# Plot holes in reality **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [February 17, 2014, 8:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/plot-holes-in-reality/681533 "2014-02-17T08:22:31Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![bibliophage](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bibliophage/32/7615_2.png) [@bibliophage](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bibliophage)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2014, 12:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/plot-holes-in-reality/681533/41 "2014-02-18T00:23:53Z")
Christopher Columbus thinking he could sail west to China. In any reasonably constructed fictional universe, he would have died in the attempt and never be heard from again. Instead the author decides to plunk down another continent across his path. How very convenient. ---
**Author:** ![Chessic\_Sense](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/7c8e57/32.png) [@Chessic\_Sense](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chessic_Sense)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2014, 12:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/plot-holes-in-reality/681533/42 "2014-02-18T00:30:35Z")
> [@pojimba](#): > > Water expands when it freezes. Even stranger, it only happens in a narrow temperature band before resuming the normal trajectory. ---
**Author:** ![Oakminster](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/77aa72/32.png) [@Oakminster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Oakminster)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2014, 12:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/plot-holes-in-reality/681533/43 "2014-02-18T00:38:07Z")
> [@Learjeff](#): > > The last president we impeached was regarding a blowjob. Now THAT’s stranger than fiction! That **IS** fiction. The fact that many otherwise intelligent people seem to believe it is a reality hole. ---
**Author:** ![Atomic\_Alex](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/atomic_alex/32/175_2.png) [@Atomic\_Alex](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Atomic_Alex)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2014, 12:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/plot-holes-in-reality/681533/44 "2014-02-18T00:39:31Z")
Lenin and Alexander Kerensky, leader of the short-lived Provisional Government which Lenin overthrew, were born on the same day, eleven years apart, in the same provincial town of Simbirsk. They attended the same school and Lenin was taught by Alexanders father, Fyodor Kerensky, headmaster of the school. In a country as large as Russia? I mean _come on_, talk about a thinly vieled plot-device to link the two main characters. ---
**Author:** ![PatriotGrrrl](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/9dc877/32.png) [@PatriotGrrrl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/PatriotGrrrl)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2014, 12:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/plot-holes-in-reality/681533/45 "2014-02-18T00:39:50Z")
> [@Shagnasty](#): > > And the fax machine was [invented (1843)](https://www.google.com/search?q=when+was+the+fax+machine+invented&oq=when+was+the+fax+machine+in&aqs=chrome.1.69i57j0l3j5.4878j0j9&sourceid=chrome&espv=210&es_sm=93&ie=UTF-8) even before that or the telephone . Someone should have told the people working on this stuff to stick to the right order because it will confuse people later on. It’s 2014, we have the internet, and yet we’re still using faxes. The most common methods of transferring money involve giving someone all the information they need to take all your money, and trusting that they will only take the amount you agreed upon. ---
**Author:** ![Battle\_Pope](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/4bbf92/32.png) [@Battle\_Pope](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Battle_Pope)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2014, 12:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/plot-holes-in-reality/681533/46 "2014-02-18T00:52:21Z")
The [Burke & Wills](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Burke_and_Wills_expedition) expedition. After travelling from Melbourne to the Gulf of Carpentaria in Australia’s north the main exporation party returned to Cooper Creek to find that the supply party (which had remained in the area for five weeks longer than arranged) had left _ **9 hours** _ before. Two of the three surviving explorers (Burke & Wills) managed to survive for another 8 weeks while the last (King) lived with a local group of the _Yandruwandha_ people before a rescue mission arrived a few months later. After almost 10 months of travel & privation it all came down to a measly _9 hours_. Who the hell wrote that? ---
**Author:** ![Shagnasty](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9dc877/32.png) [@Shagnasty](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shagnasty)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2014, 1:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/plot-holes-in-reality/681533/47 "2014-02-18T01:18:14Z")
> [@bibliophage](#): > > Christopher Columbus thinking he could sail west to China. In any reasonably constructed fictional universe, he would have died in the attempt and never be heard from again. Instead the author decides to plunk down another continent across his path. How very convenient. Columbus was the luckiest crackpot in history. He made four voyages to the New World but always assumed they were part of Asia that he was looking for, he never understood the circumference of the Earth even though plenty of his contemporaries did and he still ended up with whole nations honoring him even though he just took the equivalent of 4 Caribbean cruises with some island sight-seeing. He never even saw North America proper and his landings in Central America were brief and he didn’t understand those either. It was all Asia to him even though he didn’t find anything that originally set out to find in the first place. The end result was a bunch of captive Caribbean islanders and the start of lots of deadly infectious diseases that spread across the region but most people still think that he discovered the modern day U.S. or maybe Mexico. It isn’t true. He island hopped in places that we still like to go on vacation today like the Virgin Islands. I am sure it was a series of nice cruises for the day but the entire premise was completely wrong. Columbus died in peace knowing that he had finally found Asia even though where he really went was about as far from it as you can get on sailing boats. It didn’t matter if the culture and eventual spices did not match the original intentions. He got his ships four times over and proved everyone wrong in his deluded mind. ---
**Author:** ![BigT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bigt/32/12044_2.png) [@BigT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BigT)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2014, 1:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/plot-holes-in-reality/681533/48 "2014-02-18T01:45:04Z")
> [@Voyager](#): > > A supposedly mature Congressman caught sexting to random women. Fatal flaws, fine, but that’s absurd. > World War II was full of absurd plots which should never work in real life, like Operation Mincemeat. You’re leaving out the most absurd part, the part that brings it into bad comic book territory: the guy’s name is pronounced “wiener.” ---
**Author:** ![dofe](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/7ba0ec/32.png) [@dofe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dofe)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2014, 1:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/plot-holes-in-reality/681533/49 "2014-02-18T01:47:16Z")
Plot: evil corporation sees potential for profits after a developing country begins to relax its trade policies. The corporation starts using its private security personnel to exercise its will around the countryside at first, but then throughout the greater part of the country. This leads to an inevitable clash with the government and vicious fights ensue. After a particularly nasty one, the corporation’s national government passes a law taking over the corporation’s assets. This eventually leads to the government ruling and taxing the developing country, until years later when a half-naked-sandal-wearing man successfully liberates the country through a peaceful, non-cooperation movement. Nice story, but come on. ---
**Author:** ![msmith537](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/d9b06d/32.png) [@msmith537](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/msmith537)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2014, 2:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/plot-holes-in-reality/681533/50 "2014-02-18T02:05:51Z")
The whole thing with the financial crisis of 2008. Sure. Some evil genius invented some convoluted financial instruments that were so enticing to banks and financial services companies that they all just had to buy as much as they could. Then under the right conditions, they serve as a serve as a sort of financial Ice-IX and nearly destroy the entire world economy, as everything is linked together. ---
**Author:** ![joyfool](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/df788c/32.png) [@joyfool](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/joyfool)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2014, 2:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/plot-holes-in-reality/681533/51 "2014-02-18T02:57:39Z")
That Silent Hill is real. Somewhere in Centralia, Pennsylvania, the earth is on fore under the ground and it just continues to burn. That just can’t be right and is better suited to the horror movie franchise that sprang up around its mythology. ---
**Author:** ![davidm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/davidm/32/225_2.png) [@davidm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/davidm)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2014, 3:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/plot-holes-in-reality/681533/52 "2014-02-18T03:09:51Z")
> [@BigT](#): > > You’re leaving out the most absurd part, the part that brings it into bad comic book territory: the guy’s name is pronounced “wiener.” And don’t forget the online name he used for those activies: “Carlos Danger”. :dubious: Seriously? ---
**Author:** ![Shagnasty](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9dc877/32.png) [@Shagnasty](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shagnasty)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2014, 3:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/plot-holes-in-reality/681533/53 "2014-02-18T03:20:18Z")
> [@faithfool](#): > > That Silent Hill is real. Somewhere in Centralia, Pennsylvania, the earth is on fore under the ground and it just continues to burn. That just can’t be right and is better suited to the horror movie franchise that sprang up around its mythology. I have to give you that one. It isn’t just that the whole earth under the town is on fire, it is that we still do not have the technology to extinguish it at all. Those coal seams deep underground just have to burn until it they are done and that can take anywhere from decades hundreds of years. No 911 call can help anyone there. The really strange thing is that there are still a few people that live in Centralia. Many of the buildings are still standing including the old churches and there are still a few people with kids hanging around even though the ground around them can collapse at any time into a sinkhole. I have never been there myself but I want to. It is supposed to be incredibly spooky. The omnipresent fumes of the fire contaminate everything and there is nothing anyone can do to stop it. ---
**Author:** ![K364](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/k364/32/5_2.png) [@K364](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/K364)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2014, 4:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/plot-holes-in-reality/681533/54 "2014-02-18T04:36:26Z")
That the Sun is 400 times the size of the moon, and 400 times farther away - which makes the perfect fit for solar total eclipses/annular eclipses and viewing the corona. ---
**Author:** ![AK84](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/85e7bf/32.png) [@AK84](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AK84)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2014, 4:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/plot-holes-in-reality/681533/55 "2014-02-18T04:54:13Z")
> [@dofe](#): > > Plot: evil corporation sees potential for profits after a developing country begins to relax its trade policies. The corporation starts using its private security personnel to exercise its will around the countryside at first, but then throughout the greater part of the country. This leads to an inevitable clash with the government and vicious fights ensue. After a particularly nasty one, the corporation’s national government passes a law taking over the corporation’s assets. This eventually leads to the government ruling and taxing the developing country, until years later when a half-naked-sandal-wearing man successfully liberates the country through a peaceful, non-cooperation movement. > > Nice story, but come on. Mainly because it is a nice story.:rolleyes: Some small group of villages on some hills in the Far West of the world manage to make themselves the rulers of their peninsula, then they keep on taking over neighbours and then taking over new neighbours, including some of whom who have been the most powerful cultures for millennia. I mean… _What_ came from \*what \*part of Arabia and did _what_ So there are only ten nuclear powers on earth and 4 of them were not even created when Nuclear weapons were invented. And all of them are in regions not famed for scientific progress. ---
**Author:** ![shijinn](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/cc9497/32.png) [@shijinn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/shijinn)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2014, 6:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/plot-holes-in-reality/681533/56 "2014-02-18T06:17:08Z")
i did not get the girl, kill the bad guys nor save the world. what kind of crappy script is this? i need a better agent. ---
**Author:** ![dtilque](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/d6d6ee/32.png) [@dtilque](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dtilque)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2014, 7:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/plot-holes-in-reality/681533/57 "2014-02-18T07:39:53Z")
> [@Shagnasty](#): > > Columbus was the luckiest crackpot in history. One of the most unbelieveable things about Columbus is that he supposedly pulled off the impress-the-natives-with-a-prediction-of-an-eclipse trick. You expect me to believe that? That trick never works… ---
**Author:** ![Mangetout](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mangetout/32/19_2.png) [@Mangetout](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mangetout)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2014, 7:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/plot-holes-in-reality/681533/58 "2014-02-18T07:57:47Z")
> [@njtt](#): > > Quantum mechanics makes no fucking sense! (And the whole universe is supposed to be based on it.) Yeah, inanimate things act differently when you’re looking at them. Ri… ight. ---
**Author:** ![Hermitian](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hermitian/32/470_2.png) [@Hermitian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hermitian)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2014, 2:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/plot-holes-in-reality/681533/59 "2014-02-18T14:18:59Z")
How about the most publicized and frequent American visitations to reclusive North Korean leadership happens to be performed by Dennis Rodman. Out of all the people in the US that could represent that country, it has to be HIM? ---
**Author:** ![panache45](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/panache45/32/64_2.png) [@panache45](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/panache45)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2014, 2:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/plot-holes-in-reality/681533/60 "2014-02-18T14:35:08Z")
> [@Shakes](#): > > Low wage workers being Pro Republican. And women being anti-choice. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/plot-holes-in-reality/681533.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/plot-holes-in-reality/681533.md?page=4)