From: spike66 (spike66@attglobal.net)
Date: Sun Mar 10 2002 - 23:36:50 MST
John Clark wrote:
>spike66 <spike66@attglobal.net> Wrote:
>
> >I might also collect deuterium free water
>
>Deuterium is not radioactive, it's perfectly stable.
>
> John K Clark jonkc@att.net
>
Oops. So right you are. {8-]
As long as we are discussing technical errors in sci-fi,
I was just obsessing over the Arroway character in Contact.
Again.
I noticed a couple of minute but totally mentally destructive
nits in the story. The first is where Arroway and Joss are
star gazing and Arroway turns pi radians and says "Venus
will be over there soon."
What did she mean? If Venus had been pre-conjunction it
should be already visible. If post-conjunction, it would rise
shortly before dawn the next day. Clearly it was early evening,
for Joss uttered the magic scientist-seducing line "It would
surely be a waste of space," then they had time for a (presumably
leisurely and enormously fulfilling) copulation session, then he
said "tomorrow, let us.." yakkity yak and bla bla, then Arroway
brushed him off and went to work with plenty of darkness left.
But the second gaff was far more serious. After Arroway
heard the heartbeat-like signal and raced for the headquarters,
the signal stopped, then restarted. The second time the signal
came, they counted the pulses and realized they were the prime
numbers. The pulses were coming about one every 0.9 seconds
(I timed them). They pulsed out all the primes thru 101. In that
time the scientists had a short conversation.
The problem is that the sum of the primes thru 101 is 1161, along
with 25 pauses between primes at that speed would take about
22 minnutes to complete. Had not Arroway been such a
compelling character, or if I were any more Aspergerish than
I am, this alone would have ruined the entire movie for me. spike
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