Neil DeGrasse Tyson: Here's What 'Gravity' Gets Right

What's This?

By Anita Li2013-10-10 04:34:34 UTC

After criticizing Gravity's plot holes in a series of tweets, astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson posted an open letter to Facebook on Wednesday, clarifying his earlier gripes and praising the space drama film.

"When I saw a headline proclaim, based on my dozen or so tweets, 'Astrophysicist says the film Gravity is Riddled with Errors,' I came to regret not first tweeting the hundred things the movie got right," Tyson wrote in the post entitled, "On the Critique of Science in Film." He then went on to list parts of the film that were accurate:

1. 
   

   the 90 minute orbital time for objects at that altitude;

   
   


2. 
   

   the re-entry trails of disintegrated satellites, hauntingly reminiscent of the Columbia Shuttle tragedy;

   
   


3. 
   

   Clooney's calm-under-stress character (I know dozens of astronauts like that);

   
   


4. 
   

   the stunning images from orbit transitioning from day to twilight to nighttime;

   
   


5. 
   

   the Aurorae (northern lights) visible in the distance over the polar regions;

   
   


6. 
   

   the thinness of Earth's atmosphere relative to Earth's size;

   
   


7. 
   

   the persistent conservation of angular and linear momentum;

   
   


8. 
   

   the starry sky, though a bit trumped up, captured the range and balance of an actual night sky;

   
   


9. 
   

   the speed of oncoming debris, if in fact it were to collide at orbital velocity;

   
   


10. 
    

    the transition from silence to sound between an unpressurized and a pressurized airlock;

    
    

Tyson then jumped to number 100, citing "the brilliantly portrayed tears of Bullock, leaving her eyes, drifting afloat in the capsule."

Earlier in his post, the astrophysicist said he was shocked by the media attention given to his Sunday tweets. Tyson added that science experts "don't line up to critique Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs or Man of Steel or Transformers or The Avengers," so for Gravity to "'earn'" the right to be criticized on a scientific level is a "high compliment."

Tyson is no stranger to criticizing the scientific veracity of films. He managed to convince director James Cameron to correct the star field in a 2012 re-release of his blockbuster film Titanic .

Read Tyson's entire Facebook post on Gravity, here.

Did you watch Gravity? If so, what did you think of the film? And do you care if it's scientifically accurate? Sound off in the comments, below.

Image: Mike Lawrie/Staff/Getty Images

Topics: Entertainment, Film, gravity, Neil deGrasse Tyson, U.S.