I'm not the only one who could post...

I'm just the one who gives in first and does it.

So, how cool is chapter 6? I admired the slippery way in which the authors went from the philosophically intense issue of how and whether we should respond to all mass and energy by saying, "Ooh! That could run my X Box 360!" to the fascinating world of white dwarfs and black holes.

Not new to me, all that stuff about stars, but I confess that I have always previously skipped the math. Inspired by Darin's habit of doing the sums when he sees them in the book, I actually read the calculations, so I learned new things.

What did the rest of you like about Chapter 6? and do you want to have a bit of civilized debate about whether harnessing as much power as possible is necessary or wise?

There's a wonderful book about the Manhattan project called Brighter Than a Thousand Suns which says that it was that project that ended the option, for scientists, of saying "We're just learning stuff. We're innocent of what gets done with what we discover." The split between science (beautiful, pure, and clean) and technology (worldly, greedy, profit-centered) is gone, now.

What do you think?