SoD Methodology and Altered video

[Majin Gojira]

Recently, while debating the use of Suspension of Disbelief methodology, a question was raised: If we admit that the film has been digitally doctored to, say, dub in english, what is to say that other aspects of the film have not been digitally doctored?

The author of this question was attempting to disprove SoD methodology's validity, and of all the arguments presented, this is the only one that actually comes close to raising a valid point.

My own response to it is an admitted appeal to authority, "it's 'real' because it is stated to be 'canonical' by the copyright holder, and we have little choice but to accept it", essentially, but that does not fit well within SoD.

So, how should this argument be handled?

[Steel]

The main site has a small bit on this:

http://www.stardestroyer.net/Empire/Ess ... lysis.html

Under "Why is everyone speaking English?"

[Majin Gojira]

Not wuite, the basic (slipery slope) assertation is that if one thing is known to be doctored, then we cannot trust it as a source or some such.

[Darth Wong]

Most people who attack the SoD method rely on painting it as an assumption of perfection, ie- SoD somehow requires the source material to be perfect. No such assumption is necessary and I'm not sure why people think it is, unless they're just looking for excuses to attack it.

It's actually very much like the tactics that anti-science types use against real-life science: we don't have perfect certainty of our theories or perfect accuracy in our data, so ... throw objectivity out the window and go with revelation. Same mentality here.

[Winston Blake]

Recently, while debating the use of Suspension of Disbelief methodology, a question was raised: If we admit that the film has been digitally doctored to, say, dub in english, what is to say that other aspects of the film have not been digitally doctored?

Occam's Razor. There are details somewhere on the main site.

The question is: why should any particular aspect of the film be considered doctored? Aliens speaking English for no reason is something that should be, because it's a point that doesn't make sense. Adding the mechanism of doctoring results in it making sense. Extending this to all the things that make sense already is nonsensical.

[Connor MacLeod]

Well, in general one needs a valid reason to decide (under SoD) that footage is "flawed" - its basically a last resort. As Mike said, its not an "all or nothing" case the way some idiots portray it, some flexilibity is definitely allowed (such as deliberately changing ship sizes in Star Trek).

The catch, of course, is that being a last resort, you need a very good reason (IE no other theory could possibly fit to account for what is seen) or specific evidence for editing under particular circumstances. Assuming that because SOME of the data is flawed that it all is is still an assumption, ,and one that renders the whole point of analysis (or a "vs" debate) pretty much pointless.

Humorously, the "all or nothing" approach (again as Mike notes) often appears when discussing the possibility of sciencec and using it for analysis. Usually some idiot will bring up a possible technology device or whatnot that can't be explained by science (IE FTL) and then extrapolate that science an't always be applied. Usually this is done in response to legitimate objections to some fanboy wanking of calcs or whatnot (IE TDiC) and they just want an "out" in explaining it. I especailly see it in cases where some idiot wants to ignore thermodynamics or conservation laws (IE conservation of momentum.)

[Darth Wong]

So what do these people say when actors and directors alter dialogue or events during the creation of a movie? It happens all the time, and pretty much fucks the whole "writer's intent" method right up the ass, doesn't it?

[Gil Hamilton]

Well, I think there is a common sense element.

Take the original StarTrek. We know the giant rock Kirk uses to solve a large amount of problems is styrofoam. It acts like styrofoam, not rock, and even looks like painted styrofoam. Literally, you aren't going to ding too many Gorn skulls with it. Likewise, that spray painted cloth background that is generously presented as a rockface behind the actor is pretty clearly not a stone.

However, at a certain point, we need to accept what they present with some sense. Yah, it's a styrofoam rock that Kirk keeps bonking people with, but really, it doesn't seem all that rational to go "And therefore Gorns can be brought down by styrofoam". We've got to accept its a rock, regardless of the face that it clearly bounces off the actors like it weighs next to nothing. That's suspending disbelief right there.

[Darth Wong]

Once again, as with attacks on real-life scientific methods, we are faced with people whose basic argument is "if your method ain't perfect, then it's crap". The point is not that it's necessarily perfect, but that it works, it's reliable, it produces consistent reproducible results, and it's therefore better than the alternatives.

[Majin Gojira]

I've got to share two things from the latest jumper on the thread:

First, attacking the base assumption made in all media: that what happens actually does happen:

And up to a point, it is [Scientific]. But as soon as anyone extends the metaphor of the films and shows as documentaries*, and asks "Who made the documentary? Who shot all this footage? Who edited it?", suddenly the handwaving starts and we're told to ignore all that and just accept it.

Well, I can't "just accept it", not when this method is being held up as vastly superior to the literary analysis method. The Spider Mastermind put it less than diplomatically, but I agree with his point that the guy who invented this method really just wanted a way to "win" in these kinds of fannish discussions. He holds up "suspension of disbelief" as a way to get one single answer, which is the right one - end of story. And counting frames and doing equations is fine, work away, enjoy yourselves, but that doesn't make "suspension of disbelief" superior to the literary analysis method. It's an alternative method, not a better one.

And for God's sake, don't call it scientific. It rests on too many assumptions for it to be scientific. Calling it scientific offends me as a professional analyst and a science graduate.

(*On a personal note, treating the films and shows as documentaries is incredibly nonsensical. We're supposed to believe that there are cameras dotted around random asteroids in just the right spots to film all the battles from dramatic angles? We're supposed to believe that the Ewoks have cameras all over their village? We're supposed to believe that there was a camera crew filming Darth Vader's death scene, and they bothered to get touching closeup shots, and neither of the parties being filmed told them to back off? Please.)

And then there's this:

It's the underlying assumption of "suspension of disbelief" that the special effects crew sat down with a pencil and paper and worked out exactly what kind of energy you'd need to blast a planet apart and how fast the chunks would fly and then accurately portrayed that onscreen that I can't get past. At least the literary analysis method treats Star Wars (and anything else you care to name) as a piece of fiction, and it doesn't pretend that it's anything more than that.

Methinks this person is mightily confused.

[General Zod]

The first one is making a lot of bold claims and assuming we should take his word as gospel without bothering to do any explanation as to why we should, from the sound of it. I'm also pretty sure there's a sprinkling of ad hominems in there too.

[Ghost Rider]

And up to a point, it is [Scientific]. But as soon as anyone extends the metaphor of the films and shows as documentaries*, and asks "Who made the documentary? Who shot all this footage? Who edited it?", suddenly the handwaving starts and we're told to ignore all that and just accept it.

Strangely, the point of who made it is an omnipotent third person. Unless people have documentaries of the hidden insights of history.

So the handwaving is asking who did it, to try and make it a biased source, instead of realizing no source other then something all seeing would get the sheer level of information movies present as a story.

Well, I can't "just accept it", not when this method is being held up as vastly superior to the literary analysis method. The Spider Mastermind put it less than diplomatically, but I agree with his point that the guy who invented this method really just wanted a way to "win" in these kinds of fannish discussions. He holds up "suspension of disbelief" as a way to get one single answer, which is the right one - end of story. And counting frames and doing equations is fine, work away, enjoy yourselves, but that doesn't make "suspension of disbelief" superior to the literary analysis method. It's an alternative method, not a better one.

No mention of how the other method is superior, just that it is. Ah burden of proof, how it scares idiots.

And for God's sake, don't call it scientific. It rests on too many assumptions for it to be scientific. Calling it scientific offends me as a professional analyst and a science graduate.

LMAO.

The first part of his statement is dodging the topic at hand because he can't come up with the logical rebuttal. Similar to creationist screahing about how God just makes things happen and we cannot understand normeasure God's ability.

The second is an appeal to authority.

(*On a personal note, treating the films and shows as documentaries is incredibly nonsensical. We're supposed to believe that there are cameras dotted around random asteroids in just the right spots to film all the battles from dramatic angles? We're supposed to believe that the Ewoks have cameras all over their village? We're supposed to believe that there was a camera crew filming Darth Vader's death scene, and they bothered to get touching closeup shots, and neither of the parties being filmed told them to back off? Please.)

Given it's an all seeing eye, yes we do. But strange how he asks in the first part how can this be, and in this part he complains how can this single person see all this. Really coming to a conclusion on the data provided is part and parcel with any decent scientist. Says a lot about his claim as a professional analyst.

It's the underlying assumption of "suspension of disbelief" that the special effects crew sat down with a pencil and paper and worked out exactly what kind of energy you'd need to blast a planet apart and how fast the chunks would fly and then accurately portrayed that onscreen that I can't get past. At least the literary analysis method treats Star Wars (and anything else you care to name) as a piece of fiction, and it doesn't pretend that it's anything more than that.

Strange that as a scientist he doesn't once again observe data and thenfind a conclusion from it, but instead concludes and then tries to shoehorn his data to work. Again, says a great deal of his claim of being anything competent.

Methinks this person is mightily confused.

Nothing being confued here...he's an ignorant fucktard.

[Darth Wong]

I love the way people who make this kind of argument have absolutely no problem with the idea of George Lucas thinking of empirical data and scientific principles when writing the dialogue, but it's so obvious that he couldn't have been doing this when making the special effects.

Once you go down the road of "do you really think they sat down and did calculations", this logic inevitably leads to the conclusion that you can't derive any kind of hard data no matter what method you use. Which is fine if that's the conclusion you want, but when some idiot claims that you can't get data from objective methods but you can get them by "author's intent", then he's clearly engaging in a special pleading fallacy, where his own logic does not apply to his preferred solution.