Comments on: The Doctor is In

By: steve

steve — Sat, 30 Jul 2005 08:43:24 +0000

erc,
In the new Dr Who the daleks can levitate! I always found the original Dr Who to have a very creepy atmosphere to it. What was always disturbing about all the alien beings encountered in the Dr Who universe , especially the daleks, was that they were all utterly devoid of any compassion, not that they have a sink plunger stuck on them.

I believe TARDIS stands for Time And Relative Dimension In Space. Designed by the “temporal engineers” on Gallifrey (whom I am sure were applied string theorists:)

By: Clifford

Clifford — Sat, 30 Jul 2005 08:09:24 +0000

Hi erc, the answer can easily be found in my original question: “was there any more of the psuedo-physics babble that warmed my young future string theorist’s heart so much?”

Cheers,

-cvj

By: erc

erc — Sat, 30 Jul 2005 06:09:30 +0000

What potentially embarrassing thing am I admitting to? A childhood interest in physics? *Busted!* Ok, you got me. I’ll never be able to show my face in public again. How could I have been so rash?

I should have seen that coming… My answer: you looked for it in a TV show! A TV show where the most terrifying beings consist of an upside-down dustbin with a sink plunger attached and no ability to deal with stairs! The show might have made you wonder about the possibility of time travel etc. but surely you didn’t seriously think they were going to tell you anything about how one could do it?!

By: Jim

Jim — Sat, 30 Jul 2005 03:06:52 +0000

Peter Erwin, thanks for the info. I’ll have to find a B5 eppie guide and look for the relevant episodes.

Physics in the new series? Well, it’s mostly of the “we can travel from one end of the universe to the other in 8 seconds” variety. Lots of pretty standard sci-fi stuff about time rifts, beings of energy trying to find corporeal bodies to carry on with and so forth. To be honest, it’s a given that the average viewer will just take it on faith that The Doctor can travel through time and space; the particulars of *how* aren’t really gone in to and, to be honest, I think the series is better for it.

In fact, the main thrust of this season has been showing The Doctor facing up to the fact that, as one alien says to him (paraphrasing here) “You pop up in these places, bringing Death with you, and when it gets sticky, you just leave, while the people that are left behind have to deal with the consequences of YOUR actions”.

Oh, and the Dalek Emperor is really, seriously, cool. I love the electronic voice they use for him.

By: Clifford

Clifford — Fri, 29 Jul 2005 18:30:00 +0000

Kris! Good to hear from you! Welcome! That sounds like a great episode, by the way. -cvj

By: Kris Kennaway

Kris Kennaway — Fri, 29 Jul 2005 17:45:50 +0000

The Dr Who episode that most fascinated me as a kid featured a planet of mathematicians whose calculations directly manipulated the structure of space-time, and who were incidentally responsible for stabilizing the collapse of the universe, which otherwise would have happened long ago. I wanted to learn how to do that!

Kris

P.S. Sorry I missed you while you were visiting PI, I was out of the country for a few weeks.

By: Clifford

Clifford — Fri, 29 Jul 2005 16:24:08 +0000

Hi erc, I’m missing something here. What potentially embarrassing thing am I admitting to? A childhood interest in physics? *Busted!* Ok, you got me. I’ll never be able to show my face in public again. How could I have been so rash?

cheers,

-cvj

By: erc

erc — Fri, 29 Jul 2005 15:09:05 +0000

Clifford:

“The only thing that really caught my attention was when they would focus occasionally on the workings of the TARDIS (the time machine, for those not familiar) and when he would mention having to compute (or whatever) how they would have to get to where/when they were going. ”

I know this is a physics-oriented space, but are you _sure_ you want to be admitting this to the world at large? However, I’ve never seen a single episode of Dr. Who, so perhaps I should stay out of the fray

By: Peter Erwin

Peter Erwin — Fri, 29 Jul 2005 14:07:36 +0000

Alien catwomen in a science fiction setting? Sounds like Space Pirate Alien Ninja Catgirls… (http://www.sjgames.com/spanc/). Not a game I’ve actually played, but a suitably goofy setup.

Reply to Jim’s comment: Babylon 5, at least, had same-sex attraction (and relationships, or the hint of them) in its future setting, and even gay marriages. The latter were presented as being normal enough that a pair of undercover male operatives could be booked into a hotel’s honeymoon suite, their cover being that they were newlyweds.

By: tmccort

tmccort — Thu, 28 Jul 2005 16:52:41 +0000

“but was there any more of the psuedo-physics babble that warmed my young future string theorist’s heart so much?”

No comment.