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Has anybody noticed that mythubsters experiments seem to be getting more daring and un-necessarily dangerous? For me it started with the 'curving bullet' myth,

Has anybody noticed that mythubsters experiments seem to be getting more daring and un-necessarily dangerous? For me it started with the 'curving bullet' myth, that just didn't seem to have the necessary safety controls. Since then I've seen many myths that could have easily ended in disaster, had one simple thing gone wrong. There's a lot to be said for teaching experimentation and the scientific method, but I'm worried they're teaching a whole generation of kids that science is inherently dangerous.

ryandvm 15y ago
Actually, the problem I had with that episode was that they were mythbusting Newton's first law of motion.
- dholowiski 15y ago
  Sure, it was a pretty dumb myth that they were testing and it didn't make for a great episode, i just still can't believe they didn't end up shooting someone.
  - yock 15y ago
    Don't forget too that Kari was pregnant. Calling those sequences poorly considered is an understatement.
- jerf 15y ago
  Meh, they've tested Newton's laws numerous times. If everybody knew them, both intellectually and in their bones, they wouldn't have the myths to test, but alas, I don't think you can claim with a straight face that we live in a society with universal knowledge and deep understanding of Newton's laws. ... and if you think you do, spend some time on the much-referenced "fan site". And furthermore, there is nothing unscientific or wrong about testing our most well-tested theories. The entire point of science is that even then, the theories will still work, not that you should never test them again. I'd also further observe that for all the drama happening here, those swinging gun sequences aren't that unsafe. It may look unsafe but the actual set of things that can plausibly go wrong was less than your intuition may be claiming. It's not like there was a way they were going to shoot themselves with a particularly higher probability than usual. (And remember that if you start constructing far-out implausible scenarios under which that might happen you must be willing to worry about equally improbably things all the time; one rapidly gets to the point where things like simply driving to work must be considered too unsafe to do if one starts spending too much improbability on the constructed scenario.)
  - scott_s 15y ago
    I agree with everything you said, but I even think it's unfair to say they're "testing Newton's laws." Rather, I think they're often testing "is it feasible for us to reproduce the idealized circumstances from thought experiments." Case in point is firing an object in the opposite direction of a moving vehicle. I don't think any of them questioned the physics behind it, but it was really a question of if they could contrive the circumstances exactly so they observed the kind of result one would see without all of the nasty effects that reality imparts (like spin, air resistance, speed variance, etc.): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BLuI118nhzc http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BLuI118nhzc
- ugh 15y ago
  The nice thing is that it is no problem to test Newton’s first law of motion again and again and again. If you do it right you will always get the same results. That’s what Mythbusters is all about. It’s not about rigorous mathematical demonstrations of why something can or cannot be true, it’s about figuring stuff out in a way that actually makes it possible to see the result (and not necessarily as the result of a calculation). That’s a less powerful and much more tedious approach than our usual methods of gaining knowledge but it is a lot more accessible and just good entertainment. Since Mythbusters is less about gaining knowledge and more about entertainment it’s also the appropriate approach for the show.
  - cschmidt 15y ago
    Yes, Mythbusters is unscientific... http://xkcd.com/397/ http://xkcd.com/397/
    - ugh 15y ago
      Damn you, XKCD!
  - scott_s 15y ago
    Frankly, I think that most of the time, their methods are plenty rigorous. The only difference between them and research engineering labs is that instead of writing a paper, they produce a television segment.
    - ugh 15y ago
      Oh, their methods are quite good most of the time. The point is much rather that we know so much about how things move that if all you wanted to do, was find out whether it’s possible to bend bullets you likely wouldn’t do an experiment but break out the calculator. An experiment about this particular question can’t tell us anything new.
    - protomyth 15y ago
      For some stuff, the "Can a snow plow driving down the road push enough air to flip a passing car over?" had so much wrong with it that I didn't finish the rest of the episodes on my tivo before I moved. They tested on a dry, flat surface without any hint of ice or snow. As snow plows are not used in summer, this was a pretty bad error. A runway is flat, a road is not. I assume they were going for local location for cost and just wanted the big crash at the end as opposed to showing how dangerous a snow plow is. Coefficient of friction is an amazing thing.
smackfu 15y ago
They had a recent Locations clip-show which was surprisingly good and mentioned some more close calls. For instance, the one where they set off so much ANFO that it broke windows in the nearby town. Or where they set off a fuel-air bomb with coffee creamer that almost blew up the build team because they didn't treat it like a serious explosion with them in the bunker and such.
scott_s 15y ago
I love the show, but I felt very uneasy about the curving the bullet thing. I cringe every time they show those clips during the beginning montage. But other than that, nothing stood out to me.
worren 15y ago
Past observing tadpole behavior, science takes a strongly dangerous bent.
metastew 15y ago
>"I'm worried they're teaching a whole generation of kids that science is inherently dangerous." Hmm, I don't know about you, but I would like kids to practice 'dangerous science' and grow up to be scientists, rather than to grow up and enter the financial sector to play with billions of dollars that aren't theirs and end up crippling the economy for everyone else. Having the mindset of 'minimizing harm to self and others' is mostly expected in dangerous science, but unfortunately it seems to be optional in the financial sector.
CWuestefeld 15y ago
Actually, I think they've gone downhill, but not quite for this reason. I'd be quite happy to see them act daring. But it seems to me that at the same time they've done this, they've tried to keep the viewers out of trouble by refusing to disclose the details of the experiment. One example is when they were doing "exploding pants", they wouldn't reveal the proportions of the various chemicals that they used. I understand why they do this. However, for a show whose theme is supposed to be discovering truth by questioning, this attitude of "we know best, and you can trust us to do it right" seems wrong. And for me, it spoils the whole show.
- lucisferre 15y ago
  I think you can thanks America's post 9/11 paranoia for a TV show not being comfortable with (or perhaps legally allowed) telling people how to make explosives.
  - joeyh 15y ago
    So, the myth is "not discussing explosives recipes on TV reduces bad uses of explosives". Debunking that one in a safe & legal manner would be some Mythbusters I'd enjoy watching more than "exploding pants".
- afterburner 15y ago
  I think it's gone downhill because of a declining pool of good myths left to test (how many are basically just "someone on out forums dared us to do this" with a thin veneer of "myth").
  - CWuestefeld 15y ago
    Yet they still haven't addressed cow tipping.
    - afterburner 15y ago
      Probably so they don't end up encouraging people to test the theory themselves. Even talking about it would do that.
hemancuso 15y ago
> There's a lot to be said for teaching experimentation and the scientific method, but I'm worried they're teaching a whole generation of kids that science is inherently dangerous. I guarantee any teenager with a legitimate interest in science would consider some amount of danger the most exciting part. Inherently dangerous can be inherently awesome.
- TeMPOraL 15y ago
  > There's a lot to be said for teaching experimentation and the scientific method, but I'm worried they're teaching a whole generation of kids that science is inherently dangerous. I wouldn't even say 'dangerous', I would say 'real'. Exploding things are real. Making rocket fuel from sugar and fertilizer is real. Computing the angle of a falling ball is NOT real unless you happen to fire that ball from potato gun. Computing velocity of a block sliding from a wedge is not real, is terribly and utterly boring. Our education suffers from total detachment from reality. Physics lessons are boring, and it's right that kids point it out.
burgerbrain 15y ago
Teaching kids that science is dangerous is perhaps one of the greatest contributions to society they could possibly have! Kids love dangerous things. (Works best if you tell adults to back off and let them have fun)
damoncali 15y ago
but I'm worried they're teaching a whole generation of kids that science is inherently dangerous. I used to work at NASA on space shuttle launches. If I told you that some of the appeal did not come from the fact that one in 50 of those things was likely to go off like a firework, I'd be a liar.
surlyadopter 15y ago
For a few years, the thing that bugged me the most about the show was the editing. It was being cut and presented like the target demo was a bunch of hyperactive 8 year olds who couldn't be trusted to remember what happened on screen 3 minutes ago. As an adult with an actual attention span it was extremely obnoxious, but I realize I'm probably not their target demo so whatevs.
- _phred 15y ago
  Watching it on Netflix, I assumed it was because the show was tailored for long commercial breaks. "After blasting 2–5 minutes of nonstop hyperactive advertising, let's recap what we were doing a minute ago!'
  - surlyadopter 15y ago
    The absolute worst is when before a commercial break they "tease" the result of the experiment, by showing the results!
    - graysnorf 15y ago
      I agree. This is the reason I no longer watch the show. It may be "longing for the old days", but I feel like the earlier seasons had a higher ratio of explanation to repeated viewing of explosions.
mjwalshe 15y ago
It is :-) at my first job we had a wave tank that was driven by a computer driven servo - it would be quite posible to write code to tell the servo to travel full distance in 0 time - which would have crated a wave so powerfull it wold have flooded our lab.

ryandvm 15y ago

Actually, the problem I had with that episode was that they were mythbusting Newton's first law of motion.

dholowiski 15y ago
Sure, it was a pretty dumb myth that they were testing and it didn't make for a great episode, i just still can't believe they didn't end up shooting someone.
- yock 15y ago
  Don't forget too that Kari was pregnant. Calling those sequences poorly considered is an understatement.
jerf 15y ago
Meh, they've tested Newton's laws numerous times. If everybody knew them, both intellectually and in their bones, they wouldn't have the myths to test, but alas, I don't think you can claim with a straight face that we live in a society with universal knowledge and deep understanding of Newton's laws. ... and if you think you do, spend some time on the much-referenced "fan site". And furthermore, there is nothing unscientific or wrong about testing our most well-tested theories. The entire point of science is that even then, the theories will still work, not that you should never test them again. I'd also further observe that for all the drama happening here, those swinging gun sequences aren't that unsafe. It may look unsafe but the actual set of things that can plausibly go wrong was less than your intuition may be claiming. It's not like there was a way they were going to shoot themselves with a particularly higher probability than usual. (And remember that if you start constructing far-out implausible scenarios under which that might happen you must be willing to worry about equally improbably things all the time; one rapidly gets to the point where things like simply driving to work must be considered too unsafe to do if one starts spending too much improbability on the constructed scenario.)
- scott_s 15y ago
  I agree with everything you said, but I even think it's unfair to say they're "testing Newton's laws." Rather, I think they're often testing "is it feasible for us to reproduce the idealized circumstances from thought experiments." Case in point is firing an object in the opposite direction of a moving vehicle. I don't think any of them questioned the physics behind it, but it was really a question of if they could contrive the circumstances exactly so they observed the kind of result one would see without all of the nasty effects that reality imparts (like spin, air resistance, speed variance, etc.): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BLuI118nhzc http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BLuI118nhzc
ugh 15y ago
The nice thing is that it is no problem to test Newton’s first law of motion again and again and again. If you do it right you will always get the same results. That’s what Mythbusters is all about. It’s not about rigorous mathematical demonstrations of why something can or cannot be true, it’s about figuring stuff out in a way that actually makes it possible to see the result (and not necessarily as the result of a calculation). That’s a less powerful and much more tedious approach than our usual methods of gaining knowledge but it is a lot more accessible and just good entertainment. Since Mythbusters is less about gaining knowledge and more about entertainment it’s also the appropriate approach for the show.
- cschmidt 15y ago
  Yes, Mythbusters is unscientific... http://xkcd.com/397/ http://xkcd.com/397/
  - ugh 15y ago
    Damn you, XKCD!
- scott_s 15y ago
  Frankly, I think that most of the time, their methods are plenty rigorous. The only difference between them and research engineering labs is that instead of writing a paper, they produce a television segment.
  - ugh 15y ago
    Oh, their methods are quite good most of the time. The point is much rather that we know so much about how things move that if all you wanted to do, was find out whether it’s possible to bend bullets you likely wouldn’t do an experiment but break out the calculator. An experiment about this particular question can’t tell us anything new.
  - protomyth 15y ago
    For some stuff, the "Can a snow plow driving down the road push enough air to flip a passing car over?" had so much wrong with it that I didn't finish the rest of the episodes on my tivo before I moved. They tested on a dry, flat surface without any hint of ice or snow. As snow plows are not used in summer, this was a pretty bad error. A runway is flat, a road is not. I assume they were going for local location for cost and just wanted the big crash at the end as opposed to showing how dangerous a snow plow is. Coefficient of friction is an amazing thing.

smackfu 15y ago

They had a recent Locations clip-show which was surprisingly good and mentioned some more close calls. For instance, the one where they set off so much ANFO that it broke windows in the nearby town. Or where they set off a fuel-air bomb with coffee creamer that almost blew up the build team because they didn't treat it like a serious explosion with them in the bunker and such.

scott_s 15y ago

I love the show, but I felt very uneasy about the curving the bullet thing. I cringe every time they show those clips during the beginning montage. But other than that, nothing stood out to me.

worren 15y ago

Past observing tadpole behavior, science takes a strongly dangerous bent.

metastew 15y ago

>"I'm worried they're teaching a whole generation of kids that science is inherently dangerous." Hmm, I don't know about you, but I would like kids to practice 'dangerous science' and grow up to be scientists, rather than to grow up and enter the financial sector to play with billions of dollars that aren't theirs and end up crippling the economy for everyone else. Having the mindset of 'minimizing harm to self and others' is mostly expected in dangerous science, but unfortunately it seems to be optional in the financial sector.

CWuestefeld 15y ago

Actually, I think they've gone downhill, but not quite for this reason. I'd be quite happy to see them act daring. But it seems to me that at the same time they've done this, they've tried to keep the viewers out of trouble by refusing to disclose the details of the experiment. One example is when they were doing "exploding pants", they wouldn't reveal the proportions of the various chemicals that they used. I understand why they do this. However, for a show whose theme is supposed to be discovering truth by questioning, this attitude of "we know best, and you can trust us to do it right" seems wrong. And for me, it spoils the whole show.

lucisferre 15y ago
I think you can thanks America's post 9/11 paranoia for a TV show not being comfortable with (or perhaps legally allowed) telling people how to make explosives.
- joeyh 15y ago
  So, the myth is "not discussing explosives recipes on TV reduces bad uses of explosives". Debunking that one in a safe & legal manner would be some Mythbusters I'd enjoy watching more than "exploding pants".
afterburner 15y ago
I think it's gone downhill because of a declining pool of good myths left to test (how many are basically just "someone on out forums dared us to do this" with a thin veneer of "myth").
- CWuestefeld 15y ago
  Yet they still haven't addressed cow tipping.
  - afterburner 15y ago
    Probably so they don't end up encouraging people to test the theory themselves. Even talking about it would do that.

hemancuso 15y ago

> There's a lot to be said for teaching experimentation and the scientific method, but I'm worried they're teaching a whole generation of kids that science is inherently dangerous. I guarantee any teenager with a legitimate interest in science would consider some amount of danger the most exciting part. Inherently dangerous can be inherently awesome.

TeMPOraL 15y ago
> There's a lot to be said for teaching experimentation and the scientific method, but I'm worried they're teaching a whole generation of kids that science is inherently dangerous. I wouldn't even say 'dangerous', I would say 'real'. Exploding things are real. Making rocket fuel from sugar and fertilizer is real. Computing the angle of a falling ball is NOT real unless you happen to fire that ball from potato gun. Computing velocity of a block sliding from a wedge is not real, is terribly and utterly boring. Our education suffers from total detachment from reality. Physics lessons are boring, and it's right that kids point it out.

burgerbrain 15y ago

Teaching kids that science is dangerous is perhaps one of the greatest contributions to society they could possibly have! Kids love dangerous things. (Works best if you tell adults to back off and let them have fun)

damoncali 15y ago

but I'm worried they're teaching a whole generation of kids that science is inherently dangerous. I used to work at NASA on space shuttle launches. If I told you that some of the appeal did not come from the fact that one in 50 of those things was likely to go off like a firework, I'd be a liar.

surlyadopter 15y ago

For a few years, the thing that bugged me the most about the show was the editing. It was being cut and presented like the target demo was a bunch of hyperactive 8 year olds who couldn't be trusted to remember what happened on screen 3 minutes ago. As an adult with an actual attention span it was extremely obnoxious, but I realize I'm probably not their target demo so whatevs.

_phred 15y ago
Watching it on Netflix, I assumed it was because the show was tailored for long commercial breaks. "After blasting 2–5 minutes of nonstop hyperactive advertising, let's recap what we were doing a minute ago!'
- surlyadopter 15y ago
  The absolute worst is when before a commercial break they "tease" the result of the experiment, by showing the results!
  - graysnorf 15y ago
    I agree. This is the reason I no longer watch the show. It may be "longing for the old days", but I feel like the earlier seasons had a higher ratio of explanation to repeated viewing of explosions.

mjwalshe 15y ago

It is :-) at my first job we had a wave tank that was driven by a computer driven servo - it would be quite posible to write code to tell the servo to travel full distance in 0 time - which would have crated a wave so powerfull it wold have flooded our lab.