Comment by djsumdog | Hacker News Reader

Comment by djsumdog | Hacker News Reader

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It really isn't science. It's pop science, and although I do enjoy the Smarter Every Day guy, I do agree it's kinda disservice to understanding how things work. They should have repeated the experiment; gotten some sensor experts to see if they could quantify the "stillness" of the water, etc.

We've had pop science before (Mr Wizard anyone?), and we're just seeing more of it today. Real science is slow, methodical and doesn't infer causality from one experiment. It says, "Maybe x caused y; let's do some more tests." It's the QA person who says "Happy path works. Let's break it and see if we can inject some Javascript."

Bill Nye is a mechanical engineer/comedian/kids host. Tyson is physicists. They're smart, but they're not experts on everything.

Like I said, I like these guys, but I realize it's not science. It's half entertainment/half makes you think. In these videos it's fun, but in the political arena, _science_ presented this way can be weaponized:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yecefLsE44U

I'm aware that I'm likely coming across as curmudgeonly.

My other half is a science educator, so I'm also very aware of the problems of getting kids (or even adults) excited about science.

On the other hand, I don't like the pseudo-science cruft the media and our society is full of, and I suspect there's some vague links between misrepresenting what the scientific method actually looks like, and people taking advantage of that growing murkiness.

I'm not questioning the credentials of these guys. Just the validity of this ersatz experiment.

> ... gotten some sensor experts to see if they could quantify the "stillness" of the water, etc.

They did have some archetypal (glasses-wearing) geek do a quick sound bite towards the beginning describing the effect being observed at small scales as 'bunk', but that's all we get from that side of the argument.

Interestingly in the video you can clearly see there's direct sunlight hitting one side of the indoor pool, and parts of the outdoor one. And during the time lapse section of the video, you can see surface debris on the indoor pool swirling around.

If the Coriolis effect worked at this scale, then you'd see consistent circular motion of water in these sized tubs even without emptying.

"They should have repeated the experiment;"

From the video description:

"For the record Destin and I repeated the experiment 3-4 times each in each hemisphere and got the same results every time."

That wasn't mentioned in the video, so I missed that (I usually avoid clicking 'read more' on youtube descriptions).

'3-4 times' sounds a bit wobbly -- I'm hoping that they meant they repeated it 3 times in one place, 4 in the other.

I agree about Bill Nye, that he's more of a science educator than expert about any one specific topic, but Tyson is definitely an expert on astrophysics. He talks about a lot of stuff that he isn't an expert in because he's a popular guy, and for that reason I'm not very fond of his speaking engagements, but it's not fair to say he's not an expert at anything.

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