Scientists as Human Beings

Yesterday, Kat and I went to a see two movies that were both excellent. It was about 9:30a, and I was looking at the movie times for the La Jolla Village Cinema at the kitchen/dining table. Kat said that she wouldn't mind seeing “The Theory of Everything” again, so we went to the matinee showing at 10:10. It took us long enough to drive there because it was all local streets, though we were on Miramar Road and that's a pretty fast road except for some of the lights, which appear to be not programmed, but run using sensors, so that some of the lights were changing to red though the previous one (heading west) had just turned green. There was very little traffic before 10a, so we made good time and arrived early enough to find two aisle seats on one side of the single-aisle theatre. There were previews for some interesting movies, including a short film fest of the Oscar-nominated shorts for 2014, which included one animated short which we had seen during an animation festival a few years ago, and two longer films.

One film is titled “Leviathon” and is about a family who lives on what appears to be a lake shore in a village. A wealthy politico wants the land for his own purposes, so tries to leverage his political influence within the government to get his hands on it. It ends up being a David-and-Goliath-type struggle for the villagers, who rally to the cause of keeping their village a village rather than an estate for the fat man.

The other feature-length film is titled “Two Days, One Night,” and is about a married woman with small children, who works at a job which has been threatened due to something, a budget cut possibly. There will be an in-office vote as to whether she can stay or go. If she stays, each employee must take a pay cut in order to make her salary. The movie is, presumably, about the weekend over which she needs to convince her coworkers to vote for her to stay, subsequently voting for their own pay cut. The trailers were the same for both “The Theory of Everything” and “The Imitation Game.”

“The Theory of Everything” is about Stephen Hawking, his courtship of Jane Wilde, the development of their relationship as he's becoming well-known for as an astrophysicist, and, eventually, the signal of the end of their union. Since he was originally given about two years to live after his diagnosis, Jane probably was expecting something shorter, though just as sweet as they could manage.

Hawking's disease (ALS, or Lou Gehrig's Disease) became apparent while he was a student at Oxford, and the movie depicts his thesis defense with all three judges congratulating him on his achievement and theory of black holes. It was a really good movie to start the day.

We had a half hour to kill before “The Imitation Game” started, so we walked up to a Peet's and got a couple of mochas and shared a blueberry scone, which reminded me that I'd like to make scones sometime.  Upon returning to the cinema, we saw that we'd arrived merely ten minutes prior to showtime. The fellow at the ticket counter welcomed us back, recognizing us as two of the few people who'd come in for a matinee show earlier. This time, though, my ticket was more expensive, at the adult rate, whereas Kat's was still relatively inexpensive at the student rate. The previews, as I said above, were all the same, and we agreed to learn about when “Leviathon” would be showing so that we could come back to see it. Its run will begin, I think, on 6 February. I'll want to keep that in mind in a few weeks.

“The Imitation Game” is about Alan Turing, his recruit by MI6, the computer he designed and built in order to decode German communications, and his tragic death (he committed suicide after being prosecuted for being homosexual). It was well-told, but very, very depressing for any audience that empathizes at all with the protagonist, who is portrayed as an eccentric, lonely genius.

I think it's interesting that these two movies should come out at this time, when Science is under attack from those on the so-called “Right” (which emphasizes the difference between "right" and "correct").  I was glad that the scientists were portrayed as whole beings. Perhaps Hawking's book, A Brief History of Time, whose publication I remember (1988), will enjoy a second turn on Bestsellers Lists. We need, so badly, to foster an interest in science and engineering, for there are so many problems that require knowledge in these fields to solve.

Unfortunately, being stupid, apparently, is popular, with politicians openly giving their idiotic, mostly religiously-based, opinions by prefacing them with the phrase “I'm no scientist, but...” I am hopeful for a resurgence of interest in science and the vital role it has played and needs to continue to play in Society. I hope that the release of “The Theory of Everything” and “The Imitation Game” is a beginning, not a fluke.