Nova - "The Elegant Universe: Welcome to the 11th Dimension"

[Mark]

Nova - "The Elegant Universe: Einstein's Dream; String's the Thing"

PBS 11 (Chicago) Oct 28 08:00pm
120 Mins.
Episode #3012W.

Author Brian Greene ("The Elegant Universe'') explains string theory; physicists attempt to unify general relativity and quantum mechanics; string theory states that vibrating strands of energy give rise to all the elementary particles.

 

[DanMcS]

Thanks for reminding me. The guy doing this show was on letterman a week or two back, and it was fun to watch him explain physics stuff as Dave sat there with the open-mouthed-dog look on his face.

 

[DanMcS]

Wow, this show has been on for ten minutes, and it's already great. There's a shot of the host writing equations on a chalkboard, then he's like, "ok, what does this symbol stand for?" To which the reply is, "Ruff, ruff." He sighs, and asks "Have you been studying at all? No matter how hard you try, you can't teach physics to a dog."

 

[Krieg]

NOVA has always been the show when it comes to the hard sciences.

I'm especially happy that they went into depth regarding Einstein's inability to deal with quantum mechanics in his advancing age.

Damn I miss Sagan.

 

[DanMcS]

They took pretty much an hour and a half to do background setup, and the last half-hour is about string theory. Not precisely what was advertised, but interesting nonetheless. Ah, it's a multipart series, I didn't realize that until the very end when they advertised the next episode.

At one point, one of the scientists said something like, "Special Relativity has remarkable predictive ability. Nothing predicted by it has ever been contradicted by observation." My gamer mind is always tweaked by statements like that. It sounds like something out of Mage:TA, doesn't it? They saw exactly what they believed they would see! Heh.

 

[physicscarp]

I should have known that you'd be watching this show, Dan!

I agree with what you mean about setup, but I just kept reminding myself that not everyone understands GR and QM, let alone why they are so damn incompatible. I think Brian Greene did a great job as a host, as he always seems to create great analogies for the layman that don't seem to lose sight of the original idea. I'm actually thinking of making my physics class watch this and read his book by the same name later this year.

It was also nice to see both sides of the discussion. In particular, I liked that they called string theory on its lack of experimental evidence.

Carp

 

[Mark]

I think Brian Greene did a great job as a host, as he always seems to create great analogies for the layman that don't seem to lose sight of the original idea.

Reminds me of Asimov in that respect.

 

[Welverin]

Good to hear it was entertaining, I taped and will watch it later.

I recommend the book as well, entertaining if if your knowledge of physics is lacking (as mine is, the futher I got the less I understood).

 

[Tarrasque Wrangler]

Very interesting program. I guess my problem is, looking at the world from the Einsteinian POV, I want to see energy and matter as separate and discrete components. But here's string theory, in which the basic component of all matter is ... energy. I've got a big mental block on that. It's like, I understand the words coming out of their mouths, but they're not being assembled into sentences I recognize. Hopefully the next episode will have some more nuts and bolts.

 

[Orius]

NOVA has always been the show when it comes to the hard sciences.

It has to be.

People can say what they like about Discovery, TLC, the History channel, et al. treading on PBS's territory when it comes to educational programming (that is science and history shows). But I think the competition is good for them, PBS consistantly produces quality television, probably because they have to do so to survive. NOVA is a good example, they consistantly produce good programming. Another good recent example was Warrior Challenge. It's entertaining, not overly dumbed down, and informative.