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The Mismatched 'MythBusters'
biohack writes "Most fans of the MythBusters would agree that the two hosts of the show, Adam and Jamie, are 'diametrically opposed in every aspect of their lives'. The Christian Science Monitor story about the MythBusters explores the connection between the backgrounds of the hosts (who knew that Jamie had a degree in Russian literature?) and their creative differences on and off camera." From the article: "It took Hyneman a of couple years to feel comfortable talking in front of a camera, let alone to strangers on the street. 'You have to remember that I'm a guy who is happiest in a dark room just thinking,' he says. 'I'm not a sociable person. I don't like to talk.' Savage, on the other hand, is outgoing. They're clearly the Oscar and Felix of myth busting ... 'Jamie is all about total, complete, and utter control. Thinking first and then acting. Adam is about acting first and then thinking.'"
I have to imagine everyone on Slashdot is well aware that Jamie is introverted and Adam is Extroverted. This story amounts to "Water is Wet!"
Hello?
about Jamie that he's manic-depressive? It's part of the comedy of watching him.
First post bitches!
I thought they were brothers. Must have been the matching red hair.
To my surprise, they're not.
You can really feel the anti-social vibe that Jamie gives off even with a single viewing of the show. His science is stellar, but he sometimes seems to be a little too aloof. Other times he seems to want total control and gets a little pissy when Adam gets spontaneous.
Is it any wonder, then, that Jamie would grow facial hair? It is well known that one reason people grow facial hair is to build a personal "wall" between themselves and the world. Behind this wall, they can smile, frown, grimace, snicker, and otherwise run the emotional gamut without revealing themselves to others.
Jamie is probably borderline sociopathic, though I'd expect that Adam is one step away from being an outright psychopath.
What about Keri. I want to know about my favorite Redhead......
It's either on the beat or off the beat, it's that easy.
I moderate therefore I rule!
--
If they were both the same, the show would get pretty boring.
Perhaps their opposite personalities are one reason they got gig.
... and this is what happens when they let the editors of US run Slashdot for a day...
Adam usually does things the long difficult way and it usually ends up in failure. Jamie's plans always seem to work and they are well constructed.
Adam makes the show watchable because his idea's and his personality make it interesting TV, while you have Jamie at the same time showing you the right way to do things.
This combination is what makes good viewing and evenly balanaced between entertainment/humor and education.
I would hate to watch the show with someone who couldn't stand up to Jamie, Adam does this well and thats why the show works so well. If Jamie was allowed complete control everytime, it would be boring.
I never noticed but it is kind of like watching two different people if you stand upside down and squint your eyes.
I guess this busts the myth that they're the same person.
slow news day.
You have a thoughtfull scientist + a crazy man. The only reason that Adam is there is to introduce chaos and to be the "x factor" that attracts viewers. Jamie is there to lend credibility to their dubious experimentation.
A lot of the time though the experiments Jamie creates are very crude and not optimal solutions. For instance the cat burglar thing. He used gigantic permanent magnets to climb the ventilation that made a ear shattering thud each time they connected to metal. Much less the fact that his design relied on metallic ventilation systems. The design constraints for ventilation do not include magnetism. However Adam's solution involved vacuum pressure. A ventilation system is designed around good airflow which usually involves smooth surfaces aside from odd instances where a precisely textured surface reduces friction, not likely in ventilation systems.
Adam, the idiot protagonist, had a better design because his exploit involved an unavoidable property of ventilation. Jamie just tried to do something different or was brain-dead and used a coincidental, though widespread, property of the medium.
Why is this on slashdot anyway?
I mean, the article is about a show I love and about a pairing that works really well, and so might be interesting.
But... Christian Science Monitor... isn't Christian Science an oxymoron?
...with both diagnoses, he seems more of a case of ADHD. He's fully functional in modern (American) society, which is why I disapprove of parents who automatically want to medicate their kids at the first sign. I suspect he'd be deemed "stupid, expendable, and going" in an earlier age.
Eh, what do I care, as long as I'm not living within blast range of him?
//Information does not want to be free; it wants to breed.
Their "science" may be predictably flawed time and time again... but they're interesting.
I like it when stuff explodes for the sake of seeing something explode.
8==8 Bones 8==8
A friend of mine was a PA assistant on the show at one point, and says that they actually do NOT get along very well...
When I first started watching the show, I got the impression that they were childhood friends or something... they seemed to get along quite well, and when they had a disagreement, they managed to work it out. I was surprised to discover that this was, in fact, NOT true. (Their relationship is basically professional, only.)
;)
Still, I think it's a *great* show, and I enjoy it a lot. Some of the humor they've added is great. I think they have the right combination of supporting staff, now, and I hope they don't change it anymore.
The only nit I would pick is with their narrator sometimes repeatedly mis-pronouncing easy words, like "Mee-thane" for Methane. There was another blatant one, recently, but I can't remember it, now. Oh well. If that's the worst nit, I guess they're doing OK.
Willie...
And not just the entertainment side, mind you. The science side also benefits from the mix of personalities.
Some problems require finesse and fine planning. Others require repeated blows with a hammer. I think that's why the producers occasionally pit Adam vs. Jamie on some myth-type task. To see which works best for a given situation: The Thinker, or the X-Factor.
It's a damn good show on a lot of levels, really.
Weaselmancer
rediculous.
Introvert and extravert are the most common matches. Just like Guardian/Artisan (SJ/SP). This is basic Jung (and MBTI and Keirsey...)
Seriously, this is news?
Have you read my journal today?
You've got to be fucking kidding me.
Since when does reality television count as "science"? Am I going to start seeing articles about Survivor or other stupid television programs on slashdot now too ?
What the fuck is going on? Now we publish articles written by a bunch of assholes that beleives such shit as the existence of a god, and not happy with that (enough reason to diserve a very painfull dead), call themselves "scientists"?
...
This site is going down
WTF am I doing replying to an AC at 5 A.M on a Friday night?
The Christian Science Monitor is one of the most well-respected newspapers in circulation. Maybe you should start reading more. And no, blogs do not count.
"Who knew that Jamie had a degree in Russian literature?"
I did, as I just watched the "Bullets fired straight up" episode last night. Gotta love coincidences.
As soon as they start building death rays or chicken guns, that's when.
Mythbusters is science, done in a fun way. Ever watch Mr. Wizard or Bill Nye? Or Jearl Walker? That's the schtick these guys are in. Science as fun. You know, so that the next generation of kids will think science is cool and keep making/building/inventing stuff.
Science isn't just a field of study - it's also an establishment. And good PR is part of any successful establishment.
Weaselmancer
rediculous.
downward spiral. In ra relatively
His science is far from "stellar". Often, it's quite poor. One should never watch MythBusters for anything but its entertainment value.
Isn't it quite obvious that "entertainment value" is the primary purpose of the show? Mythbusters wasn't ever supposed to be a seriously educational show. It is interesting entertainment, like the geek equivalent to professional wrestling--just like WWE isn't real wrestling, Mythbusters isn't real science.
Their methodologies make many professional product testers and scientists cringe. We can clearly see their mistakes, but those who don't have much scientific training may not.
Well, the methodologies of professional researchers would make the average TV viewer fall asleep--even the average Discovery Channel viewer. The majority of viewers will indeed miss the flaws in their inivestigations, but it isn't hard research. For the minority who DO catch the flaws and care enough to be bothered by them write Adam and Jamie and popint out their oversights--they don't do much to hide that fact and have on occasion revisited myths.
But the educational value it does provide is quite petty, and often quite bad, as it misinforms the viewer.
Well, considering that Adam and Jamie are not acutally professional scientists or educators, but rather skilled technicians in the field of motion picture effects, I do not think most people would rely on their show for serious education purposes (though it might be great material for high school science classes for critical analysis of their investigative methods--where they go right and wrong). If someone comes away from that show unquestionably believing everything in it is completely untained, scientific conclusions then they have more to worry about than being misinformed--they need work in their skills at critical thinking.
I for one just like to watch the banter between Adam and Jamie, and seeing things explode, burn and crash. And Kari getting painted silver, and, well, being eye candy. They should hire another red-head geek-chickie...like Kate Botello perhaps.
Kari and Kate and a tub full of ballistics gel....mmmmmm.....
I was looking for the 'obvious' tag, but then I remembered this is not fark. Oh, well, time to engage the brain.
Anybody who has watched the show should be able to figure out that Jamie is an introverted control freak with a passion for safety and thinking things through. Savage is an extroverted exhibitionist who baresly remembers safety or forethought. Together they make a great odd-couple/buddy-buddy duo. I think part of the reason to watch the show is observe the interactions between the two hosts.
The addition of Grant (the geek), Tory & Kari (Joe & Jane public?) have been positive for the show. Having the two groups intermix on different projects almost lets you see the dynamics of group interaction.
I was at a San Francisco restaurant at lunchtime waiting for a friend to arrive near the Metreon off of Market St. I needed a cigarette so I stood in the alley off of 4th St. I was just kind of lazily pacing back and forth puffing on my delicious cigarette and I turned around. Adam Savage walked by on 4th street and happened to look down the alley at me. I just said "Hey Mythbuster!" and stared at him like a stunned monkey. (It was just an odd place to see someone I had seen on TV the night before.)
He replied "How's it goin'?" And I didn't say anything. I just stood there.
I think he was referring to me in that article. People who say "Hey" and nothing else.
Not an exciting story but what the hell...
Her name is spelled Kari. :)
Ant(Dude) @ Quality Foraged Links (AQFL.net) & The Ant Farm (antfarm.ma.cx / antfarm.home.dhs.org).
"Who knew that Jamie had a degree in Russian literature?" During the vodka tasting episode, the announcer says that Jamie has a degree in Russian literature. (This is the myth that running cheap vodka through a filter will increase its quality to that of a high quality vodka)
-1 disagree is not a modifier for a reason. -1 troll, flaimbait, redundant, overrated are NOT acceptable substitutes.
The beret is a dead give away.
The cancel button is your friend. Do not hesitate to use it.
Is it just me, or do these guys have the coolest jobs on the planet? Spending your time designing experiments, building stuff, and then if all else fails, blowing it up! Does it get any better than that?
You can learn a lot about a person if you just take the time to inject them with sodium pentathol
For your information here is a link to M5 Industries (Jamie Hyneman's) special effects shop: http://www.m5industries.com/ :(
And in case you were wondering they do not give tours or accept job applications.
Adam also has his own personal website: http://www.adamsavage.com/
Can anyone see these two hanging out after work? I don't think they get along very well. Adam is constantly making fun of the moustache, and Jamie obviously gets frustrated with Adam's antics.
Sorry,
Is it just me or is the "scientific method" these guys employ full of it.
I watched all of three shows, and each of them had incredible experimental flaws in them. If it wasn;t so long ago, I'd recount exactly the flaws I saw, but I forget.
Is it entertaining, perhaps, are they busting myths, no way.
You think other newspapers and media outlets aren't vetted for content? Give me a break. You can't offend the advertisers! You can't criticise Israel. Don't ask tough questions about anything national security realted or you might seem unpatriotic! I swear the white house press corps didn't ask a single challenging question between September 2000 and May 2004. The CSM has provided consistently solid reporting on all kinds of topics and frequently they print stories that are ignored by the other media altogether. Sure they'll never print something critical about the Christian Science church but I don't give a rats @ss about that. It's nice to have a different perspective. A perspective that hasn't been vetted by the church of the almighty dollar. If you want to see real journalism as good as the CSM you won't find it in the US, you'll have to try the Guardian UK, the Sydney Morning Herald, Haaretz, or the Toronto Sun.
-- QED
Of course they can walk around in relative anonymity. Even Robin Williams can go around without being hounded. There is so much to see and do in SF, and if you think that these guys are anything to attract attention, you clearly have never been to the city.
It's a girl!
On just about every show, these guys do stuff with shop tools without safety glasses, essentially documenting an OSHA violation and broadcasting it.
-fb Everything not expressly forbidden is now mandatory.
For anyone who is even remotely interested, Kari Byron in FHM
It seems to me that when the show started Jamie and Adam had more freedom to do what they wanted.
Also it was very clear that Jamie had an introverted personality and is a smart thinking kind of guy.
Anyhow some of those originals, they spent the WHOLE EPISODE on a single myth and you got to see fascinating detail on what they were trying to do, plus I felt I was learning a little bit - not a lot but a little bit.
Now, it seems to me that with the Mythterns (Kari etc) and the amount of stuff they put in an episode it's all somewhat slickly edited for the masses.
Also the narrator, who I liked originally, he FUCKING REPEATS EVERYTHING THEY SAY! etc, there's an interview with Grant he says "Ok so we need to put the flux capacitor in Jamie's whoo hooo in order to see if X will happen" - then the goddam narrator says "Grant has just told us they need to get that flux capacitor in Jamie's whoo hoo, if he gets this right we will see if X happens"
I KNOW HE JUST TOLD ME YOU FUCKER! >:(
(He also summarises what happened 5 minutes before the commercial break for another 30 seconds after each break)
Why do they have to dumb it down for the lowest common denominator??? (sp?)
The editing makes it so that they break up the myths and split them up across the episode but I find that annoying, I want them put together like the older episodes.
What happened to us seeing Jamie and Adam in a scrap yard looking for things! Sure it's not important but it was interesting damnit.
Also, I feel Jamie is being forced to behave in a way which is not normally him, you could clearly see in around mid season 2 he was somewhat agitated at this and uncomfortable, he's coming out of his skin a little bit now.
Also Adam is NOT as stupid as he's being portrayed, he's a very cluey guy and more outgoing than Jamie but I dunno - he's been turned into the "homer" of the show.
Ultimately a lot of documentaries on discovery suck now and heck I don't even get the full range of discovery over here in Australia.
Docu's used to be slow paced, informative and somewhat quiet, mythbusters didn't exactly follow this formula since it's not a docu but it was simpler and more charming originally.
Now documentaries need to have hardcore music and cgi sections, instead of just showing what is happening or speculating on what might happen from a proffessor no no they have to render something add that boomy music, have the excitable sounding narrator go at it hardcore etc.
(Don't get me wrong, I do love stuff like megastructures and so on, but still the editing seems so damned dramatic for dopey people)
Before anyone says it, I'm 28, not 50 and I still recall the good old days of somewhat intelligent television.
One might even say blblical in its proportions. :)
The CSM is a highly respected newspaper, and considered so my many non-religious people.
But a superficial, useless llittle sack of pigshit like you would never know such a thing.
Seriously. Change your Slashdot ID. "GNUALMAFUERTE" is now synonymous with "Total And Complete Shit Head Who Needs His Balls Kicked Until Sterility Is Assured"
Bill Nye is an actual scientist, but his show was a bore! Beakman's World was far more fun.
Circumcision is child abuse.
Like, eight people handed you facts that 1. you ae wrong aboout the CSM and 2. you are arguing from a position of extraordinary ignorance, yet you cling to your bigoted beliefs about the paper.
In other words, you being fantastically unscientific. You wouldn't know science if it bit yours AND your mother's ass.
I am reading more on them right at the moment, the about page actually, and indeed I do like the sound of it. Having their own reporters doing the ground work rather than using the news wires is great, need more groups doing that to spread the sources of the news out a bit.
I'm just forever weary of anything that is tied to the church, from days of tagging along with friends to youthgroups which stated that they were non-religious and then having them edge in church thoughts whenever they could. Including the bad ones regarding being against gays and biggotry.
I'm not saying the CSM does any of that, I'm just gun-shy because of prior experiences, and the number of religious people who I've known who like to think and say that they are living a good christian life while at the same time being some of the most homophobic and anti women's rights I've come across.
No it isn't.
Yes it is, Infinity!
Note to ACs: I usually delete AC replies without reading them. If you want to talk to me, log in.
I don't get it
Lots more info on the crew and their history can be found here.
Just thinking, yeah right!
Prescription glasses made of polycarbonate are fine instead. I work for an engineering department and the rule is safety glasses at all time in labs, unless you wear normal glasses. Believe me, our building manager is a stickler, he wouldn't let us do it if it weren't kosher (we are a government institution and all that).
You'll notice when there's a larger hazard they either put it behind a shield or don more protective gear. However for normal things like soldering or machining, standard glasses are fine.
Also you have to understand that OSHA regs are to protect employees from employers primarily. It's to make sure your employer can't force you to work in unsafe conditions without proper gear. They don't mandate you follow them yourself if you are self employed (which Jamie is). The reason they force OSHA stuff on us isn't because they are worried the cops will come and arrest us for not following it, but because they worried we'd get hurt and sue them and/or they'd get fined.
at my local supermarket (Diamond Heights Safeway). He looks exactly like he does on TV (doh...).
Cute? Yea. (Probably not a real red head)
But if you notice, she never really does much of anything. Boooring.
Now Scotty, she's the hottie. She can weld, wrench, machine, and I betcha she can ride a bike. She has more ink than Kari to boot.
That's a real woman.
militant gun owning 'liberal'
Adam is a props man. If you look at his credits, that's primarily what he's done. For example a number of the devices in Bicentennial man are his designs and constructions. He's not really "special effects" as most people think of it. He's done that too, but his main thing is design work. Hence, build jobs are his thing. Jamie is the gadget guy, that's what M5 is known for. Their 7-up attack machine being my favourite. When someone needs a new functional device made that hasn't existed before, Jamie is the kind of guy they seek out.
That's one of the reasons that Adam seems to be 2nd place to Jamie for a lot of the things they do is it's not his specialty. Heck, that's why they shoot the show at M5. This is the kind of stuff they do anyhow. A company approaches them and says "We want something that can do this," for example a vending machine that can attack people. They then set about scavenging that together and making it work. Mythbusters is just about applying those skills to a myth, and doing it on a more limited budget.
I personally think it's not a bad combo both personality wise and skill wise. Jamie on his own would probably make for a real boring show (he apparently had them get Adam on board for that reason) but you need someone who's got applied problem solving skills like that to make it happen. Also in addition to making the show more fun, Adam does do really well when they need some kind of setup designed and constructed.
Good Lord. Relax. Its a TV show not a doctoral thesis.
Everything about the way they produce and edit the show says edutainment. Also keep in mind each one hour show (minus commercials) covers between three to five different "myths". Their accuracy of measurement is dependent on the topic. In your example, we have a "fun" myth with low danger. Plus we have a high probablity of it looking cool on tape whether it works or not, which it probably will since the internet has several videos. I'd say "I think that was about twice as high" is a reasonable margin of error in that scenario.
Second, numbers and graphs don't mean much to most normal people. Take the "Will driving fast on a washboard make the ride smoother?" segment. They had some very good data from an accelerameter that actually had them questioning their perceptions. They also had a pyramid of wine glasses filled with water. The splashing water is easier for a normal person to translate into something they can relate to. A "horizontal acceleration of blah point blah blah m/s^2" means little, while most people have some idea the amount of force it takes to shake some water out of a glass (even if they don't know what force is).
In fact I thought they did a pretty good job of using the scientific method in that segment. When they got data they didn't expect they refined their experiment to eliminate variables and try to narrow in on what was *generally* happening.
Also I think when you hear someone mention science its usually Adam. Its safe to say that Adam doesn't always think things through. My guess is that what Adam usually means is he is *using* science, not *doing* science. Most people do not differentiate using scientific knowledge and using the scientific method. The show often uses scientific knowledge to make educated guesses about what will happen. Basically this is used to narrow "likely" outcomes. They use a fair amount of scientific knowledge for safety reasons as well. I'll even grant you that probably a good deal of the "using science" is some anonymous producer calling up a subject matter expert.
I will grant that they are taking short cuts. However, off hand I can't think of an episode where Jaime has stated that they were publishing their results in a peer reviewed journal.
Who the f*** cares?
Come up editors, if I want this kind of "news" I'd read cosmopolitan.
I must admit, I've enjoyed watching the show from time to time... however all too often they make a big production out of something that could have been disproven from simple logic. Take for example a recent episode where they were testing the myth that if you licked a stamp and stuck it to a helicopter's rotor-blade, would it unbalance the blades and render the helicopter uncontrollable? Granted it was a simple test to complete (cost the whole whopping cash for a stamp and fuel to start up a helicopter). When in simple logic, one could simply point out the large amount of Bug debris picked up by the rotor blades. I'm not seein a whole lotta heli's goin down in Florida after a massive mosquito massacre.
When the article said that one of the two guys was a runaway, it really surprised me to find out that it was Jamie. Adam seems like the wild crazy person who would run away from home, while Jamie seems like the strict and careful and proper type of person who would never attempt such a thing.
Respect the laws of physics, for the laws of physics have no respect for you.
You have clearly never set foot in London's East End.... Of course the East End way of mangling the english language is more elegant than the American one. The creative logic behind words like 'Bristols' always makes me laugh.
Only to idiots, are orders laws.
-- Henning von Tresckow
I have a PhD in chemistry, and I have learnt stuff from mythbusters. I now know that the terminal velocity of a penny is lower than that of a human, and that high velocity rounds shatter when they are fired into water.
The show is entertaining, and has a science flavour. It is better to have light-weight science that people watch, than heavy-weight stuff that only the scientific elite understand. I see it as a kids show, meant to recruit the next generation of scientists. Sure the science is simplistic, but at least there is some science on TV.
"Most fans of the MythBusters would agree that the two hosts of the show, Adam and Jamie, are 'diametrically opposed in every aspect of their lives'.
One's a clean-cut professional cop who plays it by the rules. The other's a wild rookie who'll use every trick in the book to get to the truth!
They're clearly the Oscar and Felix of myth busting
I would have said more the Tim Taylor and Al Borland
Actually, they did cover the guy who originally made Survivor about the game theory of his game.
Please, for the good of Humanity, vote Obama.
RC Car Action (Yes, no matter how much you claim you despise RC cars I know you've owned a copy before) ran an interview with Jamie last summer that was very interesting. It documented just how much commercial robotics work he actually performs for Hollywood as well as the military. And that he used to own a tourist diving business in the Carribean. And that degree in Russian studies (shocker! - right...).
A few months ago I saw an interview with Jamie, in which he said that he had been approached to do Mythbusters as a solo gig.
He said, "I started to think about it, and realized, 'Hey, I'm pretty boring.'"
So he said he'd do it of Adam was his co-host.
However well they do or do not get along on the set, they KNOW they make a great on air pairing.
"Live Free or Die." Don't like it? Then keep out of the USA
is that MB is one of my 7yo son's favorite shows. He likes to learn stuff, he loves when they blow up stuff, and he is ecstatic when they put up a "fight" with each other...
It's better to be the foot on the boot than the face on the pavement. ~~ tkx Kadin2048
Both Jamie and Adam, and the whole crew for that matter, do have a lot of fun. You can tell, also, that Adam and Jamie, if not hate, don't like each other. I think it is that tension that makes it interesting.
Their "science" however, certainly ther techniques, are kind of hit or miss. Sometimes they do something and you say, "Wow, I wouldn't have thought of that," sadly, most of the time they miss some fundimental points. Like the propeller driven jet pack thing, watching it "work" it was obvious the thing was losing power in loose belts, and they never addressed increasing the gear ratio to the props to generate more thrust and seeing how much the motor could drive the system.
Grant Imahara is probably the smartest guy there, but Jamie has boat loads more practical experience.
Kari, well, lets be honest, she's cute, smart, artistic, like to blow sh*&^%t up, and has a nice laugh, what's not to love?
I'll grant you that they got that one right. I've shot silhouette competition for years and I've seen hundreds of thousands of demonstrations that it takes .77 lb/sec of momentum (minimum, 1 is better) to push a 55 pound steel plate an inch under real-world competition conditions. The notion of a bullet blowing someone off their feet is just silly. (Yes, target reaction can be severe due to nerve trauma and associated muscle reactions, but that's not the same thing.)
Yet, I find it irritating that they do so much with firearms and understand so little. I've seen them try to use a kinetic bullet puller on rimfire ammunition; that's very stupid and a tad dangerous. I saw them try the old "frozen ice bullet" thing without ever mentioning the word "sabot"; yes, it's a myth but they could have made it work, after a fashion, if they knew anything about guns. The "shooting into water" segment was just silly; there are water tanks constructed specifically for bullet recovery and the specs on bullet penetration in water are pretty easy to obtain.
Conclusion? It's mostly just entertainment.
It's unfortunate that, in this society, quiet + intellegent = "lack of social skills". Sometimes, if your natural curiosity allows you to, over time, develop a broad knowledge on a variety of subjects, it can be very difficult not to come across as "aloof" as you put it. Here is the problem.
To make such a leap on that basis alone is prejudicial - plain and simple.
If an obviously intellegent person tries to explain something that the person he's talking to already knows, he will often assume he's being "condescending" because "smart people lack social skills"
If the same person assumes you know something that you don't, then he's being "aloof", "pompus", or a "know-it-all".
Point is, none of us are psychic. We are all prone to make these type of errors. However, if an average person does it, it's a faux pax at most and generally not taken as indicitive of a deep-seated personality disorder.
Now, let a person go through life facing that kind of prejudice, and they just might start to wall people off over time.
Jamie reminds me of me in a lot of ways...and I've fought hard to break the "intorvert" mold, I even took up storytelling at one point to get me used to interacting with a large group of people, but there are circles of people out there that just won't give you a chance. Sadly, the best course of action in those cases is to just "keep quiet" so as not to expose yourself to their judgment.
==
on a related note, sorry to hear that he and Adam apparantly don't get along. I also think it's an unfair characterization that Adam lacks the basic skills. Compared to Jamie's more methodical nature, it might appear so, but there are a couple of times where he came up with a better design than Jamie as I recall.
Those guys have to coolest job in the world, and I hope it continues on.
A goal is a dream with a deadline
See? See how he lashes out at those who question the creepy way in which he was raised? Total freak-job. Probably has all sorts of weird kinks (not that there is anything wrong with that) and will end up desiring a sex-change before his 40th birthday.
But other than that, home school is great! You'll never have to worry about scoring with the hot girl in your science class 'cause she's your sister.
Blar.
I have actually noticed a few times lately where the narrator will pronounce words like this differently during the same episode. I recall a recent one I saw where he said "meehtane" a couple of times in the intro of a segment, then "mehthane" once during an explanation of how someone's plan is going to work, and then "meethane" again later in the episode.
-- OpenVerse Visual Chat: http://openverse.com
I'd imagine you hear a lot more of it. UK and Australia have a combined population of (60 + 20 =) 80 million whereas the USA is 300 million. I don't know where Canada's 30 million would fit into things, since they're pronunciation is sometimes in agreement with USA and sometimes with UK. Or other countries that speak (UK) English regularly, like parts of India.
I wonder if the English language is going to become more homogenized as time goes on or if local differences will become more exaggerated. In the USA, the settlement by English-speakers has been rapid and recent so there's only some vague accents people can pick out (Boston, "the South", rural Minnesota, "valley girl" Californian, urban, NYC, and the generic neutral-ish "tv broadcaster" accent of denver or phoenix) and so as time goes on, local areas should have time to develop a more distinctive, unique local accent. And on the other hand, there's globalization and the internet and all that communication going on which should decrease differences. It reminds me of something I read about Newfoundland French.
It's a small world. I'd imagine that the set of slashdot readers who homeschool is relatively small. :) We started homeschooling this year.
I have the same opinion about TV shows. VERY few are worth watching. I have found "How It's Made" to be interesting - if a little light on content.
I'm holding on to every issue of Make until my kids are old enought to do the projects with me. I can't wait!
But Herr Heisenberg, how does the electron know when I'm looking?
Together, they fight crime and rescue tree-bound kittens.
I love Mythbusters, but I always forgot who's who. Which one wears the beret?
-Rich
I remember that episode and it was Jamie, who grew up in a farm and knows guns, who scolded Adam for doing that. Their showing that must have been exactly for showing it's dangerous. When they do something that's truly dangerous with guns or explosives they always call an expert.
I think the most valuable lesson one gets from the Mythbusters is that one needs not be an expert to do some thinking. True, anybody could look up in a table to see how long a bullet travels in water. But how were those data obtained in the first place? That's the "scientific" value of the show. When a new field is being explored, there are no experts and one must invent new ways to test things.
For those lacking televisions, internet tubes, and/or cable, here's a definition for you: Mythbusters, a television show hosted by two men, Adam and Jamie, who explore urban legends, examine common misconceptions, and very often blow things up. They seldom bust actual myths, so one is unlikely to view on their program a debunking of monotheism, an exploration of the romantic ideal of love, a deep dive into the faults of Creationism, or an examination of whether our government makes us more or less secure, but they often assemble clever gadgets from things like rubber bands and duct tape and welded bits of metal, so they are usually entertaining.
That is why the show is so great. You have two completely opposite personalities struggling to come to a common goal. I too am a person that is quite anti-social. The fact that I am married baffles me sometimes because I think back to when she and I met and I have no idea who I was when I got up the nerve to ask her out. It just isn't like me to be that 'brave'.
Click Click Bloody Click PANCAKES!
Are those the ones that turn into robots when they land? Because I think we definitely need more of those!
Just junk food for thought...
I started in home schooling in the 2nd grade and went all the way to graduation. I didn't go to a 4 year college but instead worked for a couple years before going to SW Tech College for computer networking, graduated with honors. I took every optional class I could, tutored for several classes, and was the assistant teacher for Linux/Unix class. I am now going back to MATC Madison for MS .NET Certificate (just starting this semester).
About the only problem I've had as a home schooled kid relating to public-schooled kids is getting that 4 year pattern figured out (freshman, junior, senior, and whatever, still haven't).
The other big problem is when trying to get into college they want a transcript from highschool, something we neglected to keep up during my homeschooling (Note to all Home Schooling parents out there, MAKE AND KEEP A TRANSCRIPT FOR YOUR KID!).
I'm willing to admit my education was lacking in some places and better in others, my main weakness is higher math (beyond Algebra), and early 80's rock bands, but for the most part I've been able to get by.
The biggest thing about Home Schooling is that it teaches kids to Learn. Many times in home-schooling, when a kid asks their parent about something it's used as an opportunity to learn researching and to find out for themselves (with parents assistance, but still the kid doing a majority of the research). Instead of answering with a negative my parents would often grab the dictionary or encyclopedia and we'd start researching. Many of my home schooled friends have had similar experiences, where an interest or a question is used as the basis for several weeks of research and fact-finding. One family I know of went so far as to open up a mini-restaurant in their house to teach their kids all the responsibilities that go along with owning and operating a business, the kids took care of everything from ordering supplies to budgeting to taxes to making the menu.
I wouldn't trade home schooling for anything and if I ever do get married and have kids I will home school them as well.
Erik of Ekedahl
DEMETRIUS: Villain, what hast thou done?
AARON: Villain, I have done thy mother.
Shakespeare invents 'your mom'
Spelling:
Aluminum
US:
Ah-loo-min-um
UK:
Ah-loo-min-ee-um
Would you like more?
Please turn in your nerd card on the way out the door. Obviously you got it under false pretenses if you don't know what "Mythbusters" is.
> my understanding that filtering alcohol in this manner basically ruins the filter in just 1-2 passes
Not in my experience. I replaced the filters every couple months, and this was for a gang that went through at least 3 liters/week (avg 2 filtration passes for each bottle). They seemed work just as well at the end of the cycle as at the beginning - and believe me, the cheap stuff we started with will burn nasal passages from across the room, so it's NOT a subtle effect!
YMMV, and I'm not affiliated with anyone, I just knew a lot of thrifty drinkers when I lived in Hollywood...
Perfectly Normal Industries
I doubt there is porn of this hottie. But a for those of you that wanna peak of her NEARLY naked... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ykhSLNlx3n0&mode=re lated&search=
"The irony when tending a flock of sheep is the dogs you put in place to protect them are genetically mutated wolves"
They forgot a few words in the Adam segment. The quote SHOULD be:
This post is humor.
Another non-functioning site was "uncertainty.microsoft.com."
The purpose of that site was not known.
Adam has mentioned a wife and kids on the show, though.
Did you just feel like posting a semi-coherent 1-liner or is there a point? Of course OSHA is to prevent workplace injuries. Duh. However that doesn't mean that our employer isn't forcing us to comply. We get in trouble if we don't. I'm not saying anyone minds, I'm just saying that's the way it is. There's many things that my employer forces me to do (if I want to keep my job). Most of them are things I'd do anyhow, but that doesn't make my terminology incorrect. For example they, or I suppose I should say we since us computer guys are the ones responsible, force the use of good passwords. No problem, I use good passwords anyhow, but I'm still forced to do so in this case as the systems will reject bad ones. At home, it's purely optional.
So don't get all huffy or self righteous with me, I know full well why there are OSHA regs and, as I noted, they are designed to protect employees form employers. However, when you work for the government at least, they will make sure you follow the regs. It's not a bad thing, just the way it is.
I don't think you would need to. When you have 100 proof alchohol it is 50% alchohol by volume. It isn't like putting salt into water where it saturates at a fraction of the volume of the water. So you couldn't be filtering this out (where is the filter going to hide that much volume), although you could be loosing some to evaporation during the filtering process. It would be interesting to measure the exact amount, but as there wasn't an obvious change in volume, it definately wasn't much.
Why is this on slashdot?This is certainly not news for nerds,or news that matters
You start out your post with a false assumption that it is the quiet + intelligent that equates to a label of "lack of social skills". I would argue it is just the quiet. As a matter of fact the intelligent probably helps with "social skills" because if used properly it allows you to say things that people might actually want to listen to.
I work in a very technical job that involves supporting the sales force. I explain things to people all the time that they already know. They do not feel that I am condesending because I do not give my explainations in a condesending way. I also explain stuff that goes right over their head but in those cases I take the time to back up and explain the concepts they may not have grasped. I find that if someone asks you a technical question they generally want to understand the answer and will work very hard with you and explain exactly what points or concepts they do not get. Sometimes this is very difficult but they usually see it through to the end and you both come out better off.
According to you that makes me a "normal person" (which I guess means I lose all my geek-cred and 1337-ness) because our customers, engineers, and sales force have not shown me any indication that they think I have a deep-seated personality disorder. So I guess I will get out of the business of life-critical product design and into something like fry-cooking before I kill someone.
My point is that it is the shyness and lack of "social skills" that makes you say or do the wrong thing and give people the wrong impression about your personality. I like to think of myself as being reasonably intelligent and quite a few people have told me I am a down-right genius at times (on the other side of that coin, my wife puts my IQ somewhere between potato and premature rot-grub but we already know she is a poor decision maker because she married me!). If I were shy and withdrawn those same sales guys would probably kick me in the nuts, but they would also kick me in the nuts if I was as dumb as a box of rocks. It is not like stupid and shy gets a pass, if anything they are picked on more (cause you never know when you will need the smart guy).
Maybe you are getting the same "pass" that the normal people are getting, but are too socially inept to realize it. I mean your ID is "StressGuy", I am guessing you are a little high strung.
I also do not want to be overly critical and disuade you from posting your opinions on any topic because I or someone like me won't like it. I applaud your decision to take up storytelling and force yourself into a social situation. After you do enough things like that and talk with us "normal people", you will realize that we are all in this together. I think you would honestly be surpised at what people listen to and remember. There are a few people out there that enjoy making other people miserable, but everyone else is more likely than not to help you out if it does not put them out too much. Some are actually even nice (not me, but other people)!
Actually you sound like a pretty great individual with a lot to offer, but no one will know unless you develop the social skills and personality to share it with the rest of the world.
Who knows WHO came up with the idea of the "don't try this at home" disclaimer. But I know one thing: I'd bet good money that even if it WASN'T Jamie and Adam's idea, some lawyer with Discovery would have insisted on it before the show would ever be allowed to air.
cya,
john
Imagine all the people...
I've known Adam for a long time. He's a great guy, funny, very outgoing, pretty much exactly what you see on the show. Very talented, especially when he's working on his passion, gun/prop stuff. Personally, I feel like the show would be more interesting if Jamie wasn't in it, as I think he's pretty boring. That's just me.
What has been written about Adam being a "props guy" is only partially true. He's an artist, the things he works on for the company are just part of what he does. He's a great tv personality, if he were to find the right vehicle. Mythbusters isn't quite it, I think he knows it, and I think he's chaffing under it.
AC
"but they are pretty damn knowledgable when it comes to engineering and engineering is largely trial and error. You don't get to their level in their fields (each taking on very large clients before doing mythbusters) without acknowledging the scientific method."
Bollocks. Engineering is not 'largely trial and error'. Often some of the complex interactions are fine tuned by designed experiments, but the basic concepts are anlytically derived.
For example when we set up the road springs for a new car we know what ride frequencies we want, we know the moments of inertia, and the mass, and desired ground clearance, so we can work out the spring rates and lengths. Where's the trial and error? Admittedly we'll order in 3 sets of springs around that calculated sweet spot, so the ride and handling guys have something to play with, but typically the final choce will be within 3% of the calculated rate.
The example that springs to mind is mobile phones a fuel (gas) stations. Any electrical engineer in the HAE industry will simply declare that the phone should not be there as it has the potential to act as an ignition source, the reasoned proof of this is long and will not make good tv. But showing a ringing phone does not ignite a fuel (gas) air mixture doesn't prove the general case that phones cant ignite fuel vapours.
I find it quite interesting how some people so devoutly believe in the oddest things. For example, i know some very devout Christians, and I don't think I've heard them say that Jesus is the son of God with as much conviction as some people have insisted that cellphones are hazardous around the fumes at a petrol station. What you say is true--if you try to do somehting 100 or 1000 (or even 1000000) times and only once manage to make it happen it means that thing is POSSIBLE, and if you never manage to do the thing it doesn't mean it isn't possible. However, it DOES prove that such a thing is so improbable it doesn't warrant such a reaction.
The cellphone-at-a-petrol station is a perfecrt example. Yes, Mythbusters did NOT prove cellphones were not a hazard, however they DID prove that the (mis)reported incidents are so highly unlikely that it does NOT warrant the hyteria around the myth. "ANY electrical engineer in the HAE industry will simply declare that the phone should not be there"? Well, *I* am one electrical engineer who will say such a restriction is ridiculous. There are countless other things that would WAY more likely cause ignition of fuel vapours that happen all the time. When you start your car the solenoid can spark. The acrylic sweater you might wear on a cold, dry winter day could create static electricity--and if you are in the habit of locking the filler open and moving about your car to, say, clean the windscreen, then going back to remove the filler....spark....boom. Locking fillers open or propping them open with the fuel cap...THAT is what should be banned, NOT cellphones.
Please get this straight...cellphones are NOT intrinsically safe however there IS a VERY remote chance of ignition, but they are NOT any more dangerous than any of a wide variety of other non-intrinsically-safe electrical devices. Your iPod is just a "dangerous" at the pump as your cellphone. The electrical acceesories BUILT RIGHT INTO YOUR CAR--like the radio or the headlights or the like--are just as dangerous. Your macbook or dell or thinkpad's battery is order of magnitude more likely to randomly explode.
And you know what makes a cellphone not intrinsically safe? It isn't the EMR energy from the transmitted signal. It isn't the backlight in the screen. It isn't the ringer. IT IS THE BATTERY. ALL reports of cellphones igniting in ANY situation has been attributed to a problem with the battery--defective charging circuitry allowing cells to overcharge, cheap aftermarket batteries, intermittent contact at the conductors and so on. Your best bet in trying to cause a cellphone to explode at a gas station would be to slam it against the fuel fillerso it smashes and the case cracks and the metal bits of the battery short and spark. There ARE intrinsically-safe phones for exceptionally hazardous locations (confined spaces with gas fumes, dusty locations like flour mills, etc) and the single biggest thing that makes them intrinsically safe is to completely seal the battery in its compartment so it cannot come dislodged and so the electrical contacts are not exposed to open air.
Anyways, that bit on Mythbusters was very amusing. Perfectly scientific? I'm sure it wasn't. It was just entertaining and IMHO did in fact proove it was an extremely improbable phenomenon. It's something like when they dropped a lit cigarette in a big trail of fuel and showed it doesn't work like hollywood were it flares up and folloes the trail--the cigaretter is too cool and the fuel too wet to allow for ignition. Mythbusters isn't about scientific proof...it is about entrtainment and, for the lack of a better phrase, "common sense". Along the way they try to explain the "why" but the point is the entertainment, and to say "this idea is so far out and PRACTICALLY unachievable that this myth is busted".