Earth should have been fine. PLOT HOLE
Near the end of the movie they say that the meteor will arrive a week early.
Pretty much means it's going to miss us. How the hell does the meteor still hit us?
Learn to science, hollywood.
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MovieChat Forums > Seeking a Friend for the End of the World (2012) Discussion > Earth should have been fine. PLOT HOLE
Exactly. First of all scientists are not just going to miscalculate the arrival of the asteroid by a whole week. They can calculate these things down to a few feet or less within any given time frame. Second of all, if they HAD miscalculated that badly, then the asteroid would miss us by something like 11 million miles. They act as if the earth is completely stationary. I can go along with the whole suspension of logic thing that movies require of us, but I can't overlook the 11 million mile misstep here.
Lars von Trier's Melancholia with it's "dance of death" crap was equally as bad, as if a rogue planet several thousand times bigger than earth and traveling through our solar system would suddenly do a gravitational tango with the earth, when of course asteroids a million times smaller whiz by our planet all the time without the earth's gravity pulling them back in for impact once they've passed us.
Damn, just hire a scientist as a consultant, and rework the plot a little to comply with the basic laws of physics and science. You'll get the same story in the end if you do it right.
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Exactly. First of all scientists are not just going to miscalculate the arrival of the asteroid by a whole week. They can calculate these things down to a few feet or less within any given time frame. Second of all, if they HAD miscalculated that badly, then the asteroid would miss us by something like 11 million miles. They act as if the earth is completely stationary. I can go along with the whole suspension of logic thing that movies require of us, but I can't overlook the 11 million mile misstep here.
Lars von Trier's Melancholia with it's "dance of death" crap was equally as bad, as if a rogue planet several thousand times bigger than earth and traveling through our solar system would suddenly do a gravitational tango with the earth, when of course asteroids a million times smaller whiz by our planet all the time without the earth's gravity pulling them back in for impact once they've passed us.
Damn, just hire a scientist as a consultant, and rework the plot a little to comply with the basic laws of physics and science. You'll get the same story in the end if you do it right.
They can't even totally predict weather all that accurately more than a few days out, and even then they're wrong at times. A lot to be honest. That's why they are constantly updating their forcasts.
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Dude, are you comparing meteorologists with meteor-ologists? That's just wrong.
The instrument has yet to be invented that can measure my indifference to that remark.
lol and he misspelled "forecasts".
I honestly think that's why science is met with such disdain, both with religious people and those who simply were asleep in middle school.
http://us.imdb.com/name/nm2339870/
Awesome response.
shareYour comment, unfortunately, shows the average level of scientific literacy in this country--or lack thereof. All the people talking about how this movie doesn't need to be accurate are just ignorant of basic facts that other developed countries take for granted.
It's like talking about farming in Antartica. If you didn't know it's frozen over, of course you can ignore the plot hole.
We could find out, if want to, where to watch a solar eclipse a hundred years in advance. We can calculate how time passes faster on satellites than on Earth to billionths of a second (one mistake and they'd fly off to space or plunge to Earth). There are certain things we can't know yet (FYI, meteorology is more like compiling baseball statistics), but there are lots of things we know to an almost incredible degree of certainty.
Much of the religious/political debates in this country essentially boil down to the same thing, ignorant people talking about things they don't understand. And then they accuse the people who know what they're talking about of being too obstinate, not open-minded enough. They don't know much about the world, so they assume other people don't, either.
Who cares if there is a meteor-logic hole in the plot the size of... a meteor!
It's not a film about science.
It's a film about life! About living your life, giving content to your self, making living mean something.
*beep* that's a cop out. I was waiting for someone so ignorant as to say "but it's about relationships!"
Well, would these relationships have occurred without a GIANT METEOR? Please. Sorry if some of us can't "dumb down" that much.
http://us.imdb.com/name/nm2339870/
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It's not a cop-out. All of us who knew anything about this film before watching, or who watched it even for a couple of minutes, knew that the scenario was not only improbable, but impossible.
If that impossible scenario bothers you to the point that you can't watch the film, don't watch it.
However, if you are willing to suspend your disbelief, as we have to do with most films, then you can just enjoy the "what-if" scenario.
I did that, and I was surprised by a really nice film with some fine performances.
It wasn't the best movie I've ever seen, but on the other hand, it was much better than I expected.
If you aren't willing to dumb down that much, then you will be missing out on a lot of greater films that are truly art.
It's a fictional movie, dude. Seriously.
Perhaps more importantly, it made little or no difference to the plot that the asteroid arrived early.
shareWe also don't get confirmation that the comet hits. We here large noises (which could be continued riots) and a fade to white. I think it would have been more powerful had it ended in the same way but without any inference to a meteor actually colliding with earth.
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That "fade to white" was the intense flash caused by the meteor hitting the atmosphere and heating up. The rumbling was the shock wave approaching. We could hear fragments of hit hit the surroundings before the big one. It hit.
shareSo, I'd guess you don't like any films with magic in them, since magic couldn't exist in the real world.
shareI can see authorities and the scientific community misleading the public about arrival dates knowing the last few days of an apocalypse would be the worst. Avoid the last few days and give people hours, instead of days, to think about the end.
My biggest problem with the movie is the whole Cessna flying over the ocean thing
Oh, the usual. I bowl. Drive around. The occasional acid flashback.
"I can see authorities and the scientific community misleading the public about arrival dates knowing the last few days of an apocalypse would be the worst. Avoid the last few days and give people hours, instead of days, to think about the end. "
That was my thought as I watched the film. Very nicely articulated.
My thoughts exactly, not that I really cared about it that much, because that wasn't what the movie was about :)
The plane though, that did make me roll me eyes lol
Hahahahahahaha I think the funniest part about all of this is how people like you, who seem to be really slow and ignorant about a *beep* of things, come here to give lectures about science and about how ignorant everyone else is LOL. That's the funniest part. You seem to be ignorant of the fact that EVERYONE is ignorant of science to an extent. If you studied something related to physics, you would still be fairly ignorant of medicine when compared to a medic. As "interdisciplinary" as your field of study may be, there will always be scientific fields that are out of reach for your career, thus making you ignorant when compared to people who actually studied something in said fields. That's it. A biologist may be ignorant of astrophysics and that's not wrong. Not everyone can be the scholar and walking encyclopedia that you are (and I'm saying that with uttermost sarcasm, because as I said, judging by your posts, you seem to be really slow and ignorant).
shareI think it was a great movie, and I hate to be the smartass here, but you are the one being ignorant, talking about things you don't understand.
For instance, you give the example that we can calculate how time passes faster on satellites than on Earth to billionths of a second. That's not entirely correct, but it's good enough, and frankly, it's not that hard to do. Then you say one mistake and they'd fly off to space or plunge to Earth. Well... that's just plain wrong. If orbital maneuvering were as precise as you imagine it is, it would be simply impossible to send things to orbit when we did. There's no possible orbit or known satellite propulsion system where one billionth of a second in burn time would cause it to enter a parabolic or degrade into a suborbital trajectory, because any impact with any debris, micrometeorites or even solar wind would cause the same effect.
That's obvious for anyone even remotely familiarized with orbital mechanics, but just to make the point, to get from a geostationary orbit, where many satellites are, to an escape orbit, you need about 1300 m/s delta v. Not only most satellites don't carry that much fuel for stationkeeping (they need like 25 m/s per year), an engine that can produce that much delta-v in 1 billionth of a second would be able to accelerate the satellite to 5000x the speed of light in one second. Wow. Talk about overengineering. Consider that the most powerful stage of satellite launchers obviously isn't the satellite RCS system used for stationkeeping, but the first stage, which doesn't need much more than the 10 m/s² of gravity to get into orbit.
In the same way, to get from a geostationary orbit into an elliptic orbit where the periapsis enters the atmosphere and actually aerobrake the satellite until it becomes suborbital and reenters the atmosphere will require about 1600 m/s delta-v, even more than needed to get to an escape orbit. That's why there are graveyard orbits where satellites are moved to in the end of their lifetime. Deorbiting a satellite from geostationary orbit will always require at least as much fuel as was needed to get it there from low Earth orbit, but moving it to a graveyard orbit will require as little as 10 m/s.
Obviously, it looks like you read somewhere that GPS satellites depend on a synchronization in the order of a billionth of a second to work, and made up a real mess, but that refers to their internal clocks used for synchronization with receivers on Earth, not their orbital stationkeeping.
To find out where to watch a solar eclipse a hundred years ago is pretty elementary. People did that centuries ago. Today we can know things with more precision, but it's not magic. There's nothing wrong with the movie since it doesn't mention in detail why the predictions for the arrival time were wrong. There are a number of different phenomena that could distort measurements of distance and give a wrong prediction.
Also, scientists can never predict unexpected circunstances. A few years ago, a comet was in a straight trajectory to Earth and would pass very close. Some people found coincidences between the alignment of the comet with the Earth and the Sun and the occurrence of the most damaging earthquakes recently, so there were a lot of wackos saying the next alignment, the closest to Earth, would be the end of the world. Guess what? The comet was destroyed by a solar coronal mass ejection when it was nearest to the Sun. Who would've guessed, huh? I bet if that happened in the movie you'd say it's a plot hole, and only ignorant people would say it can be dismissed because they don't understand and aren't as enlightened as you.
So... next time, before pretending superiority over others, try to actually learn what you're talking about. In this case it was rocket science, but rocket science really isn't that hard.
Regards.
Obviously, it looks like you read somewhere that GPS satellites depend on a synchronization in the order of a billionth of a second to work, and made up a real mess, but that refers to their internal clocks used for synchronization with receivers on Earth, not their orbital stationkeeping.
Good points, but I'd add one trivial nit-pick. Light travels very roughly about a foot in a billionth of a second, or nsec (186,000*5280/1,000,000,000). Military GPS has an accuracy to about 5 feet, so the GPS satellites and receivers need to be accurate to 5 nsecs, if not to 1. To achieve even that level of accuracy, the GPS system has to take into account the relativistic difference in time passage between a receiver on the surface of the earth and the satellite's orbital velocity.
More to the point, a difference in accuracy of 1 nsec vs. 5 nsecs doesn't seem like much, but to put it other terms, to achieve the former would take a five-fold increase in accuracy -- and that's hard to do. share
To achieve even that level of accuracy, the GPS system has to take into account the relativistic difference in time passage between a receiver on the surface of the earth and the satellite's orbital velocity.
Nope. That's a myth. As a matter of fact, GPS satellites only have to be synchronized to each other to work, and use a sagnac correction, not a relativistic correction. Actually, it would be a lot more complicated to make them work with a relativistic correction and synchronize in orbit, since each pair of satellites would be in its own inertial frame.
Also, that's just signal synchronization. Any cell phone with wireless internet transmitting data at 2.4ghz is more accurate than that, and that's why you can get cheap GPS receivers to work. What ArthurDental said is that 1ns inaccuracy in some orbital maneuver would get the satellite out of orbit, which is nonsense.
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Sorry, my original post may have been unclear. I wasn't referring to the synchronization of the satellites to each other, but to the corrections needed to have each one of them individually keep accurate time when compared to a clock on earth.
From the Astronomy department at Ohio State University (http://www.astronomy.ohio-state.edu/~pogge/Ast162/Unit5/gps.html):
Each satellite carries with it an atomic clock that "ticks" with an accuracy of 1 nanosecond (1 billionth of a second). A GPS receiver in an airplane determines its current position and heading by comparing the time signals it receives from a number of the GPS satellites (usually 6 to 12) and trilaterating on the known positions of each satellite. The precision achieved is remarkable: even a simple hand-held GPS receiver can determine your absolute position on the surface of the Earth to within 5 to 10 meters in only a few seconds (with differential techniques that compare two nearby receivers, precisions of order centimeters or millimeters in relative position are often obtained in under an hour or so). A GPS receiver in a car can give accurate readings of position, speed, and heading in real-time!
To achieve this level of precision, the clock ticks from the GPS satellites must be known to an accuracy of 20-30 nanoseconds. However, because the satellites are constantly moving relative to observers on the Earth, effects predicted by the Special and General theories of Relativity must be taken into account to achieve the desired 20-30 nanosecond accuracy.
Because an observer on the ground sees the satellites in motion relative to them, Special Relativity predicts that we should see their clocks ticking more slowly (see the Special Relativity lecture). Special Relativity predicts that the on-board atomic clocks on the satellites should fall behind clocks on the ground by about 7 microseconds per day because of the slower ticking rate due to the time dilation effect of their relative motion.
Further, the satellites are in orbits high above the Earth, where the curvature of spacetime due to the Earth's mass is less than it is at the Earth's surface. A prediction of General Relativity is that clocks closer to a massive object will seem to tick more slowly than those located further away (see the Black Holes lecture). As such, when viewed from the surface of the Earth, the clocks on the satellites appear to be ticking faster than identical clocks on the ground. A calculation using General Relativity predicts that the clocks in each GPS satellite should get ahead of ground-based clocks by 45 microseconds per day.
The combination of these two relativistic effects means that the clocks on-board each satellite should tick faster than identical clocks on the ground by about 38 microseconds per day (45-7=38)! This sounds small, but the high-precision required of the GPS system requires nanosecond accuracy, and 38 microseconds is 38,000 nanoseconds. If these effects were not properly taken into account, a navigational fix based on the GPS constellation would be false after only 2 minutes, and errors in global positions would continue to accumulate at a rate of about 10 kilometers each day! The whole system would be utterly worthless for navigation in a very short time.
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The engineers who designed the GPS system included these relativistic effects when they designed and deployed the system. For example, to counteract the General Relativistic effect once on orbit, they slowed down the ticking frequency of the atomic clocks before they were launched so that once they were in their proper orbit stations their clocks would appear to tick at the correct rate as compared to the reference atomic clocks at the GPS ground stations. Further, each GPS receiver has built into it a microcomputer that (among other things) performs the necessary relativistic calculations when determining the user's location.
Hope that helps clarify.
From your post:
Actually, it would be a lot more complicated to make them work with a relativistic correction and synchronize in orbit, since each pair of satellites would be in its own inertial frame.
Good point. With 30 or so satellites in the constellation, that would indeed be complex.
You appear to have some level of expertise on the topic, so I'll take the opportunity to ask a question I've wondered about for 40 years. I've always wondered how accurate tuners needed to be to pick up a clear radio signal, and if doppler shift between an satellite in LEO approaching, passing overhead, and receding changed the way the receiver tunes in the signal frequency. Assuming a velocity of around 18K MPH (for a total difference of 36K MPH between approach and recession), is that enough shift to the frequency to make a difference in the way the signal is received? share
Sorry, my original post may have been unclear. I wasn't referring to the synchronization of the satellites to each other, but to the corrections needed to have each one of them individually keep accurate time when compared to a clock on earth.
I know that's what you mean, but as I said, that's a myth. To use relativistic corrections to keep them synchronized to each other in orbit, you'd have to first consider each satellite and the Earth, then each pair of satellites, but that's not how it's done. Before launch they are synchronized to the ECI as a preferred frame, which is as a matter of fact a violation of relativity, then they are corrected for the sagnac effect to keep accurate time, with c constant relative to the Earth. The article you quote explains how everyone imagine it works, but that's not at all how it's actually done. It would be a lot more complicated for it to work like that. Google for articles on GPS and relativity by Ashby, Wang and Hatch, you should find some details on this controversy.
You appear to have some level of expertise on the topic, so I'll take the opportunity to ask a question I've wondered about for 40 years. I've always wondered how accurate tuners needed to be to pick up a clear radio signal, and if doppler shift between an satellite in LEO approaching, passing overhead, and receding changed the way the receiver tunes in the signal frequency.
I'm not an expert, but I can answer that. Yes, for any non-GSO satellite, doppler shift can be very significant. The frequency-shift curves are usually S shaped, with zero frequency shift when the non-GSO satellite is closest to the ground transceiver, so the compensation varies during the transit. The magnitude of the shift will be in the order of a dozen KHz per GHz of the carrier signal. This article gives you some formulas and values if you're interested: http://bib.irb.hr/datoteka/39128.p0767.PDF
As to how accurate tuners need to be, it depends on many factors. In some applications the transceivers can compensate for doppler effect dynamically, according to the relative speed, elevation, etc. In other applications, the receiver may copy signals that are off-frequency by a small margin, at the cost of requiring a wider band and channel spacing, etc.
Also, digital transceivers have to adjust bandwidth and bitrate, since the frequency shift squeezes the signal into a shorter period of time. The Cassini-Huygens probe had some problems due to that. As the probe decelerated due to atmosferic drag from Titan after being dropped from the orbiter, there would be significant doppler effect between the two. If I remember it correctly, the probe radio was built by an Italian contractor who reused code from an Earth satellite and compensated for frequency and bandwidth, but not bitrate, so during the descent the orbiter would lose data whenever the bitrate didn't match. They couldn't change the radio software to fix that, so they changed the entry trajectory to maximize those periods when the bitrate matched.
Assuming a velocity of around 18K MPH (for a total difference of 36K MPH between approach and recession), is that enough shift to the frequency to make a difference in the way the signal is received?
It will depend on the motion relative to the ground station, but let's say that satellite is in a nearly circular orbit and visible for about 8 minutes to a ground station near the equator, with a max elevation at 80 degrees. If it's transmitting at 150 Mhz, the frequency shift will be in the order of +-2.5 KHz during the transit. Depending on the application and equipment being used, there are many ways to compensate for that, but yes, it's enough to make a difference. You can't simply tune to the 150 MHz and expect to get the signal for the whole 8 minutes.
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Thanks, I appreciate the info. I wasn't aware of the comm difficulties with Cassini-Huygens, but it's an interesting story (almost on the order of missing Mars due to mixed programming in metric and English). We've wandered far from the topic of the thread, but it's been fun. Thanks.
shareWTF!!! I thought we were reviewing movies here!
share[deleted]
Zactly. Theory = Fact
shareWeather is unpredictable, meteors are not.
shareSo many people talking of the absolute precision of scientists predicting meteors...Hmm so the small meteor over Russia...I suppose that just wasn't large enough for scientists to notice? Or maybe they decided not to bother telling anyone?
If you think scientists can track an asteroid, meteor or any other strange lump of rock from space, with absolute accuracy then you are very mistaken. Go to NASA website and do some reading, listen to Seth Shostak's podcast if you don't like to read more than a few lines at a time, but don't keep passing around the same disinformation please!
GeaF
Yes, the meteor over Russia was just that...quite small and unnoticed by any scientists. Meanwhile, the very next night an asteroid passed by the earth exactly as predicted, roughly 17,000 miles away. That's pretty flipping accurate. Unlike the 11 million mile gaffe you see in this movie. And not one based on a prediction fifty years before, but one based on calculations made only days before. Believe it or not, scientists have a basic understanding of physics, even if you don't.
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"gaffe"
There is a hint that it is not a gaffe at all, but intentional misinformation to prevent panic (or delay it).
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RIGOLETTO: I'm denied that common human right, to weep.
Purposely giving misinformation about the arrival time by a week would be something governments would do for sure, try to keep panic down and people doing their jobs a little longer to keep the lights on a water running.
I don't know how hard it actually is to calculate those things but I am assuming only NASA types would be able to figure out the arrival time with any certainty. Swearing the few guys who could/would know to secrecy for the sake of it all wouldn't be hard to do. (As they did in Deep Impact).
Whether that was the intention of the film makers or not is another matter for debate. Being that it was a decent movie I am willing to give them the benefit of the doubt.
big meteors can be accurately predicted until they touch an atmosphere... little meteors can only be predicted if they are seen in time.
the asteroid in the film was 75 miles across which makes it quite big enough to be visible years in advance and be accurately tracked. If they had made it only 6 or 7 miles, then it might not have been seen until a few days before it hit, but once it was seen.
it takes several observations before a trajectory can be accurately predicted, but they would not know that it would hit earth until they could accurately predict the trajectory.
the only way that they could be a week off if it past close to a large planet, but then the odds of it still hitting earth are very small.
However none of this is relevant. The most logical explanation of the early arrival is that the governements lied in order that the civil order did not fall apart sooner... that is they told people it would arrive later to reduce panic... The movie hints at that possibility.
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RIGOLETTO: I'm denied that common human right, to weep.
The most logical explanation of the early arrival is that the governements lied in order that the civil order did not fall apart sooner... that is they told people it would arrive later to reduce panic... The movie hints at that possibility.
I agree with this, yeah. share
This could be the dumbest post I ever read anywhere, ever. Predicting weather patterns are quiet different than calculating the movement of celestial objects. WTF?
shareLars von Trier's Melancholia with it's "dance of death" crap was equally as bad, as if a rogue planet several thousand times bigger than earth and traveling through our solar system would suddenly do a gravitational tango with the earth, when of course asteroids a million times smaller whiz by our planet all the time without the earth's gravity pulling them back in for impact once they've passed us.
I always felt the "Dance of Death" was Lars von Trier's middle finger towards any type of scientific rationality we'd come to expect from movies like 2012 and Armageddon. He knew any explanation wasn't going to satisfy anyone so he just gave us something so ludicrous we couldn't debate its accuracy. That, and proof of a wicked sense of humor hiding in other pockets of the movie.
A thread cut with a carving knife
That is what they call our life
Thank-you for your knowledge about planets, asteroids, and gravity. I wondered about both movies and why the earth was destroyed. But I thought the science was correct , and our technology flawed all over the world!! But to know that the science is also wrong makes it worst.
This reminds me of the movie "The Day After Tomorrow" and the weather apocalypse. I believe scientist were panning this movie also.
Where are the good ole believable disaster movies-The Poseidon Adventure, The Towering Inferno, Volcano.
"...as long as people can change, the world can change"
Both of these films employ heavy symbolism, allegories and metaphors. The rogue planet and the asteroid are metaphoric, not literal plot devices.
Fanboy : a person who does not think while watching.share
Try reworking your definition of suspension of logic. They still call it the entertainment industry, do they not?
shareLars von Trier's Melancholia with it's "dance of death" crap was equally as bad, as if a rogue planet several thousand times bigger than earth and traveling through our solar system would suddenly do a gravitational tango with the earth, when of course asteroids a million times smaller whiz by our planet all the time without the earth's gravity pulling them back in for impact once they've passed us.
According to Uffe Graae Jørgensen who was the astro physicist behind the movie it's indeed possible when you crunch down the numbers. It require that
a) Melancholia travels with 100.000 km/h
b) The planets need to be 6 Earth radiuses from each other (AKA extremely close)
The travel of Melancholia was put into a computer simulator, so even though it's unlikely it's not physical impossible.
Also you are implying that small objects (like asteroids) are more likely to go into a gravitational tango with earth than bigger objects (planets) which is nonsense. You have to add to the gravitational pull from both objects, not subtract them. share
I decided to consider one of the headlines presented: "Conspiracy theorists say they knew all along." Perhaps the government simply provided the wrong information in order to curtail the panicked anarchy of the final days. Maybe the "elites" needed some semblance of civility while conducting plans to ensure the survival of a select few.
Yeah I know, I'm ssstretching this *beep* But I try and give the benefit of the doubt and provide as many possible alternate explanations because after all, it's a just movie.
You are not stretching anything with that theory. In a movie, nothing is random. The director deliberately put that headline on the screen while the news channel made the announcement so that the audience (at least the part that paid close attention) would understand what really happened.
shareTrue. However, the problem is that, the extent to which we know anything regarding this starts and ends with this headline. There isn't more information for us to infer as to exactly why the director put that there. It could be that she was hinting at my hypothesis or, it could very well be that she was just mirroring the fact that conspiracy theorists are always claiming deception on the part of the government no matter what the subject is.
My point was that many people are way too f*uckin' eager to declare "FACTUAL ERROR!!! THIS MOVIE NO LONGER MAKES ANY SENSE!!" instead of considering alternative possibilites.
I think thats a strength of the film. It leaves it up to the audience to pay attention to those little details.. instead of getting uptight about the accuracy of the film.
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RIGOLETTO: I'm denied that common human right, to weep.
Yes, but then you would need to have a worldwide conspiracy. And then you're talking about every scientist keeping their mouth shut, when they aren't part of the government, even those who may receive grants or be employed by government agencies. But suppose all that's true, why tell people at all? Just keep it a secret. Or at least not reveal the secret at the last moment.
But whatever. The movie isn't that good to begin with. I found it merely okay, even factoring out the silliness of the, yes, gaffe.
The film was about finding companionship and consolation in the face of impending disaster; its a very romantic film so its not for everyone. I was thinking of a particular woman I might want to be with. Anyway, you shouldn't confuse taste with quality. You don't like it fine. I understand that. But that doesn't make it a bad movie. Nor does the misinformation/conspiracy in the background regardless of how much or little sense you think it makes; that really is not an important aspect of the film what so ever.
But, it would not be that hard to get a lot of scientists on board especially if you are in control of the information. The world wide number of people capable of finding a rogue asteroid and computing its trajectory is pretty small; we're not talking millions of people. Also they would all know each other and regularly meet at conferences... so having a government offical arrange a meeting with these scientists at some conference to discuss what to do about the impending collision (e.g., can we blow it up?) would not be that difficult to organize. Especially easy to arrange if the deligates to the conference were invited to a conference in some nice location like Hawaii or whatever. Scientists love to travel -- especially when invited and the travel expenses are paid for. So at that meeting they might also disucss what information to release to the public.
Furthermore its not like the conspiracy was intended to harm anyone, it was intended (presumably) to control panic and maintain social order for a little longer. In addition, there is no particular value for an individual scientist to whistle blow and announce that information provided to the public is off and the asteroid will arrive a week earlier than announced. Its not like they are going to increase their H-factor score or get tenure for going against the official estimate and for exposing the lie... cause the world is about to end. But as noted in the film, the truth was out there (the conspiracy believers) -- perhaps some amateur astronomers had managed to track it with their backyard telescopes; not easy given its size but certainly possible. But the film doesn't dwell on the conspiracy or the pragmatics of misinformation (see Deep Impact for that); it focuses on a relationship in adversity.
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RIGOLETTO: I'm denied that common human right, to weep.
I think this post nails it, and it's exactly what I was thinking. The scientists and government officials certainly would have known about Matilda many months or years in advance, and would have needed to focus all human resources on the CSA mission to deflect the asteroid. It isn't until the space shuttle is lost that mankind actually loses hope. From there it's a case of trying to keep order and minimize the time during which people face the final reality of mass extinction.
We all know we're going to die eventually. But like the guy in the truck says, it isn't right that a man knows the exact time and place. I can see the government calculating the mass hysteria and wanting to make that window of time as small as possible. Give people just enough time to get to where they need to be, cross off a few bucket list items, then have the end come quicker than people planned, because the waiting truly is the hardest part.
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A wrench to the head changes everything.
Why does everyone always dog so deep into movies just to prove that it isn't real or that it can't happen in real life. Dudes, it's a damn movie! Just watch the movie and enjoy the movie, don't go all "THIS IS FAKE!"or 'THAT CAN'T EVEN HAPPEN, STUPID MOVIE" or "THAT IS A GREEN SCENE SCENE, I CAN SEE THAT BECAUSE OF THE PIXELS". Please, this kind of peoples ruin movies.
’’I'M A ‘‘
This is a god damn GLARING plot hole. Kinda hard to ignore. I can handle the rest of the inconsistencies but this one was just too big to ignore. It's common sense.
shareThat and why weren't people trying to find ways to survive and figuring our exactly where it was going to hit first. It was so stupid it was hard to watch.
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Well then why were all those dudes in that shelter thing? Guess they were gonners too. I still think more people would be trying to survive like they were. And if an asteroid like that were about to hit, my guess is they wouldn't tell anyone it's coming for fear of chaos.
shareNah, I think that was pretty accurate too, if the end of the world were coming, the 24-hour broadcast stations would be all over it. Even during Apocalypse ratings would matter.
share[deleted]
Apparently you missed the radio report that scientists and officials knew where it would impact first, but would not release the info to help control panic.
There were survivalists trying to plan for survival (like the ex-boyfreind), as well as certain powerful people and leader that were mentioned to have been sheltered into the large underground bunkers.
The film also takes place in 2021 (according to magazine and cough syrup dates), so things may be handled slightly differently than we would today.
Suspension of belief was definitely necessary. :)
"Don't get chumpatized!" - The King of Kong: A Fistful of Quarters (2007)
It's not a plot hole. It's information that may or may not have been correct.
Some people say it has a deeper meaning, that the government actually gave false information.
Even if that isn't true, it isn't changing the plot, as the plot is that a meteor is going to hit either way.
It's what you'd call a speed bump in the movie. If you go over it too quickly, you're gonna have a bad time.
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"If I don't understand it, it's a plot-hole!"
-Typical Reviewer
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Because there is a such thing as professionalism. These movie makers are also money makers. They make millions of our dollars on these films. That being the case, a film should entertain WHILE being informative and accurate at the same time. It's not a bed time story being told to a 5 year old. It's a movie. And although it's main purpose is to entertain, you can't just totally ignore the laws that govern our world. Film makers have become increasingly ignorant to even the most blatantly obvious facts. These are supposed to be somewhat intelligent people with advanced education. They could spend a few dollars and some time actually researching facts or consulting people who know this stuff. There is no excuse, it is laziness and stupidity.
shareWe were not watching a documentary, were we? It was a comedy, a comedy about a men and a women. A man and a women who find each others love. And then theres some and some And then the world goes FLAAASH and BOOOOM.
But I get... there are always those people who are not watching the movie, but just searching for any plot holes and then later hate about the movie how the movie sucks and how it wasn't accurately enough. I feel sorry for these people.
Just enjoy the movie(s) and don't whine about every (small) plothole.
’’I'M A ‘‘
It doesn't have to be a documentary in order for it to be accurate. Since when did the genre of movie dictate whether or not there was accurate information or plot consistency in it? First it was horror movies. Some person years ago decided to say that horror movies don't need consistency or accuracy and that it was ok to have plot holes. And now comedies don't need any type of intelligence either. What's next? Before you know it, every movie will just be a cluster of BS, inconsistency, and idiotic plot devices all because...it's just a movie. Maybe they should have made Dodge stop time at the end of the movie, then go back in time, teleport to the asteroid, use superstrength to redirect it, then teleport back to Earth, restart time, and then alter reality so that he could still fall in love with Penny...afterall, it's just a comedy right?
shareWhat you are saying is pure *beep* Teleporting has nothing to do with it. We were talking about some stupid small plot hole .
Maybe dodge should've been a unibear that flies and has magical powers and finds his love: a spongebrick that is pink with a blonde wig on. The sponge also speaks. And at the end of the movie, they run, they run so fast that they go back in time. then they make a mega-cauliflowerpowered-laser that they shoot on the asteroid (that is also made of pink sponge..) And then the world (which is also made of pink sponge) lives and dances with the moon (which teleports to mars). Then unibear and sponge make children and then they have pink unibearsponges that can talk and fly. No plotholes there.
’’I'M A ‘‘
I liked your version. it is very Dragon Ball Z-ish
Haha, I was going for Marvel Comic-ish...but I'll take DBZ-ish any day!! The Black Star Dragonballs could def revive a planet. And a Kamehameha wave could have ripped that asteroid to shreds. How crazy if Goku had appeared at the last minute...?!?! LOL!!
shareThis movie needs more polygons.
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Has anyone considered interpreting this metaphorically instead? There are lots of scientifically infeasible things in literature such as Aesop's Fables, zombies, Super Heroes, etc. and yet we don't point at them and disparage them because of their lack of truth content. We recognize that the truth of the aforementioned doesn't lie in it's scientific validity but in it's metaphoric validity. Could a fairy tale teach someone to live a better life? Sure. In the same way, letting us all know that we may die much sooner than we can foresee is illustrated by the unexpected turn of events with the intention of possibly helping us live a more full life. Death can come suddenly and without warning.
shareThis is what normal humans call, ironic comedy. The world is ending, he just lost everyone in his life, and now it will be over a week early. Murphy's law. Stop scientifically analyzing a black comedy!!!
shareI'm with you man.. I don't understand this people with their strange comments. It's like they can't tell it's a comedy, sure, black comedy, but still...
shareOh thank Christ somebody has finally spoken some *beep* sense. As you said, this movie was not a serious, dramatic expose of an impending Armageddon. It was a BLACK COMEDY and the fact that brilliant scientists in the film miscalculated the comet's arrival and that it was actually coming even earlier fits perfectly into the comedic undertone of the movie. I sincerely hope the OP is reading this.
shareAs many posters here have said, there was no way the scientists could have miscalculated that badly. Apparently the scriptwriter was rather weak not only in science but perhaps also in common sense. Another example was the idea of flying across the Atlantic in a single-propeller piston engine plane.
The "Conspiracy Theory" explanation - that the government deliberately gave the wrong information so that the panic and disorder would not start too early – is also weak:
1. Why bother to postpone the people panicking if extinction of mankind was certain anyway?
2. On the other hand, if you decide to fool the public, why not go all the way so that they wouldn't know that you lied until the moment they die? By lying about the date, the panic would be all the greater when you suddenly announce that the predicted time of impact has been shifted forward.
3. The US is not the only country. Aren't there other governments and scientists in all part of the world? For the lie to work, they all have to be in a colossal conspiracy.
This part of the film definitely makes no sense, and moreover is totally unnecessary. I don't see how the government's sudden announcement of an earlier date of impact affected any part of the story.
"This part of the film definitely makes no sense, and moreover is totally unnecessary. I don't see how the government's sudden announcement of an earlier date of impact affected any part of the story. [] "
It might make no sense, but it was totally necessary. I don't think Dodge would have sent her on her way if there was less than a day left to live. And if there was still a week left, then her return would have had a lot less impact than it did.
The important thing was that she returned. I don't think the impact on the viewer would be any less if they were able to spend a few more days before the end.
shareI agree, it was more significant that she returned because she gave up seeing her family for spending her final moments with Dodge. If they hadn't skipped ahead a week, she could have flown to England, spent a few days with her family and possibly flown back (depending on Dodge's dad). This wouldn't have been as emotional. However, this is a still huge plot hole. The only thing I can think is either the government didn't release the right information to contain chaos or perhaps the meteor was so big that it still made contact. They don't really show us what happened at the end, we *spoilers* hear a few loud bangs and then the film fades to white. Could it also be possible that since the meteor was miscalculated, it broke up while entering the earths atmosphere or something?
Badger my ass its probably Milhouse
HenryCW » Sun Nov 11 2012 12:59:43
Another example was the idea of flying across the Atlantic in a single-propeller piston engine plane.
It depends on what the airplane actually was. It looked like probably a Cessna 172. (More Cessna 172s have been built than any other aircraft.) Later models of that aircraft have about a 1000 mi (1600 km) range (+ 45 minute reserve). So, Delaware to Maine, Maine to Gander, Gander to Nuuk (Greenland), Nuuk to Reykjavik (Iceland), Reykjavik to either Ireland (Dublin or Belfast) or Scotland (Glasgow or Edinburgh), then to London (or wherever in England). All hops of 900 or fewer miles. Certainly possible.
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XenaGuy share
or they just misinformed the public on purpose, like they always do...
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