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Star Trek: The Pod Directive

Reza Aslan

Star Trek: The Pod Directive

Star Trek

Tv & Film

4.8799 Ratings

🗓️ 21 September 2020

⏱️ 53 minutes

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Tawny and Paul sit down with religious scholar, writer, and commentator Reza Aslan to discuss religion and Star Trek. Sound scary? Don't worry, this week's episode is filled with humor and dry wit as our hosts broach this fascinating topic, and Reza takes us on a deep dive on the symbolism behind a fan favorite, Star Trek: The Next Generation's "Darmok."

 

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Transcript

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0:00.0

Welcome once again to Star Trek the Pod Directive.

0:09.3

I am one of your hosts, Paul F. Tompkins.

0:11.5

I am the other one of your hosts.

0:12.8

I'm Tawny Newsome.

0:14.2

Ugh, we're back.

0:15.4

We got another episode for you.

0:18.2

This one was really, I really enjoyed this talk because I really enjoyed kind of the

0:22.6

episode that it's sort of centered around.

0:24.8

Paul, I know it's a favorite of yours.

0:26.5

I love this episode and it was great to hear somebody like Reza Aslan talking about it in

0:33.9

such a scholarly and in-depth way.

0:37.6

It was really fun.

0:39.2

Yeah, I felt like I got tickets to like a cool lecture or something.

0:42.9

I was like, oh, I'm like listening to some kind of hip TED Talk

0:46.4

that has to do with Star Trek and language and religion and...

0:49.9

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

0:51.1

It was great to hear what Reza explored in terms of the themes of myth, of religion, of storytelling, and just how societies relate to one another. It's fascinating.

1:06.3

Yeah, the way he really breaks down language. And also, there's a couple funny quips about the universal translators that I think you guys will enjoy.

1:14.1

If you've ever struggled with the concept of the universal translators in all of Star Trek,

1:18.7

I think you'll enjoy Rez's little take on them.

1:21.4

But yeah, just having someone so intelligent about language, break down how we communicate through symbols and metaphor as it relates to this

1:29.5

episode, taught me a lot and was really entertaining.

...

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