Jonathan Svilik
Aug 30, 2025
THE PLOT
Directed by James Ward Byrkit and released in 2014, Coherence begins as a normal dinner party with eight friends who meet on the night of an expected rare comet flyby. As the night progresses and the comet passes overhead, the power in the house goes out and strange things begin to happen. The friends decide to send various groups out of the house to investigate. Eventually, they realize that there is a house down the block that still has their power on. So, they go to check if they have a generator or some other form of power. But, what they discover is unsettling; the house is identical to theirs. Then they see something even more strange: the people inside the house are their doppelgängers. Now the film becomes a physiological puzzle, with the team unable to discern who is part of their original house or an alternative house. The characters are also introduced to some of the quantum physics theories that could support their experiences through a book that they find, detailing the ideas behind superposition and Schrodinger’s cat. Again, the film posits that the strange happenings of the night can be attributed to the comet passing overhead. As the night continues, people begin to disappear and reappear in the house, but with slightly different behaviors. This begs the question, as a new house and a new timeline is created with every decision, who is real and who is not? What is “real”? The film specifically follows Emily, one of the original dinner party guests. As the dinner party unravels and the rest of the characters fall into deep suspicion, Emily looks to find a house that has a version of herself that is happy. Once she finds this version, she knocks her doppelgänger unconscious and replaces her. In the morning when Emily wakes up in her chosen reality. However, she is left uneasy and uncertain. The film ends when her phone rings and she gets a call from herself, the Emily that she tried to replace.
The film is driven by quantum physics ideas such as superposition, the Many-Worlds Interpretation, and quantum decoherence. It poses questions challenging these ideas as well as taking on uncertainties related to identity and reality.
OUR GUEST
I would like to introduce Dr. Miguel Murca who is joining me on the AstroArticulated Podcast. Dr. Murca earned his bachelor’s degree in physics from the Universidade de Coimbra in Portugal in 2018. He then went on to complete his masters in physics, with a focus on quantum computing in 2020. Recently, Dr. Murca earned his PhD in quantum algorithms from the Instituto Superior Técnico in Lisbon. Since 2020, he has been working in quantum algorithms. Dr. Murca, thank you so much for speaking with me today!
EPISODE CONTENT
This episode tackles the quantum physics ideas broached in Coherence, such as superposition, The Many-Worlds Interpretation and its alternatives, and quantum decoherence/coherence.