There’s a lot of chatter on the web following James Cameron’s assertion that the aliens in Avatar are “non-placental” and therefore have no biological need for breasts. But he wanted them to have them so they would be more attractive and less-alien-looking. Did I miss some part of Avatar where the Na’vi are shown to be non-mammalian? Why not just say they are mammals so the boobs make sense? Why pretend to make up some intricate alternate reproductive mechanism that is not represented by anything in the movie, and then go to contortions to explain something that is in the movie that would make perfect sense if they were mammalian?
Archive for February, 2010
Na’vi Reproduction
Thursday, February 25th, 2010Suborbital Researchers Conference
Sunday, February 21st, 2010The first Next-Generation Suborbital Researchers Conference just concluded in Boulder, Colorado with a larger-than-anticipated turnout (250) including movers and shakers from NASA, the commercial launch industry, and the scientific community. The Conference was an interesting mix of programmatic presentations from NASA, which has proposed $15 million/year for research missions on commercial suborbital vehicles (think SpaceShipTwo from Virgin Galactic, or New Shepard from Blue Origin), presentations from the many companies involved in the commercial launch sector, and an eclectic mix of scientists and educators looking for ways to utilize this new capability to reach the lower bounds of space. By all accounts, including mine, the meeting was a resounding success. Which of course just raises the expectations for next year’s conference which is being organized by - wait a minute, this can’t be right: by me! So mark your calendars for February 28 - March 2, 2011, on the main UCF campus in Orlando for the second go-round. By then, commercial suborbital vehicles may be flying to space.