MythBusters: Swimming in Syrup and “the Momentum Force”
In a recent episode of Adam Savage’s Tested, Adam talked about some myths that changed due to budget constraints. As always, it’s quite entertaining to listen to all of his stories from his time on The MythBusters.
I’m going to talk about some physics from this episode, but I want to make sure some stuff is clear. I think Adam Savage is awesome. I’m a huge fan of MythBusters (especially after working as the science advisor for about the last 5 years). I think that one of the things that made The MythBusters so popular was that Adam and Jamie weren’t labeled as “scientists”. Instead, they seem like normal people answering questions with their super awesome building skills. Of course, this is exactly what makes them scientists — but they don’t sound like them.
I remember while working for the show, I would get an email with a video or quote for Adam (it was always Adam). The producer wanted to know if what Adam said about science was legit. My answer was always that it didn’t really matter. It was Adam just talking like a normal human. If he said things that weren’t technically true — that was fine. Now, what was NOT fine was a error in the “science panels” that they put up in the show. That’s mostly the part I worked on.
OK, so I should summarize: Adam good, MythBusters good. However, I think this is…
