What the movie gets wrong

50:56Um so perhaps there are reasons because I haven't read the book. I did a bit of research to see like what the what what the justification for these these points were. I'm still not buying it. So perhaps in the comments you can tell me if you disagree. The first one has nothing to do with Andy Weir. That just has to do with Ryan Gosling never having been in a molecular biology lab. Remember the centrifuge scene? Have you seen all of the all of the scientists on Tik Tok and Instagram? Everyone had like a gasp during the centrifuge scene because he puts two samples right next to each other on the centrifuge, okay? I got a 15-minute lecture during my Princeton undergrad

51:38bio lab because I did that and then like the centrifuge started doing this and then the grad student who was my TA had to like unplug the centrifuge and he was like, "You're a physics major. Like, are you what what are you what are you doing?" And then I thought about it for like 5 seconds. I'm like, "Yeah, that was that was really dumb. Um because you got to balance. You got to put one on one side and one on the other side. And the thing is it wasn't even like a the scene wasn't even off the to the side. The camera focuses in on the centrifuge and then he puts the two So, it's just full the the entire field of view is the centrifuge that I know is about to break and I'm

52:19sure he only has one centrifuge up there. >> Right. So, what? Now he's going to have to spin it manually or something, right? So, that centrifuge definitely broke >> Yeah. Yeah. in the story. >> Yeah. Yeah. So, that was pretty hilarious that everybody on Tik Tok was like going after that. Um the second thing was So, Ryan Gosling mentions that or his character mentions that Rocky's alien technology is like primitive in the sense that they don't know about relativity, but they're really good at material science. Okay? Now, they're so good at material science that they can literally build anything they want with this xenanite. Right. Right? Um which has xenon in some form. I can totally buy

52:59that xenon has other allotropes that is not like gas, right? There's like ways to manipulate xenon to be a material that we haven't really thought of. Condensed matter is is um a nascent field even by today's standards. So, I can buy that. What I don't buy is that an alien civilization is so advanced that they can literally 3D print xenanite and things like that, but they don't know about relativity. Okay? Because relativity to me is a very fundamental um part of the fabric of the universe. I can forgive them for not understanding general relativity, maybe, okay? But special relativity has everything to do with just electromagnetism in general,

53:43electricity and magnetism. And I know for a fact that they know about electricity and magnetism for two reasons. Well, let's actually three reasons. First, in the scene where Ryan Gosling is like trying to um in the scene where the the spaceship the Earth Hail Mary spaceship is like turning around to create artificial gravity. Um there's antennas on Rocky's spaceship that are tracking. Those antennas are using light. Okay? They're using some kind of radar because that's what the only thing that goes in empty space is light, electromagnetic radiation. So clearly

54:24he's using electromagnetic magnetic radiation in some rudimentary way, right? So you can say, "Oh, he just like he knows it's like in some rudimentary way." Fine. Uh second, he's literally 3D printing like entire spaceships worth of Xenonite. >> Right. >> How are you manipulating that material if not with electromagnetic fields, right? And if you're doing that, how do you not know about relativity? Because relativity is really a consequence of Maxwell's equations, right? If you know electricity and magnetism, you know if you're trying to manipulate charged particles, right? You know that when they move, they create a second type of force called magnetism.

55:05And then you know that the interplay between electricity and magnetism has to go at the speed of light. And then you can make logical sort of deductions about, well, what's the like how is this working, right? Um like it's it's really a logical argument where where where what relativity is. And Um third, about the material science, right? There's there's two materials that I know for a fact Rocky knows exist in terms of elements. First, um, oxygen. Oxygen, he knows about oxygen because if you remember there's a scene where Ryan Gosling goes through, um, goes to meet

55:45Rocky and then Rocky's pointing at the at the little like capsule that's a gift for him. That That scene by the way was hilarious where he kept pointing and Ryan Gosling was like, "Oh, we want to keep doing Oh, you're point Oh, you're pointing. Okay." He opens the thing, he sees, um, two like a beads of eight and eight, okay? And that's meant to be oxygen because oxygen has eight protons and eight eight electrons. And so an O2 molecule is eight and eight. Notice, Rocky did not make 16 and 16. So Rocky knows about charge. If he did 16 and 16, that means oh, I just weighed I just weighed oxygen,

56:26right? And it's like 16 things in here and 16 things in here. No, he did eight and eight, which means he's either referring to the protons or he's referring to the electrons, which means he knows about positive and negative charge. So he knows fundamentally about electricity and magnetism. He knows about charge, Coulomb's law, and they have some rudimentary form of understanding the mechanics of chemicals and chemical bonds, okay? So you can't tell me that he doesn't know about electricity and magnetism. >> That's very interesting. He has to know about light. He has to know that light is a manifestation of this of this thing. That was like immediate to us in the 1800s when we figured out that the electricity and magnetism

57:06are governed by Maxwell's equations and the speed of light just pops out. The second thing like along that vein, you're, um, manipulating xenon. Xenon is a pretty heavy element, okay? I think it's like 54 or something like that on the right hand side. Um, when you're manipulating heavy elements, relativistic corrections become ever so important in chemistry because the heavier an element is, the faster the electrons are moving. The electrons move close to the speed of light, and now the chemistry of that material has everything to do with the fact that as electrons move closer to the speed of light, they get heavier, which means they're going to the atom is going to get smaller, which means they're going to shield the

57:47nucleus more, which means the outer electrons are going to do weird things. That's why gold is the color it is. That's why mercury is liquid. And that's I think if if he's manipulating xenon at that fidelity, >> Yeah, that's a good point. >> there's no way that they don't understand relativity. It's a very compelling argument. >> saying, like >> No, it's a very compelling argument. >> can't be that good at material science and not know the fundamentals of our universe. You okay? It's not like like physics is not something like, oh, I only need quantum mechanics. Well, no, in order to do that level of quantum mechanics, you need to understand like electron spin. Where does electron spin come from? That's from relativity. So, I

58:29just don't buy that argument. That just because he's he uses echolocation means that oh, he doesn't know about relativity, he doesn't know about light. We don't see the strong nuclear force, and yet we understand it pretty well. >> Right. Right? >> Right. And also the it's it's it's one of those things where even if you you're not it's sort of you're I part of your point is like you will you would have stumbled upon it indirectly even if you weren't trying to discover it directly. >> Yeah. Perhaps we had an easier time because we live in an environment where we can see things, where light travels long distances, and blah blah blah. But I'm saying if they have the fidelity of material science ability >> Right. that they do in the movie,

59:11there's just no way that they haven't stumbled upon something as fundamental as relativity. This is this is a hot take. You got to hear fresh off fresh off the griddle. >> think it makes sense. Which if and if that's it, that's really good. >> That's it. Because and to be fair, I don't mind that this was part of the plot point, okay? Because I understand when it comes to like doing science fiction and art, you have to be able to, you know, take a little bit out and because I think it's a it's a big part of the plot that Rocky has extra fuel because he didn't take into account the fact that relativity makes his right So, he had like over

59:53overcompensated and has a lot more fuel, which is why he can give some to Ryan Gosling. So, I I don't mind. I'm just pointing it out, right? And I don't want to this I don't think this takes away from how much I enjoyed the film and how much I enjoyed the science behind the film. There's still so much that made me think as a scientist. And to be fair, this also made me think a lot. So, I very much enjoyed it. I would recommend it to anyone. And let me know if you guys think my take about relativity is correct.