But similar animals tend to evolve in similar climates, yeah? So organisms from entirely different planets might not be so similar. Overall I question the nitpick, since it’s partly a result of the fact that TV and movies rely on human actors.
Good points, Marley23. However, my earlier comments should not be read as a defense of Star Trek and other such shows for their unaccountable insistence in using only human actors. 
I was merely trying to debunk what I saw as bad science in the post I quoted. In reality most intelligent alien species would likely not look like us, but not because of some supposed ‘infinitesimal probability’ that we would develop the way we did.
I haven’t read this whole thread, so I hope I’m not doubling.
A general annoyance with many, many SF movies is that whole planets are treated like they are the size of, I dunno, a neighbourhood. Two indendent groups travelling down to the surface will, if they wander around for a short while, run into one another. Any single group going down to the surface of the planet with no clue as to where whatever they are looking for is, will find it within a short period of wandering around.
It’s taken us thousands of years to explore Earth. It’s quite, you know, big.
That’d be “independent”.
Oops…for the second time I forgot to include the blunder I opened the thread to post. My daughter is in love with these made-for-cable (possibly Disney) Zenon movies.
Besides the apparent misspelling of the title (it seems to be the main characters given name) it is just full of scientific errors. I know it’s just fluff entertainment, but my kid is watching and absorbing this crap. I don’t like the idea that she might simply not question some of this junk, and believe it for who-knows-how-long.
I won’t bother with a list, but the one that sticks in my mind is when they are waiting for the Earth to set from the point-of-view of a Moon base.
It’s gonna be a looooooooooooooooooong wait.
What I noticed about that scene is after the pod door is blasted off and the pod depressurizes so rapidly, the pod doesn’t actually move away from the ship.
I was quite proud of finding that one myself 
Star Trek had a rumble as the Enterprise went by on impulse power (and IIRC a whooooooosh on warp) included for the first season, which was then taken out for the second and third season.
That was only ships’ engines though, anything else, phasers, torpedoes etc made sound a-plenty whizzing through space 
I haven’t browsed Bad Astronomy for a while though, I forgot to check it for any Trek reference
But in Russian universe, the laws of thermodynamics obey you!
Aliens nearly always have a homologous planet-wide culture.
Oh, I got another one! For goodness sake! There’s nothing beyond infinity! What was Buzz talking about.
Ah, but you’re not allowing for single ecosystem planets such as those which make up the Star Wars universe: you can have ice planets, desert planets, jungle planets or water planets, but never one which has a mixture: given those conditions, who knows what might arise?
Laser gun turrets that recoil, in any event.
I’d say that Jabba has, by Hutt standards, some kind of freaky sexual fetish or perversion. (If the internet has taught me anything, it’s that there’s NOTHING, no matter how bizarre, that someone, somewhere, isn’t turned on by.)
Sexual attraction between alien species in bad SF films always bothers me. Star Trek is pretty bad about it – they’ve got lots of couplings between alien races, with offspring, no less.
And the idea of alien conquerors needing women for breeding purposes was a staple for bad 1950s and 1960s SF films (Mars Needs Women, The Mysterians).
There haven’t been as many where they need *men[/i for breeding purposes, probably because there wouldn’t be a lot of conflict there (“Aliens want me for stud service? Let me get my toothbrush! No, wait – I don’t really need one.Let’s go!”) A notable exception is the British film Devil Girl from Mars, where the guys don’t want to go(!) (Your joke about British men and sex goes here __________.)
Larry Niven’s statement about Superman (a Kryptonian) being attracted to Earth Woman LL (Lois or Lana or whoever) sums it up best: “On the face of it, Superman could as easily mate with an ear of corn.”
Sure looked like it was taking off on chemical rockets, at chemical-rocket speeds; and even then, your view of the sun is also lightspeed-delayed by eight minutes. Still doesn’t explain where all of the stored energy in the sun goes, though; to restate, white dwarfs take bloody ages to go out. On the other hand, having nothing happen for at least eight minutes while Picard and Soran call each other names would have been less than dramatic.
Regarding parallel /convergent evolution
But of course, the dolphin’s tail is horizontal, while the shark’s is vertical. So it’s not just the environment/ ecological niche that determines form, it’s also the genetic material available in the predecessor species, and some random chance as well.
I was astounded when watching Star Trek Voyager the other day to discover that through parallel evolution, WWF’s The Rock had turned up in an alien race (complete with eyebrow thing).
He did have a weird ridge thing on his head, though.
Or go back in time and intercept both missles the minute they launch.
Which reminds me, why the hell does the military insist on doing missle tests from the middle of the US with live nuclear warheads?
In fact, why does the military use real nuclear warheads for routine stuff when it only gives terrorists a chance to hijack them(Broken Arrow, Thunderball)? If you need to test the delivery system, wouldn’t it be just as easy(and cheper) to create a mock warhead with the aproximate size and mass of the real one?
Hey, you want to see a freaky inter-species attraction? Go watch the old Disney cartoon Gargoyles. That borders on freakin’ bestiality! And it was on Disney!
Ah yes, the “how to make 25 alien species for under $5 a peice by changing the shape of the forehead.”
I always wondered why Voyager had such a “thing” for foreheads.
Well, he can’t exceed c within Earth’s atmosphere. It’d devastate the planet. Yeah, I know, why pay attention to that part of physics when you’re ignoring another? Forget it, Jake, it’s Metropolis.
Average distance from Sun to Earth: 150,000,000 km
Speed of light: 300,000 km per second
Number of seconds in one minute: 60
Resulting length of one light-minute: 300,000 km * 60 = 18,000,000 km
Resulting average distance from Sun to Earth in light-minutes:
150,000,000 km / 18,000,000 km per light-minute = 8.333 light-minutes