> Admittedly, no real effort is put into explaining how the time machine actually works, other than Gilliam’s signature steampunk wires and bellows.
> Science Score: 9
Primer
> As for the science, the basic idea is that Aaron and Abe are trying to build a device to counter the effects of gravity by creating a room-temperature superconductor (a hot topic in physics this year, albeit a controversial one) that exploits the Meissner effect to remove the magnetic field inside a plain gray box large enough to fit one person.
> The limitation that you can’t travel to times earlier than you turned the machine on is actually very realistic—closed timelike curves in relativity would have exactly that feature.
Primer is the only backwards time travel in media I have ever seen where, apart from a few small problems, I thought the fundamental idea actually made sense and could exist in some (not our) universe.
Some of them are really good movies. But for me, movies automatically go in a non-scientific, soft science fiction category, bordering on fantasy, if time travel is a main part of the concept.
It's a bit groundhog day like: violating the law causes the day to restart, but everything you have and know from the last today gets carried over to the new today. The mission is to get out of today. Oh, and today is in Roman times.
4 comments
[ 2.9 ms ] story [ 24.0 ms ] thread> Admittedly, no real effort is put into explaining how the time machine actually works, other than Gilliam’s signature steampunk wires and bellows.
> Science Score: 9
Primer
> As for the science, the basic idea is that Aaron and Abe are trying to build a device to counter the effects of gravity by creating a room-temperature superconductor (a hot topic in physics this year, albeit a controversial one) that exploits the Meissner effect to remove the magnetic field inside a plain gray box large enough to fit one person.
> The limitation that you can’t travel to times earlier than you turned the machine on is actually very realistic—closed timelike curves in relativity would have exactly that feature.
> Science Score: 3
I don't understand this reviewer
It's a bit groundhog day like: violating the law causes the day to restart, but everything you have and know from the last today gets carried over to the new today. The mission is to get out of today. Oh, and today is in Roman times.