I think there are a number of science fiction novels that would be beneficial for high school students to read, but that's true of other times of literature as well. The problem is the minute some politician makes a law that says students must read/study such and thus in school for whatever reason, education is defined by politicians instead of educators. Education isn't a mystery and the only thing that really needs to be retooled is to make the emphasis of the educational system on giving students skill sets that they need to function in the modern job market, not to indoctrinate them in the latest social beliefs and priorities.

Actually, I experience the opposite. Atheists care a great deal that I believe in God and because of my belief, make all sorts of assumptions about me in order to ridicule me. The door swings both ways.

After fifty years of manned space exploration, we've only visited the Moon a handful of time, and most of our experiences of putting humans in space have been temporary visits into Earth orbit. We can't even figure out a practical method of sending people to Mars. What makes you think we'll ever find a way to permanently send people to other planets? We evolved to live on Earth. I say that with a certain amount of angst since I'm old enough to have grown up with the NASA manned space program and it was always my dream as a child and young adult that human beings would personally explore and colonize the galaxy. However, reality had other plans.

The old 1950s B-grade science fiction films were wrong. It isn't radiation that creates giant, monstrous crabs...it's carbon!!!

That's incredibly optimistic. What makes you think we can satisfy 100% of the world's power consumption requirements, especially 50 to 100 years from now, with "entirely renewable sources." That's an ideal but where is the evidence that it's possible in an applied sense?

Relative to the billions of years the universe has been in existence, 100 million doesn't seem to add much.

I enjoyed Ender's Game when I read it many years ago (didn't read the sequels). I may even get around to seeing the Ender's Game film at some point (probably on DVD). I had some vague notion of Card's religious preference, but I figured that was his business. I don't routinely read or refuse to read an author's work based on whether or not he's Christian, Jewish, Muslim, Buddhist, or whatever. Fifty years ago, an author might have been boycotted if it became known that he supported marriage equality or gay rights. Today, it's just the opposite. Are both attitudes advocacy or censorship?

Apparently, it's only wrong to hack someone's email if they're popular politically. I can only imagine that the response would be dramatically different if it was Bill and Hilary Clinton email instead of the Bush family.

Interesting that, for an "apartheid state," Israel has Palestinians as members of the Knesset, but then that piece of information continues to stray from the topic at hand.

I thought this was about Israel's gigabit internet upgrade, not about Israel vs. Palestine. Does every mention of Israel in the news have to trigger this debate?

It's as if the newspaper is treating registered gun owners like sex offenders, putting their names and addresses online so you can see if they live anywhere near you.

An earth-sized planet around Alpha Centuri. That's old news. I was reading about Adam Strange's adventures on Rann since the early 1960s: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adam_Strange

What? Are the light bulb police going to kick my door down to see if my light bulbs meet government standards?

We're in the middle of three wars (including Yemen) but our economy hasn't gotten any better.

I liked Ellison's writing in the 70s but I think his "angry young man" days are long gone. Now he mainly comes off as a "grumpy old man". He's had a reputation as someone who'll sue anyone for anything. Maybe he needs a new hobby. The Star Trek episode in question was filmed decades ago. Nothing more to see here. Move on. Move on.