i couldn't agree. i've watched this online at least three or four times, as i find it beautiful. i've also read the book twice (if you liked this, read fabric of the cosmos). i wish more people would watch this. i've wondered what it would take for a movie like this to be released in a theatre. oh well, let's just watch tom cruise some more.
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I think high-level physics is probably about as close as it'll ever get to pop-culture though. This may be all we get for a long time with this kind of quality and fun (though I would certainly love to be proved wrong)
Well, here's another big fan of this show. And I'm not even remotely CLOSE to a scientist. I'm one of those artsy-fartsy types. I have seen some people critisize this show because it 'dumbs-down' the science. Well, la-de-da!! I LIKE the fact that it was simplified to reach a wider audience. Even my 12 & 8yr olds like watching it! And you can be sure they WOULDN'T if someone had droned on and on about formulas.
Heck, perhaps if I had had a physics teacher like Mr. Greene in high school, I'd be a world class string theorist today!!
he ran from the Indes to the Andes in his undies
-- Shel Silverstein
The only thing I don't like about this series is that he repeats things several times. Maybe this is because it was meant to be one episode a week or something, but it got annoying when they first debuted it all on PBS. Although he does well to mention things, Brian Greene unfortunately doesn't go into depth like he does in his book. Rather it almost seems like a synopsis or summary of his book, which is good for people who know absolutely nothing, but kind of boring otherwise.
Even for highschool physics classes, the content is pretty watered-down. It seems like it's geared for the average freshman-sophomore highschool student rather than an adult audience (unless you think adults' knowledge of science is on par with the average freshman-sophomore highschool student).
yes- i think not many physicists go to imdb to discuss these things. i think if you search for other physics fora you won't be disappointed because of a lack of popularity.
i think indeed that the series was meant for the highschool-level. make all students watch it in class, and i bet that many more 18 year olds choose physics in their further studies than now, with four years of science taught the normal, rather boring way.
Actually, I'd say most adults' knowledge of physics is far less than the average freshman-sophomore highschool student. They at least are currently taking science classes and are in some way involved with learning.
This is not to say I don't think The Elegant Universe wasn't a little too watered down. It was probably just about right for the average American, but too fluffy for the average PBS viewer (not to make a broad generalization, but the people who watch PBS regularly tend to be smarter). That's fine though. There's definitely a segment of the audience who were probably hearing all of this for the first time. It's one of the best things that PBS can do to introduce people to science these days (a damn important concern, in my opinion), though I would suggest they just rerun Cosmos instead. It might be a bit out of date, but it is still absolutely the best science programming for the general public ever produced.
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I'm currently in the 9th grade and haven't taken physics yet, but I was fascinated when I watched this last year. I even asked my science teacher about it, but unfortunately he didn't know much. Then I sparked interest among my science-geek friends... I seriously don't know much about what Brian Greene was talking about but it definitely sparked an interest in me too.
A friend of mine is reading the book right now. Does anybody know if it gives a good history of Einstein's discoveries?
Back to the original post. I agree with others that imdb isn't usually the place for physics fanatics to go and discuss anything. However, this is a mainstream series that was targeted at people who don't know much about the subject so, I actually would have thought there were more than 6 threads. It was one of the more popular NOVA series.... But, it did take me a year to get to the board though.
Wow! I just saw this show, and I was amazed. I'm definately going to read Greene's book; the subject is just so interesting. I'm not the kind of person that understands in debth about neutrons and whatnot, as a matter of fact I hated my science classes, but I was inspired to read about the string theory. This show was excellent in sparking a curiousity I thought I would never find in myself. There may not be many smart people in these boards, but at least there are some that watched the show that had the kind of effect that it did.
shareI've shown this to anyone I can get to watch it and and have yet to find someone who wasn't blown away. If they could do this type of thing focusing more on quantum physics I think it would open a lot of eyes. It is a very simplistic view (I've learned a lot more since I first saw it) but it still grabs me everytime I see it again.
I also highly recommend Hyperspace by Michio Kaku if your interested in a different viewpoint on the same topic. A great read, and very understandable despite the complex topic.
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Sempiternity: "Rather it almost seems like a synopsis or summary of his book, which is good for people who know absolutely nothing,"
I'm sure you meant to say: "know absolutely nothing about physics."
Get it right, some people still have a life in the proven four dimensions, and I'm sure the majority of them have an incredibly high social intelligence.
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"Though my guess is imdb.com is not exactly the best place to go to talk about physics :p "
Nope.. Probably not. Unless Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie name one of their kids "Physics", I doubt you'll be seeing that word pop up here very often. Which is pretty sad.
Then again, this is just supposed to be a movie database, so I suppose you could use that argument. But then I would counter that with, "Why should we keep our brains away from IMDB?"
You know, I might actually have enjoyed it...
...if it weren't so patronising and so dumbed down. I almost felt like I was back in kindergarten for a lot of the documentary. The animations and graphics are great 'n all, and the topic is one of my favorites, but the delivery is horrible.
The documentary also wastes a lot of useful time in useless ways, like when they discussed what "M" stood for.
I agree. The show could have been reduced by an hour just eliminating the repetition.
Further, I think shows like this are what contribute to the widespread opposition to science in the developed world. Here we have a theory that (as presented) comes out of one equation describing the strong force, and has been blown out of all proportion almost entirely based on math and logic, which are purely human constructs we've used to help to explain the world. This is where the public gets the idea that a "theory" is equivalent to a "fantasy", and that has negative consequences for other theories. There's precious little actual evidence backing this stuff up. This show presents string theory or M theory as if it's a sort of Star Trek explanation for the real world. Even the sets used emphasize this.
A show like this might be great if string theory develops into something rigorously testable, but until then I think it just damages science, in real ways like decreased funding. Why should the public fund something that even proponents argue may never be testable? Something may be elegant or unified or we may have heavily invested in it (emotionally and financially) but if it isn't backed up with evidence, I think it's the wrong thing to do. Particularly with something as apparently deep and complex as string theory, to go SO FAR without evidence, or even plans to get it, is I think disappointingly anti-scientific.
I love this show. It's amazing and beautiful. I typically hate physics, since it's not really my strong point, but I love string theory now. I think I saw it in 8th grade, but I don't remember (it was so long ago). Now I'm 21 and it's still one of my favourite Nova specials.
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who cares about popularity just watch what you like.
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