Doctor Who Moon Episode Inaccuracies

[NFUN]

I know not to expect much from a TV show, but if anybody else has seen the Doctor Who episode about the Moon, from around 3 weeks ago, they would know what I mean. For chrissakes, the Moon was described as being only 100 million years old, and apparently, adding 1.3 billion tons of mass to it would make its gravity equal to earth. Quick Googling shows that the Moon is estimated to be 4-4.5 billion years old, and its mass is 81 quintillion tons (I may be off by an order of magnitude or two). I know there were other horrible mistakes, some of which I missed because I stopped watching halfway through, and one about biology that I forgot. Is it too much to expect of a sci-fi show to at least Google stats so their numbers would at least approach reality, or has the show degenerated to not even be in that vague genre anymore?

I don't care if I'm being petulant or picky, but c'mon, at least put some effort into the general area of science that the episode is based off of. It isn't like they are putting much effort into anything else at this point.

[Helix935]

I know not to expect much from a TV show, but if anybody else has seen the Doctor Who episode about the Moon, from around 3 weeks ago, they would know what I mean. For chrissakes, the Moon was described as being only 100 million years old, and apparently, adding 1.3 billion tons of mass to it would make its gravity equal to earth. Quick Googling shows that the Moon is estimated to be 4-4.5 billion years old, and its mass is 81 quintillion tons (I may be off by an order of magnitude or two). I know there were other horrible mistakes, some of which I missed because I stopped watching halfway through, and one about biology that I forgot. Is it too much to expect of a sci-fi show to at least Google stats so their numbers would at least approach reality, or has the show degenerated to not even be in that vague genre anymore?

I don't care if I'm being petulant or picky, but c'mon, at least put some effort into the general area of science that the episode is based off of. It isn't like they are putting much effort into anything else at this point.

its a tv show that was originally made for children plus that was an epic epsiode so please if you want to point out the inacccuracies at least watch the whole episode...

also do you mean in metric or customary, i just need to check for sure

[micha]

its a tv show that was originally made for children plus that was an epic epsiode so please if you want to point out the inacccuracies at least watch the whole episode...

Yes it was - as an educational one! A few episodes in they switched to entertainment instead.

[Superfluous J]

Nobody was around 100 million years ago to see if the moon was there, and they surely weren't here billions of years ago. There is nothing to say that the Moon, a 4.x billion year object, wasn't placed in orbit around the Earth 100 million years ago.

Now the gravity thing was wrong, as was the whole violation of the conservation of mass. And if you'd made it to the end you'd have probably had trouble with the whole "how babies are made" handwaving. However, that doesn't change the fact this this was one of the best episodes of the season and I personally suspect I'll remember for a very long time the climactic scene when three disagreeing people (one of them a child) literally held the fate of the entire human race in their hands, and had no clue what decision to make.

Doctor Who isn't science fiction so much as social commentary and Human drama hidden as a fun little show about people running around avoiding monsters.

[Camacha]

So the aliens and a guy travelling in a magic phone box are not bothering you, but the Moon is?

[rtxoff]

It's just funny, people seem not to be bothered by a phone booth which is inside larger then seen from outside but if they see anything not matching the science regarding planets & co. they totaly freak out.

Fact is if they would made TV shows that fully resemble state-of-the-art science and technology, this shows would be utterly boring and nobody would watch them.

Such TV shows as doctor who are not made to teach people science, they are made to tell a story and amuse people by doing so. If you wanna criticize them then do it by analyzing the story not the science facts because science is completely useless in such an show.

So next time when you are watching dr. who or any other scifi, relax and enjoy the show.

[ddtim]

what irritates me is that the shell would have been about 40 km thick. Chunks of that raining down on earth would have wiped out all life. They took an enormous gamble that should not have paid off, and yet it did.

[KerikBalm]

I'd be happy if people stopped attaching "science" to this sort of fiction.

Its modern/future-fantasy, as opposed to medeval-style-fantasy

[maltesh]

Nobody was around 100 million years ago to see if the moon was there, and they surely weren't here billions of years ago. There is nothing to say that the Moon, a 4.x billion year object, wasn't placed in orbit around the Earth 100 million years ago.

We have paleontological evidence of the the moon existing at least 620 million years ago, as its tidal interactions are the primary mechanism by which the earth's rotation rate has slowed.

Science fiction gets certain "gimmes", regardless of how hard or soft it is. If you play too fast and loose with those Gimmes, you wind up with a setting where the super space magic can fix anything because it's super space magic. And if you're going to take the conceit that "This setting is pretty much like our world, but with sci-fi elements attached mostly where the normal person wouldn't see them, you buy with it a certain set of assumptions. And if you're going to get an easily-researched-by-the-audience fact wrong, it's a lot better if you're getting it deliberately wrong, because This is How Our Setting Is Different, than accidentally wrong because The Writers Didn't Do The Research.

Yes, they could retroactively fix it with more exposition in another episode, but that usually goes poorly. And many shows continue to be enjoyable in spite of accuracy issues.

But to say "It's magic/science fiction, it doesn't matter if it doesn't make sense" generally just tends to beget more bad science fiction and fantasy.

[NFUN]

I can suspend disbelief about the show, and have for years, I am just bothered that the writers couldn't bother to spend 20 seconds looking up ballpark estimations of what they are saying. Most episodes have a few inconsistencies and obvious inaccuracies that I can live with, but the ones in this episode just jumped out at me so much I couldn't allow myself to be entertained. These aspects are more egregious to me than the magic phone box because they at least semi-competently hand-wave it; the TARDIS is an initial premise of the show, if they brought it in randomly in an episode 3 seasons in as a deus ex machina, then I'd be bothered. If shows have an internal logic different from our world, fine, but abandoning what logic they have with reality for little reason is bothersome.

As for why I stopped watching halfway through the episode, I was generally unsatisfied with the Moffat tenure and this episode was the last straw for Capaldi. I stopped watching by the end of Smith, and I wasn't a big fan of this season either. I was probably influenced by my disappointment to get this upset, I admit, but that disappointment, along with the show's ridiculousness, is what made me stop watching.

Edited October 21, 2014 by NFUN

[ZedNova]

Doctor who is just supposed to be fun "Sci-fi". The last episode with the 2 dimensional beings was just as outlandish as the moon one.

[KerikBalm]

When it comes to "soft-sci-fi" (I still prefer "future-fantasy" or "techno-Fantasy"), I'm inclined to allow their technology to be "the god of the gaps" - in other words, if we don't know how something works, or what happened, then they can do whatever they want with it (within reason).

But when we have clearly established facts, it bothers me when they are thrown out.

This is why sci-fi rapidly becomes dated... the gaps in knowledge get filled in.

When some sci-fi show operates outside the gaps, it only shows the writers are ignorant, or they think the audience is.

There is a reason comic books stopped using "radiation" as the source of superpowers... its the "god of the gaps" -> the gaps got filled by scientific knowledge (and they the public gradually became aware of it), then they moved on to various DNA/genetic engineering related things, or just plain aliens or unexplained human technology made by a really smart guy.

How would you like some show that treats the earth as actually being flat? the sun as revolving around the earth (and all the planets too)? A show that says George W Bush was America's first president, and he lead the US to victory against a redcoat King Obama and the battle of yorktown was fought on 9-11 against general Osama (but everything else is normal)?

Or how about a sci-fi movie that just dismisses evolution with one line and substitutes creationism/intelligent design while saying some other star system is only half a billion miles away? (I'm looking at you Prometheus! I guess I'll give it points for not using FTL, since it took them so long to cover a distance that wouldn't even get them to jupiter!)

[NFUN]

I'd be happy if people stopped attaching "science" to this sort of fiction.

Its modern/future-fantasy, as opposed to medeval-style-fantasy

I am well aware that sci-fi and fantasy are two sides of the same coin, but that still isn't an excuse. Would you be comfortable if Dumbledore, for example, randomly broke canon and made statements that the audience knows is false, and has from the first book, when he should know better? If some random wizard started creating matter from nothing against the [apparent] rules of magic? If Harry resurrected a unicorn from the first book and killed Voldemort permanently through his horcruxes with not explanation why?

There isn't much of a false equivalence between these examples and the episode. If the show's universe is presumed to work the same as ours unless stated otherwise, giant deviations that anybody with minimal knowledge of the Earth's mass or history can see are pointless, lazy and distracting, detracting from the message of the show for little reason save small convenience.

[rtxoff]

There's something called stylistic features of art. Even if some of you don't like such features when they are not realistic they are still art and there are plenty of people enjoying this art.In fact much more then people not enjoying it, the success of such shows speaks for themselves. Honestly an average person really does not care about the numbers they tell how big the moon is in such a show, it is really not important for them or the story. The only ones freaking out about this are scientists and it's the ones the show is not made for. If i want to inform myself of the physical properties of the moon i will not do so by watching dr. who.

Also things like flat earth, sun revolving around earth and so on may have already been in such shows/movies, it's all stylistic features and the artists had a very good reason for putting them in.

In this case (i am probably not right here just making a stupid example) the reason could have been to motivate people talking about it and spreading the word about dr. who.

Sometimes artists don't explain themselves, in contrast to scientists they don't have to.

[NFUN]

While I agree with you gpisic, that isn't the issue. I am bothered not only by the mistakes, but by how completely pointless there were. The Doctor didn't have to say that the Moon was orbiting Earth for 100 million years, he could have just said that it was there for all of human history, or even millions of years. Likewise, he didn't need to repeatably (I think) say that the Moon gained 4 billion tons, but that it just got a crapload heavier. The mistakes just show laziness, and could easily have been avoided. Whether or not this perceived laziness affected other aspects of the show is another discussion.

Basically, the errors weren't intentional artistic expressions or direction, but unnecessary, unrectified ignorance.

[Drunken Hobo]

If Monty Python can make a broadly accurate song about the galaxy, you'd at least expect Doctor Who to get the age of the Moon right.

[peadar1987]

While I agree with you gpisic, that isn't the issue. I am bothered not only by the mistakes, but by how completely pointless there were. The Doctor didn't have to say that the Moon was orbiting Earth for 100 million years, he could have just said that it was there for all of human history, or even millions of years. Likewise, he didn't need to repeatably (I think) say that the Moon gained 4 billion tons, but that it just got a crapload heavier. The mistakes just show laziness, and could easily have been avoided. Whether or not this perceived laziness affected other aspects of the show is another discussion.

Basically, the errors weren't intentional artistic expressions or direction, but unnecessary, unrectified ignorance.

I kind of agree with you. The episode was a fantastic human drama, but all of the easily rectified inaccuracies just stuck in the back of my mind, and they could so easily have been fixed or avoided.

[KerikBalm]

Would you be comfortable if Dumbledore, for example, randomly broke canon and made statements that the audience knows is false, and has from the first book, when he should know better? If some random wizard started creating matter from nothing against the [apparent] rules of magic? If Harry resurrected a unicorn from the first book and killed Voldemort permanently through his horcruxes with not explanation why?

There isn't much of a false equivalence between these examples and the episode.

Did you read my post #12, I completely agree with you (and provided my own set of ridiculous examples that should be shunned)

[micha]

Agree with most people here. I have no problems in accepting a "magical phone box" (or whatever) in a show. I also have no problems in accepting weird made-up "facts" about a fictional setting as long as they are broadly internally consistent.

What annoys me no end (and jolts me out of my happy suspension of disbelief) is when a show is set in "reality" (ie, our universe) and then screws up the facts of "our" universe. Either it should get them at least roughly right, or it should set up its own universe where it can make up all of the facts, figures, and rules.

Hence I much prefer shows and books set in completely fictional settings.

[Tw1]

What annoys me no end (and jolts me out of my happy suspension of disbelief) is when a show is set in "reality" (ie, our universe) and then screws up the facts of "our" universe. Either it should get them at least roughly right, or it should set up its own universe where it can make up all of the facts, figures, and rules.

This, so much this. It's so annoying, especially when it's a show I like, and want to be good.

Though Doctor Who is sort of it's own universe, it's close enough to ours to get things right.

It could be argued that the young Moon is an attempt to be consistent with the strange timings set up with the Silurians, but it wasn't worth it.

I like to think the Silurians where lying, and that there's an opportunity for another story there.

Possibly what bugged me most were the fact that you could hear sound from that thing through 380 000 km of vacuum, it was designed with wings, through it would be traeling through vacuume, and they chose to use a space shuttle. Why the space shuttle? And why the dodgy landing? Whyyyyy?

Edited October 22, 2014 by Tw1

[1of6Billion]

..

Yes, they could retroactively fix it with more exposition in another episode, but that usually goes poorly. And many shows continue to be enjoyable in spite of accuracy issues.

..

My mind read that as explosions

[ddtim]

having done some reading, it would have taken some serious lightening of the shuttle and at least 10 launches to get enough fuel into orbit to get the shuttle to the moon, let alone to the surface.

[DuoDex]

As a longtime Who fan, I'd have to give the episode a 9.5 out of 10. The -.5 is simply for the sheer amount of bullsh*t science included. There wasn't even any pseudoscience to back it up! In my 10+ years of watch the show, anything that can be explained/done using the current science is explained/done using current science, and if it can't it's done with pseudoscience. I have never seen an episode break the laws of physics and biology except for very, VERY, essential plot points.

Now, Kill the Moon was an outstanding episode from perspective of plot. However, the science included to make that plot occur, makes me go

. It certainly makes the plot work, but the plot could have worked without it too.

Here's my list of inaccuracies and the best ways to fix them, without significantly changing the plot.

• The moon weighs 8.1 quintillion tons. A mass gain of 1.3 billion tons would be like a small asteroid hitting it. Solution: Have it gain 1.3 quintillion tons.
  
• Eggs don't gain mass, they lose it. Solution: Have it lose mass. If the moon were to lose mass, we certainly wouldn't have higher tides, we'd have lower tides, resulting in several of the world's ports becoming useless, the life cycles of fish becoming heavily disrupted, a sudden lack of currents destroying habitats across the globe, et cetera, et cetera.
  
• Prokaryotes are one-celled creatures. Spiders the size of badgers cannot be prokaryotes. Anyone hear of the square² cube³ ratio? (For those that haven't it basically dictates that prokaryotes can't be badger-sized) Solution: Call them "prokaryote analogues".
  
• The space shuttle cannot into moon. Solution: Strap on some boosters, Jeb.
  
• The amount of nukes the space shuttle can carry can't blow up the moon. Solution: Call them antimatter bombs or something.
  
• A creature that has just hatched cannot lay an egg that is the size of it. Solution: Have it lay an egg that grows from the size of Minmus to the size of the moon really quickly.
  
• Redshirt analogues died. Solution: Redshirt analogues die.
  

[Superfluous J]

having done some reading, it would have taken some serious lightening of the shuttle and at least 10 launches to get enough fuel into orbit to get the shuttle to the moon, let alone to the surface.

It's the future. Nowhere in the episode did they say they used conventional means to get the shuttle up there.

Also, the shuttle was not central to the plot like the breaking of the laws of gravity and conservation of mass are.

Great list, but you forgot...

* You can't just create or destroy mass. SOLUTION: The creature channels mass through hyperspace or a wormhole.

Edited October 22, 2014 by 5thHorseman

[megatiger78]

The moon is not a egg