YouTube Pop Science.

Pinball1970

Pinball1970

Valued Senior Member
There are some good channels out there, what is your experience? Do you dismiss all?
The scientists I have spoken to tell me that science is science and pop science is entertainment.
That is a hard distinction, one is Griffith's second edition and the other is Cox talking about his non expert subject on location in that far-away-voice....
There are layers in-between.
My introduction to the mathematics of Quantum mechanics was Leonard Susskind Stanford lectures, they are still on there. The down side is that they are quite slow and you have to deal with audience questions.
What about you?
 
I don’t have the patience for videos about science. Reading is generally a far quicker way to impart a lot more information. But videos about nature itself are a different matter.
 
While I prefer text as X does, I've seen video from science educators like Hannah Fry (The Rest is Science), Michael Stevens (Vsauce), and Derek Muller (Veritasium) which seemed well-researched and having great clarity. The Serious Science channel might be better where you want some more depth and the presenters are noted experts in their respective fields.
 
exchemist said:
I don’t have the patience for videos about science.
Click to expand...
I know, I had you in mind when I posted this!

You never watched "The sky at night," or "Tomorrow's world?"

Also you will not be able to get a text book on the Euclid space telescope, the upgrade on the large Hadron Collider or the latest paper on key organics detected in deep space.

These science communicators make a very good job of this.
 
I'm kind of like exchemist. I can quick-scan and comprehend text far faster than I can watch a video. And increasing the playback speed to cartoon character speech doesn't really work for me, either.

Nevertheless, I do sample a large number of them each day (not necessarily science-related ones). What's irritating is that the transcripts outputted by YouTube are incredibly sloppy, and they no longer even seem to have the option for eliminating the time signatures. Resourcefulness always finds a forbidden workaround for both, though.
_
 
Pinball1970 said:
I know, I had you in mind when I posted this!

You never watched "The sky at night," or "Tomorrow's world?"

Also you will not be able to get a text book on the Euclid space telescope, the upgrade on the large Hadron Collider or the latest paper on key organics detected in deep space.

These science communicators make a very good job of this.
Click to expand...
I used to watch Raymond Baxter in Tomorrow’s World sure, when I was a teenager. But that was a kind of technology news programme, drawing your attention to new things you were not aware of. There are Radio 4 programmes today that do that and sometimes I listen to those, if they are not too annoying.

YouTube videos don’t do that.

(P.S. apologies if I’m a bit crabby. I had a prostate biopsy last Monday and I’m still peeing blood, which is starting to piss (haha) me off. )
 
Pinball1970 said:
Ouch, that's not good.
So you had tests before you got to that stage? PSA? scan?
Click to expand...
MRI showing suspicious areas. But the quack says whatever it is, it is “not a ticking timebomb”, i.e slow developing. My father went to his grave with prostate cancer at the age of 94, dying from simple old age. So it could be one of those or else benign. Doc says radiation or surgery v. effective at such an early stage anyway. So I’m not too worried, but the biopsy has been more intrusive than I had expected. So I’m not full of the joys of spring right now.
 
exchemist said:
MRI showing suspicious areas. But the quack says whatever it is, it is “not a ticking timebomb”, i.e slow developing. My father went to his grave with prostate cancer at the age of 94, dying from simple old age. So it could be one of those or else benign. Doc says radiation or surgery v. effective at such an early stage anyway. So I’m not too worried, but the biopsy has been more intrusive than I had expected. So I’m not full of the joys of spring right now.
Click to expand...
Ok well get some good rest and food, I am sure you will.
 
I occasionally use (good quality!!) videos to help me built intuition for new mathematical concepts I encounter, particularly in differential geometry, topology etc, since I am a very visual thinker and learner. But yeah, most formal learning happens from textbooks. I just find that a lot of maths texts are great with formal definitions, proofs asf, but terrible with helping you build intuition.
 
No Ghost In This Shell said:
I occasionally use (good quality!!) videos to help me built intuition for new mathematical concepts I encounter, particularly in differential geometry, topology etc, since I am a very visual thinker and learner. But yeah, most formal learning happens from textbooks. I just find that a lot of maths texts are great with formal definitions, proofs asf, but terrible with helping you build intuition.
Click to expand...
Yes I too find it (or found it) helpful to visualise mathematics. I used to enjoy very much the Open University mathematics programmes when they were shown on BBC2, back in the day. It was somehow very soothing - almost meditative - to follow an entirely abstract idea. And the mathematics lecturers spoke with great clarity, in a gentle and thoughtful tone, which was also very calming. I miss those.
 
exchemist said:
Yes I too find it (or found it) helpful to visualise mathematics. I used to enjoy very much the Open University mathematics programmes when they were shown on BBC2, back in the day. It was somehow very soothing - almost meditative - to follow an entirely abstract idea. And the mathematics lecturers spoke with great clarity, in a gentle and thoughtful tone, which was also very calming. I miss those.
Click to expand...
YouTube is the closest thing!

Dr Physics A, all you ever see is the board. He works through the equations, that's it.
 
Some examples needed, good bad ugly.

Remember, science communication is not just about passing University level exams, it is explaining how vaccines work, climate change, as well as controversy in Cosmology and debunking pseudoscience.

The other side is entertainment, if you already understand the science, then you will find some of the videos interesting.

Richard Dawkins put it rather eloquently.

"Science is interesting, if you, disagree you can fuck off."

You can tell he was a Baliol man.
 
Anton covers Cosmology, Astrobiology and Abiogenesis. This is a clip about a paper from Nature that had a miscalculation.
I like his treatment of the issue. TheVat You mentioned DE and DESI features here.

 
Pinball1970 said:
Some examples needed, good bad ugly.

Remember, science communication is not just about passing University level exams, it is explaining how vaccines work, climate change, as well as controversy in Cosmology and debunking pseudoscience.

The other side is entertainment, if you already understand the science, then you will find some of the videos interesting.

Richard Dawkins put it rather eloquently.

"Science is interesting, if you, disagree you can fuck off."

You can tell he was a Baliol man.
Click to expand...
Was he left wing, then?
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top