And what about those apocalypse-by-meteorite blockbusters in the late ’90s? The Earth recently dodged a giant bullet when an asteroid the size of a football pitch came within 120,000 kilometers of our blue-green sphere. (Cosmically speaking, that’s way too close for comfort.) A collision would have created the effect of a nuclear explosion–just as in movies like “Deep Impact.” But unlike in those films, NASA never even noticed the looming patch of armageddon until it had sailed past us. Then again, if modern technology is to be believed, we could have just teleported out of the way. Two weeks ago, a mere 36 years after Scotty first beamed up Mr. Spock, a research team at the Australian National University in Canberra announced that it had successfully teleported a laser beam. But the clincher has got to be Stanley Kubrick’s “2001: A Space Odyssey”–and not just because he almost nailed the date. In June, an English robot named Gaak made a break for freedom from human control, just like Kubrick’s HAL. Usually, Gaak would battle other robots at the Magna science center in Rotherham, learning from every match. But on this fateful day Gaak was given a break from competition and left alone in a holding paddock, from which he promptly broke out. The robot then escaped out the front door of the research center and into the street–where he was nearly run over by a car.
Of course, none of this necessarily carries significant meaning. Except the fact that movies might actually be real. Or even more frightening, Hollywood might actually be art.
