Hollywood accused of silly science

[Deckerd]

The BBC magazine has a good article with scientists pleading with film makers to limit their silly science in films.

 

[All Seeing Eye]

I think the scientist needs to chillax a bit.

 

[Kelthaz]

Reduce the amount of silly science? No way! We need more silly science.

 

[Lindley]

Silly science isn't really a problem.

Stupid science of the kind that makes you say, "What kind of writer would commit such a thing to paper and think it's a good idea," is the problem.

 

[Zulu Romeo]

Remove the silly science (and even the stupid science), and Hollywood would cease to exist. That's how I see things.

 

[Zachary Smith]

In related news, Hollywood now asks scientists to make science "more interesting" and "exciting" and with greater potential for "thrills and adventure" so that life can be more like the movies.

The original article SHOULD be titled, "Scientist Makes Ass of Self". There's a REASON that movies are part of the ENTERTAINMENT Industry--they are intended to entertain, NOT educate.

 

[Lindley]

Problems only really arise when the level of stupidity interferes with the entertainment.

 

[Zulu Romeo]

I'm glad to see that my favourite guilty pleasure film of the last decade, "The Core" was featured in that article. This is my favourite quote from the article:

The film is so bad, Prof [Sidney] Perkowitz thinks "it's almost deliberately wrong just to irritate the scientists in the audience."

 

[Argus Skyhawk]

While science errors are inevitable in movies, and movies are obviously supposed to entertain, not educate, I do appreciate it when moviemakers take care to at least try to get the science correct. Enjoyability and imagination are NOT incompatible with scientific accuracy.

One of the more annoying quotes beneath that article read:

If Jules Verne had followed the scientific rules of his day instead of following his own imagination, would we have many of the scientific discoveries that have been made over the last century?

I would like to point out that Jules Verne did follow the scientific rules of his day. Simply reading 20,000 Leagues makes it clear that his imagination was all fired up by myriads of scientific discoveries, and he implemented them in ways that entertained.

 

[scotpens]

I would like to point out that Jules Verne did follow the scientific rules of his day. Simply reading 20,000 Leagues makes it clear that his imagination was all fired up by myriads of scientific discoveries, and he implemented them in ways that entertained.

Quite true. The technology in Jules Verne's stories was conservatively extrapolated from what existed at the time. Did Verne predict multi-stage rockets and the complex lunar-orbital-rendezvous method of getting to the Moon? No, he launched an oversized artillery shell at the moon with a gigantic cannon. Did Verne predict nuclear energy? Emphatically, NO. In the novel 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea, Capt. Nemo's submarine was powered by advanced electric batteries. The implication that the Nautilus had atomic power was an invention of the Disney movie.

Reduce the amount of silly science? No way! We need more silly science.

Agreed. In fact, we need a Ministry of Silly Science!

 

[iguana_tonante]

I wish people could know more about real science to truly enjoy silly science in movies!

More seriously, I have no problems with silly science except when, as Lindley wisely said, it interferes with the entertainment. The Core has some really bad science, but it's so hammy that I can't help but love it ("unobtanium"? ). Worse offenders are movies like Mission to Mars, that try at real science (in the first half of the movie) and fail miserably, without even knowing why.

 

[Meredith]

More Fire and Explosions in Space!!!!! I wanna hear stuff go boom in the vacuum of space!

 

[T'Girl]

Star Trek might be one of the worst offenders. FTL engines, phaser beams moving slow enough to be ducked, having children with alien species, etc.

Jules Verne is the first science fiction writer I've found to mention the internet, he described it as a super elaborate phone system (dial-up?), the phone system was new at the time. You could ask this mechanical system questions and it would provide answsers.

 

[Deckerd]

Is Mission to Mars the one where they had a double helix spinning round made of M&M's? That punched right through silly to a new plane beyond.

 

[John Picard]

He has a point. Some suspension of belief is fine, but the problem is that audiences tend to take what the film portrays as fact. Look at what the CSI television shows have done to court cases. People on juries expect forensic evidence to have been analyzed in a flashy, sexy fashion in very short order, which has been the bane of judges and lawyers on both sides.

 

[Zachary Smith]

He has a point. Some suspension of belief is fine, but the problem is that audiences tend to take what the film portrays as fact. Look at what the CSI television shows have done to court cases. People on juries expect forensic evidence to have been analyzed in a flashy, sexy fashion in very short order, which has been the bane of judges and lawyers on both sides.

WHY should it be the responsibility of the ENTERTAINMENT INDUSTRY to properly educate people in regard to modern forensic science? It's not their JOB.

BTW would you also suggest that the holders of the rights to old properties should be forced to go back and UP-DATE their movies and TV shows to keep them consistent with contemporary knowledge or will you simply ask that they no longer show them in public once their accurate science has been outdated?

This is a ridiculous perspective. Have you ever been called to jury duty? NEITHER the prosecution OR the defense want potential jurors on the panel who know anything about ANYTHING. I, for example, was an employee in the library of a chiropractic college and got called to potentially serve on a jury on a case regarding a compression injury to the cervical spine in a Home Depot when a door came down on a woman's head. They lawyers asked if anyone had any knowledge of spinal injuries and/or anatomy and when I told them where I worked, BOTH sides fell over themselves getting me OUT.

The judicial system wants BLANK slates they can influence in order to win their case. They do NOT want people with "CORRECT" or "ACCURATE" understanding of forensics AT ALL. They want people on juries they can MANIPULATE. Frankly, the judicial system in this country has a FAR greater responsibility to be HONEST about such sciences than the Entertainment industry has to educate the public.

 

[John Picard]

He has a point. Some suspension of belief is fine, but the problem is that audiences tend to take what the film portrays as fact. Look at what the CSI television shows have done to court cases. People on juries expect forensic evidence to have been analyzed in a flashy, sexy fashion in very short order, which has been the bane of judges and lawyers on both sides.

WHY should it be the responsibility of the ENTERTAINMENT INDUSTRY to properly educate people in regard to modern forensic science? It's not their JOB.

BTW would you also suggest that the holders of the rights to old properties should be forced to go back and UP-DATE their movies and TV shows to keep them consistent with contemporary knowledge or will you simply ask that they no longer show them in public once their accurate science has been outdated?

This is a ridiculous perspective. Have you ever been called to jury duty? NEITHER the prosecution OR the defense want potential jurors on the panel who know anything about ANYTHING. I, for example, was an employee in the library of a chiropractic college and got called to potentially serve on a jury on a case regarding a compression injury to the cervical spine in a Home Depot when a door came down on a woman's head. They lawyers asked if anyone had any knowledge of spinal injuries and/or anatomy and when I told them where I worked, BOTH sides fell over themselves getting me OUT.

The judicial system wants BLANK slates they can influence in order to win their case. They do NOT want people with "CORRECT" or "ACCURATE" understanding of forensics AT ALL. They want people on juries they can MANIPULATE. Frankly, the judicial system in this country has a FAR greater responsibility to be HONEST about such sciences than the Entertainment industry has to educate the public.

Right. It's better people ignorant You missed the entire point of what I was trying to say.

This example should help a bit:

I once posted this in another thread, but it's pretty applicable here...

A year or so ago, I caught my mother-in-law telling my then 2 year old daughter that the sun turns into the moon at night. I laughed and said that, even though she is young, we should we should try to teach her things that are accurate- then I explained to my daughter that "the Earth goes around the sun and the moon goes around the Earth."

My mother-in-law gave me a dirty look and said, "How do you know?"

I was a bit speechless.

 

[Zachary Smith]

He has a point. Some suspension of belief is fine, but the problem is that audiences tend to take what the film portrays as fact. Look at what the CSI television shows have done to court cases. People on juries expect forensic evidence to have been analyzed in a flashy, sexy fashion in very short order, which has been the bane of judges and lawyers on both sides.

WHY should it be the responsibility of the ENTERTAINMENT INDUSTRY to properly educate people in regard to modern forensic science? It's not their JOB.

BTW would you also suggest that the holders of the rights to old properties should be forced to go back and UP-DATE their movies and TV shows to keep them consistent with contemporary knowledge or will you simply ask that they no longer show them in public once their accurate science has been outdated?

This is a ridiculous perspective. Have you ever been called to jury duty? NEITHER the prosecution OR the defense want potential jurors on the panel who know anything about ANYTHING. I, for example, was an employee in the library of a chiropractic college and got called to potentially serve on a jury on a case regarding a compression injury to the cervical spine in a Home Depot when a door came down on a woman's head. They lawyers asked if anyone had any knowledge of spinal injuries and/or anatomy and when I told them where I worked, BOTH sides fell over themselves getting me OUT.

The judicial system wants BLANK slates they can influence in order to win their case. They do NOT want people with "CORRECT" or "ACCURATE" understanding of forensics AT ALL. They want people on juries they can MANIPULATE. Frankly, the judicial system in this country has a FAR greater responsibility to be HONEST about such sciences than the Entertainment industry has to educate the public.

Right. It's better people ignorant You missed the entire point of what I was trying to say.

This example should help a bit:

I once posted this in another thread, but it's pretty applicable here...

A year or so ago, I caught my mother-in-law telling my then 2 year old daughter that the sun turns into the moon at night. I laughed and said that, even though she is young, we should we should try to teach her things that are accurate- then I explained to my daughter that "the Earth goes around the sun and the moon goes around the Earth."

My mother-in-law gave me a dirty look and said, "How do you know?"

I was a bit speechless.

I didn't suggest it's better to keep people ignorant. I suggested that it is in the INTERESTS of lawyers and their PREFERENCE to HAVE ignorant people in the jury pools and I stated that the ENTERTAINMENT INDUSTRY is under NO obligation to EDUCATE the public acurrately or otherwise--nor SHOULD it be. The task before it is to ENTERTAIN.

By the way, from what movie or TV show did your mother-in-law get the idea the sun turns into the moon at night? Or does your example have absolutely NO connection with the topic at hand? You see, I think pretty much everyone is in agreement already that, unlike the Entertainment Industry (which has the job of providing entertainment), parents and relatives of children very much have an obligation and DUTY to teach youngsters about the realities of life and the world around them to the best of their abilities. Sorry you have a clueless mother-in-law but to blame movies and TV because she thinks the sun turns into the moon at night is as lazy as her not bothering to pick up a fact-based book and learn a little bit about the REAL world.

 

[137th Gebirg]

Funny how nobody has mentioned "An Inconvenient Truth" yet.

 

[cardinal biggles]

There's too many entertainment films to go through first. Don't worry, they'll get to the documentary category soon enough.