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Choose the New PBS Science Show

Posted by kdawson on from the new-nova dept.

chinmay7 writes "PBS has posted three different pilots for a new science show, and they want viewers to weigh in and help choose one as the regular science feature. All three pilots are viewable as vodcasts. Wired Science aired on January 3rd. The pilot certainly is polished, as one might expect from Wired Magazine, and deals with interesting topics: 'Meet rocket-belt inventors, stem cell explorers and meteorite hunters.' Science Investigators (air date: January 10) seems to be the most 'science' show: 'The investigators examine 30,000-year-old Neanderthal DNA, vanishing frogs, mind-boggling baseball pitches and more.' 22nd Century (air date: January 17) is pretty gimmicky and loud for my taste, but delivers interesting content — 'In the coming decades will all our brains be wired together like networked computers?' So watch and vote."

10 of 143 comments (clear)

  1. Wired Sucked by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Interesting

    is it too much to have hosts that are not 30 something smart asses? or better yet, science stories that are not ubiquitous in the media already. or even better, shows dedicated to one topic rather than 4 or 5 so we can get some real information involved? or at best. . just redirect the funding to NOVA.

    1. Re:Wired Sucked by Aqua+OS+X · · Score: 2, Interesting

      Eh. The Wired show strikes me as the only show out of that selection that could potentially broaden PBS's demographic a bit. Considering the recent resurgence of nuts who want PBS to slowly suffocate from lack of funding, I can't say I have a problem with PBS targeting the Wired / Engadget demographic.

      If they eliminated the irrelevant (and oddly boring) destruction of more electronics equipment, and focused a bit more on fewer stories, it could be respectable.

      --
      "Things are more moderner than before- bigger, and yet smaller- it's computers-- San Dimas High School football RULES!"
  2. Why is this necessary? by artifex2004 · · Score: 4, Interesting

    How are these shows substantially different or improved from Nova ScienceNOW and Scientific American Frontiers? (Speaking of which, having Alan Alda as the host of that show made it palatable for some older people who wouldn't otherwise look at science stories.)

    If they really want a new show, they need a resurrection of Newton's Apple, and target younger audiences. For that matter, they should resurrect 3-2-1 Contact, too. If they need to find a free slot, they could get rid of Cyberchase, one of the lamest shows pretending to be educational I've seen, besides some emo girl clown sitting on a couch.

  3. Saw them by DaveM753 · · Score: 4, Interesting

    I watched all of "22nd Century" and "Wired Science", and the first half of "Science Investigators". I thought "22nd Century" had interesting topics, but the "hosts" were utterly condescending, biased and overtly scripted, almost to the point of being insulting. I liked the topics in "Science Investigators" too, but the "this is like, way cool, man" approach of the first male host made me gag, so I turned it off after about 15-20 minutes. "Wired Science" was the best for me. I guess the other two shows would have broader appeal to a younger set of viewers than me (40 yrs and one day), but they can vote on their own... :-)

  4. More NOVA!! by iluvcapra · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Why not just make more original episodes of Nova, dangit!

    OTOH, there's tons of coverage of natural science, physics, applied science and anthropology, but in general not many shows on IT; this is remarkable considering how unlikely it is for the average person to see the Tevatron, but that person probably deals with computer viruses, data encryption and slow internets on a daily basis. There should be a Secret Life of Machines for computers. You could have:

    • The Secret Life of the Router
    • The Secret Life of C
    • The Secret Life of the Hard Drive

    And so on. I don't think Hunkin would do it, so we'd have to find someone suitably cheeky but computer-friendly and having an artistic streak. Maybe Woz.

    --
    Don't blame me, I voted for Baltar.
  5. Re:Anything educational please. by Pollardito · · Score: 2, Interesting

    I'm also curious why you used the adjectives "impartial" and "unbiased." Are you implying the Myth Busters, Nova, and other such shows are somehow "partial" and "biased" because they're flashy? Are fun and educational mutually exclusive concepts to you? i'm not the OP, but the problem that i have with Myth Busters is that while what they're doing has some science in it they don't really concern themselves in explaining their thought process during the show. they explain the myth, they describe their tests at a really high level and then show the test results (the flash), but they don't really spend much time explaining how they arrived at their test plan, why they don't need to test some other factors, or much else between the two endpoints of the timeline. it seems like they're catering to those that just want to watch the flash and those that can look at their end test results and already know enough to work backwards from there. there's not really any education going on, because the first target audience is people who don't want to know more and the latter target audience already knows the subject anyway. i was watching the show at my parents' house over the holiday and everyone in the room agreed that it'd be much more interesting if they'd spend the entire time debunking one myth in more detail than glossing over all the interesting stuff so that they could cram two myths or more into one show.
  6. Re:Anything educational please. by Andrew+Kismet · · Score: 2, Interesting

    You are the reason science will never be popular as it should be with kids and teenagers. So what if it lacks controls? If it gets them into *REAL* science, they'll learn about the importance of rigourous testing. If it wasn't for watching Tron, the Last Starfighter, and WarGames in my youth I'm fairly certain I wouldn't be a Computer Science undergrad right now.

    Science does not "requires that nothing be published without peer review and approval" - that's the most rigourously painful, while still truthful, definition I've seen. Science is the Scientific Method: Observe, Hypothesis, Test, Repeat.

  7. Re:Direct link to 22nd century by jlarocco · · Score: 2, Interesting

    Actually, the QuickTime versions seem to work better.

    wget http://www.pbs.org/media/22ndcentury/22ndcentury_3 84.mov
    mplayer 22ndcentury_384.mov

    wget http://www.pbs.org/media/kcet/wiredscience/wired-p ilot-full_480.mov -O wired_pilot_full_480.mov
    mplayer wired_pilot_full_480.mov

    wget http://www-tc.pbs.org/wgbh/si/video/chapter_1_300. mov -O ch1.mov
    wget http://www-tc.pbs.org/wgbh/si/video/chapter_2_300. mov -O ch2.mov
    wget http://www-tc.pbs.org/wgbh/si/video/chapter_3_300. mov -O ch3.mov
    wget http://www-tc.pbs.org/wgbh/si/video/chapter_4_300. mov -O ch4.mov
    wget http://www-tc.pbs.org/wgbh/si/video/chapter_5_300. mov -O ch5.mov
    wget http://www-tc.pbs.org/wgbh/si/video/chapter_6_300. mov -O ch6.mov
    mplayer ch*.mov

    They don't seem to have that last one as one big file.

    --
    Maybe not
  8. Bill Bill Bill Bill! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Interesting

    Attention PBS: I will vote for any show as long as you get Bill Nye to host it.
    That is all.

  9. Re:Anything educational please. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Interesting

    If it wasn't for watching Tron, the Last Starfighter, and WarGames in my youth

    I've never found science-fiction fans to be at all more literate of the scientific process than fantasy fans. It's very rare for people to go on to voluntarily go on to further the basic skills they learned as a kid. As a result, teach bad science and you're going to get a population with a bad grasp of science. As for computer science, and I say this as someone who majored in it, it's very rarely taught as science rather than an engineering discipline.