"Warp" <war### [at] tagpovrayorg> wrote in message
news:4ada43b1@news.povray.org...

>   It's based on theoretical science, not handwaving:
>
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Q-ball

In that case, I'm surprised you exclude FTL travel, which is typically based
on as just as solid (or shaky) theorizing.

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On 10/17/09 15:55, Warp wrote:
> - No far-fetched supernatural phenomena (unknown to modern science).

	This is perhaps too restricting. Go back 100-150 years and write a 
story about modern times. See what scientists will think of it.

Anyway:

- Moon
- People say Solyaris (the original) is good - I haven't seen it.
- The original Planet of The Apes.
- The Andromeda Strain
- Forbidden Planet (not sure if it violates Faster Than Light travel, I 
don't think they ever discuss the travel methods).
- Contact should really fit what you're asking for. Not everything is 
"explained", but it involves a lot of discussions about science.
- Gattaca
- Deep Impact is nice in some ways. It suffered from the fact that 
Armageddon came out the same year. It's *much* better than its rival, 
though.
- Blade Runner
- The Fly (I've seen only the 80's version). First half is not 
impressive. Second half is awesome.
- The Thing (perhaps - the story it's based on was somewhat hard sci fi, 
I forget if the movie is).

But likely you've seen most of the above.

Your requirements perhaps don't include movies like:

The Man From Earth
Stalker
Twelve Monkeys
Serenity

-- 
Be independent! No, not that way! This way!

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Neeum Zawan <m.n### [at] ieeeorg> wrote:
> - Deep Impact is nice in some ways. It suffered from the fact that
> Armageddon came out the same year. It's *much* better than its rival,
> though.

Much, much better.

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Warp wrote:
>   Besides Alien (and Aliens), this one is a perfect example of what I'm
> looking for: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0448134/

Why do people like this movie so much?  It was one of the most 
disappointing denouements I've ever seen.  Really great beginning half, 
but totally let down in the end.

...Chambers

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Warp wrote:
>   Btw, can anyone recommend *good* sci-fi movies? Preferrably hard science
> fiction. "Hard" in this context means physically plausible technology and
> physics, which imples, among other things:

One based on biology rather than physics: 28 Days Later.

It's not a movie about zombies.  It's a movie about rabies on crack - 
and it's one of the best movies of the decade :)

(The sequel, 28 Weeks, was good, but not anywhere near the same league. 
  It was more a straight up slasher).

...Chambers

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nemesis wrote:
> Neeum Zawan <m.n### [at] ieeeorg> wrote:
>> - Deep Impact is nice in some ways. It suffered from the fact that
>> Armageddon came out the same year. It's *much* better than its rival,
>> though.
> 
> Much, much better.

I'd only partially agree.  Deep Impact had much better emotional 
development, but was overall poorly written.  Combined with the fact 
that it took itself so seriously, it was just painful for me to watch. 
Armageddon was poor in quality throughout, but was lighthearted and 
didn't take itself seriously at all.  In all, it was a much more 
enjoyable film.

But I guess it all depends on what you look for.  I find that many Sci 
Fi fans, for instance, are willing to overlook the common failings of 
the genre (poor characterization, dialogue, plot development, etc) and 
focus only on the parts that grab them (the societal observations, the 
twist endings, etc).  I guess something in Deep Impact must have 
resonated with you more than Armageddon did.

...Chambers

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"somebody" <x### [at] ycom> wrote in message news:4ada66c5@news.povray.org...
> "Warp" <war### [at] tagpovrayorg> wrote in message
> news:4ada43b1@news.povray.org...
>
> >   It's based on theoretical science, not handwaving:
> >
> > http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Q-ball
>
> In that case, I'm surprised you exclude FTL travel, which is typically
based
> on as just as solid (or shaky) theorizing.

Reading up a little bit more about the movie, manking will apparently have
artificial gravity (!?) in a couple of decades, on top of the other
nonsense. Even if we can ignore all the bad physics, it makes absolutely
zero sense to me to be sending a *manned* craft for such a mission. What do
you need astronauts for, to steer the ship in the right direction so it
doesn't miss (!) the sun? Maybe it's explained somewhere in ironclad logic,
but I highly doubt it. All in all, it sounds like a really bad rehash of
last-minute-space-heroics-to-save-the-world genre. I don't understand the
relatively high IMDB score - maybe there's some terrific acting and
supremely zany dialogue to make up for plot deficiencies and bad science.

Post a reply to this message

somebody wrote:

> Reading up a little bit more about the movie, manking will apparently have
> artificial gravity (!?) in a couple of decades, on top of the other
> nonsense. Even if we can ignore all the bad physics, it makes absolutely
> zero sense to me to be sending a *manned* craft for such a mission. What do
> you need astronauts for, to steer the ship in the right direction so it
> doesn't miss (!) the sun? Maybe it's explained somewhere in ironclad logic,
> but I highly doubt it. All in all, it sounds like a really bad rehash of
> last-minute-space-heroics-to-save-the-world genre.
> 
> 
A couple of things.

One of the tenets of Science Fiction is that you are allowed to change 
one or two science facts and develop your world as if they were true.

If you don’t have a manned mission then you don’t have a traditional 
human based story. As you will know, this is the suspension of disbelief

Now the “Film” thing that I cannot forgive is the way spaceships and 
attack craft behave as if they were aeroplanes. Accelerating forward to 
go faster when they are in orbit and banking when they turn.



-- 

Best Regards,
	Stephen

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Stephen wrote:
> Almost 20 years ago. I must reread it.
> I first read “The Bridge” then “The Wasp Factory” then Heigh Ho
 it’s oft
> to the culture we go :-) I loved the word play of “Feersum Endjinn”
 (Dr
> John note the spelling ;-)).
> 

Duly noted
<muttering accent=Glaswegian>Feersum Endjinn, Feersum Endjinn</mutterin
g>

John
-- 
"Eppur si muove" - Galileo Galilei

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On 10/18/09 03:50, Chambers wrote:
> Warp wrote:
>> Btw, can anyone recommend *good* sci-fi movies? Preferrably hard science
>> fiction. "Hard" in this context means physically plausible technology and
>> physics, which imples, among other things:
>
> One based on biology rather than physics: 28 Days Later.
>
> It's not a movie about zombies. It's a movie about rabies on crack - and
> it's one of the best movies of the decade :)

	Didn't like the whole last third of the movie when they enter the 
military complex. It was a sudden change of pace, mood, everything. If 
not for that, it'd been a great movie.

-- 
Be independent! No, not that way! This way!

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"Stephen" <mca### [at] aolDOTcom> wrote in message
news:4adaeeaf$1@news.povray.org...
> somebody wrote:

> > Reading up a little bit more about the movie, manking will apparently
have
> > artificial gravity (!?) in a couple of decades, on top of the other
> > nonsense. Even if we can ignore all the bad physics, it makes absolutely
> > zero sense to me to be sending a *manned* craft for such a mission. What
do
> > you need astronauts for, to steer the ship in the right direction so it
> > doesn't miss (!) the sun? Maybe it's explained somewhere in ironclad
logic,
> > but I highly doubt it. All in all, it sounds like a really bad rehash of
> > last-minute-space-heroics-to-save-the-world genre.

> A couple of things.
>
> One of the tenets of Science Fiction is that you are allowed to change
> one or two science facts and develop your world as if they were true.
>
> If you don’t have a manned mission then you don’t have a traditional
> human based story. As you will know, this is the suspension of disbelief

I can suspend disbelief easier regarding matters like presence of FTL or
artificial gravity. But decision of manned vs unmanned is not even a high
tech / advanced sci issue, it's about common sense. I find it very hard to
suspend my disbelief about the brightest minds of the world making such a
blunder and sending a survivor/big-brother crew (from the reviews, it looks
like we have the stereotypical young, maverick, ethnically diverse and
politically correct, emotionally pre-teen, and sequentially eliminated
bunch) on a mission that undeniably calls for an unmanned spacecraft. And
yes, of course there wouldn't be a story or a movie without astronauts on
that mission, but then again, did all the other sci-fi avenues run dry that
this movie about an implausible scenario has to be absolutely produced?

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Chambers wrote:
> nemesis wrote:
>> Neeum Zawan <m.n### [at] ieeeorg> wrote:
>>> - Deep Impact is nice in some ways. It suffered from the fact that
>>> Armageddon came out the same year. It's *much* better than its rival,
>>> though.
>>
>> Much, much better.
> 
> I'd only partially agree.  Deep Impact had much better emotional 
> development, but was overall poorly written.

How poorly written?  Any plot holes I'm unaware of?  I liked how the 
story kickstarts with a supposedly love affair of a high politician... I 
find the plot quite tight.

> twist endings, etc).  I guess something in Deep Impact must have 
> resonated with you more than Armageddon did.

Certainly the emotional involvement was great, but so was the whole trip 
to the asteroid very plausible and the consequences of the half-failure.

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> we can control gravity without using a
> centrifuge. I think this is more unlikely than FTL travel 

Given these are both based on relativity, why would one be more likely than 
the other?

> .... apart from growing to full human-size from cat-size within days without
> apparently ingesting any organic matter? 

Surely the people on the ship had to eat. Maybe it found the food stores?

> Event Horizon has some great SF in it, 

I have no idea why everyone liked that movie. I thought it was awful.

Also: Equilibrium.
Also: Mission to Mars (altho the movie itself was not that great)


> it makes absolutely
> zero sense to me to be sending a *manned* craft for such a mission.

Except that when the fate of the entire world hangs in balance, having 
people there who can make decisions rapidly might be the difference between 
8 people dying and extinction of the race.  Assuming they even were supposed 
to die.


There's lots of good books like this, including Niven's Known Space series 
(of course, there's FTL and teleportation there and such, but it follows 
rules), lots of the stuff by Robert Forward, Vernor Vinge, Robert Sawyer, etc.

I mind less having things like FTL than I do that they follow rules that are 
well spelled-out, as if they're actually scientific principles. Otherwise, 
it's just magic mcguffins in disguise.  Indeed, excellent science fiction is 
that which you could say the plot is driven by the rules the extreme science 
fiction follows.


-- 
   Darren New, San Diego CA, USA (PST)
   I ordered stamps from Zazzle that read "Place Stamp Here".

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"Darren New" <dne### [at] sanrrcom> wrote in message
news:4adb5a5c$1@news.povray.org...

> > it makes absolutely
> > zero sense to me to be sending a *manned* craft for such a mission.

> Except that when the fate of the entire world hangs in balance, having
> people there who can make decisions rapidly might be the difference
between
> 8 people dying and extinction of the race.

Except that, even in these movies, the only purpose those on board serve is
to screw things up. How hard would it be for NASA to crash an unmanned craft
into the sun? All you need is 1960's dumb technology for that, scaled up
accordingly for the payload. The complexity and the number of fatal fail
points go drastically up when you need life support for such long term
missions, even if when you have emotionally, intellectually and physically
rock solid astronauts. I haven't seen the movie - do the space cowboys in
this movie do anything that truly requires human presence, or is it the same
old "turn two switches simultaneously on in slow motion to start the timer
that detonates the bomb and run for your life" ritual? (Well, I gather they
all die, so maybe not the last part).

Post a reply to this message

somebody <x### [at] ycom> wrote:
> "Warp" <war### [at] tagpovrayorg> wrote in message
> news:4ada43b1@news.povray.org...

> >   It's based on theoretical science, not handwaving:
> >
> > http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Q-ball

> In that case, I'm surprised you exclude FTL travel, which is typically based
> on as just as solid (or shaky) theorizing.

  Exactly which part of theoretical physics is the FTL travel eg. in Star
Trek or Star Wars based on? Care to give references to some scientifical
papers discussing the subject?

  While are it, also give some references to theoretical physics which
explains FTL communication in Star Trek and Star Wars (which badly breaks
GR principles).

  (I don't need to give you references to the Q-ball theory because the
wikipedia article has plenty at the bottom.)

-- 
                                                          - Warp

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somebody <x### [at] ycom> wrote:
> Reading up a little bit more about the movie, manking will apparently have
> artificial gravity (!?) in a couple of decades, on top of the other
> nonsense. Even if we can ignore all the bad physics, it makes absolutely
> zero sense to me to be sending a *manned* craft for such a mission. What do
> you need astronauts for, to steer the ship in the right direction so it
> doesn't miss (!) the sun? Maybe it's explained somewhere in ironclad logic,
> but I highly doubt it. All in all, it sounds like a really bad rehash of
> last-minute-space-heroics-to-save-the-world genre. I don't understand the
> relatively high IMDB score - maybe there's some terrific acting and
> supremely zany dialogue to make up for plot deficiencies and bad science.

http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/ptitlexxpmjrh25rbg?from=Main.ComplainingAboutShowsYouDontWatch

  So now that you have "proven" that the movie I mentioned sucks, what next?
What was your point and goal?

-- 
                                                          - Warp

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Chambers <Ben### [at] gmailcom> wrote:
> Warp wrote:
> >   Besides Alien (and Aliens), this one is a perfect example of what I'm
> > looking for: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0448134/

> Why do people like this movie so much?  It was one of the most 
> disappointing denouements I've ever seen.  Really great beginning half, 
> but totally let down in the end.

  Why do people like movies which other people detest?

  Why are you asking unanwserable questions?

-- 
                                                          - Warp

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Darren New <dne### [at] sanrrcom> wrote:
> I have no idea why everyone liked that movie. I thought it was awful.

  Give me a movie which everybody likes and nobody says anything like
what you wrote there, and I'll give you a movie which doesn't exist. ;)

> > it makes absolutely
> > zero sense to me to be sending a *manned* craft for such a mission.

> Except that when the fate of the entire world hangs in balance, having 
> people there who can make decisions rapidly might be the difference between 
> 8 people dying and extinction of the race.  Assuming they even were supposed 
> to die.

  That's especially true since the movie establishes that the second ship
used up all the radioactive material the world could dig up, so it was their
absolutely last chance. One small failure in the ship, which could be
trivially fixed by a human crew, and the entire world is doomed. It makes
a whole *lot* of sense to make it a manned flight.

-- 
                                                          - Warp

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Darren New <dne### [at] sanrrcom> wrote:
> > we can control gravity without using a
> > centrifuge. I think this is more unlikely than FTL travel
>
> Given these are both based on relativity, why would one be more likely than
> the other?

I wasn't aware we had any theories at all that might give us arbitrary gravity
control. I'm a bit behind on my cutting-edge physics though so perhaps I missed
it.

I've certainly not read any SF that offered any explanation for gravity other
than sheer mass, whereas there's lots of genuine relativity-driven FTL travel
ideas knocking around. (I believe the wormholes in Contact were even first
formulated on request specifically for that novel.)

> > .... apart from growing to full human-size from cat-size within days without
> > apparently ingesting any organic matter?
>
> Surely the people on the ship had to eat. Maybe it found the food stores?

Yeah, that's why I think it's a weak criticism. But even so, it was only a day
or two later that it was fully grown.

> > Event Horizon has some great SF in it,
> I have no idea why everyone liked that movie. I thought it was awful.

Well it was a bit of a mishmash. But they had proper acceleration tanks, and I
couldn't fault Sam Neill's pop-rendition of GR...

> Also: Equilibrium.
> Also: Mission to Mars (altho the movie itself was not that great)

Equilibrium was far too naked (and dumbed-down) a rip-off of Farenheit 451 +
1984. I almost walked out of until the kung fu started up again. Not seen the
Mars one.

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somebody <x### [at] ycom> wrote:
> Except that, even in these movies, the only purpose those on board serve is
> to screw things up. How hard would it be for NASA to crash an unmanned craft
> into the sun? All you need is 1960's dumb technology for that, scaled up
> accordingly for the payload.

  I find it rather amusing how you are bashing a movie you haven't even seen.

  You *think* that it was just a question of "let's send a rocket to the
Sun... oh, it failed, well, we'll just send another... oh, it also failed,
well, we'll just keep sending them until one succeeds; heck, let's send ten
ships at the same time, at least one is going to succeed".

  Except that's not the case in the actual movie, which you would know if
you had actually seen it. The second ship was the absolutely last chance
humanity had. That's it. No more. If it fails, humanity is dead.

  The idea was that they packed *all* the fissive material they could find
into the two ships. There was no more after the second one. Finito. If the
two ships failed, humanity is dead.

  Thus it makes a lot of sense to send a manned ship. Even the smallest of
failures, something which could be trivially fixed by a crew, could mean the
mission would fail.

-- 
                                                          - Warp

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nemesis wrote:
> Chambers wrote:
>> I'd only partially agree.  Deep Impact had much better emotional 
>> development, but was overall poorly written.
> 
> How poorly written?  Any plot holes I'm unaware of?  I liked how the 
> story kickstarts with a supposedly love affair of a high politician... I 
> find the plot quite tight.

Oh, no, I just saw an asteroid that's going to hit the earth 2 1/2 years 
from now, I have to rush down the mountain in the middle of the night 
instead of making a phone call, so I can get killed running off the road 
just so we have some reason to add tension to the first half of the movie!

That and Elijah Wood's whole story arc really bugged me.  Tea Leoni is a 
great actress, and all of her segments were really well done, as were 
Robert Duvall's.

...Chambers

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Warp wrote:
>   Why do people like movies which other people detest?
> 
>   Why are you asking unanwserable questions?

Because I've never heard someone actually able to explain why they think 
this movie is good.

It's one thing if you watch a movie that's so bad it's good (Army of 
Darkness, anyone?), or a movie that is purposely lighthearted in pursuit 
of the "fun factor" (Armageddon, Transformers, etc).  It's another when 
a movie's fans all take the movie seriously, talk about how great the 
science in it is, talk about how great the storyline is, without seeming 
to realize the absurdity of it.

Like I said, the first half of Sunshine was really good, and held a lot 
of potential.  It was the whole Pinbacker thing I didn't like, because 
it's like the story turned a corner and we were suddenly watching a 
straight up slasher.

...Chambers

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Neeum Zawan wrote:
>     Didn't like the whole last third of the movie when they enter the 
> military complex. It was a sudden change of pace, mood, everything. If 
> not for that, it'd been a great movie.

Really?  I'm surprised to hear you responded that way.  I always saw the 
movie as focusing on the character's reactions to the desolation; from 
that point of view, including the military group makes sense.  Once you 
make that step, the conflict between the main characters and the 
soldiers becomes inevitable.

That's the main reason I don't like "28 Weeks" as much.  It's a great 
slasher film (which there's nothing wrong with), but it lacks the 
emotional punch of the first one.

...Chambers

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Doctor John wrote:
> Stephen wrote:
>> Almost 20 years ago. I must reread it.
>> I first read “The Bridge” then “The Wasp Factory” then Heigh Ho it’s oft
>> to the culture we go :-) I loved the word play of “Feersum Endjinn” (Dr
>> John note the spelling ;-)).
>>
> 
> Duly noted
> <muttering accent=Glaswegian>Feersum Endjinn, Feersum Endjinn</muttering>
> 
> John

Fearsome Engine you Pearly King, you. ;)

-- 

Best Regards,
	Stephen

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On 10/18/09 13:11, Darren New wrote:
>> Event Horizon has some great SF in it,
>
> I have no idea why everyone liked that movie. I thought it was awful.

	Agreed. Was kind of scared to raise the point.

> Also: Equilibrium.

	Incredibly over dramatized. I didn't like it.

> Also: Mission to Mars (altho the movie itself was not that great)

	Fun movie. Not at all hard SF, though, or even close.


-- 
If you try to fail, and succeed, which have you done?

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Bill Pragnell wrote:
> Darren New <dne### [at] sanrrcom> wrote:
>>> we can control gravity without using a
>>> centrifuge. I think this is more unlikely than FTL travel
>> Given these are both based on relativity, why would one be more likely than
>> the other?
> 
> I wasn't aware we had any theories at all that might give us arbitrary gravity
> control. I'm a bit behind on my cutting-edge physics though so perhaps I missed
> it.

Well, we're looking for the Higgs right now. We have zero theories that 
would give us FTL.  The closest we have, "Warp drive," assumes you're going 
to frob gravity around to make it happen.

Actually, there's also the wormhole bit with "exotic matter", but it turns 
out "exotic matter" means matter with negative mass, so again it's intertwined.

> I've certainly not read any SF that offered any explanation for gravity other
> than sheer mass, whereas there's lots of genuine relativity-driven FTL travel
> ideas knocking around. 

I haven't seen any well-founded FTL mechanisms that don't assume it's done 
through manipulation of gravity. Wormholes, black hole travel, exotic 
matter, space warps... all gravity effects.

> Well it was a bit of a mishmash. But they had proper acceleration tanks, and I
> couldn't fault Sam Neill's pop-rendition of GR...

Fair.

>> Also: Equilibrium.
>> Also: Mission to Mars (altho the movie itself was not that great)
> 
> Equilibrium was far too naked (and dumbed-down) a rip-off of Farenheit 451 +
> 1984. 

Plot-wise, maybe. The acting was excellent, tho.

-- 
   Darren New, San Diego CA, USA (PST)
   I ordered stamps from Zazzle that read "Place Stamp Here".

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Neeum Zawan wrote:
>> Also: Mission to Mars (altho the movie itself was not that great)
>     Fun movie. Not at all hard SF, though, or even close.

Really? They even got the orbital mechanics right and such. I thought it was 
very good physics, other than the very ending of course.

-- 
   Darren New, San Diego CA, USA (PST)
   I ordered stamps from Zazzle that read "Place Stamp Here".

Post a reply to this message

Darren New <dne### [at] sanrrcom> wrote:
> Bill Pragnell wrote:
> > Darren New <dne### [at] sanrrcom> wrote:
> >>> we can control gravity without using a
> >>> centrifuge. I think this is more unlikely than FTL travel
> >> Given these are both based on relativity, why would one be more likely than
> >> the other?
> >
> > I wasn't aware we had any theories at all that might give us arbitrary gravity
> > control. I'm a bit behind on my cutting-edge physics though so perhaps I missed
> > it.
>
> Well, we're looking for the Higgs right now. We have zero theories that
> would give us FTL.  The closest we have, "Warp drive," assumes you're going
> to frob gravity around to make it happen.

Ok, I see what you mean. (I don't like warp drive personally, it's a retrofitted
contortion that, as you say, requires quite fine gravity control. I rate it
alongside star wars' hyperdrive to be honest. I was thinking of wormholes etc.)

> Actually, there's also the wormhole bit with "exotic matter", but it turns
> out "exotic matter" means matter with negative mass, so again it's
> intertwined.

Yeah, I guess that does push it into hyperdrive realms doesn't it. It just feels
a bit better developed because you can hide the detail in the exotic matter,
whereas I've not heard of any engineering applications of the Higgs Boson yet!

> > I've certainly not read any SF that offered any explanation for gravity other
> > than sheer mass, whereas there's lots of genuine relativity-driven FTL travel
> > ideas knocking around.
>
> I haven't seen any well-founded FTL mechanisms that don't assume it's done
> through manipulation of gravity. Wormholes, black hole travel, exotic
> matter, space warps... all gravity effects.

Hmm, the 'manipulation of gravity' that I was thinking about wasn't any cleverer
than piling big fat masses up in interesting ways - ever read any Stephen
Baxter? He's a big fan of going to the end of the universe to watch the last
protons of humanity decay... :)

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Chambers wrote:
> Oh, no, I just saw an asteroid that's going to hit the earth 2 1/2 years 
> from now, I have to rush down the mountain in the middle of the night 
> instead of making a phone call, so I can get killed running off the road 
> just so we have some reason to add tension to the first half of the movie!

You gotta start somewhere.  Not exactly genius, but not particularly 
buggy that one.

In any case, he did get killed because was on a rush to get the digital 
data delivered ASAP (mail server was down) and was trying to phone while 
driving.  yeah, just watched again to be sure... :)

tension is good.

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Bill Pragnell wrote:
> Ok, I see what you mean. (I don't like warp drive personally, it's a retrofitted
> contortion that, as you say, requires quite fine gravity control. 

Well, it's the one that actual scientists are actually talking about. :-)

> I rate it
> alongside star wars' hyperdrive to be honest. I was thinking of wormholes etc.)

Generally speaking, "hyperdrive" and "warp drive" tend to mean the same 
thing - going somewhere that the speed of light is faster. (Assuming it's 
explained at all.)

> whereas I've not heard of any engineering applications of the Higgs Boson yet!

Well, it depends what you can do with it! Higgs provides inertial mass, as I 
understand it, so it's really likely the basis of any "generated" gravity.

> Hmm, the 'manipulation of gravity' that I was thinking about wasn't any cleverer
> than piling big fat masses up in interesting ways - ever read any Stephen
> Baxter? 

The few I've read have been awful. :-)

And piling up big fat masses isn't gravity manipulation to achieve FTL 
travel? :-)

As an aside, I just got back from the bookstore and it seems they have no 
actual science fiction in their science fiction section. There was some 
heinlein and asimov and other dead authors, a whole shelf of star wars and 
star trek, another shelf of manga, and everything else was vampires and 
dragons.  Oh, except for the John Ringo type stories. (Many of which I'm not 
even sure why they're listed under Science Fiction, except the author also 
writes some science fiction.)  WTF guys? Haven't you written any actual 
science fiction in ten years? Is America so hopelessly stupid and luddite 
that nobody reads something with actual science in it?

-- 
   Darren New, San Diego CA, USA (PST)
   I ordered stamps from Zazzle that read "Place Stamp Here".

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"Warp" <war### [at] tagpovrayorg> wrote in message
news:4adb6cf3@news.povray.org...
> somebody <x### [at] ycom> wrote:

> > Except that, even in these movies, the only purpose those on board serve
is
> > to screw things up. How hard would it be for NASA to crash an unmanned
craft
> > into the sun? All you need is 1960's dumb technology for that, scaled up
> > accordingly for the payload.

>   I find it rather amusing how you are bashing a movie you haven't even
seen.

<g>

>   You *think* that it was just a question of "let's send a rocket to the
> Sun... oh, it failed, well, we'll just send another... oh, it also failed,
> well, we'll just keep sending them until one succeeds; heck, let's send
ten
> ships at the same time, at least one is going to succeed".
>
>   Except that's not the case in the actual movie, which you would know if
> you had actually seen it. The second ship was the absolutely last chance
> humanity had. That's it. No more. If it fails, humanity is dead.

The *first* ship would have been unmanned in reality.

And *if* the second unmanned ship failed, *then* they'd send a manned rescue
and repair mission, which would make for a more beliavable premise.

>   The idea was that they packed *all* the fissive material they could find
> into the two ships. There was no more after the second one. Finito. If the
> two ships failed, humanity is dead.
>
>   Thus it makes a lot of sense to send a manned ship. Even the smallest of
> failures, something which could be trivially fixed by a crew, could mean
the
> mission would fail.

I'm afraid manned crafts still don't make sense. Trying to accomodate humans
badly compromises such missions. Not just due to life support issues, but
mainly due to the need to return them back to earth. Maybe one reasonable
scenario (stealing even more heavily from 2001) would be to have one or two
sacrificial humans in suspended animation, to be awakened for a limited time
only in case of emergency. Alternatively, you send a trailing rescue/steward
mission. But really, there's next to nil that can go wrong on an impact
mission to the sun if you do your homework, and there's next to nil that on
board humans can do should something go wrong, as Columbia and Challenger
showed us. Yes, astronauts fixed the Hubble, but that took months of intense
ground preparation.

Post a reply to this message

On 10/18/09 16:36, Darren New wrote:
> Neeum Zawan wrote:
>>> Also: Mission to Mars (altho the movie itself was not that great)
>> Fun movie. Not at all hard SF, though, or even close.
>
> Really? They even got the orbital mechanics right and such. I thought it
> was very good physics, other than the very ending of course.

	Well, perhaps you're right. It's been a while. I suppose Mars doesn't 
have a significant enough atmosphere to worry about burning up the way 
they entered?

-- 
When you die, you lose a very important part of your life.
                 -- Brooke Shields

Post a reply to this message

Darren New schrieb:

>> Event Horizon has some great SF in it, 
> 
> I have no idea why everyone liked that movie. I thought it was awful.

Not /everyone/ did. I think it was one of the worst "SF" movies ever: 
You go to the theater expecting some nice decent science fiction (in 
broadest sense) action movie, and all you get is some horror thriller.

"Contact" was equally "disappointing", but it was easily able to make up 
for it by being ingenious in its own right.

I think "Alien" was just as bad as "EH", but as I never went to the 
theater to watch it, I'm more willing to forgive.


In this respect - i.e. regarding expectations being met, "Independence 
Day" was probably the best Sci-Fi-Action movie I've ever seen, both at 
the theater and at home.

It promised straightforward action and special effects in a Sci-Fi-esque 
setting, and hit that mark 100%. The plot was just an adaptation of "War 
of the Worlds", but it never claimed to have an original plot in the 
first place.

Ah, thinking about it, I must say that there's another movie that fully 
met my expectations, /and/ had an intelligent plot: "I, Robot". It 
actually /exceeded/ my expectations, in that it managed to amalgamate 
multiple of Asimov's short stories and their plot devices into a 
consistent single storyline.


Another movie set in the future and happening to feature Will Smith, "I 
am Legend", definitely falls into the same category as "Event Horizon". 
A pseudo-science-backed classic vampire movie - WTF?!

Post a reply to this message

Stephen schrieb:

> Now the “Film” thing that I cannot forgive is the way spaceships and 
> attack craft behave as if they were aeroplanes. Accelerating forward to 
> go faster when they are in orbit and banking when they turn.

Yeah, they obviously didn't play those "attractor" leves of "Osmos" :-)

As for banking however, there /is/ some sense to it (though probably 
unknown to most movie makers) for manned craft: While "upward" 
acceleration of 9g can be survived with proper equipment and training, 
"downward" acceleration of that order of magnitude probably kills 
instantly though brain hemorrhaging, and I could imagine that "sideways" 
acceleration of 9g could break a pilot's neck.

(I couldn't find any definite infos on this on the 'net, but it seems 
that for instance roller coasters in Germany may have an "upward" 
acceleration of up to 6g, but a "sideways" acceleration of no more than 2g.)

So while it is most likely true that attack craft in movies typically 
bank because the director didn't think /at all/, non-banking (manned) 
attack craft would only prove that the director didn't think /enough/.

Post a reply to this message

Chambers schrieb:

> One based on biology rather than physics: 28 Days Later.
> 
> It's not a movie about zombies.  It's a movie about rabies on crack - 
> and it's one of the best movies of the decade :)

Given that you think it worth mentioning, I reckon it /is/ a movie about 
zombies, backed with a pseudo-scientific background story explaining 
that this type of zombies happens to be people infected by rabies on crack.

Just like "I am Legend", I guess.

I actually detest such movies. If I'd want a zombie movie, I'd watch a 
/real/ zombie movie.

Post a reply to this message

somebody <x### [at] ycom> wrote:
> The *first* ship would have been unmanned in reality.

  Why? The first ship failing for a trivial reason was as possible as with
the second ship.

> And *if* the second unmanned ship failed, *then* they'd send a manned rescue
> and repair mission, which would make for a more beliavable premise.

  You don't "rescue and repair" a ship which eg. plummets into the Sun
without exploding because something critical failed a bit before.

  I honestly think you are now really stretching to try to find something
to complain (about a movie you haven't even seen). I'm failing to see your
ultimate motive. Is it to disagree just for the sake of disagreeing? What
is your ultimate goal?

-- 
                                                          - Warp

Post a reply to this message

clipka <ano### [at] anonymousorg> wrote:
> Darren New schrieb:

> >> Event Horizon has some great SF in it, 
> > 
> > I have no idea why everyone liked that movie. I thought it was awful.

> Not /everyone/ did. I think it was one of the worst "SF" movies ever: 
> You go to the theater expecting some nice decent science fiction (in 
> broadest sense) action movie, and all you get is some horror thriller.

> "Contact" was equally "disappointing", but it was easily able to make up 
> for it by being ingenious in its own right.

> I think "Alien" was just as bad as "EH", but as I never went to the 
> theater to watch it, I'm more willing to forgive.


> In this respect - i.e. regarding expectations being met, "Independence 
> Day" was probably the best Sci-Fi-Action movie I've ever seen, both at 
> the theater and at home.

> It promised straightforward action and special effects in a Sci-Fi-esque 
> setting, and hit that mark 100%. The plot was just an adaptation of "War 
> of the Worlds", but it never claimed to have an original plot in the 
> first place.

> Ah, thinking about it, I must say that there's another movie that fully 
> met my expectations, /and/ had an intelligent plot: "I, Robot". It 
> actually /exceeded/ my expectations, in that it managed to amalgamate 
> multiple of Asimov's short stories and their plot devices into a 
> consistent single storyline.

  Wait a moment. You base your opinion about movies solely on whether they
meet the *expectations* you had about the movies before seeing them (rather
than judging them in their own right, without any prejudices)?

  I'm sorry to say this, but that sounds just crazy.

-- 
                                                          - Warp

Post a reply to this message

Darren New <dne### [at] sanrrcom> wrote:
> Bill Pragnell wrote:
> > Ok, I see what you mean. (I don't like warp drive personally, it's a retrofitted
> > contortion that, as you say, requires quite fine gravity control.
>
> Well, it's the one that actual scientists are actually talking about. :-)

Not the only one! Wormholes have been discussed in the journals for a couple of
decades now.

> Generally speaking, "hyperdrive" and "warp drive" tend to mean the same
> thing - going somewhere that the speed of light is faster. (Assuming it's
> explained at all.)

Perhaps we're thinking of a different warp drive - I think star trek's warp
drive ended up as a bubble of compressed spacetime, not a different realm...

> > whereas I've not heard of any engineering applications of the Higgs Boson yet!
> Well, it depends what you can do with it! Higgs provides inertial mass, as I
> understand it, so it's really likely the basis of any "generated" gravity.

That's what I mean - it looks hopeful, but we don't know enough to have any
specific ideas yet. :)

> > Hmm, the 'manipulation of gravity' that I was thinking about wasn't any cleverer
> > than piling big fat masses up in interesting ways - ever read any Stephen
> > Baxter?
>
> The few I've read have been awful. :-)

Ah well. I agree his Ideas take front seat to everything else, so it depends on
what you look for in SF. However, the Mammoth series is definitely worth reading
- no cosmology in those - and I quite enjoyed the imagery in Flux (even if it is
a rehash of Niven's The Smoke Ring).

> And piling up big fat masses isn't gravity manipulation to achieve FTL
> travel? :-)

Well, we could do that now!

> As an aside, I just got back from the bookstore and it seems they have no
> actual science fiction in their science fiction section. There was some
> heinlein and asimov and other dead authors, a whole shelf of star wars and
> star trek, another shelf of manga, and everything else was vampires and
> dragons.  Oh, except for the John Ringo type stories. (Many of which I'm not
> even sure why they're listed under Science Fiction, except the author also
> writes some science fiction.)  WTF guys? Haven't you written any actual
> science fiction in ten years? Is America so hopelessly stupid and luddite
> that nobody reads something with actual science in it?

A shame. I was looking at the SF section in a bookshop over here recently, and
it's pretty decent at the mo. There's the regular slew of dead/getting on
classics (asimov, clarke, niven etc), a couple of shelves each of star wars,
star trek, doctor who and whatnot. But I'd say at least 20-30 shelves of proper
recent (last 30 years) SF. Much of it is british authors though, we don't get so
many of the recent US stuff unless it's popular. I had a really hard time
finding Vernor Vinge over here, for example. Buying online's the best bet - but
then browsing is impossible.

(I read A Fire Upon the Deep for the first time last year - probably the best SF
I'd read for a long time!)

Post a reply to this message

Warp schrieb:

>   Wait a moment. You base your opinion about movies solely on whether they
> meet the *expectations* you had about the movies before seeing them (rather
> than judging them in their own right, without any prejudices)?

No; if I did that, I wouldn't have enjoyed "Contact".

If you interpret that into my posting, you haven't read it carefully 
enough, or with a bias.


>   I'm sorry to say this, but that sounds just crazy.

Why? If I feel like watching a Sci-Fi action movie, and the thing I pay 
money for turns out to be some splatterpunk or whatever - which I 
wouldn't normally like anyway, and which I absolutely positively /not/ 
feel like right now - then what's crazy about me considering the movie bad?

My judgement of a movie is simple: If I enjoyed it, then I consider it 
good - if I didn't, then I consider it bad. Obviously, expectation /is/ 
a factor affecting whether I like it or not.

I don't give a damn about excellent vs. not-so-good acting so long as 
the movie manages to keep me focused on the story it tells; nor do I 
give a damn about excellent vs. not-so-good plot as long as the movie 
manages to keep me focused on the acting. And the expectations I have 
when entering the theater affect how good a movie can accomplish this. 
If I came particularly for the special effects, I really don't give a 
damn about anything else as long as the special effects are good and 
plenty and the other stuff is good enough to not distract me for longer 
than a few moments.

Anyone claiming to judge movies otherwise, and considering my way to 
judge movies superficial, I'd consider them dishonest, puffed-up 
intellectual farts.

Post a reply to this message

clipka <ano### [at] anonymousorg> wrote:
> Anyone claiming to judge movies otherwise, and considering my way to
> judge movies superficial, I'd consider them dishonest, puffed-up
> intellectual farts.

Oi! :)

I try to have no expectations of a movie that I don't know anything (or much)
about; I often enjoy such movies more than any other precisely for that reason.
In such cases, I'll try to classify it by genre only afterwards.

For your second point, naturally you're entitled to enjoy any movie any way you
see fit :)

In many cases, however, I can see what's coming from the publicity. Where
overly-hyped cinema is concerned, I am rarely wrong about what is coming. I knew
exactly what I was getting with, say, Transformers (and was not disappointed!).
I knew exactly what was coming with, say, Ghost Rider (and was accordingly
disappointed).

We don't all watch movies in the same way. If we did, there would be no
controversy over what constitutes a 'good' movie or a 'bad' movie.

Post a reply to this message

Bill Pragnell schrieb:

> I try to have no expectations of a movie that I don't know anything (or much)
> about; I often enjoy such movies more than any other precisely for that reason.
> In such cases, I'll try to classify it by genre only afterwards.

Trying to avoid having expectations is a much different thing than 
claiming to succeed in that attempt, or claiming to judge a movie 
unbiased by one's expectations (let alone insisting that you /must/ 
abide by these standards to judge a movie). /Those/ are the people I'd 
consider dishonest, puffed-up intellectual farts.

As I said: A good movie is one I enjoy - be it entertaining, touching, 
thrilling, relaxing, inspiring, or whatever - and a bad movie is one I 
don't enjoy (which obviously depends on the mood I'm in); everything 
else is a lie.

It's fair to reason why I /do/ enjoy some movie, or whether I /might/ 
enjoy some other movie I haven't seen yet - but there's no reason 
whatsoever why I /should/ enjoy some movie I don't (or vice versa).

Good acting, good plot, good cut... those are all just expectations 
individual people have. Exalting these expectations above others - like 
good special effects, a good laugh, or even good match of a certain 
genre stereotype - is hypocrisy.

Post a reply to this message

clipka <ano### [at] anonymousorg> wrote:
> Trying to avoid having expectations is a much different thing than
> claiming to succeed in that attempt,

I do claim to succeed, not all of the time, but frequently.

> or claiming to judge a movie
> unbiased by one's expectations

Of course, I can make no such claim! :)

> (let alone insisting that you /must/
> abide by these standards to judge a movie). /Those/ are the people I'd
> consider dishonest, puffed-up intellectual farts.

Well, fair enough.

> As I said: A good movie is one I enjoy - be it entertaining, touching,
> thrilling, relaxing, inspiring, or whatever - and a bad movie is one I
> don't enjoy (which obviously depends on the mood I'm in); everything
> else is a lie.

I can recognise a movie as well-made in most ways, yet still not enjoy it as
much as a movie that I recognise as derivative, shallow and poorly executed.
This is something most reviewers fail to do, and in doing so give me no helpful
guidance on what to see or avoid. Of course, I don't *expect* anyone to agree
with me on what is well or poorly executed, or indeed enjoyable. :)

> It's fair to reason why I /do/ enjoy some movie, or whether I /might/
> enjoy some other movie I haven't seen yet - but there's no reason
> whatsoever why I /should/ enjoy some movie I don't (or vice versa).

Of course. I'm actually mostly in agreement with you on this, but I do
understand Warp's position.

Post a reply to this message

"Warp" <war### [at] tagpovrayorg> wrote in message
news:4adc205c@news.povray.org...
> somebody <x### [at] ycom> wrote:

> > And *if* the second unmanned ship failed, *then* they'd send a manned
rescue
> > and repair mission, which would make for a more beliavable premise.

>   You don't "rescue and repair" a ship which eg. plummets into the Sun
> without exploding because something critical failed a bit before.

Huh? Is the payload supposed to be *manually* detonated "inside" the sun?
It's then sillier than I thought. If you drop a bomb into the sun and if it
doesn't detonate, I'm sorry, but there's *absolutely* nothing on board
astronauts can do except turn into plasma long before they notice the
malfunction, much less diagnose or fix it. What you are suggesting is like
strapping a technician to an atom bomb before dropping it off the plane, for
him to fix it in case something goes wrong on the way down.

>   I honestly think you are now really stretching to try to find something
> to complain (about a movie you haven't even seen). I'm failing to see your
> ultimate motive. Is it to disagree just for the sake of disagreeing? What
> is your ultimate goal?

The whole premise struck me as supremely farfetched, that's all.

Post a reply to this message

On 10/19/09 01:16, clipka wrote:
> Another movie set in the future and happening to feature Will Smith, "I
> am Legend", definitely falls into the same category as "Event Horizon".
> A pseudo-science-backed classic vampire movie - WTF?!

	I didn't see I Am Legend, but I've seen both of the "originals". They 
were OK, actually.

-- 
Did you know the word gullible isn't in the dictionary?

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On 10/19/09 02:01, clipka wrote:
> Given that you think it worth mentioning, I reckon it /is/ a movie about
> zombies, backed with a pseudo-scientific background story explaining
> that this type of zombies happens to be people infected by rabies on crack.
>
> Just like "I am Legend", I guess.
>
> I actually detest such movies. If I'd want a zombie movie, I'd watch a
> /real/ zombie movie.

	I really don't get why. You don't like it just because they're not dead.

-- 
Did you know the word gullible isn't in the dictionary?

Post a reply to this message

Bill Pragnell wrote:
> Darren New <dne### [at] sanrrcom> wrote:
>> Bill Pragnell wrote:
>>> Ok, I see what you mean. (I don't like warp drive personally, it's a retrofitted
>>> contortion that, as you say, requires quite fine gravity control.
>> Well, it's the one that actual scientists are actually talking about. :-)
> 
> Not the only one! Wormholes have been discussed in the journals for a couple of
> decades now.

I meant in terms of "warp drive", the one scientists are talking about is 
making a bubble of space and moving that using gravity techniques.

I wasn't speaking of Wormholes is "warp drive" but another kind of FTL. 
Wormholes are also gravity phenonomena.

> Perhaps we're thinking of a different warp drive - I think star trek's warp
> drive ended up as a bubble of compressed spacetime, not a different realm...

OK. Sometimes it's a different realm, sometimes (more realistically) it's a 
"bubble of compressed spacetime."  I'll grant you "hyperspace" to mean the 
former. :-)   I haven't heard of any serious scientific progress in 
hyperspace travel.

> That's what I mean - it looks hopeful, but we don't know enough to have any
> specific ideas yet. :)

I'm not into it enough to know that.

> a rehash of Niven's The Smoke Ring).

There was one I read, I don't remember what it was called, something with 
giant cat aliens in it.... Anyway, they could go FTL, and coming out, they 
had to use the FTL engines to slow down, as they came out close to 
lightspeed. What impressed me about one small part of the story was they 
were going to sneak-attack this space station, and there were all kinds of 
speed-of-light calculations they were doing. As in, "We come out 70 light 
minutes from the space station, with the first of three slow-downs 65 light 
minutes out, and the second 55 light minutes out, but we won't do the second 
one, so after 55 minutes they'll see we haven't slowed, tell the guardian 
warship that's 12 light minutes on the other side about it, and by the time 
we see the guardian ship react, we'll be 32 light-minutes out, etc etc.

>> And piling up big fat masses isn't gravity manipulation to achieve FTL
>> travel? :-)
> 
> Well, we could do that now!

With enough work, yes. :-)

I'll grant you that wormholes look more feasible than warp drive, which in 
turn looks more feasible than hyperspace.

> Buying online's the best bet - but then browsing is impossible.

Yeah. I have a hard time finding new authors on Amazon. Especially someone 
(like Jim Butcher) doing stuff that's good but that I wouldn't normally 
expect to be good.

> (I read A Fire Upon the Deep for the first time last year - probably the best SF
> I'd read for a long time!)

It was way funny back when it was written, given that all the aliens 
complaining about slow netnews bandwidth was right on the money.

Everything Vinge does is great, yes. Wonderful ideas.

-- 
   Darren New, San Diego CA, USA (PST)
   I ordered stamps from Zazzle that read "Place Stamp Here".

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Neeum Zawan wrote:
>     Well, perhaps you're right. It's been a while. I suppose Mars 
> doesn't have a significant enough atmosphere to worry about burning up 
> the way they entered?

I don't know. Some of them did indeed burn up, IIRC.

-- 
   Darren New, San Diego CA, USA (PST)
   I ordered stamps from Zazzle that read "Place Stamp Here".

Post a reply to this message

somebody wrote:

> I can suspend disbelief easier regarding matters like presence of FTL or
> artificial gravity. But decision of manned vs unmanned is not even a high
> tech / advanced sci issue, it's about common sense. I find it very hard to
> suspend my disbelief about the brightest minds of the world making such a
> blunder and sending a survivor/big-brother crew (from the reviews, it looks
> like we have the stereotypical young, maverick, ethnically diverse and
> politically correct, emotionally pre-teen, and sequentially eliminated
> bunch) on a mission that undeniably calls for an unmanned spacecraft. And
> yes, of course there wouldn't be a story or a movie without astronauts on
> that mission, but then again, did all the other sci-fi avenues run dry that
> this movie about an implausible scenario has to be absolutely produced?
> 
> 

Was it made by Hollywood?

Nuff said ;)

-- 

Best Regards,
	Stephen

Post a reply to this message

clipka wrote:
> Stephen schrieb:
> 
>> Now the “Film” thing that I cannot forgive is the way spaceships and 
>> attack craft behave as if they were aeroplanes. Accelerating forward 
>> to go faster when they are in orbit and banking when they turn.
> 
> Yeah, they obviously didn't play those "attractor" leves of "Osmos" :-)
> 

LOL

> As for banking however, there /is/ some sense to it (though probably 
> unknown to most movie makers) for manned craft: While "upward" 
> acceleration of 9g can be survived with proper equipment and training, 
> "downward" acceleration of that order of magnitude probably kills 
> instantly though brain hemorrhaging, and I could imagine that "sideways" 
> acceleration of 9g could break a pilot's neck.
> 
> (I couldn't find any definite infos on this on the 'net, but it seems 
> that for instance roller coasters in Germany may have an "upward" 
> acceleration of up to 6g, but a "sideways" acceleration of no more than 
> 2g.)
> 
> So while it is most likely true that attack craft in movies typically 
> bank because the director didn't think /at all/, non-banking (manned) 
> attack craft would only prove that the director didn't think /enough/.

Fair point.

-- 

Best Regards,
	Stephen

Post a reply to this message

somebody <x### [at] ycom> wrote:
> "Warp" <war### [at] tagpovrayorg> wrote in message
> news:4adc205c@news.povray.org...
> > somebody <x### [at] ycom> wrote:

> > > And *if* the second unmanned ship failed, *then* they'd send a manned
> rescue
> > > and repair mission, which would make for a more beliavable premise.

> >   You don't "rescue and repair" a ship which eg. plummets into the Sun
> > without exploding because something critical failed a bit before.

> Huh? Is the payload supposed to be *manually* detonated "inside" the sun?
> It's then sillier than I thought. If you drop a bomb into the sun and if it
> doesn't detonate, I'm sorry,

  Would it really be so hard to actually *cooperate* with the person you are
having a discussion with, rather than trying to constantly and meticulously
find flaws, just for the sake of argument and to try to prove other wrong?

  Imagine the following situation: One day before the final detonation
sequence is started, an electrical failure happens (something which could
be fixable by a crew of people), which makes the ship inoperable and the
computer unable to start the countdown sequence. Communication with Earth
might also get compromised.

  A crew on board could fix the problem in a few hours, and the operation
is again good to go. An unmanned ship would just continue its journey,
plummet into the Sun and fail to detonate at the critical point. There's
no way you could set up and send a repair crew in time before that happens.

> >   I honestly think you are now really stretching to try to find something
> > to complain (about a movie you haven't even seen). I'm failing to see your
> > ultimate motive. Is it to disagree just for the sake of disagreeing? What
> > is your ultimate goal?

> The whole premise struck me as supremely farfetched, that's all.

  At least it's based on actual theoretical physics.

-- 
                                                          - Warp

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