Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Posting-Version: version B 2.10.PCS 1/10/84; site ahutb.UUCP Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!burl!ulysses!mhuxr!mhuxj!houxm!ahuta!ahutb!leeper From: leeper@ahutb.UUCP (m.leeper) Newsgroups: net.sf-lovers Subject: Re: FIVE MILLION YEARS TO EARTH (super-s Message-ID: <515@ahutb.UUCP> Date: Sun, 3-Mar-85 23:27:09 EST Article-I.D.: ahutb.515 Posted: Sun Mar 3 23:27:09 1985 Date-Received: Tue, 5-Mar-85 02:45:52 EST References: <491@ahuta.UUCP>, <24700005@siemens.UUCP> Organization: AT&T Information Systems Labs, Holmdel NJ Lines: 80 REFERENCES: <491@ahuta.UUCP>, <24700005@siemens.UUCP> >Five Million Years to Earth is a HORRIBLE film!! It's one >of those schlock things where the scientist sees something >inexplicable, dreams up a ridiculous (i.e. almost totally >unsupported by evidence) explanation for it, and this >explanation is taken as fact for the rest of the movie. >Movies like this spread more wrong ideas about science than >creationism! (well, maybe I'm exaggerating a little...) If >it were about the occult it would be a pseudo-science >fiction film. Perhaps it should be called an anti-science >fiction film? In fact, the more I think about this, the >more I like the connection with creationism. The 'science' >in a movie like this is very much like the 'science' in >creationism -- based on nonunderstanding of what science is >really about, based on jumping to conclusions, etc. Got that out of your system? Good! I do hope you are feeling better. I agree that what goes on in this film is not like what real scientists do. But why is that? Roney and Quatermass approach their observations and draw the most likely conclusions. This is very much what scientists do or should do. The reason what they do is in character very different than what your run-of-the-mill scientist is that they are encountering a very different chain of evidence than probably occurs in the real world. You expect that, this is science fiction. And as far as science fiction goes, the chain of evidence is not all that improbable, given the premise. Kneale has only one assumtion in the 1960 TV play on which the film was based. That is basically the same premise of 2001. The premise is that the reason apes evolved into humans was through alien intervention. (The difference with 2001 was in how the idea was handled. Clarke took the idea and said "It's going to happen again." Kneale took the premise and said "How are we different than we would be had we evolved ourselves? What evidence might still be around in the ground and in the human mind that we had been intentionally altered?") Given the evidence I cannot think of any time in the film when Quatermass or Roney jump to a wild conclusion when there is another that is simpler AND more convincing. Faced with the evidence that the only five million year old skeletons found intact were inside a constructed craft there are not a whole lot of simple conclusions to draw. That fact alone is inconsistant with our current understanding of the origins of intelligence. I know the script quite well and I never found a conclusion they drew to seem wild to me. Perhaps you can give an example or too where the reasoning of the characters is wild IN THE LIGHT OF THE EVIDENCE PRESENTED. You do well to compare the premise of this film with creationism. This is a science fiction film whose premise concerns the origin of the species human. Creationism and evolution do also. This film simply plays with a third origin theory. That is what good science fiction does, play with theories. In that way it is like creationism. Where it differs is that it admits to being fiction. It tells the viewer to play with the idea in his/her own mind for the sake of playing with the idea. It does not tell the viewer to believe the idea. I am sure that Nigel Kneale would have nothing but dismay if some cult were to be formed believing the origin theory in FIVE MILLION YEARS TO EARTH. I am a little dismayed by your use of the phrase "If [the film] were about the occult..." Among other things this film certainly is about the occult. It is about a good deal more than that, but one of the things this film concerns is the occult. The occult occurences are (in the context of the film) exaggerated explanations of phenomena caused by the alien ships in their functioning to control the descendents of the altered apes. It is actually a clever idea since there appears to be a lot of reported occurences of occult phenomean over the ages to tie it in with Kneale's premise. That doesn't mean that Kneale really believes in occult phenomena but it nicely unifies two apparently disassociated fields and makes the idea that much more engaging. Oh, and as to whether scientist really do what Quatermass and Roney do, on top of what I have previously said, let me ask you to perform a little experiment for me. Go to the yellow pages, find a private investigator, call him and ask him how similar his work is to what goes on in "Hound of the Baskervilles." Or do you consider this to be another HORRIBLE work of fiction? Mark Leeper ...ihnp4!ahutb!leeper