#this isnt particularly scientific i just took the ones that had the most plays on spotify and my personal favs

[wings-of-a-storm]

LUCAS’ HELL NIGHT ANALYSIS: PART 2 OF 2

Well, with this piece, I have officially finished trying to give voice to all the  frenzied thoughts in my head after watching that terrible Friday night unfold for Lucas.

I think the hardest part was revisiting the anguish on Lucas’ face. That is going to haunt us all for a while, no doubt...

Alright so we are up to Lucas running for the exit of Chloe’s house after finding Eliott with Lucille and being publicly outed... That poor guy.

OPEN GANG WARFARE

I only realised upon watching this scene that you actually see the ripple of Lucas coming through the crowd before you actually physically ‘see’ him. Like people were actually flying across the screen because Lucas was shoving partygoers out of the way to get to the doorway. He was like a hurricane, leaving a trail of destruction before and after him. From our limited angle, there are at least two victims: Unknown Partygoer No.1, and the Bouncer.

A minute of silence please for the victims of Lucas’ savagery. Particularly for Unknown Partygoer No.1 who was actually shoved aside the first time Lucas entered the house as well. :’)

Obviously I laugh otherwise I cry. It was actually heartbreaking seeing the lengths Lucas needed to go to to get out of there before he lost it completely.

I actually felt bad for Basile in this scene -- he was being really sweet and trying to grab hold of Lucas to, I dunno, support him? Calm him? Reassure him? He wasn’t to realise that that was the worst thing he could have done because Lucas needed space and distance from the heartbreak he had left behind in the house.

Things might have been ‘okay’ if Arthur’s patience hadn’t snapped; if he hadn’t escalated things further with that passive aggressive jab that was rather below the belt regardless of Lucas’ lies. Things could have been worse though -- there could have been actual punches instead of all the shoving and pulling. And the only casualty was Arthur’s glasses (which the petty part of me kind of revels in?). But still, getting into any physical altercation with your friends is extreme and just goes to show the pressure cooker Lucas’ life had become.

It is a shame the Gang had to reach this point, but they’ve all been kind of assholes to each other at one time or another. I think perhaps only Yann has been a good friend to everyone. Arthur, Lucas and Basile have all been hurtful at some point…

I wonder where Lucas and Arthur will go from here though; how they will make up in the school break if they aren’t forced to see each other in class. (Assuming David sticks to reality in his skipping of the hiatus?) This type of anger between them seems much closer to Marti and Elia than the og -- and it took the special powers of the love wizard Giovanni GaraU to piece their friendship and pride back together. Does Yann have the same touch? Time will tell...

ELIOTT KISSING LUCILLE

Lucas had already reached his breaking point when he engaged in a physical altercation with his friends. He had already lost control over his emotions and was incredibly vulnerable standing exposed in front of the yard. People were staring at him and Arthur was still screaming bloody murder from the doorway about wanting to slap the hell out of him. Of course it was at this moment when Lucas saw the man behind his heartache kissing the girl he said he had broken up with.

So much of Lucas seeing Eliott kissing Lucille was awful. Firstly, Eliott and Lucille could have just stayed inside the party, but them seeking out time alone outside is just so private and intimate.

Secondly, Eliott was the one initiating everything (something none of his counterparts did). He was the one cupping her face and smiling at her and going in for two kisses. Two!

And thirdly, yes, that smile of his as he was looking at her was meant to cut all of our hearts out. Eliott’s smile is like his strongest weapon even if he doesn’t realise it. He uses it as a shield and he uses it to express all the pure and lovely joy in his heart. When he walks into any room, that smile is the first thing you see. It’s nuclear -- even from far away, that smile absolutely knocks you out. And boy did it knock Lucas out.

I’m not sure I’d go as far as to say Eliott was giving Lucille the same smile Lucas gets. Eliott’s a very smiley person and even Lucas’ friends received that kind of smile when Eliott didn’t even known them. I feel like there is an extra level of giddiness to Eliott’s smile when he looks at Lucas. I wasn’t worried about him smiling at Lucille so much. Especially when I assume the context of it, which is...

Okay, so after Eliott was hurt by Lucas and feeling like he had to give him up so as not to be a burden to him, he would have been absolutely devastated. We saw his face in that corridor and that would have been him trying to hide most of it. I’m a little grateful we never saw the extent of Eliott’s private devastation...

But Eliott’s snap decision to cut Lucas out of his life, meant he was suddenly alone with this intense heartbreak, and probably feeling extra vulnerable because it related to that terrible force in his brain that he can’t control and that always messes his life up.

No matter how strained his and Lucille’s relationship had become in the end, she was still someone close to him who really knows who he is and has seen the worst of him. She is so safe. And since we have never seen Eliott with any friends at school, I imagine that Eliott is pretty isolated at the moment without her. It feels completely believable that he would seek Lucille out for that comfort and security. It would also make him feel better about his mental illness to know that there is someone in the world (excluding his parents who we have no information on aside from David’s headcanons), who sees that side of him and accepts it. He’s not alone with it.

Luckily for Eliott, Lucas made his comments about mental illness only a day or two after Eliott had broken up with Lucille. That meant there was a window of opportunity to try and repair things with her. It would have required a lot of effort on his behalf though, to be convincing enough for her to take him back even though he was secretly battling heartbreak over someone else. He might have even ironically used his mental illness as an excuse for their break up (actually, I am convinced he did because it will probably end up fuelling a certain comment from Lucille to Lucas about Eliott’s patterns).

What this means though is that Eliott has to stay convincing for Lucille: he has to be that happy boyfriend who wants to be with her, who just suffered a blip. If Lucille sees through him, he is in danger of being alone again. There is probably also an element of Eliott needing to convince himself that he will be happy with Lucille and can make their relationship work. The alternative of being alone after such a terrible year is just too painful.

So yeh, I’m not too surprised by all the smiles and kisses that Eliott was initiating with Lucille even though it hurts to see them. His instagram diary tells us the truth: that while he recognises the good parts of having Lucille as his girlfriend, it isn’t the same now.

(Side note: His ‘L and him’ caption breaks me! Like A) he is distancing himself from himself, and B) it’s like he is cherishing the letter L and finding comfort that he still has an L in his life. He can almost pretend it is the other L...)

LUCAS' FACE AFTER SEEING ELIOTT KISSING LUCILLE

Well, Lucas’s face after seeing Eliott smiling at Lucille, cupping her face, kissing her, doing things he can still remember Eliott doing with him not too long ago... That is a face that is going to haunt us for a long time. The level of fury in it, of betrayal... I’ve never seen anything like it in Skam. That expression not only cuts straight through your chest, it strangles your heart.

it was so powerful and clearly the exact moment Lucas reached the bottom of what he could endure. Like shit, place a copy of that face into a scientific journal under “Human breaking point.”

When I think about that look and all the intense emotions swirling behind it, It feels like the dark twin of the look Eliott gave Lucas when he was playing piano. When Eliott looked at Lucas in that moment, you were just hit with those eyes, and it felt impossible to even begin describing all the different emotions in them. Lucas’ devastating fury holds a very similar power with all the complex emotions behind it. I consider it a ‘twin’ because Lucas’ eyes also seemed fuelled by love, but love that had been desecrated and turned into a wound against him...

(That gruesome lip curl when he glanced back at Arthur still yelling at him though. Oh damn that was fierce.)

Oh gosh guys, it was just so hard seeing Eliott kiss Lucille during the worst time of Lucas’ life. It was stomach-churning in a ‘I think someone just punched me in the gut’ way. Like, Lucas used to go to this guy for comfort and now in his time of need, when his ex-beard is yelling out his sexuality to strangers, when his friends are yelling awful things at him for everyone to hear, he not only doesn’t have Eliott to go to, but Eliott is so engrossed in the person Lucas always felt second-rate to. Eliott doesn’t even look up at the noise, he is completely oblivious to Lucas’ distress. Could Eliott feel any further away?

I don’t even want to begin trying to imagine everything Lucas was feeling at that moment as he looked at Eliott and Lucille. It is just too devastating. It actually feels worse than what Eliott went through in the school corridor, because at least then Eliott had control over it. Eliott could walk away before ever having to see what Lucas’ face would look like if he learned of Eliott’s mental illness; before ever having to hear Lucas break up with him over it.

Eliott also had all the information over their break up while Lucas remains in the dark (hi Polaris). Lucas is the one who has to see the guy he is in love with for real kissing the person Lucas has always felt second-rate to. And after all those promises that they would be together because Eliott had chosen him...

And since Lucas does not have the information on their break up that Eliott has, all Lucas can see when he looks at them is: Eliott never loved me; Eliott played me; Eliott has been happy with Lucille while I have been so miserable I’ve barely had energy to get off the couch; Eliott lied to me; Eliott never needed space, he just used it as an excuse to get back with Lucille without guilt; of course Eliott doesn’t want to be with me, why would I be so stupid to believe that he did?

And then in the midst of all this gut-wretching pain and the slap of betrayal, Lucas glances back at his friends who he just fought with, who can’t understand what he is going through, who are still hurling really hurtful things at him from the doorway (well, Arthur is), and he is just over everybody.

It almost feels like he is standing in this awful triangle of snipers who have opened fire on the most raw parts of his life -- his sexuality, his family situation, and the man he loves humiliating him in front of everyone. It’s just way too much humiliation and exposure for one person to take. Of course he had to get as far away from everyone and that hellhole of a place as soon as possible.

What is extra fun is that the people behind Lucas seem to have pieced some of the puzzle together. They see his fighting with the Gang, they see the pained expression of his face as he looks ahead, and they all turn to see what he is looking at to cause such an unmistakably anguished face. They see Lucille and Eliott. Guess we’re going to have some fun rumours after all when each section of the party joins up what they have witnessed with Lucas at the epicentre…

LUCAS HURTING HIMSELF

We all had an inkling that the beginning of Lucas’ hell week would be the hardest version for the viewer to watch. I think overall, our assumption was proved correct and that is all because this is the first version where we have seen Lucas’ face in the peak of his anguish.

In comparison, Skam og and Italia gave their Isak/Martino some privacy with their pain. We only ever see Isak’s back as he falls to his knees and cries so loud you can hear it over the Kanye track. We only ever see the vague outline of Martino’s face in the darkness as he screams and cries into his hands (it was so dark, it was lucky we were even able to see the spit flying from his mouth as he screamed). You basically had to rely on all other senses to figure out the amount of pain that Isak/Martino were going through. I think that method is powerful in itself, don’t get me wrong. But in France, we see Lucas completely exposed to the anguish ripping his soul apart. And it is incredibly confronting.

At first when Lucas left the party and the camera was following him down the dark, empty path, it felt like og: Lucas had privacy with his rage and pain. But then everything got loud; all the senses were like doubled. The sound of him smashing his fist against the bars of the fence was so loud and violent. We had that kind of noise in Italia too but that was from the piece of wood Martino was wielding, not his actual hand. So not only do you have the deep echo of metal being hit by a fist, you vicariously feel the pain that that must be inflicting on Lucas’ hand.

And then after Lucas realises he has injured himself and his legs lose power and he slumps down to the floor, the street light completely exposes the expression on his face. His anguish is completely exposed -- and it is anguish that is actually distorting his face. He almost isn’t recognisable. I mean, it is hard to watch anyone suffering that level of pain, but it’s even more hard-hitting with Lucas because his expressions are normally so controlled and neutral.

Two things absolutely wreck me next in this scene. The first is the way he cradles his bleeding hand. When you’ve hurt yourself, of course your natural instinct is to hold the damaged area as if you can somehow contain the pain to that one spot. But since his hurt hand feels more like a physical representation of his emotional hurt, it feels like he is trying to cradle himself. I HATE IT, MAKE IT STOP, GUYS!

The second thing that wrecks me is how after he slumps to the ground and leans his head back -- which also crashes against the metal bars with a deep booming echo -- he mouths something as if to say ‘ow’, like he is just hurting all over, no matter what he does.

And through all of it, he is crying without any sound because the emotion is coming from such a deep place in him. Until you see the numbness take over…

I’ll say it again: it is highly confronting. I can’t even bring myself to take screencaps of it.

I mean, that’s probably why og and Italia took a step back -- because that level of pain is so private and awful, it’s almost wrong for us to witness it. But, well, France plays dirty.

LUCAS HAS NO BEDROOM

Did I just say France plays dirty? Because they are about to double that claim by reminding us all of their trump card: that Lucas has no place to cry privately. His bed is literally in a communal living area while Manon goes through her own grieving in his bedroom.

When a person is as wounded by life as Lucas is right now, it is so essential to have a safe space all to yourself to be able to grieve in. Particularly for someone as reserved as Lucas, who won’t let anyone see any hint of his pain at all (except for this Friday night when his depression was so extreme, he had no energy to move in front of his friends and he couldn’t hide it anymore). How the hell is this poor kid supposed to grieve in a communal living room?!

And that also raises another question: how long did Lucas stay slumped on the cold concrete path on Friday night? If that was the best privacy he had, it was probably a long time. So yeh, thanks for that, France! Like this whole clip didn’t hurt enough…

A TINY BIT OF HOPE TO END ON…

What is unfortunately so hard with Lucas is how reserved he is with his emotions. He is such an island and that makes it hard for others to be able to help him. When Mika reached out to him on Thursday, he got a defensive eye roll. When Yann tried to reach out to him on Friday, he got grumpiness and a hurtful ‘It has nothing to do with you.’ It’s really hard to see Lucas push people away like that and just suffer so many things alone.

This week is going to be such an important turning point for him though. He will finally make that step to trust in others and share the pain that has been slowly drowning him. He has no other choice because he cannot mentally survive like that any longer. And when Lucas starts to open himself up more to his friends and roomates and starts to value that process, it is going to put him in such a healthy place to be able to be that support for Eliott when Eliott’s secrets are exposed and he becomes highly vulnerable.

Lucas’ journey is really tough right now but he is going reconnect with people and with life and be the best person he can be once he starts to accept help. It’s going to be such a rewarding journey to go through with him. <3

[vincent-marie]

A Look Back on TREASURE PLANET

So recently I rewatched TREASURE PLANET for the first time in about fifteen years and… I'm not gonna lie, it's still my personal favorite of the 2D Disney animated features from the early to mid-2000s.

Let's be real. Of the 2D features Disney released around that time period, TREASURE PLANET is one of the more solid films. ATLANTIS: THE LOST EMPIRE had some interesting ideas and some really nice design work and animation, but it really needed to be at least two hours long if it wanted to flesh out the characters and the world-building without requiring supplementary material (like a special edition of Disney Adventure magazine). Hardly anybody remembers BROTHER BEAR was even a thing, and the less said about HOME ON THE RANGE, the better. (Seriously, that movie wasn't even worth the Steve Buscemi cameo.)

The only other film of that era that has really held up was LILO AND STITCH, and I'll admit it's probably a better film than TREASURE PLANET. It took more risks in terms of character, setting and originality, and emotionally it leaves more of an impact. (That scene when Nani sings to Lilo makes me cry like a baby every time.) My only problem with it is it always felt like two entirely different movies collided with each other and it never felt like they really meshed well. Otherwise, I agree with most fans that it’s a good film.

Also, of course, there was the excellent THE EMPEROR’S NEW GROOVE, which was just such a huge departure from Disney’s normal schtick and trying something more Tex Avery-esque, only for it to be a perfect storm instead of a total crash and burn. That is much to be proud of.

Going back to TREASURE PLANET, I can understand that most folks walk away saying it’s an "okay" film. I, however, am not one of those people. I've had a real soft spot for this movie ever since I saw it, but now I appreciate this film for additional reasons.

Namely, the animation and effects work. Holy crap, is this movie gorgeous! It's like watching Don Bluth's ANASTASIA, except I don't have to feel guilty about historical inaccuracies. (Now it’s just scientific inaccuracies, but STAR WARS gets away with that all the time.)

Directors John Musker and Ron Clements had apparently wanted to do a sci-fi retelling of "Treasure Island" since before they started working on THE LITTLE MERMAID. With that in mind I do feel like this movie would have fared better with critics back in the early 90s during the Disney Renaissance. However at that time they would not have had such elaborate and detailed CG effects within arm's reach. There's something I really enjoy about the use of 3D backdrops so that they may do sweeping camera movements, and that's not even getting into the lighting effects to establish atmosphere.

What's more, there are a lot of subtleties to the character animation that I never appreciated until now. You could just pick one character and focus on him or her during the whole movie and find a lot of fun little quirks in their dialogue or walk cycles.

Admittedly, much of this film’s appeal probably depends on how much of an animation fan you are. In my case I was watching John Silver’s animation and I suspected that Glen Keane was probably in charge of animating him (as there are moments when Silver looks so much like Ratigan). Those suspicions were confirmed during the end credits and I was delightfully geeking out about it.

It’s also easy to see where this film might not have had a lot of mass appeal. Most of the focus on the story is on Jim Hawkins and his daddy issues, which by the early 2000s was already a cliche of a character arc. And it’s not helped by the fact that Jim himself is... well, kind of on the bland side as a protagonist. There’s not a lot about him that makes him any more or less interesting than any other teenage male lead. But for what it is I think the movie did fine at establishing and building the relationship between Jim and Silver, which does have its warm and comforting moments. For both of them.

And at least the film is straightforward with its plot and characters and it’s not a structural mess like HERCULES, a previous venture by Musker and Clements.

Something I’ve noticed over the years is that TREASURE PLANET has a little bit of a cult following. I distinctly remember this one time when I was taking a storyboard class in college; we were assigned to do a “Master Study” assignment by recreating the key story frames in our favorite scene in a favorite animated movie. One of my classmates picked the scene when Jim is brought home to the inn by the police and embarrasses his mother. I recall being so impressed, and even a little envious, that she got the character design style down to a T. (If you’re wondering what movie/scene I picked for my Master Study, I picked the Big Ben scene from THE GREAT MOUSE DETECTIVE.)

Then, of course, some friends and I suspect that TREASURE PLANET might have fared better if it had been released a bit later, more towards the height of the Steampunk craze. It’s not quite what I would call “Steampunk”, as it takes place in a sort of alternate universe version of the 18th century and not the Gothic era, and most of their transport is solar-powered and not steam-based. Nevertheless it’s easy to see how fans of Steampunk could find it appealing, with its mostly earth-tone color pallet to evoke the painted illustrations of the classic novel it was based on. Also that combination of a pre-20th century aesthetic with out-of-this-world science fiction elements is pretty much, in my opinion, what makes Steampunk so much fun to play around with. Also, a robot made out of copper. End of story.

In terms of why this film didn’t do so well when it was released, I suspect what stunted its success was the marketing. I could be wrong, as I was actually living in Honduras at the time of the film’s release, but we got some TV stations from Denver, Colorado. I remember a lot of the TV spots spent most of their time highlighting the goofy comic relief moments with Morph, and there was a real emphasis on the presence of B.E.N., even though he's in less than one-third of the movie. In other words, the film's success might have been partially sabotaged by a marketing team that seemed to think if you don’t take your film seriously at all that will somehow draw in the crowd.

Although speaking of the comic relief characters, I actually don’t mind them that much. I always thought Morph had a lot of cute, funny moments that weren’t too obnoxious. As for B.E.N., I kind of have mixed feelings for him. On one hand, the directing team made better use of Martin Short’s improvisational skills than PEBBLE AND THE PENGUIN or WE’RE BACK! ever did. But on the other hand, does B.E.N. have to be so loud and shouty? However, while B.E.N. is a real screw-up, he’s not so much to the point where I want to see him get smashed with a sledgehammer. He’s generally likable, not at all loathsome, and just annoying enough, but not TOO annoying.

However while we’re still on the subject of B.E.N., I’d just like to add that the CG animation on him is really nice. Making him 3D gives him a sort of sense of solidity compared to his hand-drawn humanoid compadres, and to top it off his animation isn’t at all stiff or feels like the CG is holding him back. There is some really expressive squashing and stretching going on with his dialogue. It’s so subtle in places that you’d probably miss it if you’re not looking for it. A lot of CG animation studios at the time like Pixar and Dreamworks had not quite mastered squashing and stretching themselves, so kudos to Disney for pulling it off so well.

Now if I may indulge a little on why I remember this film fondly, my favorite characters were always Dr. Doppler and Captain Amelia. They are both fun and engaging on their own, but together they are weirdly adorable. Granted, I've always thought them getting together at the end was a bit rushed, but I still totally buy it.

(What I don't buy is that they'd be so eager to have kids after Doppler showed such annoyance and revulsion towards that toddler alien girl at the beginning. I get that the creators wanted some visual shorthand to indicate that they're an official couple, but they could have just been wearing wedding rings or throw in a little more of them dancing together.)

Part of the reason I love these characters on their own is the casting. I was already familiar with Emma Thompson from Ang Lee's adaptation of SENSE AND SENSIBILITY, and her character of Eleanor Dashwood was very quiet and reserved. You can imagine my disbelief and delight hearing her play an assertive, witty badass as Amelia. (As if I didn't already think Amelia’s design was cool.)

As for David Hyde Pierce, I had only occasionally watched FRASIER growing up, but when I saw this movie I was familiar with him through some other memorable voice acting roles, particularly that excellent Season 8 episode of THE SIMPSONS, “Brother From Another Series.” In other words, I already knew him to be funny, snarky and charismatic.

While I'm on about the casting, I feel like there's a totally wasted opportunity to have these two characters in a room together, say, before the black hole scene, exchanging witty banter to show how compatible they are in a casual setting. It’s a shame that Emma and David didn’t record their dialogue together, because with her being an accomplished writer and with his skills at improvisation, there could have been some good verbal combat by way of “Much Ado About Nothing-Meets-Frasier.”

But looking back, I remember I immediately loved Captain Amelia just on principal. As a kid I never really gravitated that much to any of the Disney princesses. I can’t really describe why, but it was mostly how they were marketed as just looking pretty and (arguably) kind of passive in their own stories. Not to mention how when Disney Princess became a brand, they really amped up the girly cutesy-ness to their preexisting images. Not to say there’s anything inherently wrong with cute or feminine things, but it really made me feel like a weirdo who somehow wasn’t fit to be called a girl.

Captain Amelia, on the other hand, had her own style of femininity by wearing a classy, more masculine captain’s uniform along with thigh-high high-heeled boots (that she has no problem running in). She had a no-nonsense attitude, she was focused and cool-headed in a stressful situation, she was downright snarky and took crap from no one. In other words, she was the type of woman I wanted to be when I grew up, and to this day she is my favorite Disney Lady, bar none.

And while I’m at it, I’m just going to add that I’ve always found Dr. Doppler more attractive than your standard Disney prince. Besides his character design looking like a canine version of Roger from 101 DALMATIONS, he just always seemed like he’d be fun to get a coffee with.

Well, that’s about all I really want to talk about regarding TREASURE PLANET. It’s a shame it’s not remembered by more people as it does have some really good elements to it, but in some regards I can kind of see why it wasn’t a huge critical success. If you haven’t seen it already I recommend checking it out as it’s a pretty solid standalone film that doesn’t need supplementary material and covers all the bases with the plot and some fun character moments here and there. If you’re an animation fan I cannot stress enough how you really need to watch it, or even rewatch it, because, again, the animation and effects work is just a real feast for the eyes.

[viralhottopics]

The climate change battle dividing Trumps America

Climate change denial and energy conspiracy are high on the presidents agenda, but US scientists are fighting back

Ever since Donald Trump became US president, certain sectors of American society have felt particularly embattled. His statements on Mexicans and Muslims are notorious, but there is another community, less heard about, that has also been sent reeling: scientists.

If politics has never been a world that is overly respectful to empirical research, Trumps victory exploited a growing popular suspicion of expertise, and a tendency to seek out alternative narratives to fact-based analysis. Conspiracy theories, anti-vaccination campaigns and climate change deniers have all traded on this rejection of science, and their voices have all been heard, to differing degrees, in the new administration. But for the science community perhaps the most provocative act so far of Trumps short time in office was the appointment of Scott Pruitt, a Republican lawyer and climate change sceptic, as head of the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA).

Id say a lot of Trumps cabinet picks are not ideal, says Shaughnessy Naughton, of the science activist group 314 Action. But Pruitt is really an offence to the organisation. Hes spent his career suing the EPA. Hes for state rights when its for polluters and against state rights when its for conservation or protecting the environment.

Naughton is the founder of 314 Action, which seeks to promote Stem science, technology, engineering and maths education and help scientists become politicians. The name refers to the first three digits of the mathematical ratio pi, a scientific imprint that occurs everywhere in life. But too often, Naughton believes, science has remained aloof from politics, while politics has grown less troubled about getting involved in science.

Pruitt is perhaps the most conspicuous example of this development. As attorney general for Oklahoma, he frequently sued the EPA in alliance with oil and gas lobbyists. Since taking over at the EPA, he has promised to weaken regulation of carbon emissions from cars and power plants, and has withdrawn requests for information on industrial production of methane.

A leading EPA official called Mustafa Ali, who is involved in environmental justice, recently resigned from the agency, complaining that there has been a concerted effort to roll back the positive steps that many, many people have worked on through all the previous administrations.

Science is under attack, says Naughton, and this administration is an example of that. If you look at the science committee in the House [of Representatives], its clearly hostile to empirical evidence. We are not going to win this battle by signing polite letters. We are going to win by getting a seat at the table. That means getting people that have pro-science agendas and scientific backgrounds elected at all level of government.

A former chemist who has worked in cancer research, Naughton has twice run for Congress, both times losing out in the Democratic primaries. She knows from experience a lot about the pitfalls and demands of American politics, particularly the vital role played by donors.

Though it has only existed since the end of last year, 314 Action has already had more than 3,000 scientists and people from scientific backgrounds sign up for training. One of them is Brian Johnson, a 32-year-old nuclear engineer. Johnson doesnt have much of a political history. He was an active supporter of the independent Ron Paul in the 2012 presidential elections, but thats about it. Now hes aiming to run for Congress in the 2018 elections. The more I look into it, he says, the more I realise it really is a huge commitment. I will probably have to resign from my job in order to campaign.

He will run as a Democrat. Isnt that a long way, politically speaking, from the libertarian Ron Paul? Johnson insists that, on all the critical issues, he supports the party line. But it is striking that his political stance is largely about what he is against rather than what he is for. And first and foremost hes against Trump.

Johnson says he waited to see if Trump would honour his campaign commitment to appoint the best people. When that didnt happen, Johnson got angry.

He appointed Rick Perry to be in charge of the Department of Energy, he says. Hes not exactly a nuclear engineer. Hes been looking to defund data collection on global warming. Hes just protecting his interest in fossil fuels, not serving the American people.

Perry, a former governor of Texas, is an enthusiast for extracting fossil fuels, does not believe that the human effect on climate change is a proven case, and is on record as wanting to scrap the Department of Energy, which is largely devoted to nuclear energy and its applications.

You know Donald Trumps views are not founded in evidence, says Johnson. They are founded in whatever feelings hes got. He doesnt really care if theres evidence for what hes doing.

Not all scientists agree with Johnson and Naughton. For instance, William Happer, the distinguished professor of physics at Princeton University, argues that global warming is not a problem, that climate science is a so-called science, that climate scientists are a glassy-eyed cult, and that increased C02 emissions are beneficial, because they are a boon to plant life.

Naughton laughs when I mention Happers name. Thats like talking about Andrew Wakefield, she says, referring to the British medical researcher, now based in America, who maintains, despite a wealth of contrary evidence, that the MMR vaccination is a cause of autism.

It would be wrong to compare Happer to the thoroughly discredited Wakefield, but its no coincidence that he has been touted as Trumps chief science adviser. Its as if the president is not interested in mainstream scientists who are proponents of widely accepted theories.

Climate change sceptic and now head of the US Environmental Protection Agency, Scott Pruitt. Photograph: Susan Walsh/AP

Enraged by the administrations appointments and Trumps immigration policy, Brian Johnson turned to 314 Action. But if he thought that his scientific background and opposition to Trump was enough, he soon began to realise what running for office in America involves. He discovered that a deep knowledge of nuclear fusion came a poor second to the ability to fundraise.

314 Action told me the steps I would have to take, how I would fundraise, who I would talk to, and the networks I needed to tap into, he says. Ive learned how to make myself a viable candidate that can run a serious campaign.

Some of what Trump and his cohort say can make the scientific establishment sound like a bastion of political correctness. But science is not only under threat from the right. For many years now the postmodern strand of leftwing thought has tended to view science as a social construct.

This outlook, exposed by Alan Sokals notorious 1996 hoax (in which a spoof scholarly article was published by an academic journal) has often dismissed emphases on empirical research as scientism, in other words as just another belief system.

Indeed, in some cases science has been accused of being simply a cultural pillar of western ideological hegemony. Perhaps the most notorious example of this kind of thinking saw the South African leader Thabo Mbeki reject the orthodox scientific thesis on HIV-Aids as a product of centuries-old white racist beliefs.

In such cases science is understood not as a neutral, or unbiased means of analytical observation and prediction, but instead as a deeply ideological interpretation of events. Both political extremes, for different reasons, have a history of questioning the science establishments political underpinning.

And both have employed the same method to discredit mainstream science: promoting the dissenting voice. Trump seeks out climate change deniers to support his agenda, just as Mbeke made use of the molecular biologist Peter Duesbergs controversial, and now discredited, theory that HIV did not cause Aids. Mbekes stance is estimated to have cost more than 300,000 South African lives.

That took place in a pre-internet age. Now the wonders of technology have made it even easier to disseminate an anti-science message through a medium the web that serves to flatten out hierarchies of empirical truth.

Naughton is familiar with the tactic of digging out heterodox opinions to justify bad policies. What I find completely remarkable, she says, are the people who reject all the experts and find an outlier with a PhD who says something that confirms their belief. It doesnt make any sense. There is a place for questioning everything. Thats important. But we do need experts, we do need to accept facts. Gravity is not something we debate. At a certain point, your opinion is not as relevant as the facts.

But of course its not always easy to distinguish opinion from fact, especially when accusations and counter-accusations of fake news dominate the debate. Scientists are used to a long process of peer review. Thats not how it works in politics.

Politics is much more emotional and volatile than science, says Molly Sheehan, a bioengineer, who is considering whether to enter the congressional race in the Philadelphia area. It moves a lot faster.

She too is using the know-how provided by 314 Action to inform her preparation. Although she is a longstanding political activist, she says it was Trumps election that galvanised her to look at becoming a politician. It went from a hobby to the feeling of I need to do everything in my power to ensure our country comes back to paying attention to reality and paying attention to fact.

Sheehan says the kind of scientific belief and optimism that America experienced under JFK in the 1960s has been replaced by apathy and cynicism. She believes that the US has been growing more anti-science for many years. Its just that Trump has made the drift definitive.

People dont remember how bad diseases were, she says They dont remember polio, or measles or mumps. They dont realise that medical science has had a huge impact on child mortality and morbidity. People dont have the emotional connection to science that they had in the 1960s.

But can scientists create that connection by becoming politicians? President Kennedy, after all, was not a scientist, but the space race he launched captured the public imagination. What can scientists bring to the political scene?

First of all, says Johnson, I think a scientist can really understand technical issues, whether its climate change or cyber security. Politicians like Trump make a decision and then go out and find the science to support it. If I were in Congress I would want to seek out the science first, and then have that inform my policies.

Its an admirable ambition, but is it one that will inspire the public? One of the criticisms that has been launched at politicians, not just in America but in the UK and Europe too, is that they have become too technocratic. Which is to say that instead of viewing issues from a personalised emotive basis, they are more likely to be dry utilitarians, allowing research to show the sensible policy.

The triumph of Trump was to portray that kind of politics as divorced from peoples reality and therefore insular, and most likely corrupt. It worked. But how long will it last? On the whole people tend to prefer trained pilots flying planes and experienced surgeons carrying out serious operations. In other words, when it really matters, we want expertise.

The question is whether the experts are the best people to argue for expertise. Scientists are good at winning the argument, but that doesnt necessarily mean they are good at winning over the people.

Sheehan sees the Trump election as an opportunity for scientists to reassert themselves. For while his presidency may at first be a backward step, Sheehan believes it will provide the impetus to force science back on to the national agenda. It might be the wake-up call thats needed for the pendulum to swing back the other way, she says.

The European temptation to look down on America and its more garish habits has proven particularly irresistible in recent months, but there remains an energy and optimism in the country that should not be underestimated. 314 Action is a fine example of a spirit that doesnt dwell in defeat but instead looks at practical ways of putting things right.

Trump should beware. The scientific revolution starts here.

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