For your sake, let’s not imagine the biological implications too vividly here.

Once women — and by extension, their partners — reach a certain age, the procreation question becomes inevitable. Should we? Can we? When? How many? How will this affect our careers, our finances, our lifestyle, our happiness? (And this obviously doesn’t even have to be a “we” and “our” conversation; it can just as easily be a “me” and “my” one instead.)

But what if, in the name of equality, this was a less one-sided conversation? What if through some breakthrough, the burdens and privileges of childbirth could be shared equally by both genders, and it was up to each parent to choose who carries each child?

If male, would you want to have this experience?
If female, would you be willing to give it up?

What would the societal side-effects be?
Would there be a weird “favorite child” effect?
Would people fight or even litigate over who gets to, or has to, carry a child?
How else would families work differently?

My main concern if I could stop time: can I still stream Netflix?

When someone says “Time Machine”, everyone thinks of a machine that lets us travel backward and forward through time at will. It’s a mode of transportation in a new dimension.

But what if instead of theoretical time travel, we were talking about theoretical time creation? A machine that makes time, not one that transports you back and forth through it.

How would you want a time creation machine to work?

What would the rules be? Would the world stop while you got to go about your business until you turned it off? Would it merely slow down the whole world so there were more hours in a day?

What would be the most useful or necessary features?

If you were the sole owner of one of these new kinds of time machine, how would you use it?

We’re talking way beyond pretentious Mensa member stuff here.

Everyone thinks they’re at least fairly smart. Lots of smart people are humble about how smart they are (but really wonder if they’re even smarter than most people give them credit for). Lots of not very smart people are awfully confident that they’re smarter than you think they are. Is it possible we’d be better off if we all knew for sure exactly how smart we are, or would this be a disaster?

Imagine there were a way to measure intelligence absolutely, taking into account all the factors that you perceive to make someone “smart”. So through some process, your knowledge, wisdom, intuition, insightfulness, critical thinking, and ability to articulate ideas clearly, across all subjects or expertise, could be factored down to a simple number.

Imagine also that this is instantaneously applied to everyone in the world, which makes it possible to know with certainty, based on a percentile, where you or anyone else really stood in relation to every other person on the planet in terms of intelligence. You might be 47% or 83% now, but suddenly, you would know for sure.

Then imagine that some technology (a digital readout across your forehead, online database searchable by your mobile device, whatever you want) allows you to not only know your absolute intelligence rating, but also any other person’s, anytime you want.

[Note: I’m assuming it is possible to change this number with effort. Studying, learning, even just gaining life experience would potentially add to your rating, assuming you were gaining intelligence more than others who are not trying as hard. So this number isn’t a lifetime sentence or privilege (though some might have a genetic head start or natural hurdle to overcome), but a totally accurate real-time measurement relative to everyone else in the world.]

If it were possible to know this, would you want to?

If it were possible to know this about everyone else (and for them to know it about you), would you want that also?

How would this knowledge impact your day-to-day life, and how you deal with the people in your life?

How would it affect society in general, from things like education to job interviews, dating to elections, even just watching TV or sports?

We’re not even talking full hive-mind assimilation or anything.

Rick and Morty practically deserves its own section on this site; every episode raises a deep existential question or moral dilemma then skewers it mercilessly through insane sci-fi comedy.

A recent episode in particular dealt with a hive-mind called “Unity”, which assimilated all the individuals on a planet, where they lived peacefully and prosperously. The kids, thinking they were liberators, freed some of the assimilated… who then went on to spark a race war. Tricky stuff.

In light of the current racial violence plaguing the country, it’s tough not to wonder if a little reprogramming would be helpful enough to make it worth the obvious violation. So:

Scientists discover a foolproof way to brainwash/reprogram the minds of every American to eliminate racism. It’s painless and has no other side effects. To make all our lives easier, they want to make this mandatory, as long as it passes as a ballot measure in the next election.

Would you vote for this measure?

Would you feel like you were giving up some meaningful freedom by doing so?

If for, how would you convince those resistant? If against, how do you defend your side?

Saying, “It’s not worth it, I’d rather stay normal,” is for cowards.

After catching X-Men: First Class on cable the other day, I got to thinking about the classic “Which superpower would you want?” question and tried to think of a way to make it more interesting or complicated. Also, I really liked the recent Daredevil series on Netflix.

So: imagine some villainous genius/cosmic accident/industrial disaster gives you a superpower, but also leaves you disabled in some major way, either physical or mental. So for example, you can fly, but you’re schizophrenic. Or you are super-fast, but you only have one arm.

The bizarre wrinkle is, you only have your superpower one day a week. During that day, your disability vanishes. The rest of the week, you have to live with your new problem, and without that new superpower to make up for it.

If it matters, you can choose the day each week to switch to the super-you.

What superpower would you choose, and what disability would you be able to live with in exchange?

What would you do with your superpower, and how would you adjust to your new limits the rest of the week?