As previously mentioned, California is building the first stretch of its high-speed rail thoroughfare in a relatively unpopulated area in the Central Valley. This struck some of us as odd. But good news yesterday for the skeptics: money has been approved to nearly double the length of that first segment, and extend it to Bakersfield. From the WSJ:
Critics had panned the first 65-mile route as the “train to nowhere” because it would start from the tiny town of Borden, connect to new stations in downtown Fresno and another one east of Hanford before ending in Corcoran, another small town. Authority board members hoped the expansion to an Amtrak station in Bakersfield, a city of 339,000 on the southern end of the valley, would put an end to critics’ derisions.
Six members of the California High-Speed Rail Authority board voted unanimously on the extension, and total track length for this initial pass will now be 123 miles.
Photo credit: NASA – Gene Roddenberry, second from right, and Star Trek cast members visit the Space Shuttle Enterprise in 1976 with NASA Administrator James C. Fletcher, left. NASA
“Star Trek” is also unusual for its close connections to NASA, both in its storylines and in the real world. Decades of “Star Trek” adventures have ignited a love of spaceflight across generations, inspiring many who now work as space professionals.
I’m a cultural anthropologist who studies why people work in space exploration. I’ve interviewed astronomers, engineers, flight surgeons and astronauts. Although I focus more on science fact than science fiction, I’ve noticed in my interviews how much the two threads intertwine.
Because of this, I found myself at a “Star Trek” convention in early August 2026, just ahead of the show’s 60th anniversary on Sept. 8. The convention participants included people of widely different ages, appearances and identities. I was struck by just how much those gathered reflected the series’ values.
When NASA met Star Trek
In the original series, the show’s creator, Gene Roddenberry, came up with a philosophy held by the Vulcan people. He called it IDIC: infinite diversity in infinite combinations. It suggests that an ideal society is made up of many different types, all working together.
It represented Roddenberry’s rejection of conformity. It also explained why the Enterprise crew included a Russian alongside Americans, and Black, Japanese and female characters all in positions of responsibility and authority. While many ordinary viewers absorbed “Star Trek’s” lessons of camaraderie and acceptance, those involved in real space exploration also took notice.
The cast of ‘Star Trek: The Original Series’ included a diverse crew of characters. Walters Art Museum
Roddenberry established relationships with NASA personnel in the early days of his series. NASA provided photographs of planetary bodies and advice about the realities of spaceflight, as well as stock footage and access to certain NASA facilities.
Leonard Nimoy, who played the popular character Mr. Spock, was even brought to the National Space Club’s Goddard Memorial Dinner in 1967 as a special guest. Then-Vice President Hubert Humphrey gave the keynote speech. Afterward, though, it was Nimoy, not Humphrey, who found himself surrounded by the club’s members, including NASA employees, aerospace engineers, members of the military and government officials, all eager to meet the actor portraying the starship Enterprise’s first officer.
The relationship between NASA and “Star Trek” benefited the show by legitimizing the series. It also helped NASA by publicizing its work and depicting a positive future where its efforts to land on the Moon would eventually lead to visits to distant worlds – and amazing scientific advances like the show’s transporter and warp drive.
In 1977, actress Nichelle Nichols, who portrayed communications officer Uhura, was hired to recruit for NASA. The space agency had expanded its pool of astronauts to include scientists and other “mission specialists.” For the first time, an astronaut no longer needed to be a pilot to participate in a space mission.
NASA selected its first Black astronaut candidates and its first female astronaut candidates in 1978. While this move toward inclusivity may not have been directly influenced by infinite diversity in infinite combinations, it was compatible with it. “Star Trek” inspired many of NASA’s future employees. In interviews for my book “The Ultraview Effect,” a quarter of the space professionals I spoke with mentioned “Star Trek” as an influence.
Nichelle Nichols sits in the space shuttle simulator at the Johnson Space Center in March 1977. NASA
An Apollo astronaut I interviewed, for instance, said he believed humans would eventually “be able to go anywhere in the universe, just like ‘Star Trek.’”
A young engineer who had grown up in the 1990s told me his motivation came from the “opening line of ‘Star Trek’… to explore strange new worlds.”
A space shuttle mission specialist emphasized Roddenberry’s decision to make the starship crew multicultural, explaining: “Today I look at the diversity of it … he was setting the stage back when it wasn’t acceptable [in order] to be acceptable!”
A changing future
That influence has accompanied a changing astronaut corps.
Both the 2025 astronaut class, which for the first time included more women than men, and the crew of Artemis II, which sent the first woman, first Black astronaut and first Canadian on a lunar mission, resemble the future that “Star Trek” imagined.
The “Star Trek” fans at the convention I attended were even more diverse. It was clear to me that Roddenberry’s “infinite diversity in infinite combinations” isn’t just a concept from the series, but something that has become a defining value of contemporary Trek fandom.
NASA’s Spitzer Space Telescope captured a region of the galaxy that looks a little like the USS Enterprise, which NASA highlighted in a news release in 2016. NASA/JPL-Caltech
One such fan, Bjo Trimble, holds special status. She is credited with “saving ‘Star Trek’” when the series was almost canceled in 1968 after two seasons. Wearing a rainbow “IDIC” pin, she signed autographs at the SyFy Sistas booth, where T-shirts featuring Black “Star Trek” icons such as Uhura and Benjamin Sisko were on display.
However, with the Trump administration’s recent orders to dismantle all of NASA’s diversity, equity, inclusion and accessibility programs and policies, institutional support for “Star Trek’s” vision of acceptance and inclusivity, which flourishes in its fan base, is being undone. This rollback occurred just as NASA’s crews were reaching new milestones in representing the diverse future that “Star Trek” has encouraged for decades.
Sixty years later, some of the diverse future that “Star Trek” imagined has become part of everyday spaceflight. Other parts of that ideal remain unfinished.
Should the U.S. follow these other countries and broadly eliminate the ability to write checks?
Years ago, experts predicted that checks would have disappeared by now. However, they are still around, and billions are written each year in the United States.
Why? The quick answer is that businesses love them. And plenty of Americans still use checks for good reasons. But there is more to the story.
I am a business school professor and one of the few academics who advocates for the use of cash. While I have long told everyone about the benefits of paper money, I didn’t give paper checks much thought or use them until my mother’s recent death. Then I found myself writing checks to the cemetery, funeral home, gravestone engraver and a host of other places. Plus, I started getting refund checks back from her landlord and insurance companies.
These experiences made me look more deeply into this form of payment to understand what was happening.
Fewer checks for bigger bucks
Every three years the U.S. government runs the Federal Reserve Payments Study by asking banks and credit unions for internal information. This survey tracks everything from how often credit cards are used to the number of checks written.
While check usage has sharply declined in the U.S., a significant number – about 9.2 billion in 2024 – are still written, the data shows. The face value of those checks is probably bigger than you’d expect: more than US$24 trillion, not adjusted for inflation. That is almost as large as U.S. gross domestic product of $29 trillion that year.
Not everyone can imagine numbers in billions or trillions, so let’s put those figures in more manageable terms.
A little over 150 checks were written per person in 2000. By 2024, the average had plummeted to 27 checks – slightly more than two per month. However, over that time, the amounts typically scribbled or printed on the face of those checks rose.
In 2000, the typical check was worth less than $1,000. By 2024, the average amount had more than doubled to $2,600.
And in both of those countries, check usage has fallen more sharply than in the United States.
Who uses checks today?
While check payments have declined, there are still two big groups of check writers in the United States.
The Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta runs the Survey and Diary of Consumer Payment Choice. This survey asks people, rather than banks, for information on their payment habits. Roughly one-third of all respondents stated they used a paper check in the past 30 days.
Not surprisingly, the answers vary by age. About 60% of people 65 and over say they wrote a check. Among those 18 to 24, under 6% said they did.
It also turns out that a lot of people who think they never write checks actually unknowingly do it all the time. If you pay your bills online, your bank tries to pay them electronically. If it cannot electronically make the payment, the bank cuts a paper check on your behalf. Any online bill payment taking more than a couple of business days to post is being sent by check.
Another important factor is that small businesses love checks. Over 80% of businesses with sales between $1 and $10 million make payments using checks. Why? Small businesses often require two signatures on a check. The need for signatures means owners have to sign their name before any money goes out the door. This gives them control over money and a clear idea who is getting paid and how much.
Small businesses also like receiving checks. I wrote a lot of checks after my mother’s death because many of those small businesses I dealt with wanted an extra 3% and sometimes more to cover the cost to them of a credit card payment. Writing paper checks saved me and the businesses a lot of money.
The future
While many Americans still write checks, their declining usage clearly underscores that they are not ideal for making payments in all situations.
One of the biggest problems with checks is that you never know if the check writer has sufficient funds to cover the amount. When an account doesn’t have enough money, the check bounces. The Federal Reserve, which clears about one-third of all U.S. checks, returned about 22 million checks, with a total face value of around $80 billion. While these numbers are large, over 99% of all checks written don’t bounce.
Another problem with checks is forgery. Thieves steal checks from mailboxes, alter information and then cash them. The most recent figures show about 500,000 annual cases of check fraud in the U.S. Again, while a half-million is large, it is a tiny fraction of the 9.2 billion checks written annually.
The unit, which costs about $100 million a year to run, turned a $6.6 million profit in 2024. But its machines need replacing, and the Federal Reserve is wavering on spending the money.
For me, the answer is a clear no. While checks are clearly less important today than in the past, the numbers show that the American people and businesses still use and need checks.
“Kids and their phones these days” has been a complaint ever since the first cellular phone was introduced. However, there has been growing concern over the amount of time children spend not just on their phone, but scrolling through social media. The state of New York is hoping to address this issue through their finalized SAFE for Kids Act.
The Stop Addictive Feeds Exploitation (SAFE) for Kids Act aims to hold social media companies more accountable for the time children spend on their apps. It also seeks to limit kids’ exposure to their algorithms. Officials believe that constantly scrolling through social media feeds negatively impacts a child’s sleep and overall mental health.
New York Governor Kathy Holchul and Attorney General Letitia James made a public announcement to social media companies affected by this law, specifically Instagram, TikTok, YouTube, Facebook, Snapchat, and X.
“What changes is the default,” said James. “Platforms cannot automatically place minors into feeds engineered to maximize engagement. This is not a question of privacy, this is a question about content. This is not about the First Amendment. Again, this is about protecting children.”
“Social media companies, you’re now on notice,” said Holchul.
Critics and the issues that still need to be addressed
There are some criticisms of this law, particularly around age-verification. The law offers the option of using government-issued identification along with another proof of identity (such as an email address or an uploaded photo of the user). This complicates things aside from First Amendment rights. It would require millions of adults to share private information to scroll and post on social media after hours. While the law states that the companies must encrypt and erase such information upon age verification, that’s not guaranteed. This is especially concerning as social media companies already deal with users’ private information being hacked and leaked.
Governor Holchul still believes this criticism isn’t a governmental issue but a business one that social media companies need to resolve.
“Social media companies tell me, ‘We have no way of knowing whether someone’s under 18 or not,’” Holchul claimed. “I said, ‘You’re smart people. Use [artificial intelligence] to figure it out. Ask how you do it.’ And you’re not supposed to allow underage gaming anyhow—sports betting—so you must have some metric. So don’t tell me you can’t do it. Figure it out.”
How parents can help their children on social media
Regardless of where people stand on this law, experts offer some advice for parents who feel social media is negatively affecting their children. They recommend setting personal screen time limits for their children and taking advantage of built-in parental controls on their platforms. Parents limiting their own social media use can also influence how kids use it, too.
Psychologists also recommend talking with children about how and why they use social media. Specifically, discuss the fantasy that social media showcases from influencers versus the real lives of those people. Talk about why there was a social media post (advertisement, sharing joy, hoping for engagement, etc.) along with the content of it. Asking how they feel after watching or reading content in their feed helps as well. Such practices, along with limiting exposure, creates trust between child and parent without judgement.
Though how we fix screen and social media addiction is still largely in the air, take comfort knowing brilliant minds are exploring methods to address the growing issue.
