The Look Around You programme was produced in 2002 and 2005 by the BBC and makes a brilliant mockery of self-teaching programs from the early to mid-1980s, the sorts of programs that were shown here in the US on PBS stations and required you to send away for a workbook through which you would follow along as the program ran.
The first season had eight ten-minute episodes, and the second season had six thirty-minute episodes. The episodes ranged in topic from water, calcium, maths, brain, and computers. The humor is bone dry but certainly present, and the science is atrociously wrong throughout.
In this premier episode, I particularly recommend skipping to...
- 6:17 - calcium molecule (including triple helix) and the dread Helvetica Scenario
- 8:00 - the refining of calcium from 6 tonnes of teeth per day
- 9:22 - the return of the Helvetica Scenario
- 10:10 - a very weird thing (whose name I can't figure out) on a pillow
- 12:20 - the nonsensical reaction between calcium and sodium chloride to form Thompson's oil
- 13:10 - calcium oxide vapor's paralytic properties
- 13:30 - the effects of helium gas upon calcium - using a ping pong ball to demonstrate that the calcium pile hasn't really disappeared after the helium exposure at 2.5 quorums per second - showing calcic image misplacement
- 16:20 - the differences between calcium and intelligent calcium
- 20:42 - some advice about calcium
It's tough to get full episodes online, but DVDs can be purchased.
Most of the clips on YouTube are much shorter than the one I've embedded above....check them out after the jump...
No comments:
Post a Comment