Michio Kaku, that omnipresent, physics-spouting android of a television personality, has a show on The Science Channel called Sci-Fi Science. Each 30-minute episode discusses some sci-fi concept, like warp drives or something, and goes over the basic physics behind that concept and what we can do today.
(Really? You GUESS that carbon dioxide is denser and heavier than air? You aren't sure about that?)
My issue with the show is that I don't know who it's for. If you're catering to the uninformed-laymen market, why have it on a channel that's aimed squarely at the super-laymen demographic. It would be like Scientific American explaining chemistry with wacky comics and slapstick. There's nothing wrong with being an uninformed-laymen. You're still interested in this stuff, you might just not have enough time to read up on this and do all of the other things that you enjoy. But Discovery Networks already has a channel for this demographic, it's called the Discovery Channel! What? Are they too busy just blowing shit up in the name of "science" in an attempt to attract a demographic one step below what they should be doing? What the fuck!
Is that their strategy? Create a channel, aim it at a market, then, tailor all of the shows to entice a lower market? The Learning Channel used to be simple but educational, now it's aimed at assholes. Discovery is now the simple but educational, and Science Channel is now the somewhat dry and educational channel (with a few silly things thrown in). What the fuck is the new Science Channel, that actually covers science, going to be called?! The UNIFIED FIELD THEORY CHANNEL?!?!
It's also odd that they'd attach a luminary of advanced (and some would say fringe) concepts like string theory to a show that seems aimed at middle-schoolers.
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