kennyc wrote:I enjoyed the most recent episode about 'light' much more than the previous black hole one....

Me too. Episode 4, especially the bits upon crossing the event horizon seemed like another return to being heavy on the visuals but light on the exposition. Neil Degrasse Tyson wrote a book called Death By Black Hole where he spoke about weird relativistic effects and spaghettification, there really wasn't any excuse for so little explanation of what we were actually seeing. The whole black hole singularity thing was really poorly described as well, a real shame when there was so much that could be said about it.

The latest episode was right back on track, though. It was an excellent way of embedding scientific discovery into human history and culture. The parts with Newton and Fraunhofer, even the description of QED were brilliantly explained. Parts of it were funny, some moving and it was awesome to have Neil tell us that the particular segment about spectroscopy was deeply important him because that initial experiment was the basis of his scientific field.

I watched that episode this afternoon. Saved it to watch when I was alone. I found the explanations about light and how we see it very interesting.

The_Piper wrote:

Animavore wrote:He said "billions and billions"

Even the creators of Cosmos don't know or don't care that Carl Sagan never said that in the original.

His ex-wife being one of them

This series got me to get an app for my iPhone so that I can look at the night sky and identify what I'm looking at.

To make A Sky Full of Ghosts, I think they took Travels in Space and Time and Lives of the Stars from the original series, added them up and divided by two, and ended up with half a coherent episode.

We seem to be about a week behind on National Geographic in the Netherlands - so it sounds like this Sunday's episode will be better

The latest episode, covering photosynthesis, micro-organisms, atoms and neutrinos, was the best one so far, imo. Like most episodes, it contained a strange mix of topics, but this time it didn' t bother me. I enjoyed this one more than the previous episodes.

^^^
Me too. I really like how he emphasizes that we are part of the universe in so many ways.

Pulsar wrote:The latest episode, covering photosynthesis, micro-organisms, atoms and neutrinos, was the best one so far, imo. Like most episodes, it contained a strange mix of topics, but this time it didn' t bother me. I enjoyed this one more than the previous episodes.

The weird mix of topics did bother me at first, but got better towards the end of it. It's also a shame that they glossed over how Democritus actually arrived at his findings, it was one of my favourite parts of the original series. The segment on the inner workings of the plant cell were absolutely fucking batty as well; The representation as a steampunk factory and production line could have come out of an ID apologetics film. Why not just represent the thing as we can see it and rely on Neil's description to flesh out what's going on?

Bribase wrote:

Pulsar wrote:The latest episode, covering photosynthesis, micro-organisms, atoms and neutrinos, was the best one so far, imo. Like most episodes, it contained a strange mix of topics, but this time it didn' t bother me. I enjoyed this one more than the previous episodes.

The weird mix of topics did bother me at first, but got better towards the end of it. It's also a shame that they glossed over how Democritus actually arrived at his findings, it was one of my favourite parts of the original series. The segment on the inner workings of the plant cell were absolutely fucking batty as well; The representation as a steampunk factory and production line could have come out of an ID apologetics film. Why not just represent the thing as we can see it and rely on Neil's description to flesh out what's going on?

The factory thing annoyed me too.
I thought the exact same thing.
The real thing (or as close to) would have been a lot more exciting to watch.

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Well.....that was a strange episode last night....focused completely (it seemed to me) on leaded gasoline.

I've sorted stopped watching. I've a good mind to go back and watch the original again.

TBH, I'm struggling to maintain interest. Not a biggie, as I don't think I'm really the target audience, but the Sagan impersonation is wearing thin. I expected him to be his usual exuberant self, and I'm finding it generally disappointing.

It might have been better if the show had been fronted by Hugo Weaving.

I mean I can understand the idea of exploring 'mans effect on his environment' but if that is what is was supposed to be about then it failed due to being too micro-focused on a single topic rather than exploring other environmental issues and our effect/place/interaction with the cosmos at large.

I enjoyed it.

I think the writers did that to show how interlinked science is. You can't discount the methods used to date the earth without discounting other everyday applications from the same science. In many Christian's minds, they separate science into "common science" and "evolution science" and I think he was pointing that out, as well as pointing out how special interest groups will hire their own science shills to obfuscate the issue.

You have to cut Neil some slack, he wasn't the writer or producer of this show so he has to take direction on how to narrate each episode. Personally, I liked last night's episode as did those I was watching it with.

I think this episode was the best one yet. The previous one, with the tiny cellular factories and crap simply pissed me off.

I watched the new one in the end. It wasastory I hadn't heard befor. I liked it, its parallels with modern day global warming denialists is staggering.

Episode 8 was about stars and the history of astrophysics. Definitely one of the best episodes yet, probably because the subject was within Neil's expertise.

Yes, enjoyable. Good to see the women (the computers) get some focus and credit!