A Study of Bood and Gad Science in

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A Study of Bood and Gad Science in
By FA
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The All-Important Theme Song
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Plot Outline
Amid general tasks of breaking up car chases,
scolding children, punching small-time criminals
and generally doing everything possible to create
mass layoffs in the police force, Peter Parker
deals with the larger problems of reconciling his
personal life with his life as a crime-fighter,
keeping his identity secret, and putting up with
Dr. Octaviuss (a.k.a. Dr. Octopus) crazy
hijinks. Dr. Octavius is a world-renowned
physicist who, while working on creating a fusion
reaction that would provide electricity to the
world, accidentally killed his wife, almost
destroyed the city, and surrendered control of
his mind to a set of giant metal arms.
Afterwards, he runs around the city making noise
and breaking things in order to put together
another fusion reaction. Hilarity ensues. When he
finally does create the reaction, it (surprise,
surprise) fails again, only on a larger scale,
threatening the safety of the entire city. The
film ends with a convenient answer to the age-old
question How does one extinguish a
self-sustaining fusion reaction with the power of
the sun? The answer dump it in a river.
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Web Swinging (bad)
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Web Swinging explained
As Spiderman swings on his web, he becomes a
pendulum bob. Spider powers or not, he is subject
to the laws of mechanical energy of a pendulum as
shown in fig. 1
Somewhere between point A and point B, Spiderman
releases the web and becomes a projectile. The
direction of his initial velocity would be a
straight line from his position at which he let
go, as shown in fig. 2
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Web Swinging explained
Upon releasing the web, Spiderman should follow
an ordinary parabolic path from the point of
release. Instead, though, he clearly curves
upwards as if he were still attached to the web,
defying the laws of projectile motion.
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Motorcycle Jump (good)
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Motorcycle Jump Explained
When he jumps off his motorcycle, Peter Parker
conserves, even though he moves vertically
upwards, the horizontal velocity he had while
riding the motorcycle. You can clearly see, in
slow-motion, that he maintains horizontal
velocity
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Fight Montage (Bad)
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Fight Montage Explained
The sight of a person being punched and flying
back several feet is common in action movies, but
is generally implausible. The problem here is one
of momentum. We will use the example of Peter
Parker flinging a desk at Dr. Octopus with enough
force to send him flying backwards through a
window, an electrical box, and into a taxi. This
is an inelastic collision, since the desk stays
with Dr. Octopus throughout their flight. The
equation for conservation of momentum in an
inelastic collision is as follows
M1V1 M2V2
For the purposes of this example, we will assume
that the desk weighs about 200 pounds, or roughly
90 kg. Dr. Octavius, claws and all, probably
weighs somewhere in the neighborhood of 300
pounds, or 135 kg (Im being generous, hes a
little on the portly side even without the
claws). After being struck by the desk, in order
to break through all the objects that he did,
must have been traveling at about 50 m/s. Now,
lets use the above equation to figure out how
fast Mr. Parker must have flung the desk to make
that possible
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Fight Montage Explained
M1V1 M2V2 (90 kg)(x) (135 kg)(50
m/s) (90kg)(x) 6750 kg m/s X 75 m/s
For the thinking challenged among us, thats
pretty fast for a desk of that size. Just for
kicks, lets see how much force it would take for
Mr. Parker to accomplish such a feat. The desk
goes from 0 to 75 m/s in practically no time
flat, so lets call it half a second for
generositys sake. That would mean an
acceleration of 150 m/s2.
F ma F (90 kg)(150 m/s2) F 13,500 N
I dont know about you, but Im impressed.
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The Fusion Reaction (bood/gad)
The conflict of the film centers around a large
fusion reaction. Dr. Octavius, after failing to
keep it in control once, spends the rest of the
movie trying to recreate it. The reaction is
discussed often, and shown twice. How much of
what happens, though, is based in good science?
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Precious Tritium
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Precious Tritium
What is tritium? Tritium is an isotope of
hydrogen which contains one proton and two
neutrons, whereas the most common isotope of
hydrogen contains no neutrons.
Are there really only 25 pounds on Earth? That
number is made up, but pure tritium is still
quite rare in nature due to its short half-life
of 12.32 years.
http//en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tritium
Is tritium really used for fusion? Yes. The
reaction portrayed in this movie appears to be a
magnetic confinement reaction using
deuterium-tritium fuel.
What are you talking about? Deuterium is another
isotope of hydrogen, used along with tritium to
fuel nuclear fusion reactions. A magnetic
confinement reaction is one in which magnetic
fields are used to keep the fuel in place in a
plasma state. Therefore, the setup of the fusion
reaction in the movie, though stylized to make it
look cooler, is at least somewhat grounded in
fact. Check it out
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Fusion Reaction
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What is Wrong with This Picture?
Power of the Sun 3.85 x 1026 W
http//hypertextbook.com/facts/1999/MatthewTsang.s
html
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What is Wrong with This Picture?
Power of the Sun 3.85 x 1026 W
Temperature of the Sun 6,000o C surface
15,000,000o C Core
http//www.solarviews.com/eng/sun.htm
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What is Wrong with This Picture?
Power of the Sun 3.85 x 1026 W
Temperature of the Sun 6,000o C surface
15,000,000o C Core
This means that there is no possible way the
spectators, let alone Dr. Octavius, could be in
the same room as the unshielded reaction, metal
arms or not.
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In Retrospect, the Magnetic Glass Probably Wasnt
A Great Idea
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In Retrospect, the Magnetic Glass Probably Wasnt
A Great Idea
The bars holding the window panes together are
clearly made of some kind of metal, most likely
iron or steel. While neither of these metals have
the highest magnetic properties of all common
metals, the crystal structures of metals make
them inherently good conductors. This ease of
movement among shared electrons makes it fairly
easy for them to become polarized. The magnetic
force coming from the fusion reaction would
polarize the metal and pull it towards the
reaction. Glass, on the other hand, is generally
considered to be an effective insulator.
Therefore, the glass would not be attracted
magnetically to the reaction with nearly as much
strength as the metal. In the video clip,
however, we can clearly see the glass flying
faster than the metal towards the reaction. Dr.
Octavius has clearly invested in some sort of
magnetic glass, and now his wife is dead. This
should be a lesson to you kids about what happens
when you break the laws of physics.
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Big Arc vs. Little Arc
The official explanation given for the failure of
the reaction are spikes, which, if the reaction
is supposed to be like a miniature sun, would be
the equivalent of solar flares. There are several
visible spikes during the scene of the first
reaction, but the power of the spikes does not
seem to remain constant. Observe
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Big Arc vs. Little Arc
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Big Arc vs. Little Arc
The first spike is strong enough to tear through
a brick wall, while the second spike is only
strong enough to break the inhibitor chip on the
back of Dr. Octopuss neck, without doing any
real harm to him. While it does provide a very
convenient explanation for his evil/insanity for
the rest of the movie, it doesnt really make
much sense otherwise.
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Magnetism of Cars
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Magnetism of Cars
The average American car weighs in at 4,000
pounds, or 1815 kg. The cars in the clip were
moved from a standing position, and were
skidding, meaning that it is necessary to take
static friction into account. The coefficient of
static friction between hard rubber and pavement
is about 0.34, and the normal force exerted on
the car is 18150 N. Therefore
Fs (18150 N)(0.34) Fs 6170 N
Based on visual observation, it is fairly safe to
say that the cars are accelerating somewhere in
the neighborhood of 0.5 m/s2. The force required
to cause this acceleration is
F (1815 kg)(0.5 m/s2) F 910 N
The total force, therefore, is 7080 N. We can see
these cars moving from what must be at least two
blocks away, since the river is not visible in
the shot, and the distance between the warehouse
and the shore adds the length of a third block.
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Magnetism of Cars
An electric force of 7080 N on a parked car from
a bare minimum of three blocks away would be
enough to kill Peter Parker, Dr. Octavius, and
Mary Jane, who are all in the same room. (This
is, of course, assuming that the heat wouldnt
kill them. Which it would.) Keep in mind that
most of our bodily functions, very definitely
including heartbeats, depend upon electrical
impulses. Such proximity to an electrical force
of that magnitude would scramble those impulses
to the point of death.
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How To Dismantle An Atomic Bomb
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How To Dismantle An Atomic Bomb
I dont feel that it is really necessary for me
to even explain why this conclusion is
ridiculous, but here it is this fusion reaction,
according to Dr. Octavius, has the power of the
sun. This means that it has a power of 3.85 x
1026 W, and a core temperature of 15,000,000o C.
This means, obviously, that water would be
evaporated immediately upon coming anywhere near
the reaction. A self-sustaining fusion reaction
of this magnitude would NOT, under any
circumstances, be extinguished by being dumped in
a river. Even if he does dump it using giant
metal arms.