• Question: How realistic are all the disaster movies like 2012 and Armageddon etc in terms of their world-ending theories and the ways they prevented them?

    Asked by ibot to Ed, Katie, Sam, Steve, Vera on 21 Jun 2011. This question was also asked by alicebieberx, hannahpattinson127, ggalietta, lilmissmeg, sophieloren, serenappah28, louiseaori, erin10.
    • Photo: Steven Daly

      Steven Daly answered on 21 Jun 2011:

      I think movies use a lot of creativity when they are making these movies. I do not think 2012 was at all that realistic in terms of the things that happened. Armageddon was possibly slightly more so in that a comet could hit Earth, and we would know it was coming. However, we would not be able to blow it up with a nuclear bomb, it is simply too big. One thing we could do is attach some rockets to one side of it, and try to push it slowly out of the way. We would have a few years to do this, so it is possible.

    • Photo: Ed Morrison

      Ed Morrison answered on 21 Jun 2011:

      Movies can be good for introducing us to interesting ideas. But the details are quite often very unscientific. Still fun though.

    • Photo: Vera Weisbecker

      Vera Weisbecker answered on 21 Jun 2011:

      I agree with Steven and Ed, the movies aren’t all that realistic. The only thing realistic about 2012 is that the Mayan calendar ends on that year, and this has caused some people to think that the world is going to end. What a crazy conclusion when there are so many better explanations – like, maybe the Mayans just didn’t feel like they needed a calendar update for a time as far ahead as this?

Comments

  • Photo: hannahpattinson127

    hannahpattinson127 commented on :

    thanks because i asked a similar question and that really helped. however, can you please elaborate on that mayan calender theroy? do you think they were depressed? and also who were the mayans?

    • Photo: Vera

      Vera commented on :

      The Mayans were a civilisation in South America. They were one of the most sophisticated civilisations on Earth, but after approx. 800 A.D. the civilisation collapsed for reasons still debated (droughts are one potential culprit). Among many other achievements (like, huge pyramids), they als marked time in a calendar, just like we do – we know that 40 years are between 1980 and 2020, for example. The Mayan calendar went for many years ahead, but it stopped in 2012. Sounds reasonable to me since 2012 was a long time ahead for the Mayans, but this completely random fact has caused people to freak out…

    • Photo: Steve

      Steve commented on :

      The Mayans were a civilization that lived in Mexico a few thousand years ago. They didn’t so much predict the world would end, they actually said that it would be the start of a new age for them. A few people decided that this new age meant a huge natural disaster, and this theory became popular on the internet.