Now Where Was I ? wrote:

Asanty wrote:

Is Brand back to Earth at the end or it is only me, I mean that desert landscape and sand, it all looked like abandoned Earth

No, it's the third planet

I agree.

Miles wrote:One more thing...

I love the way the film ends, but I am the only one that was slightly disappointed with the lack of title card at the end? The way it transitioned from super loud to the piano was a little off for me.

Forget You wrote:Thanks smokey.

Perhaps I'm stuck in my 3-dimensional thinking and that's why I can't seem to grasp the logic. I did not study physics in high school/college so my education in time travel, relativity, quantum physics and the like are very, very limited. Just the very notion that time slows down the farther out in the universe you go is puzzling to me; for example, it's 11/06/2014 right now. If I was to get launched in space and travel through a wormhole to another galaxy and it would take me 2 years to get there, it would be 11/06/2016 for me when I get there. Then if I immediately went back home through the wormhole (taking another two years), it would be 11/06/2018 when I got back - basically 4 years to travel to another galaxy and back...but on Earth, perhaps 50 years or more would have passed - how? Why did it take me 4 years in Earth time to travel there and back and why isn't it still 11/06/2018 on Earth?

It has nothing to do with how far you are in the universe, all it has to do is with how fast you are going, and how massive are the bodies you are close to.

Short answer is, that's how the universe behaves, and it isn't intuitive! We don't perceive that kind of time differences in our everyday lives, but if we did we would find it normal. And it is a very real effect that has been observed, not just a theory.

Some decades ago very precise clocks were put on a plane traveling around the world, while other equally precise clocks remained on the ground. The clocks were initially synchronized, but when they were reunited there was a tiny difference of some dozen nanoseconds between the clocks that had flown in the plane and those that had remained on the ground. That difference had been predicted by the theory, and it resulted from two effects: the so-called kinematic time dilation, and gravitational time dilation. Kinematic time dilation comes from relative motion: clocks in the plane had moved relative to the clocks on the ground. Gravitational time dilation comes from a difference in the gravitation experienced: clocks in the plane were further from the center of the Earth, so they experienced less gravitation, and so less time dilation relative to the clocks on the ground. The sum of the two effects measured was the same as the one predicted by the theory, which in this case is Einstein's theory of general relativity.

These two effects have to be taken into account in GPS satellites, as their time flows more rapidly relative to ours back on Earth's surface. The difference is tiny but it's there.

The difference becomes obvious at very high speeds (at a significant percentage of the speed of light) or near very massive bodies such as black holes. In Interstellar the Endurance doesn't move that fast, so the kinetimatic time dilation is negligible, and so if they had done what you are mentioning (two years to the wormhole and two years back), there would have been a tiny difference between the time on-board the Endurance and the time back on Earth. A wormhole wouldn't introduce time dilation as far as I know. However a black hole is very massive, and so when we get close to it the gravitational time dilation becomes enormous relative to that back on Earth, and that's what happens in the movie.

Hope this helps.

I liked the ending at first, and still do, but now feel they missed a golden opportunity.

justind wrote:I liked the ending at first, and still do, but now feel they missed a golden opportunity.

If only they ended the film with Coop reuniting with the elderly Murph on her deathbed and the final moment of the film being her tearily telling him "Dad, I love you.. forever", which she didn't tell him when he left. This would have been the most emotional moment of the movie and had a nice symmetry story-wise.

Not a bad idea and presented without a hint smugness. I applaud you sir!!

I don't envy you if that's going to eat at you every time you watch it, however. At least you'll be able to turn your head to your fellow viewers and throw out an intelligent observation!

leo wrote:

Forget You wrote:Thanks smokey.

Perhaps I'm stuck in my 3-dimensional thinking and that's why I can't seem to grasp the logic. I did not study physics in high school/college so my education in time travel, relativity, quantum physics and the like are very, very limited. Just the very notion that time slows down the farther out in the universe you go is puzzling to me; for example, it's 11/06/2014 right now. If I was to get launched in space and travel through a wormhole to another galaxy and it would take me 2 years to get there, it would be 11/06/2016 for me when I get there. Then if I immediately went back home through the wormhole (taking another two years), it would be 11/06/2018 when I got back - basically 4 years to travel to another galaxy and back...but on Earth, perhaps 50 years or more would have passed - how? Why did it take me 4 years in Earth time to travel there and back and why isn't it still 11/06/2018 on Earth?

It has nothing to do with how far you are in the universe, all it has to do is with how fast you are going, and how massive are the bodies you are close to.

Short answer is, that's how the universe behaves, and it isn't intuitive! We don't perceive that kind of time differences in our everyday lives, but if we did we would find it normal. And it is a very real effect that has been observed, not just a theory.

Some decades ago very precise clocks were put on a plane traveling around the world, while other equally precise clocks remained on the ground. The clocks were initially synchronized, but when they were reunited there was a tiny difference of some dozen nanoseconds between the clocks that had flown in the plane and those that had remained on the ground. That difference had been predicted by the theory, and it resulted from two effects: the so-called kinematic time dilation, and gravitational time dilation. Kinematic time dilation comes from relative motion: clocks in the plane had moved relative to the clocks on the ground. Gravitational time dilation comes from a difference in the gravitation experienced: clocks in the plane were further from the center of the Earth, so they experienced less gravitation, and so less time dilation relative to the clocks on the ground. The sum of the two effects measured was the same as the one predicted by the theory, which in this case is Einstein's theory of general relativity.

These two effects have to be taken into account in GPS satellites, as their time flows more rapidly relative to ours back on Earth's surface. The difference is tiny but it's there.

The difference becomes obvious at very high speeds (at a significant percentage of the speed of light) or near very massive bodies such as black holes. In Interstellar the Endurance doesn't move that fast, so the kinetimatic time dilation is negligible, and so if they had done what you are mentioning (two years to the wormhole and two years back), there would have been a tiny difference between the time on-board the Endurance and the time back on Earth. A wormhole wouldn't introduce time dilation as far as I know. However a black hole is very massive, and so when we get close to it the gravitational time dilation becomes enormous relative to that back on Earth, and that's what happens in the movie.

Hope this helps.

Yeah, traversal by wormhole negates time-dialation, which is why that would be our preferred mechanism of transport if we ever reached that level of technology.

I find it insane that people like Einstein and his colleagues were able to posit these theories without the benefits of modernity.

After more then 12 hours of thinking about this film after watching it, i decided i liked the ending. It was fitting.

justind wrote:I liked the ending at first, and still do, but now feel they missed a golden opportunity.

If only they ended the film with Coop reuniting with the elderly Murph on her deathbed and the final moment of the film being her tearily telling him "Dad, I love you.. forever", which she didn't tell him when he left. This would have been the most emotional moment of the movie and had a nice symmetry story-wise.

i slightly disagree... i like how it ended better, and here's why

smokey81286 wrote:
Yeah, traversal by wormhole negates time-dialation, which is why that would be our preferred mechanism of transport if we ever reached that level of technology.

I find it insane that people like Einstein and his colleagues were able to posit these theories without the benefits of modernity.

Some experiments at the end of the 19th century led to the inescapable conclusion that relative motion induced length contraction and a difference in the rate at which time flows. The scientists at the origin of the experiment wanted to measure the velocity of Earth relative to light, but too bad that velocity was always the same no matter in what direction the Earth was moving! Some time later Einstein realized that relative motion was akin to a difference in the gravitation experienced (now that was some leap!) and came up with his theory, predicting a whole bunch of effects which turned out to be observed in the remaining of the century. Experiments are still carried out to test his theory, and invariably the experimental results agree with the theory. One great man for sure.

leo wrote:

smokey81286 wrote:
Yeah, traversal by wormhole negates time-dialation, which is why that would be our preferred mechanism of transport if we ever reached that level of technology.

I find it insane that people like Einstein and his colleagues were able to posit these theories without the benefits of modernity.

Some experiments at the end of the 19th century led to the inescapable conclusion that relative motion induced length contraction and a difference in the rate at which time flows. The scientists at the origin of the experiment wanted to measure the velocity of Earth relative to light, but too bad that velocity was always the same no matter in what direction the Earth was moving! Some time later Einstein realized that relative motion was akin to a difference in the gravitation experienced (now that was some leap!) and came up with his theory, predicting a whole bunch of effects which turned out to be observed in the remaining of the century. Experiments are still carried out to test his theory, and invariably the experimental results agree with the theory. One great man for sure.

His theory is not the end story though, some time in the future it will have to be united with quantum mechanics, which will give rise to a deeper understanding of the universe. That's what Murph does in the movie