Mythbusters wants to settle the question once and for all -did the Apollo astronauts really go to the moon? The cast and crew of Mythbusters visited several NASA locations to conduct experiments to see if the moon footage could have possibly been faked. Phil Plait of Bad Astronomy Blog served as an informal advisor for the episode, which is scheduled to air April 25th. If he has any inside knowledge of how the experiments went, he’s not telling. Link -via Digg
I've always said, if you look at the footage you'll notice there are no stars in the background. This is because the lunar surface was far too bright, if the exposure on each frame was long enough for the stars to be visible everything else would be washed out. It's nearly impossible to get stars to show up in a film photograph even without something really bright also in the picture. Now if it were done on a soundstage wouldn't they have said to themselves, "It won't look real without stars. Let's paint some stars in the background." There's also the matter of the artifacts from the color television camera they used, which in order to save space and electricity was just a monochrome television camera with a spinning disc in front of the lens with red green and blue filters. If any of the astronauts move too quickly in the color broadcast footage you'll notice they leave a colorful trail behind them, because they appear in a different place on each of the three monochrome frames that make up on color frame. Why the Hell would they have used a cheap, space-saving camera if it were filmed on a soundstage? God, all these idiots can blow me.
If they can't duplicate some claimed results in an afternooon of sometimes shoddy experiments, they declare a Myth "busted". Obviously, they have to dumb down and speed up the action for modern American ADHD society, but I get the impression Jamie & Adam would have "busted" Bell's telephone, Edison's incandescent bulb, and the Wrights' airplane too.
I have a lot more confidence in their results when they are able to "confirm" myths or declare them "plausible" at least. The burden of proof to declare something "busted" is often a whole lot higher than they admit on the show.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mQKxAqpjroo
Yay Buzz, show them what you got!
Most of their "myths" can be solved with pencil and paper an basic physic/math skills.
It's way closer to "professional" wrestling then "Bill Nye the Science Guy".
Entertaining, yes - but Science, only by happenstance.
If you believed they put a man on the moon, man on the moon
If you believe there's nothing up my sleeve, then nothing is cool
The Mythbusters themselves have come out and acknowledged that the show isn't as scientifically rigorous as they'd like it to be, and they often feel uncomfortable declaring things busted based on the limited dataset that they have. However, 'science' is not the point of the show. It can't be; if it were, it'd be boring, or hosted by a smarmy idiot like Jay Ingram (God, I hate that guy). Instead, they're not (exactly) trying to educate, they're trying inspire, and get people to ask questions and challenge their basic assumptions. And then blow some stuff up. I think they do a great job, especially since they *don't* fudge their results, and *don't* hyper-sensationalise the material like other pseudo-science shows, and the hosts are real, believable, *honest* people.
My wife (with a Masters in engineering) absolutely *hates* "Mythbusters" (on account of their weak design of experiments), so I have to sneak it when she's not around. :-)
Obviously, they are pretty intelligent/clever and at least the show encourages some creative thought (unlike most of what's on the tube), so I give them a lot more leeway than she does.
It's an aside, but has anyone ever noticed that when a new "educational" cable network comes out, the initial offerings are pretty educational, but within a couple of years get really dumbed down? I remember when TLC was actually about *learning*, A&E had "Biography" shows that were about people of history (rather than Jessica Simpson), and "The History Channel" had real sensible documentaries, rather than lots of UFO and Supernatural coverage. Sigh...
What will top this?
What's that? Some kind of old book, eh?
I would also like to say how proud I am of the Mythbuster crew for proving beyond a shadow of a doubt that free energy doesn't exist. They had a whole week to figure out cold fusion and it was a total bust. If these guys can't figure it out then it is surly impossible. Coal, gasoline, and nuclear are the only way to go. MYTH BUSTED!
They even proved that "magic bullets" don't exist. Firing a bullet made from ice water and another made from frozen hamburger was a total let down. They couldn't make it work and ice water & frozen hamburger are pretty much the only materials that a fella can make a magic bullet out of... so there, myth busted again.
I know I can trust the guy in the ubercool beret and his friend who likes to blow up toilets with M-80's to get to the bottom of all of this false space landing non-sense. I'm sure they will fully explain all the details of why the astronauts had air-conditioning packs when there is no air on the moon and how the suits were too big to fit through the little tiny hole in the landing pod. They will surly explain how they made it through the Van Allen radiation belt and how they snapped of thousands of pictures, traveled all across the surface of the moon and conducted numerous scientific experiments in only a few hours.
Question: So are these guys just total hacks who pawn off Pseudoscience as facts?
Answer: No. People on TV tend to be pretty honest and don't lie. MYTH BUSTED.
Answer: Actual scientists form a hypothesis and then conduct a SERIES of experiments (like several hundred to thousands) before they come to a conclusion... but since these guys have a TV show we'll let them slide. One or two experiments should do the trick. MYTH RE-BUSTED
Answer: Buster the dummy confirmed that these guys are legit. MYTH RE-RE-BUSTED
It is no longer a Myth but an undisputed FACT that these dudes are like real trustworthy n' stuff. Me and Buster will even vouch for them. IT GOTS TO BE REAL!
It's nice to see how they base their, heh, (I can hardly call them experiments without laughing), their "Proofs" on the weakest arguments skeptics have put forth, and yet they still have to manipulate their results in order to fit their own beliefs.
Take their silly flag experiment. Gently wave it in the 'atmosphere' test- then in the 'vaccum' test they yank really hard on the dials to show how it can continue to move for a long time. What a joke.