# Whoa... Math in "Day the World Stood Still" **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [December 11, 2008, 3:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whoa-math-in-day-the-world-stood-still/476674 "2008-12-11T03:49:47Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Labtrash](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/labtrash/32/528_2.png) [@Labtrash](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Labtrash)\ **Post date:** [December 11, 2008, 5:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whoa-math-in-day-the-world-stood-still/476674/21 "2008-12-11T17:56:04Z")
SLIGHT HIJACK Which Stadium is “erased” in the preview? /SLIGHT HIJACK ---
**Author:** ![photopat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/e95f7d/32.png) [@photopat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/photopat)\ **Post date:** [December 11, 2008, 6:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whoa-math-in-day-the-world-stood-still/476674/22 "2008-12-11T18:43:48Z")
Just a hunch here, but after seeing the previews I get the feeling Klaatu is not the only visitor this time (That or there are a whole bunch of Gorts - one on each sphereship) and Klaatu ends up siding with Earth against his colleagues. ---
**Author:** ![Cat\_Whisperer](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cat_whisperer/32/4839_2.png) [@Cat\_Whisperer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cat_Whisperer)\ **Post date:** [December 11, 2008, 7:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whoa-math-in-day-the-world-stood-still/476674/23 "2008-12-11T19:15:04Z")
I don’t support all the Keanu hating. He is a limited actor who knows his limits and has had a spectacular career within them. Plus he’s really, really pretty. 🙂 I will be going to see this movie, like I see all post-apocalytpic/massive disaster movies, and I will be thankful for it in a sea of Hollywooded-up rom-com and tv series remake crap\*. \*Although “Get Smart” wasn’t actually that bad. ---
**Author:** ![squeegee](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/squeegee/32/14537_2.png) [@squeegee](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/squeegee)\ **Post date:** [December 11, 2008, 7:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whoa-math-in-day-the-world-stood-still/476674/24 "2008-12-11T19:22:30Z")
> [@lawoot](#): > > No review for a movue that hasn’t come out yet? What’s unusual about that? Gah, I misread that as 12/8/08. Sorry, too much LDS in the '60s. ---
**Author:** ![aerodave](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/f08c70/32.png) [@aerodave](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/aerodave)\ **Post date:** [December 11, 2008, 8:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whoa-math-in-day-the-world-stood-still/476674/25 "2008-12-11T20:55:50Z")
> [@squeegee](#): > > Sorry, too much LDS in the '60s. Yeah, man…those Mormons will fuck you up every time. ---
**Author:** ![Baldwin](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/baldwin/32/7264_2.png) [@Baldwin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Baldwin)\ **Post date:** [December 11, 2008, 10:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whoa-math-in-day-the-world-stood-still/476674/26 "2008-12-11T22:48:43Z")
_The Day the Earth Stood Still_, not “World”. Though the “Whoa” allowed me to guess what the thread was about. I always wonder about the board full o’ math you see in so many movies – how often is it just a random jumble of calculus? One nice thing about the show _The Big Bang Theory_ is the real math on the boards. (Although I did note somebody had written “Movement of inertia” instead of “moment of inertia” in one of the episodes – though that might have been a deliberate joke.) ---
**Author:** ![ultrafilter](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/3d9bf3/32.png) [@ultrafilter](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ultrafilter)\ **Post date:** [December 11, 2008, 11:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whoa-math-in-day-the-world-stood-still/476674/27 "2008-12-11T23:02:53Z")
> [@Baldwin](#): > > I always wonder about the board full o’ math you see in so many movies – how often is it just a random jumble of calculus? One nice thing about the show _The Big Bang Theory_ is the real math on the boards. (Although I did note somebody had written “Movement of inertia” instead of “moment of inertia” in one of the episodes – though that might have been a deliberate joke.) It’s usually gibberish and technobabble. One notable exception is [It’s My Turn](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0080936/), which contains a completely valid proof of the [snake lemma](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Snake_lemma). ---
**Author:** ![squeegee](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/squeegee/32/14537_2.png) [@squeegee](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/squeegee)\ **Post date:** [December 12, 2008, 1:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whoa-math-in-day-the-world-stood-still/476674/28 "2008-12-12T01:18:36Z")
> [@ultrafilter](#): > > It’s usually gibberish and technobabble. I saw Good Will Hunting with a colleage of mine who is a bit of a math book (MS-EE from MIT), and she told me that the first blackboard equations she saw that Will solved looked legit, but she only got a short glance and wasn’t positive. Though she said she had no idea what the second series, the one where the solution involved radiating lines and circles, was supposed to be. ---
**Author:** ![blondebear](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/blondebear/32/1022_2.png) [@blondebear](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/blondebear)\ **Post date:** [December 12, 2008, 1:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whoa-math-in-day-the-world-stood-still/476674/29 "2008-12-12T01:30:59Z")
> [@labtrash](#): > > SLIGHT HIJACK > > Which Stadium is “erased” in the preview? > > /SLIGHT HIJACK According to[Roger Ebert’s review](http://rogerebert.suntimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20081210/REVIEWS/812109993), it is Shea Stadium ---
**Author:** ![billfish678](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/7bcc69/32.png) [@billfish678](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/billfish678)\ **Post date:** [December 12, 2008, 2:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whoa-math-in-day-the-world-stood-still/476674/30 "2008-12-12T02:16:18Z")
> [@squeegee](#): > > Gah, I misread that as 12/8/08. > > Sorry, too much LDS in the '60s. So it is possible… you CAN wake up the next morning moaning “Man, I had too much Jesus last night” ---
**Author:** ![msmith537](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/d9b06d/32.png) [@msmith537](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/msmith537)\ **Post date:** [December 12, 2008, 3:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whoa-math-in-day-the-world-stood-still/476674/31 "2008-12-12T03:32:06Z")
> [@ShelliBean](#): > > Careful. If you say that out loud you end up in a phone booth flying through space and time, and only speaking some weird valley language. And possibly facing an army of Tedites. ---
**Author:** ![Yumblie](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/y/76d3ee/32.png) [@Yumblie](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Yumblie)\ **Post date:** [December 12, 2008, 3:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whoa-math-in-day-the-world-stood-still/476674/32 "2008-12-12T03:34:29Z")
> [@Baldwin](#): > > _The Day the Earth Stood Still_, not “World”. Though the “Whoa” allowed me to guess what the thread was about. > > I always wonder about the board full o’ math you see in so many movies – how often is it just a random jumble of calculus? One nice thing about the show _The Big Bang Theory_ is the real math on the boards. (Although I did note somebody had written “Movement of inertia” instead of “moment of inertia” in one of the episodes – though that might have been a deliberate joke.) Probably the best moment in Spider-Man 3 was when Peter was in physics class, and they were discussing real quantum mechanics. It’s really easy to use quantum mechanical terms for technobabble, but from what I remember, Peter’s answer actually made sense. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [December 12, 2008, 4:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whoa-math-in-day-the-world-stood-still/476674/33 "2008-12-12T04:41:27Z")
Blackboard technobabble was one of the details which ruined _The Time Machine_ of a few years ago. That movie was _almost_ awesome, if they had just payed attention to the details, but as it is, it stunk. It wasn’t even random calculus, that they could have copied out of any textbook or gotten any physics student to write up for them in five minutes; it was just random symbols strung together in nonsensical ways. ---
**Author:** ![CalMeacham](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/calmeacham/32/35_2.png) [@CalMeacham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CalMeacham)\ **Post date:** [December 12, 2008, 2:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whoa-math-in-day-the-world-stood-still/476674/34 "2008-12-12T14:55:36Z")
One of the things I love about the comic strip **Foxtrot** is that his math and physics are always correct. If you see an equation in the strip, it means something, and is always appropriate. Quite a change from the technobabble in things like The Far Side. Movies and Television shows these days hire technical advisors, so their random equations _should_ be accurate, and often are (as in the aforementioned Good Will Hunting – I’ve read an article about the use of advisors for that film). But apparently they still manage to screw things up. ---
**Author:** ![Hypno-Toad](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/b2d939/32.png) [@Hypno-Toad](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hypno-Toad)\ **Post date:** [December 12, 2008, 3:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whoa-math-in-day-the-world-stood-still/476674/35 "2008-12-12T15:33:43Z")
> [@squeegee](#): > > Sorry, too much LDS in the '60s. The important thing is that you retrieve the whales. ---
**Author:** ![Wendell\_Wagner](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/8491ac/32.png) [@Wendell\_Wagner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wendell_Wagner)\ **Post date:** [December 12, 2008, 3:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whoa-math-in-day-the-world-stood-still/476674/36 "2008-12-12T15:36:06Z")
The math in _Good Will Hunting_ was correct but irrelevant to what sort of math it was supposed to be, as I understand it. ---
**Author:** ![squeegee](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/squeegee/32/14537_2.png) [@squeegee](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/squeegee)\ **Post date:** [December 12, 2008, 4:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whoa-math-in-day-the-world-stood-still/476674/37 "2008-12-12T16:07:23Z")
> [@Wendell\_Wagner](#): > > The math in _Good Will Hunting_ was correct but irrelevant to what sort of math it was supposed to be, as I understand it. I’m told the first problem really was a Fourier series, as the actor’s dialog stated. Which I wouldn’t know from a hole in the ground, so I’m relying on my cow-orker’s say so. ---
**Author:** ![Skywatcher](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/skywatcher/32/254_2.png) [@Skywatcher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skywatcher)\ **Post date:** [December 12, 2008, 5:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whoa-math-in-day-the-world-stood-still/476674/38 "2008-12-12T17:14:45Z")
> [@lawoot](#): > > No review for a movue that hasn’t come out yet? What’s unusual about that? Reviewers typically go to advanced screenings, if allowed. It’s a bad sign when a movie doesn’t have advanced screenings for reviewers. ---
**Author:** ![Equipoise](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/equipoise/32/151_2.png) [@Equipoise](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Equipoise)\ **Post date:** [December 12, 2008, 7:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whoa-math-in-day-the-world-stood-still/476674/39 "2008-12-12T19:21:05Z")
> [@AuntiePam](#): > > Really. The previews show mass destruction, and if I remember right, in the original some soldiers were killed and Gort did something to shut down electrical power worldwide (except in hospitals), but he wasn’t a mass murderer. > > Or are the tidal waves and stuff in the previews caused by something other than Gort? Regarding the destruction in the previews, [spoiler]Those are megagazillions of flying nanorobots heading from the compound where they took Gort, back to the mothersphere in Central Park, just happening to destroy everything in their path. Gort was made of these things, and disintegrated into them, which is how he busted out of the underground complex. What a dismal and disappointing film. I happen to like Keanu and he was perfect as Klaatu. The movie, which left most of the thoughtful, thought-provoking stuff out of the script or on the cutting room floor, let him down. [/spoiler] ---
**Author:** ![MovieMogul](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/f08c70/32.png) [@MovieMogul](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MovieMogul)\ **Post date:** [December 12, 2008, 7:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whoa-math-in-day-the-world-stood-still/476674/40 "2008-12-12T19:26:53Z")
With a 23% on RT and a 41 on Metacritic, it looks like math is definitely not this film’s friend… [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whoa-math-in-day-the-world-stood-still/476674.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whoa-math-in-day-the-world-stood-still/476674.md?page=3)