NTG’s drinking and selling the “Pluto shouldn’t be a planet” Kool-Aid made me regard him as a poser. He jsut blindly spouts the IAU party line with not even so much as a mild counter argument. Whoever posted that he sounds like a teleprompter reader hit the nail on the head. I thought it sucked. It needs to be remade by PBS and by any of the myriad of serious astrophysicists out there who have just as interesting personalities.
BwanaBob, what do you have against Pluto? It doesn’t deserve that kind of abuse. It’s finally gotten the recognition it deserves, and you want to take that away from it?
I liked both versions. The original Cosmos, wasn’t it a PBS production? But the current NdGT version, that’s from Fox, right?
So the new version maybe speaks more clearly to a younger audience, raised on special effects and anime, and does a fine job. The focus is a bit tighter–in other words, less material, but done more prettily. The original Cosmos might be better suited for high school and college students, and grown-ups.
As for Pluto the planet, I’m fine with it, provided that we add in the 3 (or more?) similarly sized planets to our elementary school teaching of what’s in the solar system. Why stop with Pluto?