Julio Laredo wrote:
"Michael Baldwin, Bruce" wrote in message
oups.com...
Julio Laredo wrote:
"Michael Baldwin, Bruce" wrote in message
ups.com...
Julio Laredo wrote:
"Michael Baldwin, Bruce" wrote in message
ps.com...
Julio Laredo wrote:
"Michael Baldwin, Bruce" wrote in message
oups.com...
It was screening on TV the other night so I thought I'd watch it.
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0120647/
Man, talk about crap.

I happened to see only a few minutes of it, once. It's use of
cliches
showed the thinking behind the writing was way too conservative for
my
tastes.

I know what you mean. Almost every film made nowdays is formulaeic.

Starts off with some kid with with a ****ant little scope (not
even a
Mead!) discovering a comet or assteriod. So what does he do?
Calls
some turkey in Nevada who is laughingly supposed to be a
professional asstronomer.

It is essential in effective satire that the satirist have some
modicum of
knowledge of the subject be satirized. Let's see how you stack up.

Ah, so it was satire. Yeah, I can see how that makes sense now.

You didn't know that what you wrote was satire? Oh, how sad.

Lame attempt at sarcasm noted.

Most comet discoveries have been by amateurs, and one of the 2002
winners of the Edgar Wilson Award used binoculars.

They give out awards for this? A0L!

Yes, they sure do.

How dumb is that!

No more than any other award which is based on a combination of
knowledge,
skill, and luck.

Ah, you mean like the Darwin Awards!

The Darwin Awards are for those who, after a lifetime of stupid behavior,
has their
stupidity catch up and kill them. That takes a lack of knowledge, and
skill, and luck.
The Edgar Wilson Award, on the other hand, as I said, takes knowledge,
skill, and luck.
http://www.cfa.harvard.edu/iau/special/EdgarWilson.html

So you are more likely to win a Darwin than a Wilson.

And not everyone would head right to CBAT, it would be
within the realm of possibility that an amateur would try to
contact
someone
he considered a professional for verification.

To verify what? That he saw a comet?

Yes, there is a procedure. And it is a race to get your name on it.

The last thing I'd want is my name on a comet that's going to destroy
the Earth.

They wouldn't know the trajectory at that time.

You could guess.

Anyone with any knowledge knows that one photograph of a planetary object
may show where it is at a given point in time, but not it's path or
velocity. So, only the incredibly stupid would guess.

So how was that astronomer able to determine the comet's trajectory
from one observation?

So, here, your satire was off the mark. Strike one.

That clown is sitting in what looks like a radio scope station
listening to classical music (what else?). After he's told, he
looks
for it himself. Not sure how he gets an image of it the way he
did
with a radio scope, but he does.

Radio telescope stations do have optical scopes for aiming the
dishes,
and are often used in
conjunction with the radio images. Here, too, your satire is off
the
mark.
Strike two.

Are they located on top of mountains by themselves or in arrays? Did
the film show an optical scope being used?

I don't know what they showed in the film.

So your "strike one" was illinformed?

No. Optical scopes are used to help aim the dish or dishes. And it
would
be reasonable
to presume that an optical scope could be attached to a camera, and the
camera to a computer. Anyone who knows astronomy knows that.

Yes but no optical scope was evident in that part of the film. If you
had bothered to watch it, you would have seen for yourself.

You said there was a radio observatory. Optical scopes are used to aim.

None was shown.

Everyone knows that.

Everyone? Show me where it was shown in this film, or Contact or The
Dish?

To disagree would be like me objecting to the
truck, you say, that wipes out the "clown" couldn't because, well, the movie
didn't show the truck being made and having an engine of some kind put in
it.

I was more interested in knowing what the semi was doing driving up to
the observatory at that time of night.

The accessibility to a spotter scope is a given, otherwise they can't aim
the dish, and if they can't aim the dish, well, a pretty expensive umbrella.

In The Dish, it was shown to be done computationally. The Dish was set
in 1969.

I tried to watch the part where
they were planting the explosives. Once I predicted almost every
thing
that
was going to be shown before it was shown, I got bored and changed the
channel.

Well, I watched it all. Its entertainment value was laughable. Which
was just what I wanted that particular night.

Then, get this, he transfers it to floppy disk! What the hay! Is
he
using OS/2 or something? Let me guess. His crappy software is
written in FORTRAN too.

I guess you think that optical disks and XP have been around
forever;
they have not.

The film was made in '98. The Internet had been around a while by
then.

Doesn't matter. In the film the guy saved the information. Some
people
save to the Internet, some don't. I don't save things to the
Internet.
Back in 1998 I saved to floppies and CDs. Now I save to thumbdrives.

Good for you. My point was that the plotline at that particular point
was ludicrous. So you're "strike two" doesn't hold water either.

Sorry, still holds up. There would be absolutely nothing wrong with his
saving
a text file to a floppy. Besides, FORTRAN would be tape and punch cards.

Tell me about it.

Obviously, I had to.

Because you love the sound of your own voice?

If you were paying attention, the movie came out in 1998, which
means
shooting would have begun at least 2 years before.

Are you sure about that? Don't forget these types of films are
usually
set in the future. Would be kind of dumb to set something like this
in
the past, don't you think?

Shooting still began in about 1996 with no regard to when the picture
was going to come out.

Since it came out at about the same time as Armageddon, I find that
odd. Why do these sorts of films come out in rapid succession? 2 years
is a long time to wait to cash in on the popularity of something else.

Serendipity. Deep Star Six, Leviathan, and Abyss came out in rapid
sucession, as did
Red Planet and Mission to Mars, Ratatoulle and No Reservations, and
Monsters
Inc
was quickly followed by Ice Age. The lead times for movies can be
measured
in years,
and in the case of all these movies, one did not influence any of the
others.

And you know that for a fact?

Oh, dear, the "you know that for a fact?" throwdown. Whatever shall I do?

Get a clue and prove it.

So, what? That the movies came out separated by as little as 33 days? The
lead time for movies can be measured in years? One did not influence
another
because principle shooting had been done and all that was left was
post-production?

So?

Armageddon followed Deep Impact by 54 days.

You just stated it was 33 days. So which was it? 33 or 54?

That would be barely enough time
to change the posters, much less make changes in the SFX or story.

Why would it be necessary to change posters etc?

As in movies before and in the future, it'll happen.

So? You don't seem to understand why it happens.

"Silent Running" was set in the future, and showed
hardwire programming. Who does that, now?

I set the registers on a PDP-11 not too long ago. Not very exciting.

That is a little different than using a microscope and a laser to change
the circuitry on a an integrated chip, which is how it was done in that
movie.

Your point being?

Silent Running got the prediction on the future of robotic programming, as
you seem to have.

I fail to see what robotic programming has to do with lasers,
microscopes and chips.

While it is possible to predict what may happen, and could happen, you
still have to base it on what is known, now.

You mean like in Star Trek and Star Wars?

Two entirely different kinds of movies, and different, still, from Deep
Impact, which is set in a time frame of only a few years from the release
date.

While Star Wars' timeframe is unknown (it was supposed to be set in
the past), Star Trek's one is.

Some 500 years in the future. From what I saw of Deep Impact, the
technology
was in keeping with the late 20th century. Saving to a floppy was entirely
expected.

So are other methods.

At the time the movie was being made,
the most popular way to save small files was by floppy. The movie
audience would immediately know what he was doing, and why.

You could also do a printout or write it to a mag tape. I'm sure the
audience would know about that too.

And would you have made the same comment? Be that as it may, he
didn't, and it would be no reflection on the kind of software he was
using.

I was pointing out the inadequacy of the plot. What are you doing?

Oh, I see. I think you first need to know what a plot is. It is the story.
It is not your lack of knowledge of technology.

You've lost the plot ages ago.

In that time frame nearly
all computers had floppy drives, and since the coordinates for the
object
would be in a relatively small text file, a floppy would have been
a
very reasonable method to store the information.

So would email.

Again, this isn't a particularly secure way, especially at a place of
employment.

Why? I don't follow your logic here. He also had a radio dish outside
he could have used.

Anyone who knows astronomy would know that, unless he was involved
with SETI, the radio dish is made to recieve, only.

You mean like in Contact?

And if it recieves, it can't be used to send email. Recieve. Send. Not
quite
the same, no matter how much you might want it to be.

You present yourself as an expert on this yet you can't even fix your
newsreader's word wrap problem. Why am I not impressed?

You had made it sound like he was being secretive, so he could make sole
claim to the discovery, and the cash prize of the Edgar Wilson award. If
he
wanted to be secretive, email is not the way to go, as anyone who has
had emails used against them in court or disciplinary procedures could
attest.

No, I'm making it sound like the plot at that point was stupid.

But, it wasn't. From what you described, it was entirely credible, to
someone with knowledge of astronomy and the, if you can call it that,
cut-throat world of cometary one-upmanship.

Now your statements are just laughable.

All in all, I don't think the plotline leading up to his death was
well concieved or necessary.

Well, that is something different from your original complaints

Not entirely.

Entirely.

Which means that you can't seem to read posts coherently.

Strike three. You have proven yourself to be inept and I can see
no
reason
to go further since whatever you would have to opine would be of no
merit.

Sounds more like your batting average needs some work.

Note: no response.

No repsonse there was needed. I had proven my points before.

Since you admitted you didn't see that part of the film, I fail to see
how you can claim any of your points hold water.

Going by the information you have given, removing the worthless opinions,
there is nothing in your description that is untoward for the situation.

Unlike yours?