MythBusters - The Lost Experiments

theLorax writes "From Discovery: "If you like the MythBusters here are some videos they just posted of some of the out takes and things that didn't appear on the show. Cola bits (cleaning things with cola), water torture, otter ping pong, live power lines, cement build up and plywood flight." Here is the interview we did with these guys in December.

Comments

What has happened to the Discovery Channel?

[CyricZ]

I have relatives in the US who recently told me about the lack of quality on the Discovery Channel. I recall watching very good shows on it around a decade or so ago. True to their name, they focused on content that most traditional channels wouldn't bother to touch.

However, what I've been hearing now is that the Discovery Channel is moving away from their specialty programming, more towards content that will appeal to a wider range of people. This change does being a decrease in quality, according to my cousins.

I think I know what they mean. Shows like American Chopper and American HotRod, which I have watched over here in the UK, are more like soap operas than educational, enlightening shows. The two or three minutes of engineering in each episode is overshadowed by 57 minutes of workplace drama and commercials.

While a show like Mythbusters isn't as bad, it still lacks the quality that previous shows on the Discovery Channel had. None of the hosts have much engineering or scientific experience, and it shows. Even watching just one episode, one will hear numerous factually incorrect statements (especially when it comes to chemistry or physics). Perhaps it is entertaining, but educational it is not.

Re:What has happened to the Discovery Channel?

[bani]

the assumption people usually make when they bring up the subject is that discovery channel programs are produced by the discovery channel. they are genuinely suprised to find out that e.g. mythbusters isn't produced by them.

discovery channel can only show whats being produced. if shit is being produced then shit is all they have to air. people seem to think they know exactly what is available for discovery channel to purchase for broadcast. keep in mind that junkyard wars, the program discovery channel fanatics always bring up as an example, (aka scrapheap challenge) was a purely accidental find.

if you know specific programs discovery channel should be airing, tell them.

Re:What has happened to the Discovery Channel?

[samkass]

Are these shows educational? No.

If you're arguing that Mythbusters isn't educational, you haven't watched enough episodes. Yes, they make mistakes. So do over half of all peer-reviewed scientists' papers, last I read. But it's still a very educational show, and more importantly, one that gets the watcher thinking instead of passively being entertained.

Even if the show contains a greater proportion of entertainment to education than some might like, I think it educates more than some of the old dry shows, because more people watch them. Just to use some silly math, if a show is 90% educational and is watched by 100K people, let's say it has provided 90K education-people worth of education to the world. If a show is 60% educational and watched by 1M people, it's provided 600K education-people worth of education! How's that for a Mythbusters-style estimate?

Re:What has happened to the Discovery Channel?

[Moofie]

What a narrow-minded view.

These folks never pretended to be Great Scientists. They can and do, however, come up with clever ways to perform experiments that would otherwise be expensive or dangerous.

They sometimes do the dangerous stuff anyway.

I think it's a superb show. I like the way they often go back and revisit things that people say they got wrong. You know, kinda like scientists are supposed to.

I have an extensive science and engineering background, and I think they do a terrific job. Do they get everything right? No. Who cares?

Re:Video summaries.

[Z0mb1eman]

I actually watched the water torture one, by chance. It refers to the so-called chinese water drop - a person is immobilized, and drops of water drop on the same spot on their forehead, at a rate of one drop every 2 seconds or so.

They tested it on Kari... since there's no physical torture (other than being restrained), and they were obviously going to let her go when she had enough, it's not much of an issue showing it on TV.

Re:Reason

[MikeWasHere05]

It can't be both?

Mythbusters is Good

[transami]

Cyric, you are terribly off base! These guys are professionals who have a huge amount of hands on experience in material science. And these guys are doing a great job of introducing the basics of expiremental method to a wide audience. Is it perfect? Of course not. But you are comparing apples and oranges. While I would certainly appreciate some in depth programs on paricular aspects of science, just becuase Mythbusters is not this, does not make it worthless. I usually watch TV to relax. If I wanted a textbook education in physics I'd take a college course, not watch Mythbusters. While the information gained from the show may often be trivial, there are nontheless a great many useful tidbits to be gained from watching. Anf these guys are funny too!

Science

[Freaky Spook]

Science in its most basic form is a system of acquiring knowledge, based on experimentation to find truth.

The mythbusters discuss the theory of the myth & then generate a hypothesis weather it is plausible or not, then conduct an experiment to find out weather their hypothesis is correct.

What is not science about that???

It may be basic science, but its still science.

From what I have seen it is getting a lot of people interested in science so that has to be good doesn't it.

Re:What do these experiments entail?

[evilviper]

The clip in the video showed a snafu that occured with the first truck when they accidentally filled it up with cement rather than just having enough for a thin coat. It lead up to a spectacular event where they blew up the enture truck with 850 pounds of TNT.

The cement truck was the most disappointing one in a long time. Everyone who has ever even seen explosives in action knows that you drill a hole in the material (the cemet block in this case) and drop the TNT down the hole before detonating it. They just hung a stick of dynamite above the cemet, and gave up when it didn't do anything.

Before Mythbusters, I've never wanted to reach through my TV and smack people for being so stupid. With Mythbusters, it's a regular occurance. It almost seems like they go out of their way to make their tests complete nonsense.

Re:An "Entertainment" disclaimer?

[raoul666]

It's not great science, but a lot of it isn't half bad. Besides which, they're usually testing fairly simple myths to see if they're plausible or not. Some stuff, like "could you raise a boat with ping-pong balls" they do. Scientific or not, that's a good, solid result. It's possible. It's really the busted myths that may or may not be accurate. To give them credit, I usually hear them say things like "for this to work you'd need this, this, this, and this to happen, and that's incredibly unlikely" or "we couldn't build a jetpack, so an average joe probably couldn't either." As for scientific or engineering background, they may not be certified or educated, but they certainly do alright. Their solutions are usually simple, and they typically work. Look at the rig they used to get those ping-pong balls down to the boat. Design me something cheaper, faster, and easier, if you can.

Also, a lot of the time they call in experts. I think that's a pretty good lesson to be teaching people, about both science and life.