So, I’ve been watching the Mythbusters marathon today, and it made think about a number of experiments I would to see tried. Among them was one I posted about here a couple of months ago: What would happen if you poured Vodka into a humidifier?
Anyway what are some myths you’d like to see Adam and Jamie tackle?
I’ve got an idea involving a variant of Galvani’s frog-leg experiment, part of a fresh steer carcass, and some napalm (or a substitute that burns at the same temperature, at least).
(I have a zombie theory I want to test out…)
About the only myth I can think of that they haven’t tested is the put-a-sleeping-person’s-hand-in-warm-water thing.
Two problems:
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Is there any way to make that myth safe for television?
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If it is shown to work, I fear for the future of humanity.
A little off-topic, but I want to see Mike Rowe on Dirty Jobs work as a snowmaker at a ski area. Middle of the night, 20 below zero, high winds, trying to keep water flowing. Seriously dirty job.
Since you posted this, I would like to say to everyone that doesn’t know that both Dirty Jobs and Mythbusters start new seasons this week on Tuesday and Wednesday, respectively.
Sound suppressed firearms-the whole works, handguns, rifles ,subguns-both supersonic and subsonic ammo, downrange and up close.
My stepson wants them to do the “atomic flush” myth: if you flush all the toilets in a school building at once, what happens? His friends seem to think the pipes will all burst, but he’s not sure.
He’s sent it in to them, but heard nothing…not surprising, they probably get thousands of suggestions a year.
I want the upside-down-Formula-One racer myth (at speed, the airflow produces downward force in excess of the weight of the car, thus, you could drive it upside down on a ceiling if you could get it fast enough). Note: I don’t actually care whether the myth is true or not (what possible applicability could it have?), I just want to see the setup they’d have to use to try it.
It’s a common request in their forums, and treated with a derision usually reserved for those who still think a plane can’t take off from a treadmill. But they did that one, so I hold out hope.
That sounds interesting. Have you submitted it to them? I know they’re always asking people to do such.
I once posted about the fire/drop a bullet thing, similar response. The thing is, nobody would accept that I fully had a grasp of the physics involved and I wanted to see how much (if noticeably at all, even on a high speed camera) the curvature of the earth and other factors that I’m everyone who’s been here for longer than a month knows about played. Of course, there are many, many issues with it, such setting up the high speed in the right place, hoping it’s not a blustery day, and so on. I would have accepted “too difficult” but the… vitriolic reaction wasn’t very fun. I still maintain that I want to see them try it.
You’re in luck. They’re testing it on Wednesday’s episode.
I’d love to see them actually try to prove what they set out to prove instead of rejiggering things so it’s something else entirely.
I want to know if someone’s head remains conscious after being severed from the body. They should do an experiment to determine this, guest-starring Kanye West.
Y’know, I haven’t - I probably should.
Do submit your idea, BrotherCadfael. Dirty Jobs has to keep going as long as possible! Even jobs that aren’t ‘dirty’ per se are fun to watch Mike do, and watching Mike do anything is part of what keeps me going in my sad life.
As for Mythbusters, seems like they’ve done everything and from now on are just going to blow things up. They should change the title to Blowing Things Up With the Mythbusters.
OK, I registered at the Discovery site and opened a thread in the Dirty Jobs Suggestions forum on snowmaking.
I’d love to see them test magnets and traffic lights. Too many times I’ve been stuck on my SV650 at a light that won’t turn green. People keep saying they don’t work, but for every one that say’s it doesn’t work, there’s someone that says it’s worked for a signal that’s caused them trouble. Cheap and easy to do, though there’s no excuse to blow something up or build a gadget, so I suppose they’ll never do it.
I really do think they could make most of an episode around the functions of a stillsuit from Dune. It is, at it’s heart, a movie prop, which is what Jamie’s company is mostly about. And it in some way uses science, but exactly how much, is up for debate. For example, “near-normal evaporation near the skin layer”, umm … yeah, but uh … no, no fabric is actually the same as, but then, they only say “near-normal”, so what’s the answer? Just how good is the best contemporary permeable fabrics under these conditions?
There are other things to test: can humans generate enough pumping force to desalinate sweat through a reverse osmosis membrane. Okay the, how about human urine? The British show Braniac sent human urine through a Brita-type water filter until it was (barely) potable. And I’m just going to not think about the suit processing feces like the book and movie said.
Can Jamie and Adam construct with off the shelf components a wearable heat exchange system, one that’s not the borderline magical “heat exchange fibers” mentioned. And can you really capture enough human moisture to endure the desert longer? And what’s the best style – David Lynch black, or SiFi Channel reflective silver?
And the quintessential question – what does Kari look like in a stillsuit?
Monkeys and typewriters. Hey, they wrangled ducks to see if they echoed, they can wrangle a thousand monkeys.
Y’know, Arkcon, I was reading through your post thinking it was probably too difficult, and just because they can’t manage to do it doesn’t mean it’s impossible, and so on,
But this would indeed make it worthwhile.