Cosmos: A Spacetime Odyssey

But how many fingers and toes do you have?

Nice to see it return to the cosmos again at the end, and hearing Sagan was a nice tough to finish off the season.

this last ep was by far the best one. sucks the season is over. little blue dot.

awesome show.

I'd love to see a science show that discusses a particular, more current issue per episode and has someone working in the field to interview or assist with the explanation. Mike Rowe and Neil Degrasse Tyson should have a deathmatch to see who hosts it.

The real question is whether they're going to do another season.

Soygen_sl said:

Next season is the Creationist view.

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God did it.

Roll credits

^See that shit is why I stopped watching the whole show around episode 6. It just felt like I was watching Tyson's rebuttal of religious fundamentalism's influence of science, not a wondrous exploration of the universe we live in. Dawkins covered that shit a decade ago'(although he didn't bother trying for a subtle approach, whereas Tyson made a token effort), and it made no difference because it's all just preaching to the choir, just like Tyson's approach will make no difference because it's preaching to the choir. You can't use a rational, scientific argument to shake someone out of a belief based on deep seated emotional conviction and indoctrination.

I got much more enjoyment out of watching Sagan's original for the first time on youtube, frankly.

As for global warming, I think arguing over the specifics kind of misses the point - pumping huge, constant amounts of chemicals and debris into an ecosystem is going to influence it negatively. That's inarguable. Putting aside warming, or cooling, or CO2 levels, we're fucking our planet up on every level, and that's not going to stop until either A) we somehow (fuck knows how) create a global society and economy which isn't controlled by the wealthy owners of multinational corporations which are, almost by definition, motivated solely by profit, or B) seriously dramatic effects orders of magnitude above what we're already experiencing finally force these plutocrats and their corporations to realize that their own survival is at stake (if they even care and are capable of change at that stage), by which point it's quite likely too late.

TLDR: We're fucked.

Of course they thought the same thing about nuclear apocalypse, and we made it through that one, so maybe I'm wrong. I'd like to think so, that humanity is capable of learning to put long term benefits above short term ones. But I look at my 1 year old nephew and have a hard time believing he's gonna live in an awesome future.

I used to go to church every Sunday and was a hardcore believer. It's not as ridiculous as you think.

They are here, and they are everywhere.

They are not your friends.

They.

Are.

Here.

Azrayne_sl said:

^See that shit is why I stopped watching the whole show around episode 6. It just felt like I was watching Tyson's rebuttal of religious fundamentalism's influence of science, not a wondrous exploration of the universe we live in. Dawkins covered that shit a decade ago'(although he didn't bother trying for a subtle approach, whereas Tyson made a token effort), and it made no difference because it's all just preaching to the choir, just like Tyson's approach will make no difference because it's preaching to the choir. You can't use a rational, scientific argument to shake someone out of a belief based on deep seated emotional conviction and indoctrination.

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Honestly, me too. It started to get to where the episodes felt like a rebuttal to an argument that no one is explicitly making, and it started to get annoying. It also started to get that there wasn't a whole lot of actual scientific theory/thought in the episodes, but instead a lot of science history. And honestly while it wasn'tbadscience history, neither was it particularly good. Every scientist is the hero and every close-minded agency of power is the villain. It was around ep6 that it started to become more and more clear that the tone was intentional, not accidental, and not going to change.

I've watched Sagan's multiple times. I didn't finish watching this one. I'm not gonna say it's horrible, because it's not horrible. But it would have been a lot better if they didn't waste their time in playing the sorts of culture games they decided to play. And it would have been a stronger argument.

Something something arguing with idiots.

I used to go to church every Sunday and was a hardcore believer. It's not as ridiculous as you think.

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Ok yeah there's a small percentage, but my observation has been that they usually drift away fairly early, on first exposure to these kinds of arguments and the general scientific worldview. By the time someone is arguing for creationism to be taught alongside evolution, they're generally stuck in their path I'd think.

I don't know, it's hard for me to comment on the whole thing because religion in general and evangelical/fundamentalist Abrahamic religion just isn't the force in Australian society that it is in American society. It's here, but it's pretty invisible on the surface.

Honestly, me too. It started to get to where the episodes felt like a rebuttal to an argument that no one is explicitly making, and it started to get annoying. It also started to get that there wasn't a whole lot of actual scientific theory/thought in the episodes, but instead a lot of science history. And honestly while it wasn't bad science history, neither was it particularly good. Every scientist is the hero and every close-minded agency of power is the villain. It was around ep6 that it started to become more and more clear that the tone was intentional, not accidental, and not going to change.

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Exactly. I was a bit squeamish about it from the beginning, when they did Giordano Bruno in I think the first episode, not only because only absolutely butchered the facts of his life, worldview, works, trial and execution, but because his worldview was so far out of line with anything someone like Tyson would find acceptable that I found it a little absurd that they're setting a thoroughly mystical man up as a hero (martyr, really) of science, all because of an idea he had (which he didn't even obtain through scientific methods) which was later confirmed to be true.

And that kind of, let's say intentional and deceptive omission, almost historical retconning, isn't uncommon, because up until the enlightenment (and for some, even later) basically all historical scientists and philosophers were also mystics with strong spiritual/religious worldviews (and often practitioners of alchemy, astrology, magic, spiritualism, etc).

I'm not saying those worldviews or practices should be given any scientific credence because they happened to be held/practiced by people who also made major historical contributions to science, but once you step away from science and start getting into history, you can't just excise the philosophical context and the worldview these men operated in because it no longer fits with modern scientific understanding of the universe.

But I bring this up because although this kind of thing is common, the butchering of Bruno by the new Cosmos was absurd even by the usual standard. Context is important in history, and it's hard to take the show seriously when it was so careless with it's delving into history. It just killed any ability to take it seriously, if he's happy to butcher history for an agenda, how do I know he isn't doing the same to the science?

Iannis_sl said:

Honestly, me too. It started to get to where the episodes felt like a rebuttal to an argument that no one is explicitly making, and it started to get annoying. It also started to get that there wasn't a whole lot of actual scientific theory/thought in the episodes, but instead a lot of science history. And honestly while it wasn'tbadscience history, neither was it particularly good. Every scientist is the hero and every close-minded agency of power is the villain. It was around ep6 that it started to become more and more clear that the tone was intentional, not accidental, and not going to change.

I've watched Sagan's multiple times. I didn't finish watching this one. I'm not gonna say it's horrible, because it's not horrible. But it would have been a lot better if they didn't waste their time in playing the sorts of culture games they decided to play. And it would have been a stronger argument.

Something something arguing with idiots.

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Most of what you think you know is bullshit. Not to single you out or anything; most of what we all know is complete bullshit. How would you know if it wasn't? After all, most of everything you know is predicated upon the trust of other people knowing their shit.

Do you actually know that Germany lost WWII? How do you know that we nuked Japan? How do you know that we won WWII? How do you know that the Periodic Table of Elements isn't some grand scam?

A What I am trying to say is that you really only know what you've been told, and that you trust that knowledge. Misplaced trust can be a very bad thing, indeed.

I think of Cosmos as the best "science>religion" message made in the past 20 (at least) years. Dawkins did this years ago, but he's a dick about it. You don't convince someone irrational with blunt force. You convince them with as little explicit convincing as possible. Once a person feels you are trying to convince them, they close the gate to their mind. There are actually studies showing this.

For that reason, I have mixed feelings about it. On one hand, I was often frustrated because there was so much cool shit that I had no idea about (e.g. in the electromagnetism episode), but was left with blue balls because they spent more time hero worshiping and arguing antigod that they left the actual science out of it. For that reason, I probably wouldn't buy it as a classic science show to show it to my future kids, for example.

On the other hand, I think they did a phenomenal job targeting religious indoctrination in the absolute perfect way for our time. The way I see it is, if this doesn't have some large effect, it's time to give up with direct recognition and start convincing by omission of religious belief. No more addressing young earth creationists in any way other than ignoring or laughter like a child just said something cute. That sort of thing. Media whores like Bill Nye are already lending way too much legitimacy by recognition and I believe are harming the overall goal.

So anyway, as a targeted attempt to change the US public opinion slightly toward valuing science, they did a great job (or great attempt). The thing is, a LOT of effort clearly went into this show. I doubt those who put their hard work into it did it just so the show can be forgotten in the future as that silly, (now) anachronistic show that once talked about religion like it wasn't a fairy tale. It has no chance to be a classic like the original one seems to be (haven't seen it) because their focus is not on science; It's on religion.

Cosmos is a show about religion

Agree pretty much with Dabamf. The show wasn't bad but I left feeling the desire to know more. I learned a bunch about history and how we got to the point we are but they just glossed over much of the actual science behind it. The anti-God was a tad heavy handed to me. They could just lay out the facts and let people formulate their own opinions without spicing the lecture with bias.

Although it is a show tailored to a younger audience than me, I was also disappointed in the lack of knowledge bombs. I really enjoyed the episode that explained evolution. I had never heard or seen an explanation that made such perfect sense - particularly when they started talked about the eye. The other two episodes that really stood out were the light waves episode (which everyone here loved) and the geology episode about how the Earth has changed over millions of years. I think I liked that episode much more than others here. But that shit just fascinates me about how we know such intricate details of geological events hundreds of millions of years ago.

Dabamf_sl said:

(haven't seen it)

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You should. I got a real kick out of it, even though the special effects are outdated and some of the science stuff (that I picked up on, which means I'm sure there's more) is a bit outdated. It's worth it to skip out on having the anti-religious crap shoved down your throat.

Azrayne_sl said:

You should. I got a real kick out of it, even though the special effects are outdated and some of the science stuff (that I picked up on, which means I'm sure there's more) is a bit outdated. It's worth it to skip out on having the anti-religious crap shoved down your throat.

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Which science parts are outdated?

Well, from what I remember, he has almost an entire episode about SETI and the search for exoplanets. So that's a bit dated.