XKCD: It's more than a comic

Interesting. I did not know about that.

Edit: and of course it's the page topper... Angular Diameter Turnaround

Edited by Aetol on May 20th 2022 at 10:30:35 AM

Oh, yes. Not only are you literally looking backwards in time, you are looking into a space that gets smaller as you look farther.

What's even weirder about this is that it means that we are effectively unable to look "outwards" into the universe. It's as if our gaze is always forcibly drawn inwards, towards a central point that encompasses the entire universe, sort of like light that can only fall deeper into a black hole, but never move outwards.

You hinting at something there?

It has been suggested (PBS Space Time) that our visible universe could be the interior of a black hole: more specifically, a time-reversed black hole (aka a white hole) whose interior is shaped like the FLRW metric — i.e., perfectly homogenous. Would we be able to tell the difference between that and an infinitely expanding, spatially flat universe? Even if we can't, the thought experiment can give us some useful insights.

For example, we know that the cosmic event horizon is actually shrinking as the universe expands thanks to dark energy, and it is a true event horizon: nothing from beyond it will ever reach us and everything that passes it will become red-shifted into infinitely long wavelengths.

Edited by Fighteer on May 20th 2022 at 9:03:25 AM

Yeah, I was writing that and realized that sounded a lot like how a black hole works. There are some interesting parallels there.

Goofs

This is what happens when you crowdsource your knowledge base.

Umm...

Shit.

So the biggest goofs are the people who add goofs?

Not goofs, but severely lacking in the suspension of disbelief (and all assorted tropes) areas.

This reminds me of some of the Artistic License examples on This Very Wiki.

Edited by petersohn on May 23rd 2022 at 7:22:34 PM

Cinema Sins and their ilk also come to mind, at least for me.

You gotta admit that is some dedication to nitpicking, though.

I don't think I could understand the mindset of someone who'd go to see a film only to see how many continuity errors and plot holes and the like they could find.

These people watch the movie multiple times.

I'm always amazed by the people who will report that a piece of equipment you can see for roughly 5 seconds is time inaccurate by a couple of years.

Sure, that too.

Edited by C105 on May 23rd 2022 at 10:08:05 AM

Exactly, they don't do it on the first watch, but they just might on the fifth.

And it is in the nature of fandom to obsess over details, even irrelevant ones. I am once again reminded of Shattner calling out his fans in that comedy sketch on being way too into Star Trek.

I, for one, am amazed by people who will elaborately trope every single gun, car, tank, uniform and whathaveyou on a work's page.

Edited by Redmess on May 23rd 2022 at 9:56:42 PM

They at least seem to be doing it for comedy.

I'm pretty sure Cinema Sins is doing it for comedy, yes. Some of their nitpicks are very obvious running gags.

These nitpicks do not necessarily have bad intentions. They are made by people who watch the film, probably because they love it, then start noticing details that they find weird or out of place, and have an urge to write them down.

By the way, I was referring to TV Tropes in my reply above, in case that was missed.

But surely nobody on TV Tropes is nitpicking anything, right?

Nooooooo.

Reminds me of entries on this wiki that use “Anachronism Stew” to characterize works that are set in, say, 1963 but show tech or fashion from 1961.

I…don’t think that’s what that trope is for.

I think that's usually the other way around.

Also, most examples of Writers Cannot Do Math (at least it was the last time I checked) are dates being on the wrong day of week. I don't think "didn't bother to check the calendar" means "cannot do math".

Yeah, the real math problems are usually with calculating ages and birthdays, especially when it involves big family trees (like the one in Harry Potter).