MovieChat Forums > On the Beach (2000) Discussion > too bad it's unscientific propaganda

too bad it's unscientific propaganda

posted 19 years ago by nikjunk
96 replies | jump to latest

They did a good job with this film, but it's too bad that the portrayal of nuclear war is so far from accurate. A few years back I did a paper on the real, scientific results of nuclear war and it just isn't the all-human-life- killing thing that we hear about. At the peak of the arms race (or, obviously, today) the US and Soviet Union, working together, would be incapable of ensuring the death of everyone in Texas. Worldwide radiation is a big crock, and even nuclear winter is far from certain.

I'm not gung-ho about nuclear war (who is?). I just really, really don't like propaganda, no matter how well-intentioned. Back when nuclear disarmament was in vouge the anti-nuke crowd deliberately spread a lot of disinformation in an attempt to scare people onto their side. Misinformation pisses me off. I'm a big supporter of free speech, so I'm using my right to free speech to combat their abuse of it. I could go on about this, but don't want to be boring. If anyone is interested in more facts, I can post more.

[–] Strazdamonas 12 years ago

If you did a scinetific paper on the subject you should know that we have enough nuclear weapons to crack the earth open. thrice.
ensuring everyones death - nope. unless we use salted warheads. oh wait, they did use salted warheads in this movie. i guess then it is possible.

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Applied Science? All science is applied. Eventually.

[–] NikolaiDante 11 years ago

We DON'T have the ability to blow up the world or 'crack it open'.

It is estimated that the asteroid that hit 65 million years ago had an estimated diameter of 10 km (6.2 mi) and delivered an estimated energy equivalent of 100 teratons of TNT (4.2×1023 J).

By contrast, the most powerful man-made explosive device ever detonated, the Tsar Bomba, had a yield of only 57 megatons of TNT (2.4×1017 J), making the Chicxulub impact 2 MILLION times more powerful. And that was all in one place and it barely made a dent.

Oh and there have been bigger ones......

So pile all our little firecrackers in one place and let see what happens....

[–] Strazdamonas 11 years ago

it is wrong to assume that most efficient way to crack the earth is to pile all our bombs in one location ABOVE ground level and make them blow. In fact a chain rection of underground explosions are much more powerful when it comes to cracking earths crust, as proven by eathquakes.
The explosion may have been stronger than the largest Bomb we have, but do remmeber we have hundreds of thousands on nuclear warheads. Though, not anymore, we disarmed quite a lot of them actually, and in the process a few (think 20 or so) gone missing actually. noone knows who has them now, but if they do they arent using them at least.

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Applied Science? All science is applied. Eventually.

[–] clacton0 11 years ago

The above post this is what happens in the film Crack In The World 1965.

www.youtube.com/eastangliauk

[–] 11 years ago

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[–] ryan-anthony-carroll 11 years ago

I don't know what planet the OP is living on but your post p1sses all over science as a concept, at the peak of the arms race the nukes could not take out the population of Texas....WTF?
A counter-force exchange targeting ONLY military targets would kill 30-55 million people according to declassified studies from the cold war. There are a group of people who poo poo such studies who refuse to believe in the dangers of nuclear war and you are clearly from this school, ironically a very unscientific school, like climate change deniers and conspiracy theorists...start off with a conclusion, build any confirming evidence around it, disregard anything that seems to contradict it.

One nuclear exchange would not kill everyone on earth or cause the effects in this film. That's not what the movie and book suggested though. Read Trinity's Child or watch the film adaption BY DAWNS EARLY LIGHT.
There was an initial nuclear exchange, then a second one. In the Nightwatch 'Doomsday' Plane the military tells the new President that if they allow the subs to fire at the Soviet cities (the ICBMS and Bombers by that stage having been used) then it would end up , upon Russian retaliation, like On the Beach, where the worldwide fallout and radition would eventually cause human extinction.
It would take 3-4 exchanges to make it happen but it would happen. Think about it, most of the worlds cities pulverized into radioactive fallout and shot up into the sky, and all that circulating around the planet on the prevailing winds and currents, no sunlight gets through, crops die, breadbasket agriculture regions are 'dusted'.
Of course it would happen.

[–] chudddds-775-350714 10 years ago

and, as in most issues in life, the truth probably lies somewhere in the middle of both opinions.