At one point, Maureen fills a weather balloon to ascend to 350,000 (above 65 miles) altitude. Although it is filled with helium, the balloon should have expanded its volume (according to Boyle's Law) by many times, but it still shows its original size, even at that altitude. Even if they use some kind of as yet undeveloped textile, even at 25 miles, the balloon would have expanded to a hundred times its original size.
During a flashback where Will is shown performing stress tests prior to his final acceptance or rejection for the colonist program, he is inside a container labeled "JPL Hyperbaric Medicine" while outside there are indications on the monitoring equipment that he is above 14,000 feet. This is HYPOBARIC, not hyperbaric. Hyperbaric chambers are used for deepsea diving training, where hypobaric chambers are used for altitude training. Also, Will emerges from the chamber while the monitor shows it is still at 16,000 feet. It's doubtful that the door would open at that pressure difference.
When Maureen is packing for her secret excursion to test her theory, the duffle bag that appears in the foreground says "High Altitute" instead of "High Altitude" (can be clearly read at 4:07)
Will is sitting under the "light tower", plugging things in, when John walks up to him:
John: Hey, you might want to run those in parallel. That way if one of the lamps shorts, the others won't go out as well.
Will: Like Christmas tree lights?
John: Yeah. Yeah, exactly.
1) If any light wired in parallel with others "shorts" (becomes a short circuit from one of its connections to the other), all the other lights will go out too because the over-current protector (circuit breaker or fuse) will turn off the power supply, or there will be a fire. He meant to say "if one of the lamps blows" (becomes an open circuit).
2) The type of Christmas tree lights that they are referring to are the old, cheap ones that are all wired in series on a loop of single-conductor from one terminal of the plug to the other. If one of those becomes a short circuit, it will of course not light up, but all the others will (and in fact will each be operating with a higher voltage drop and be brighter, possibly also malfunctioning). What usually happens to light bulbs, though, is that the filament breaks and it becomes an open circuit, in which case none will light up. Neither of the characters is likely to have ever encountered that type of Xmas light string in their past life, in 2049, since they haven't been popular or made that way for decades as of 2019.
John: Hey, you might want to run those in parallel. That way if one of the lamps shorts, the others won't go out as well.
Will: Like Christmas tree lights?
John: Yeah. Yeah, exactly.
1) If any light wired in parallel with others "shorts" (becomes a short circuit from one of its connections to the other), all the other lights will go out too because the over-current protector (circuit breaker or fuse) will turn off the power supply, or there will be a fire. He meant to say "if one of the lamps blows" (becomes an open circuit).
2) The type of Christmas tree lights that they are referring to are the old, cheap ones that are all wired in series on a loop of single-conductor from one terminal of the plug to the other. If one of those becomes a short circuit, it will of course not light up, but all the others will (and in fact will each be operating with a higher voltage drop and be brighter, possibly also malfunctioning). What usually happens to light bulbs, though, is that the filament breaks and it becomes an open circuit, in which case none will light up. Neither of the characters is likely to have ever encountered that type of Xmas light string in their past life, in 2049, since they haven't been popular or made that way for decades as of 2019.