-lethal way you can neutralize a threat, disable something without doing long term damage. That to me is absolutely fascinating. That's what you want if you talking about any sort of combat situations where you don't want to use lethal force. This is something where I thought this was going to be one of those technologies that doesn't really exist, we might have to tweak the laws of psychics to make happen but no, this is something that there are multiple possibilities that people are looking at at how to make this happen today. 

Me: I definitely would like my own phaser. Haha. Everybody has technology in their hands today. Out in public, and at work, I see so any people on their phones, I am guilty as well... I know people who continuously text or look at their phone for something. Do you think it's a major problem and do you have advice for people like me who are always looking at their phone? 

Ethan: I think there's a time and place for everything. Like with anything it's possible to become dependent and addicted to things but the way we interact with each other is more about us as individuals of what we value and how we chose to live, any of the technologies itself, right. People once spent their noses in newspapers without taking to each other. People have spent too much time watching television without talking to each other. Now it's on our computers or on our smart phones or our tablets. The thing is there's always ways to interact with each other. The way I think the technology we have today gives us more opportunities for connection. I would just urge everybody to make sure you value the real life space connections you have with each other instead. In the end, throughout this whole universe, there'll never be another human being like you. 

Me: Very cool. You have a daily column somewhere, right? Ethan: Yeah, on Forbes.com. I write Starts With a Bang. 

Me: Yeah, Starts With a Bang is the number once science blog on the Internet. Thanks for being here, Ethan, this was deep and fun. Please come back soon. 

Ethan: I sure will, Jason. Live long and prosper.

That about does it for this entry of the Phile. Thanks to my guests Jeff Trelewicz and of course Ethan Siegel. The Phile will be back next Thursday with Gary Brooker from Procol Harum. Spread the word, not the turd. Don't let snakes and alligators bite you. Bye, love you, bye.

Not if it pleases me. No, you can't stop me, not if it pleases me. - Graham Parker