Myths tested, according to Wikipedia:
Mythbusters: Flu Fiction
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Cold myths: Ick. Not much to say. I guess I'm glad the sneeze myth was busted. As for the other, the results were pretty obvious. What bears adding, though, is what they pointed out in an earlier myth (about "double-dipping" with a cracker): germs get everywhere in normal human interaction anyway, and that's why we have immune systems.
Tornado decapitation: I wonder why they even bothered throwing the glass by hand rather than going right to a controllable rig. I guess to pad out the episode. Anyway, on the truck thing, it did look to me like the glass was failing to decouple from the truck in both cases. I wonder if there was a way to have a release trigger that would let go of the glass a split-second before impact, maybe by crossing an infrared beam just before the target or something. But the glass-flinging rig (which was like a ramped-up version of Jamie's scary card-flinging gizmo from the myth about lethal playing cards) was a better way to go. As the narrator said, it's weird for them to do the biggest, most visually spectacular test in the middle of the myth and then ramp down, but it got better results. And it's kind of scary that the myth was confirmed.
Tornado decapitation: I wonder why they even bothered throwing the glass by hand rather than going right to a controllable rig. I guess to pad out the episode. Anyway, on the truck thing, it did look to me like the glass was failing to decouple from the truck in both cases. I wonder if there was a way to have a release trigger that would let go of the glass a split-second before impact, maybe by crossing an infrared beam just before the target or something. But the glass-flinging rig (which was like a ramped-up version of Jamie's scary card-flinging gizmo from the myth about lethal playing cards) was a better way to go. As the narrator said, it's weird for them to do the biggest, most visually spectacular test in the middle of the myth and then ramp down, but it got better results. And it's kind of scary that the myth was confirmed.
Sneeze Myths: Uck. That was just... Ugh.
The 100mph thing I've always been suspicious of but the spread if it didn't surprise me. I do wonder, however, if they didn't get results due to a small sample size? Jamie and Adam may not be the most, um, "forceful" sneezers. I also wonder why the picked snuff to generate a sneeze rather than pepper or even something as simple as dunking their head in water and "breathing" it. Both of which can generate sneezes.
The spreading of the sneeze didn't surprise me much. Not much to say here.
The tornado decapitation. Eh. Seemed like a waste, it was obvious to me that a pane of glass would shatter as soon as it hit a person and most windows these days are likely made of tempered glass and not going to cause many problems and, hell, even likely shatter when ripped out of the frame or while in the funnel. And while it may not de-capitate, if it's pane glass I couldn't see it being fun to get hit by it.
The truck can only go 80 miles an hour?! Is it governed by bullshit California liberal hippie laws? Or is that all the faster in can go in the limited space? The stronger glass in the, rare, EF-5 tornado makes sense, but those sizes of tornados are hardly common. as they said. The average tornado's results were quite surproising.
I still it's hardly common for entire, clean, sheets of glass to be flying through the air.
The 100mph thing I've always been suspicious of but the spread if it didn't surprise me. I do wonder, however, if they didn't get results due to a small sample size? Jamie and Adam may not be the most, um, "forceful" sneezers. I also wonder why the picked snuff to generate a sneeze rather than pepper or even something as simple as dunking their head in water and "breathing" it. Both of which can generate sneezes.
The spreading of the sneeze didn't surprise me much. Not much to say here.
The tornado decapitation. Eh. Seemed like a waste, it was obvious to me that a pane of glass would shatter as soon as it hit a person and most windows these days are likely made of tempered glass and not going to cause many problems and, hell, even likely shatter when ripped out of the frame or while in the funnel. And while it may not de-capitate, if it's pane glass I couldn't see it being fun to get hit by it.
The truck can only go 80 miles an hour?! Is it governed by bullshit California liberal hippie laws? Or is that all the faster in can go in the limited space? The stronger glass in the, rare, EF-5 tornado makes sense, but those sizes of tornados are hardly common. as they said. The average tornado's results were quite surproising.
I still it's hardly common for entire, clean, sheets of glass to be flying through the air.
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Those can, yes, but the whole point of snuff is to induce sneezing. That's what it does. So it makes sense that it's the best thing for the task, as long as you keep your use of it brief. (Although I suppose they could've also used trick sneezing powder.)
Ooo... kayy... leaving aside that anachronism... they went at 80 mph because they didn't need to go faster. They were aiming for a specific kinetic energy, and given the mass of the sheet of glass they were using, that was the appropriate velocity.
Besides, Tory's not a professional stunt driver, and that was an ordinary truck, not a racing vehicle. And 80 MPH is pretty damn fast as it is. Going faster would've been unnecessarily dangerous and quite stupid. Of course, that's practically Tory's motto, but that's all the more reason not to ask him to do it.
I took it that the truck could go only so fast so they made up for it by making the glass larger.
Anyway, interesting myth and the results were surprising to me, but I still wonder how "possible" it is. I mean, just because it "can" happen doesn't mean it "does" or "will" happen. As I said, I doubt that there's many whole panes of glass flying around in tornados that're going to be flung in nice, flat, clean patterns towards people's necks.
On Adam's final experiment with the nasal drippings it seemed silly to me. "If Adam's nose is dripping and he doesn't touch anything will anyone be infected?" Well, of course not. He didn't touch anything! They should've still had him touch things but maybe reign in contamination by using Purel, wiping into his hankie, etc. I mean, if nothing he touches is handled by someone else it seems likely to me no one will be contaminated. And they seemed to take "contamination" as being "OMG YOU'LL GET SICK!!!" Which strikes me as a step or two too far and only reafirms germ-a-phobes' fears.
Yeah, his sludge was all over the place but that doesn't necessairly mean the people he touched or the people who touch things he tocuhed would get sick. Immune systems are wonderful things, being a germ-a-phobe isn't a good way to build one up.
tornado decapitation from glass pane from a truck maybe.
but from experience i can tell the glass in most downtown towers is safety glass that is shattering into tiny pieces on its way down.
i live in nashville and in 98 a tornado ripped through the heart of downtwon.
and glass was flying every where out of the towers. but no decapitation and as far as i know no major injuries from the glass.
(there were about 100 injuries in all so there may have been some cuts.
but by far the glass i saw on the ground was very tiny pieces. i found glass from our building several blocks away.
no if one had gotten hit by the elevator or the washing machine seen flying through the air.
but from experience i can tell the glass in most downtown towers is safety glass that is shattering into tiny pieces on its way down.
i live in nashville and in 98 a tornado ripped through the heart of downtwon.
and glass was flying every where out of the towers. but no decapitation and as far as i know no major injuries from the glass.
(there were about 100 injuries in all so there may have been some cuts.
but by far the glass i saw on the ground was very tiny pieces. i found glass from our building several blocks away.
no if one had gotten hit by the elevator or the washing machine seen flying through the air.
Adam has truly disgusting sneezes!
Not a bad episode. Had the same problems with the flu part, difference between being touched and getting sick. But then you have to figure out how communicible things are, how long something can sit before it's not as infectious, immune systems, etc. Just easier to see what he touched, how far it got, etc. The examples were both extreme, though, as he either went out of his way to touch everything, or put his hands in his pockets and just gave verbal instructions, touching nothing. Just having him act normally around people would have made more sense, like how he interacted in the model-building experiment.
The tornado one was kinda 'meh' to me. Fun to go through, but not really breaking any ground or saying anything interesting. hard things going fast = injuries. Yep, got it. And the truck wasn't releasing right in any of them, so kinda wasted. The wheel-shooting one pretty much got it, though. narrow, stiff surface + speed usually will be able to produce this, just gotta crunch the numbers. Cities and such may use safety glass to avoid some of this, but not really important to the myth, as it was much more of a rural, tornado at the farm kina myth, so would be dealing with regular house glass panes, and in many cases, older houses, so using the kind of glass they used was fine.
The tornado one was kinda 'meh' to me. Fun to go through, but not really breaking any ground or saying anything interesting. hard things going fast = injuries. Yep, got it. And the truck wasn't releasing right in any of them, so kinda wasted. The wheel-shooting one pretty much got it, though. narrow, stiff surface + speed usually will be able to produce this, just gotta crunch the numbers. Cities and such may use safety glass to avoid some of this, but not really important to the myth, as it was much more of a rural, tornado at the farm kina myth, so would be dealing with regular house glass panes, and in many cases, older houses, so using the kind of glass they used was fine.
I rated it excellent. Maybe my favorite of the season.
I thought their drip rig and how they used it to test the germ myth was rather ingenious.
I thought their drip rig and how they used it to test the germ myth was rather ingenious.
Watching Kari on Mythbusters always brings a smile to my face 
I was impressed with the runny nose testing, but yeah, we have immune systems for a reason, and if we totally cut ourselves off from germs it won't learn how to fight them, we need to be exposed to some things so we can build an immunity for it.
I was impressed with the runny nose testing, but yeah, we have immune systems for a reason, and if we totally cut ourselves off from germs it won't learn how to fight them, we need to be exposed to some things so we can build an immunity for it.
I thought this was going to be about flu shot myths cuz of the whole swine flu hooplah
i still think the torque of the tornado would shatter glass before it went very far.
i actually have a maple that for years showed where its bark was twisted.
and there was even swirl patterns in the grass.
i might actually believe it more with a straight line wind.
Depends on the radius, really. The funnel cloud is just the center of the actual tornado, which is a much wider body of rapidly rotating air. Look at footage of real tornadoes and you'll see stuff swirling around them at considerable distances from the visible funnel. At a radius of a hundred meters or more, a window-sized pane of glass wouldn't feel much difference between a straight path and a circular one.
A couple notes. They actually said the truck couldn't go above 80mph which necessitated the larger glass. The truck and throwing was silly and time wasting. When I heard the myth my first thought was "robot." I'm a little puzzled at the double thick glass. The earlier thinner glass they qualified as being rated for use in construction within tornado areas. While the runny nose bit (up to 1L per day? ugh) was an "extreme" case I think it should be shown to employees and school children. It shows a little bit of self-awareness can help prevent spreading illness far and wide. The amount of lost productivity, wasted use of antibiotics, and needless health care costs, is staggering each "cold/flu" season.
You have to be exposed to germs and viruses to become immune to them. You'll end up sicker living a santized life than you would if led a somewhat dirty one. Autoimmune diseases (where the immune system is so freaked out that it begins to attack itself) are much more prevalent in developed nations than it is in under-developed ones. I'm not saying to wallow in filth but the need for every soap to be "anti bacterial" and for everyone on the planet to pretty much carry with them Purel is insanity. You need to expose yourself to these things to develop immunity to them. Playing it "safe" is all fine and good, but the day-glo drip was not only, perhaps, a bit extreme but also just re-afirming people's fears.
OMG THERE'S GERMS EVERYWHERE!!!!
It's not likely going to kill you to touch something someone just had who just wiped their nose. At the very worst case you'd end up with... a cold, maybe a flu.
Oh the noes!Yes, people die from the flu, but generally those people are older or have otherwise compromised immune systems. You can't lead a completely sterile life it's far less healthy to do so than it is to lead a "dirty" one. If Adam really did have a cold the likelihood of anyone at that table catching it from his drippings is slim, and if they did catch it they'd get... a cold. Making them uncomfortable for a few days. And the average adult gets something like 10 colds a year anyway, so it's not even possible to avoid getting a cold. People need to chill out and not be so freaked out over germs.
If Adam had just wiped his nose, I'd have no prolbem shaking it and then perhaps, wiping or rinsing my hand later. I'm not freaked out by germs and, somehow, I manage to practicaly never get sick aside from the usual colds every year.
Well and that one time I had food posoining, but that was Wendy's fault.
And, OK, the brain tumor thing but Lord knows who to blame for that!
^Actually I read that they conducted a study of wearing aluminum foil on the head to block transmissions, and they found it actually amplifies them. You'd need to encase your head completely on all sides, make a full Faraday cage, in order to block radio signals, and you can't do that as long as you have a face, neck, and body in the way.
What this means, of course, is that the whole "you must wear foil hats to block the alien transmissions" is actually a disinformation campaign by the aliens to give them even more complete control over us! Aaaaahhh!!! They're here already! You're next, you're next!
What this means, of course, is that the whole "you must wear foil hats to block the alien transmissions" is actually a disinformation campaign by the aliens to give them even more complete control over us! Aaaaahhh!!! They're here already! You're next, you're next!
i thought it was okay but it was a bit disgusting....the slushie drink one was better done.....
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