Cosmos

[Menolly]

I found the first episode to be very slick and entertaining. I liked the focus on Bruno.

I'm sure there were many things glossed over, but if it was "dumbed down for the masses," I don't believe it was done in such a way as to make it feel as if we were being patronized.

I'm not generally a FOX network fan. Yet kudos to the and The National Geographic Channel for giving this a shot. The sentimental tribute to Sagan at the beginning and end was just the right touch for me.

[Vraith]

Really? I thought the effects/visuals were pretty good.
The Bruno...optimistic but doomed attempt to draw in peeps that might just dismiss the show out of hand.
The rest just incredibly damn dull...the best part was just the very end implied "we won't be doing anything this boring ever again."

The interviews in PR ABOUT the show were better than the show.

[dlbpharmd]

I thought the first episode was great, and last night's episode was very dull.

[Cail]

This new guy, though he may be popular on Facebook, is no Carl Sagan.

[dlbpharmd]

This new guy, though he may be popular on Facebook, is no Carl Sagan.

Although I agree with him, he's a little too heavy-handed and "preachy" for me. "Evolution is a scientific fact." Well, yes, but don't beat me over the head about it.

[Zarathustra]

If there were a religious controversy over the world being spherical or the existence of gravity--when the evidence was abundant and irrefutable--I can imagine being beat over the head about it. The fact that people can still say "it's just a theory," and there are millions of people who don't believe perhaps the single most important scientific fact of our existence, certainly deserves a robust and frequent rebuttal.

I haven't seen the show, but sounds like something I'd appreciate.

[Hashi Lebwohl]

The very phrase "it's just a theory" highlights people's misunderstandings about scientific principles. A theory, as you all know, is a principle which has been independently verified by various people/teams through experimentation and observation.

The true key to evolution is the concept "living beings change over time" yet for some reason far too many people still think it means "men evolved from monkeys". Do these people also realize that human beings and bananas share something like 85% of genome sequences?

My advice to Dr. Tyson--at least I think that is who is hosting Cosmos now--is to quit trying to teach anything to people who have decided that they do not wish to learn facts. If they wish to be ignorant then let them remain thus.

[Damelon]

I'll watching the second episode tonight, but my problem with the first episode was with the Bruno story.

First, what was the point of telling it? He didn't come to his conclusions about other systems with livable worlds by any scientific method. He read Lucretius, was familiar to some extent with Copernicus, and he had a dream. He had no proof regarding any of it. As Tyson said, he got lucky. Reading up on him afterward, I admit I didn't know much about him before, apparently the main reason he got into the trouble with the church was for denying the trinity. A far more serious charge to them than what he thought about the stars.

Second, how the story was told. They spend the rest of the show dazzling with CGI and they tell Bruno's story through a cartoon? Compare that to Sagan telling the story of Kepler. Not only does Sagan tell a better story, it is much better visually too.

[edit]

I thought the second episode was very good. (Though I'm still not a fan of the cartoon animation)

Quick point:

Along with defending evolution; it pointed out what we, as a species, have been doing for thousands of years. Genetically modifying organisms, though it doesn't call it by that name. Using the obvious example of dogs, but also stating that every major food crop is defended from a barely edible ancestor.

[Zarathustra]

Since this has been added to Hulu Plus, we just started watching it. We're three episodes in, and loving it. Really an excellent show. The simple, evidence-based rebuttal to the idea that an eyeball can't have evolved on its own was great. However, I wish they'd done more justice to the Irreducible Complexity argument, so viewers could see just how powerful the rebuttal is. Really, the arguments against evolution are a failure of imagination and ignorance of the facts. Eyeballs don't have to start out with every single part working perfectly as we see them today. Pointing out the fact that there exists animals with eyes at every single stage in the evolution of this organ was just brilliant.

There are so many people who I wish could see this.

The episode about comets and Newton was great, too. Halley's prediction is one of the most important predictions in the history of our species. Taking something that appears chaotic and thus supernaturally ominous and rendering it predictable, mundane, and rational was one of the most important steps in removing us from our mythological fears to a state fo comprehending wonder.

I like the cartoons, too.

[Hashi Lebwohl]

Since this has been added to Hulu Plus, we just started watching it. We're three episodes in, and loving it. Really an excellent show. The simple, evidence-based rebuttal to the idea that an eyeball can't have evolved on its own was great. However, I wish they'd done more justice to the Irreducible Complexity argument, so viewers could see just how powerful the rebuttal is. Really, the arguments against evolution are a failure of imagination and ignorance of the facts. Eyeballs don't have to start out with every single part working perfectly as we see them today. Pointing out the fact that there exists animals with eyes at every single stage in the evolution of this organ was just brilliant.

I had that question once, specifically about eyeballs. I couldn't figure out how light-sensitive tissue would have come about in the first place...but then chlorophyll came first and it is also light-sensitive (or, rather, uses light as an energy source). I suppose I'll have to track down the show online and give it a try.

The concept of Irreducible Complexity is simply one of many concepts which are difficult for many people to grasp, usually because their teachers didn't understand it, either.

[Vraith]

The concept of Irreducible Complexity is simply one of many concepts which are difficult for many people to grasp, usually because their teachers didn't understand it, either.

I disagree--Irreducible Complexity [and the other thing folk who believe in it also like to believe in...specified complexity] are relatively easy to understand. That's why folk believe. [part of...there are other reasons, but they're all connected] Cuz it is easier to "understand" than the things that prove it wrong.
Just like it is MUCH simpler to look around and up and down and believe in a flat earth and/or one in the center of the universe.
But the simplicity is an illusion, [when it isn't a flat out intentional lie] and the understanding a mis-
It SEEMS simpler [from our point of view, without instruments, and just looking around], even OBVIOUS, that we are the center.
But, as "hard" as the math and observations that prove otherwise are [and they ain't THAT hard] they aren't as hard as the hoops you have to jump through to keep the Earth at the center.

[Hashi Lebwohl]

I disagree--Irreducible Complexity [and the other thing folk who believe in it also like to believe in...specified complexity] are relatively easy to understand.

For you, perhaps. On the one hand we might find it strange that someone doesn't understand some concept because to us not only does it make sense but we have gone through the steps to prove it ourselves or we have read the research that went in to proving it and seen disproof of the counterarguments. Those people, on the other hand, find it strange that we can understand it because to them either it doesn't make sense, seems counterintuitive, or conflicts with something else they believe.

[High Lord Tolkien]

I haven't seen the show yet.
No great desire to for some reason.
I love science shows.
Through the Worm Hole with Morgan Freeman is fantastic.
Actually there are plenty of very well done Space and Science shows to choose from.
I think what was amazing about the original Cosmos was that there was really nothing like it on TV (before cable and the internet) at the time.
I still have the Cosmos book that came out based on the show.
It's beat up and well used, it was my bible for most of my life.

[lorin]

Not a fan of this show. I dislike the use of all these props and animation. Makes me feel like an idiot. Sort of like that talk show with dr. Oz. He uses giant scale models and tons of props. It's really juvenile.

[Savor Dam]

Don't look at it that way, lorin. Dr. Tyson isn't talking down to *you*...he is tailoring the wind to the shorn lamb. Popularizing science to the masses inevitably results in more educated people feeling like it is "dumbed down", which it is. In order to dispel ignorance, there has to be a certain amount of simplicity in the presentation, or you cannot engage the audience you seek to reach.

Instead, try feeling a modicum of quiet pride in knowing you are already well-enough read to understand the material without these adaptations.

[lorin]

Don't look at it that way, lorin. Dr. Tyson isn't talking down to *you*...he is tailoring the wind to the shorn lamb. Popularizing science to the masses inevitably results in more educated people feeling like it is "dumbed down", which it is. In order to dispel ignorance, there has to be a certain amount of simplicity in the presentation, or you cannot engage the audience you seek to reach.

Instead, try feeling a modicum of quiet pride in knowing you are already well-enough read to understand the material without these adaptations.

Its not that I am that well read, I certainly am not. I think this is a great show for kids in 10th and 11th grade, similar to Walking with Dinosaurs.

[Savor Dam]

Its not that I am that well read, I certainly am not.

Everything is relative. You may not consider yourself well read, but the very fact you are here (and what we know of you from five years of posting here) points to broader and deeper knowledge than is common across the general public.

While your former clients may or may not be considered a representative sample, I think you will agree you knew a thing or two more than any random handfull of them, nu?

I think this is a great show for kids in 10th and 11th grade, similar to Walking with Dinosaurs.

Those currently in grades 10 and 11 (who are paying attention and have attained that level, not just auto-promoted to it) are already a march ahead of the base level of retained education...

[Zarathustra]

I think this is a great show for kids in 10th and 11th grade ...

Or parents who watch it with their kids, hoping to get them to stop staring at a video game for an hour. My son thought it was good once he saw it, but he wasn't very happy about giving up all the other endless entertainment choices at his fingertips. Man, to be 13 in the 2nd decade of the 21st century ...

We're definitely going for a hike tomorrow, get out into nature.

[Hashi Lebwohl]

Man, to be 13 in the 2nd decade of the 21st century ...

Every now and then I manage to pry her phone out of our daughter's hands; she, also, is 13 so that alone gives them things in common. In defense of those 13-year-olds when I was 13 I spent nearly every waking moment after homework glued to my Commodore 64, either playing games or tweaking programs to solve my math homework more efficiently. Still, I know what you mean--I can see now that having their eyes on a screen can cause them to miss things around them.

[sgt.null]

my grandmother bought me Sagan's book as a Christmas present when the show first ran. have yet to catch the new series. AI really enjoyed the original and would like to see it again.