Nov. 25th, 2007

Pedantry

Nov. 25th, 2007 11:25 am
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I"m a little pedantic sometimes. I can't help it! When I see bad grammar or flaws in logic, I have to point them out!

Today, for example, I was reading a list of "things we learned at the movies." It's one of those lists of things like "the more people shooting at you, the less chance they have of hitting you" and so on. Most of them made me chuckle, but one of them made me go "Argh, you idiot."

"An electric fence, powerful enough to kill a dinosaur, will cause no lasting damage to an eight year old child."

You all probably recognize the movie that's from. If you don't, it's Jurassic Park. And whoever wrote this list didn't spare ten seconds to actually think about the electrocution scene. Because I don't know about you, but if I had a park full of dinosaurs that I wanted to open to the public, a park that was going to make me oodles of money, a park that had already cost me oodles of money, filled with dinosaurs that had been produced with a great deal of expense and effort, I wouldn't be setting up a containment system that instantly killed my very expensive critters the first time they brushed up against it.

Or in other words; DUH, it's not powerful enough to kill a dinosaur, it's just powerful enough to make one uncomfortable.

The scene where the kid gets blown off the fence is completely plausible! Honestly! What kind of idiot is going to look at that electric fence and think it's meant to kill the dinosuars? I suppose, given that most city-bred types have never encountered a real electric fence,* they don't know what they're talking about, but man... think a little! Who wants to kill escaping livestock? You might as well just let 'em escape, if the fence is going to keep them in by killing them!

*Our next-door neighbor when I lived in Toquerville had a cow, which they kept fenced in with a single wire. The wire was electrified, and we were always daring each other to touch it. You got a mild but slightly painful shock, similar to the effect of a low-end personal taser, from touching it. Scale that up to dinosaurs, and there's still no way something that's intended to deter them is going to kill a human, really. It'd be more like a real police taser. So I suppose the scene is a bit unrealistic in that the kid was hurt more than he really should have been, rather than being unrealistic in his surviving!
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If you want a tail, ears, or small loonakit plush before Chrismas, order now or never! If you place any orders more than a week from today I cannot guarantee their arrival before Christmas.

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Aidan Rhiannon

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