Weak attempt at an appeal to authority argument. None of those people dispute the FACTS I cited, facts which disprove
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pjmcgill142 — 10 years ago(February 07, 2016 02:20 AM)
Lindbergh's choice of a single engine aircraft points to this issue. As a twin engine aircraft couldn't have completed the voyage with one engine out, he chose a single engine aircraft simply because the probability of failure was much lower with the one engine.
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degree7 — 10 years ago(September 08, 2015 01:32 AM)
That wasn't really the expert's point. What he was actually saying was "the more complex the system, the more catastrophic the failure." The small error created a system failure that cascaded through every avenue. The problem was not only that the computer system was more complex, but that the relationship between Moscow and Washington was more complicated due to human interference. The solution should have been simple: we're sorry it was an accident, please don't retaliate. More over, they should have been able to recall the bombers, but they had trained the pilots to ignore direct orders due to Soviet tricks. The threat of mutually assured destruction tied precariously to such a system meant that only a small mistake could set off a chain reaction. The president even says at the end that the blame is placed squarely on human beings for devising it. Complex systems fail in complex ways that aren't as easy to fix as simple ones.
~ I'm a 21st century man and I don't wanna be here. -
robert3750 — 10 years ago(September 08, 2015 06:35 PM)
If you want to say "what he really meant was" or "his actual point was", go ahead. I was just commenting on what he actually said, namely that more complex
machines
are more prone to failure. He said nothing about "Moscow-Washington relations", or human systems. Again, I simply pointed out that his statement about
machines
is wrong, because of the examples I gave that contradict it. -
degree7 — 10 years ago(September 08, 2015 06:54 PM)
I understand, but you also said that the movie doesn't squarely place the blame on human error, which is false. The movie is about our mistakes, not those of machines. The stuff about political relationships was read in between the lines, and related to chaos theory.
~ I'm a 21st century man and I don't wanna be here. -
robert3750 — 10 years ago(September 09, 2015 10:48 AM)
Again though, you can say "the movie is really about human fallibity, etc.", but the fact is that the incident
as shown in the film
is caused by a
machine failure.
Dr. Strangelove does a better job of placing blame
directly
on people. -
degree7 — 10 years ago(September 09, 2015 12:11 PM)
Except the movie does place the blame
directly
on people. The incident might have been instigated by the machine failure, but it was human error that allowed the event to come to pass.
Russian Premier: This was no one's fault.
The President: I don't agree.
Russian Premier: No human being is at fault. No one is to be blamed.
The President: We're to blame, both of us. We let our machines get out of hand.
Russian Premier: Still, it was an accident.
The President: What do we say to the millions killed? Accidents will happen? I won't accept that.
Russian Premier: All I know is that as long as we have weapons-
The President: All I know is that men are responsible; we're responsible for what happens to us. Today we had a taste of the future, do we learn from it or go on the way we have? What do we say to the dead?
Russian Premier: If we are men, we must say it won't happen again. But is it possible? With all that stands between us?
The President: We put it there Mr Chairman, and we're not helpless. What we put between us we can remove.
~ I'm a 21st century man and I don't wanna be here. -
robert3750 — 10 years ago(September 14, 2015 10:49 AM)
The President: We're to blame, both of us. We let our machines get out of hand.
There's no talk in
Dr. Strangelove
about "machines getting out of hand". The blame is placed directly on a loony General acting according to Plan R, which was authorized by the President. Even the Doomsday Machine operates exactly as its human designers intended. -
robert3750 — 10 years ago(September 14, 2015 11:49 AM)
The President: We're to blame, both of us. We let our machines get out of hand.
There's no talk in
Dr. Strangelove
about "machines getting out of hand". The blame is placed directly on a loony General acting according to Plan R, which was authorized by the President. Even the Doomsday Machine operates exactly as its human designers intended. -
sage2112 — 10 years ago(September 19, 2015 12:17 AM)
I think the point he was making was that the more complex the machines are, the harder it is for a human to step in if/when needed when something does go wrong.
Really you liked Strangelove better? Are you just more into comedies? Like, did you prefer Airplane! to Airport! ? -
robert3750 — 10 years ago(September 19, 2015 10:47 AM)
More complex machines can be more difficult to deal with, but they're nothing but a tool. The ultimate responsibility ALWAYS lies with humansOUR choices. Saying that the "machines got out of hand" dodges this. That's one of the things I like about Dr. Strangelove. There is NO talk about "machine failure", or "machines getting out of hand". EVERYTHING is focused on the choices that PEOPLE make.
Dr. Strangelove vs. Airplane! is a poor comparison. The latter is pure farce played strictly for laughs. Strangelove is satire, using comedy to comment on a very serious subject (nuclear war). In fact, Kubrick started to make a serious movie, but decided that a comedic tone was more effective. His decision was a brilliant one. What better way to point out the insanity of nuclear war than to show someone who is literally insane as the instigator?
Dr. Strangelove IS the superior film, and it has nothing to do with being "more into comedies". It is ranked number 39 on the AFI's top 100 films,37 on the Hollywood Reporter's list of favorite films by industry people, 42 on the BBC.com top 100, and number 50 right HERE (IMDB top 250). I think that's a damn good consensus. Fail Safe appears NOWHERE on those lists. -
jgroub — 10 years ago(January 22, 2016 01:47 PM)
What you say is literally true - I cannot deny that Strangelove is higher.
But - for me personally, Fail Safe has much more meaning, and I'm sure others feel the same way. It was literally my first introduction to global thermonuclear warfare; in other words I saw Fail-Safe before Strangelove, and for that reason, Fail-Safe had a much, much bigger impact on me.
Fail-Safe made me think, and made me think for a long time after seeing it. While I enjoyed Strangelove immensely, and of course it's a great film, it didn't have that impact on me.
I consider a truly great film to be something that provokes the viewer. Recently, there have been two films that did this - Her and Ex Machina. Fascinating looks at artificial intelligence that had me thinking for weeks afterward.
I want the doctor to take your picture so I can look at you from inside as well. -
LateNightCable — 10 years ago(January 22, 2016 12:16 PM)
So just what are those failure rates of current day computers eh?
Last time I checked, we live in a world of buggy electronics and crashed servers.
Computers today are always screwing up over something. Bring a modern car in for a repair, and the problem could be due as much to a bad sensor or other electronic component as anything mechanical.
Electronic failure is not a false premise now, any less than it was in 1964.
But the premise was meant to be fictional anyway. The producers made note at the end of the film, the DoD's claim (or some other authority) that no possibility of failure as portrayed in the story existed.
I actually thought it was a vastly better film than Dr. Strangelove,
which was a peculiar mix of self conscious farce and Cold War drama that I just didn't think worked at all.
"Cristal, Beluga, Wolfgang Puck It's a f#@k house." -
robert3750 — 10 years ago(January 22, 2016 08:11 PM)
So just what are those failure rates of current day computers eh?
Much lower than the
less
complex computers of the past, which is the point.
Electronic failure is not a false premise now, any less than it was in 1964.
What is false is the strawman premise you created. I never said there's no such thing as electronic failure, only that the facts do not support the contention in the film that more complex electronics are more prone to failure than simpler ones.
But the premise was meant to be fictional anyway.
Agreed. It's not reality.
I actually thought it was a vastly better film than Dr. Strangelove
Of course you can state your opinion, but Strangelove is rated more highly by people on IMDB and critics in general. -
LateNightCable — 10 years ago(January 22, 2016 09:43 PM)
Much lower than the less complex computers of the past, which is the point.
Now there is a straw man argument, as it is superficially plausible, but not easily determined to be fact.
Comparing an era where computers were used sparsely, and for relatively basic computation, to one which is essentially ruled by computers is basically apples and oranges One solid fact however is that complex systems today experience an exorbitantly greater rate of failure by their sheer number alone.
The crew of Apollo 11 and it's computer with 64 kilobytes of memory made it to the moon and back, while smart phones today which rival supercomputers from 30 years ago glitch out by the thousands. And their replacement ensures steady business.
What is false is the strawman premise you created. I never said there's no such thing as electronic failure, only that the facts do not support the contention in the film that more complex electronics are more prone to failure than simpler ones.
See above.
Of course you can state your opinion, but Strangelove is rated more highly by people on IMDB and critics in general.
The masses are highly impressionable idiots who's pop culture clouded judgement is not to be trusted,
Kubrick worship and all that. The average movie goer is waiting for someone of authority
to tell them what they like more.
"Cristal, Beluga, Wolfgang Puck It's a f#@k house." -
robert3750 — 10 years ago(January 24, 2016 06:32 PM)
Comparing an era where computers were used sparsely, and for relatively basic computation, to one which is essentially ruled by computers is basically apples and oranges One solid fact however is that complex systems today experience an exorbitantly greater rate of failure by their sheer number alone.
You're comparing apples and oranges by confusing sheer numbers with rate. The fact is that the simpler computers of an earlier era (ENIAC, etc.,) were extremely unreliable. ENIAC was down HALF the time. There is no way you can reasonably contend that the much more complex IBM 360 of 1964 had anything approaching such unreliability. Saying that there are "thousands" of failures (out of BILLIONS of smartphones) amounts to a failure rate on the order of one ten thousandth of one percent, far smaller than the much simpler IBM 360. Your own numbers prove my point.
The masses are highly impressionable idiots who's pop culture clouded judgement is not to be trusted,Kubrick worship and all that. The average movie goer is waiting for someone of authority to tell them what they like more.
That amounts to saying "I'm right because I'm smarter than other people on IMDB, and I'm also smarter than movie critics". That's not an argument. -
BrianRaess_Is_FinallyGone — 10 years ago(February 13, 2016 08:31 AM)
Continuing
to argue over the span of almost 2 years, and making one post almost two years later to make that observation are two very different things. It's obvious you're too dumb to know the difference. Just like you're too dumb to understand the point of the quote in the movie. Making you the ONLY one in this thread who doesn't. No one is ever going to convince you of anything no matter how convincing as you're, obviously, too dumb to understand it.