Kevin S. Decker

Like many episodes of South Park, “Medicinal Fried Chicken” drags real political scenarios into the cold, hard light of the Rocky Mountains. In this chapter, the author aims at challenging the received interpretation of the moral message behind “Medicinal Fried Chicken” and many other South Park episodes, the message that legislating lifestyles is immoral at worst and ridiculous at best. This message is encapsulated by the moral perspective known of libertarianism, which takes individual rights in political and social scenarios to be not only basic, but also to trump many other moral considerations. For tensions between an individual's good and the common good in the drug legalization debate, the chapter further discusses a 1989 exchange between Milton Friedman and William J. Bennett.

The dystopian elements of the Alien films display the dark side of social mechanisms. Modern philosophy is not exempt from the temptations of this “authoritarian synthesis”. It also responds to the themes of impurity, whether through religious heresy, mental illness, or bodily invasion or corruption. In the shooting script for Alien, it is clear that Ripley has been “infected” by the Xenomorph Facehugger in the pod; on screen, that fact is held from us until much later in the film for dramatic effect. Ripley's fears about contagion actually fit together well with the thinking of the German Idealist philosophers of the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries, who were among the first philosophers of biology. Ripley does not seem much interested in sex throughout the first two Alien films, but she is interested in having a family, especially after Newt's death.

Both Georg W.F. Hegel and Martin Heidegger would find the lack of art in Frank Herbert's distant future more disturbing than merely the loss of technique and beauty. The experience of truth through art is to see the elements of the artwork of Thatched Cottages at Cordeville not with the same eyes as if we were walking by this scene in person. The point of Cottages at Cordeville the Duniverse version of this painting owned by Taraza, Mother Superior Odrade, and then Sheeana – as revealing a truth beyond understanding is highlighted in its brief appearance in Chapterhouse: Dune. Despite Hegel and Heidegger's bad news that “art is dead,” the gholas and their destinies make it seem as though the vast cycle of the play called Dune is ready to begin yet again – surely good news.

This chapter examines the sense of irony along with the parallels between the persona of “Stephen Colbert of The Colbert Report” and the character of the “ironist” discussed both by philosophical Romantics in the nineteenth century as well as the American philosopher Richard Rorty (1931–2007). For both Colbert and Rorty, irony can be funny and refreshing, and yet at the same time represents a challenge to our beliefs. The chapter looks at the differences between verbal irony and its more robust counterpart, “existential irony,” and examines the extent to which Colbert fits this description. More importantly, the embracing irony has serious implications for how to deal with political responsibilities in the new and more precarious, “post‐ironic” world.

Alien and Philosophy: I Infest, Therefore I Am presents a philosophical exploration of the world of Alien, the simultaneously horrifying and thought-provoking sci-fi horror masterpiece, and the film franchise it spawned. The first book dedicated to exploring the philosophy raised by one of the most successful and influential sci-fi franchises of modern times Features contributions from an acclaimed team of scholars of philosophy and pop culture, led by highly experienced volume editors Explores a huge range of topics that include the philosophy of fear, Just Wars, bio-weaponry, feminism and matriarchs, perfect killers, contagion, violation, employee rights and Artificial Intelligence Includes coverage of H.R. Giger’s aesthetics, the literary influences of H.P. Lovecraft, sci-fi and the legacy of Vietnam, and much more!

In avatar, Jake Sully struggles with his sense of self at a variety of levels, including the metaphysical. In Plato's and Aristotle's book Philosophy in the Flesh, George Lakoff and Mark Johnson call this shared conjecture the “folk theory of essences.” In Avatar, the presuppositions about personal identity that ground the linkage process between human beings and avatar bodies seems to follow Locke's insights quite faithfully. This way of talking about the essential self challenges the bodyswapping scenarios of John Locke and Avatar, urging us to attend not to far‐fetched thought experiments but instead to our first‐person experience of how mind and body actually interact, our ordinary sense of “what it's like” to be embodied. This approach, known as “existential phenomenology,” offers an alternative to perspectives like Locke's – perspectives. In many ways, the existential phenomenology coincides with Na'vi wisdom.

_Enlightenment from the _South Park_ gang faster than you can say, "Screw you guys, I'm going home"!_ _The Ultimate South Park and Philosophy: Respect My Philosophah!_ presents a compilation of serious philosophical reflections on the twisted insights voiced by characters in TV’s most irreverent animated series. Offers readers a philosophically smart and candid approach to one of television’s most subversive and controversial shows as it enters its 17th season Draws sharp parallels between the irreverent nature of _South Park_ and the inquiring and skeptical approach of Western philosophy Journeys deep beyond the surface of the show’s scatological humor to address the perennial questions raised in _South Park_ and the contemporary social and political issues that inspire each episode Utilizes familiar characters and episodes to illustrate such philosophical topics as moral relativism, freedom of expression, gay marriage, blasphemy, democracy, feminism, animal ethics, existential questions, and much more It’s a Bigger, Longer & Uncut version of the highly acclaimed _South Park and Philosophy: You Know, I Learned Something Today_—and is guaranteed to be much funnier than killing Kenny

Doctor Who is the longest-running science fiction program on television, having been in continuous production between 1963 and 1989. “Classic” Doctor Who was widely syndicated around the world and appeared to many US viewers on their local Public Broadcasting System channel. The show was rebooted with continuity to the original program on BBC One in 2005. The success of the show rests on the appeal of its central character and his/her traveling companions, the creativity of its bizarre locations and alien adversaries, and, of course, the diversity of destinations that its time travel format allows it. This chapter is about the apparent nature of time in Doctor Who and, by extension, what the nature of “our” universe would have to be like if time travel were actual. After looking over infamous paradoxes and philosophical arguments and rehearsing some traditional philosophical approaches to the nature of time travel and the problem of changing history, I outline the theory that best accords with the reality of time travel in Doctor Who, that of “Four-Dimensional Realism.”

Star Trek: The Next Generation (TNG, 1987–1994) is a very close second to Star Trek (TOS, 1966–1969) in the hearts and minds of fans of televised science fiction. Although both series are examples of space opera that focus on the exploration of the cosmos by a group of Starfleet officers and their crew, TNG is notably different in execution. It explores the interests and backgrounds of its ensemble cast more thoroughly, for example. It also entertains inter-season story arcs and fleshes out the cultural background and politics of alien races (both new and old) in a much more grandiose way.In many ways, The Next Generation is also a more robust example of Star Trek creator Gene Roddenberry’s humanistic vision of the future than its progenitor. Ironically, this is partly because he had less personal creative control on TNG. This chapter will explore the various historical faces worn by humanists through history as well as Roddenberry’s distinctive contribution to that history. To humanize the philosophy of humanism in TNG, the chapter will look at the philosophical implications of the series-spanning antagonism and verbal sparring between Captain Jean-Luc Picard and the powerful, arrogant entity Q. It will then demonstrate, through a detailed look at representative TNG episodes, the arguments that support the credibility and value of humanism against other competing worldviews in the areas of virtue and character, religious belief, and social ethics.