FOX To Host New Cosmos 206
twocows writes "FOX is set to make a new season of Carl Sagan's 'Cosmos: A Personal Voyage,' hosted by Neil Degrasse Tyson and written by none other than Ann Druyan (Carl Sagan's widow). Let's hope they don't screw it up like every other good show they've aired in the past decade."
How long? (Score:2, Insightful)
How long will it survive the flood of complaint calls about forcing evolution into peoples houses?
Re:How long? (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:How long? (Score:4, Funny)
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Re:How long? (Score:4, Insightful)
Yes, NDT will be good. He's an ass kicker. He'd probably quickly point out that they Martian temp rise has been attributed to a slight increase in radiation (sunlight) on a mostly CO2 atmosphere (heat trapping) that has led to a great increase in dust clouds (making the atmosphere denser and more heat absorbing) and at the same time the soil left behind after the dust is kicked up is darker, which means that it's also more heat absorbing. So the mechanism is entirely different. The minor increase in solar radiation just wouldn't have that effect on the Earth — not without massive deforestation and a huge outpouring of CO2 (even more massive than what we've done already).
No, how Fox will screw this up is by ordering 13 episodes, airing them out of order (so that ape-like creatures evolve from liberals, perhaps) and then only airing about eight or so before canceling the series. But then it has the rights and no one else can show them.
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I'm saying that Mars is warming for entirely different reasons than the Earth. Just because two things are similar does not mean they are the same, or even related. For the Earth's rise in temp to be caused by the same as Mars', the conditions would have to be the same or similar. They aren't. Apples and oranges.
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Sorry, climate is not weather, and if you don't know the difference, you're well advised to take some lessons.
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The "Mars is warming" myth is argument #27 on this excellent list of arguments [skepticalscience.com] from "climate skeptics", you may want to check on some other things you've "heard". Of course there's also a WP page [wikipedia.org]
Re:How long? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:How long? (Score:4, Informative)
One is the tanker car full of manure and the other is the maglev that pulls the bullshit train.
I'm comfortable refusing to give my money to both, especially since anything they make that is of interest can be obtained free of charge and commercial free.
How you like me now, Rupe?
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How you like me now, Rupe?
He's probably not too fond of you but I bet he'd love your voicemail.
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How are you giving them money? Are you hooked up to a Nielsen box?
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If you buy a copy of Angry Birds Rio, you are giving Fox money. If you subscribe to a cable system, you are giving Fox money. If you pay to see X-Men: First Class you are giving Fox money. Same with Mr Popper's Penguins, or Rio.
Fox is in a lot of pockets, and I try to keep it out of mine. It's not going to make a difference unless I'm posting torrents of high-quality rips of Family Guy or whatever, but for me it's a matter of honor.
Re:How long? (Score:5, Insightful)
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You say "follow", but you clearly don't mean that in the Twitter sense ( http://twitter.com/#!/neiltyson [twitter.com] )
14 hours ago, he said: "Yes, all rumors are true: I'm hosting a 13-episode, 21st century version of COSMOS, to air on FOX in 2013: http://n.pr/nBEz44 [n.pr] "
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This bothers me. I'm all for teaching science in ways the viewer can relate to -- something Dr. Sagan did very well -- but I fear that Fox may be on a track that often results in a vague representation of the facts and weakly presented science, tailored to make you feel goo
Re:How long? (Score:4, Funny)
Billions and Billions of years.
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We just have to trust NDT (Score:5, Insightful)
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From the article: "The deal with Fox is reportedly due to MacFarlane’s long-running relationship with 20th Century Fox, which helped him create the Family Guy franchise."
I think we're talking about the entertainment channel and not the propaganda/entertainment channel. Like you, I'm hoping Degrasse Tyson properly 'informs' the show. If it's one thing our society needs it's a good, strong shot-in-the-arm of scientific appreciation.
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They're under the same umbrella, but you do have a point.
FOXNEWS wants to get people in with propaganda and..."creative" truths.
FOX the entertainment channel wants people to watch with as much entertaining TV as possible. They'll broadcast a special of religion RIGHT NEXT TO a special about atheism if they thought it would get more viewers.
Ah, capitalism. Sometimes you smell so good.
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From the article: "The deal with Fox is reportedly due to MacFarlaneâ(TM)s long-running relationship with 20th Century Fox, which helped him create the Family Guy franchise."
You mean the show that had this version of Cosmos? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hE_OehRLH3s [youtube.com] I suppose that's okay then, because Mt. Dew is the best soda everï made. Throwback Dew if you're a Fundamentalist Dew-head.
MacFarlane talks about that aspect of Fox (Score:4, Insightful)
On one of the Family Guy DVD extras, he answers a fan question about the politics of the show and Fox. He explains that Fox Broadcasting and Fox News are run very separate, and that Fox in total is a massive company. So massive that he, one of their rather big name creators, has never met Murdoch. He said that in the entertainment division, what they care about is people watching a show. If the show gets viewers and sells ads, that's all that matters there are not concerns with the political content.
Makes sense too. Fox News is what it is because people want to hear that narrative. They have to maintain their slant because that is precisely why they have the viewers they do. They have people who desire to hear that and (sometimes I think even more) people who listen to make themselves angry at what "the other guy" is saying. So they do it for ratings.
Well their entertainment branch, the regular Fox stations, are the same, except they don't have a narrative because it is entertainment. They want to give people what they want, which for the entertainment side is often very different. It is a different set of viewers for different programs.
Hence they are fine with MacFarlane. His show brings in viewers, probably not the same ones as Fox News but that doesn't matter. Even better for that matter, the Fox News viewers can watch that while the Family guy viewers watch that and Fox gets more money.
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Sarah Palin hosting a Discovery show and Neil Degrasse Tyson on FOX. What's going on??
Or beams, maybe. (Score:4, Insightful)
If you ask me, I think it's rays.
The same rays that has guys hating Transformers and loving Little Ponies.
Fire the orbital friendship cannon! Set weapons to "tolerate!"
Re:We just have to trust NDT (Score:5, Informative)
The man said it best himself.
http://twitter.com/neiltyson/status/99600564995887104 [twitter.com]
"Simple Logic: Worried that FOX viewers don't know, think, or care about science? That's why COSMOS belongs on FOX."
and he's right. if anyone can spark an interest in science it's Dr. Neil deGrasse Tyson.
If you can't bring yourself to tune into Fox
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=139033386 [npr.org]
National Geographic Channel will air a same-night encore of the episodes following their broadcast on Fox.
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Logic fail: people can change the channel.
If you can't bring yourself to tune into Fox
Are there really people like that? I don't like the ideology over on the news channel so I won't watch Fringe on the entertainment channel? I'm not hooked up to a rating box, so who the hell knows or cares?
Re:We just have to trust NDT (Score:5, Insightful)
Probably like most people here, my initial reaction was to wonder why the hell an organization that hates science and rational thought is hosting Cosmos, and more importantly, whether they'll turn it into a soapbox for god-knows-what. If Neil Degrasse Tyson is on board though, I'm a little less worried. That man doesn't take any bullshit, and if Fox tries to muscle him into anything, he's going to walk away. That can be your canary in the coal mine to see if the show is worth watching.
Like someone else mentioned, the Fox that airs Family Guy, The Simpsons and formerly Married with Children is not the same as FoxNews that airs Bill O'reilly, Sean Hannity and formerly Glenn Beck. I guess it's true that ignorance is the base bigotry. The sad part is, you don't even know who to hate.
You are like General Custer hating Gandhi because he was an Indian.
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It should be noted that General Custer did NOT hate Indians. He rather admired them, actually. Alas, his job didn't care whether he liked them or not, he still had to protect the "settlers" (yes, even when the settlers were doing illegal things).
Of course, this was the period of the "noble savage" concept, which automagically made Indians kind of cool to people who had never encountered them.
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I think the original argument stands. Politics aside, FOX is still the network responsible for hack documentaries such as "Alien Autopsies" and that moon landing hoax nonsense which was bad enough to compelled NASA to issue a public statement to the contrary. I find it very unlikely that NDT will see eye to eye with the network executives on this endeavor and will leave the project screaming bloody murder sooner rather than later.
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That just means the channel has much to atone for. :-) So let them have it, I say. I hope they get a good CGI team for the space stuff.
This is hilarious. We have a new Cosmos headed by a solid, scientific host, and people are tripping over their own precious little ideologies in apoplexy because of a channel.
This is why I avoid the stuff. Ideology, that is.
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Like someone else mentioned, the Fox that airs Family Guy, The Simpsons and formerly Married with Children is not the same as FoxNews that airs Bill O'reilly, Sean Hannity and formerly Glenn Beck.
There is some leakage between the channels. For example, remember when Paris Hilton was trying to "break in" to the big leagues of celebritism? She had that show, "The Simple Life" and it aired on the Fox Network. One day before the premiere episode, O'Reilly, in his "no spin zone" 'broke the news' of her sex tape.
So, when it comes down to making mo money, the two channels don't have quite so much editorial independence.
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why the hell an organization that hates science and rational thought is hosting Cosmos,
Does Fox really hate science? AFAIK they do National Geographic ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Geographic_Channel [wikipedia.org] )
They love profit. If it makes them more money to host Cosmos they will. If it makes them more money to host a series on "Intelligent Design", they will. If it makes them even more money to host both series, they will- hey think of the synergies :).
If you're grumbling about Foxnews, from a Free Market Capitalist's view they're doing things fine, depending on how you measure it they're t
Ahaha! So that is their game (Score:2)
You do know how the canary test works don't you? Either Neil Degrasse Tyson will play ball or he will be pining for the fjords. Either way, Fox wins. They always do. *Omnious music plays*
Without Carl (Score:2)
It will suck.
Degrasse? He's great, but I really like Cox (Score:2)
Just update the original (Score:2)
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Simpsons already did it...
err, I mean, they sort of did update it, thought not the graphics itself... at least not based upon the info at imdb.
Wikipedia mentions "Cosmos, a special edition", a shorter version which had some of the same footage, and computer graphics, in 1986, on TNT.
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Han shot first.
Showing on Fox? (Score:3)
One exception I can think of... (Score:3)
screw it up like every other good show they've aired in the past decade
FOX has yet to screw up Fringe, which is one of the best shows on TV - broadcast or cable - aside from moving it to Friday nights. But since every good geek has some sort of DVR (and would be home on a Friday night anyway) that doesn't matter too much for this series.
If they screw up Fringe, though, then a pox on all their families. And a plague on their villages for good measure!
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A true geek has no life to speak of on Friday, anyway!
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Who? (Score:2)
Did you mean: Ann Druyan [wikipedia.org]
Being FOX you have to wonder... (Score:2)
what's their agenda? Part of me wonder if they aren't trying to increase the number of educational shows in their prime time schedule in order to weaken the argument for public television. Of course once Murdoch finally kills the corporation for public broadcasting and the public televisions, he'll be free to drop these educational shows and go back to his usual prime time crap.
I admit this seems too far fetched of a scheme to take seriously. Only Murdoch would be crazy enough to try that... o wait. ;)
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have you ever seen some of the shit they show on Fox late night.. some of those shows go totally against the news organization's slant... besides, NatGeo will will rebroadcast on the same night. I have a lot of respect for NatGeo.
There's a lot of anti-evolution comments in this post (obviously meant to be jokes) but I think that's kind of insulting to Dr. Tyson. He would NEVER cave to that kind of thing... and Ann Druyan (assuming she still has some rights to COSMOS) would would only grant permission if the
Is that the NAT Geo (Score:2)
That broadcasts "things" that pose such questions as "how would earth defend itself from alien attack". Imagine Independence Day with the indepth research, the special effects, the realism.
The humans ultimate attack? Lifting themselves up by balloons to the space ships hovering about the earth. Oh and it is a globally coordinated strike... apparently the weather is the same all over the planet in the future. Oh god, now I am trying to make sense of it.
NatGeo and Discovery are not what it once was.
all this slanted commentary... (Score:2)
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Ideology is the mind killer. Ideology is the little-stupid that brings idiocy.
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Ideology is the mind killer. Ideology is the little-stupid that brings idiocy.
Mod parent +1 Funny, please!
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ITS FOX not FOX NEWS (Score:5, Insightful)
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Is that the same FOX channel that aired the "Conspiracy Theory: Did We Land on the Moon?" program, that promoted moon hoax claims ?
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Both are owned by the extreme right-wing and criminal Newscorp. That they try to cultivate multiple brand images is more a sign of a corporate personality problem than it is of unbiased functionality.
You do realize that Murdoch supported Hillary Clinton, right? You do realize that Fox is NOT FoxNews, right? Murdoch is a business man. His only agenda is making a profit, which is what businesses are supposed to do. Murdoch looked at the news landscape and realized that it was dominated by left wingers and slanted far to the right of the American public. So, he created a news network that is right of center, but one that still presents both sides of the political spectrum. What do you know... Fox New
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I am sure he has his reasons. That changes nothing I said.
"You do realize that Fox is NOT FoxNews, right?"
Fox News however is Fox. So is the Sun, the Wall Street Journal, the New York Post, and of course so was the News of the World. Notice a pattern? About the only case of extreme-right tabloid trash that doesn't have the Newscorp name on it is the Daily Mail.
"Because Murdoch found that a majority of the population was not represent
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"You do realize that Murdoch supported Hillary Clinton, right?"
I am sure he has his reasons. That changes nothing I said.
Of course he had his reasons. He was convinced that Hillary Clinton would be far easier to demonize, and would be a far more effective rallying point for the Republican base in the general election than any of the other Democratic candidates.
Say what you will about Murdoch's ethics (and I'd suggest you start with, "Ewww!"), that he is a master strategist and long-term thinker is beyond question.
Fox != Fox News (Score:4, Insightful)
Fox is not Fox News channel. Knee-jerk anyone? BTW, Fox News channel exists because people want to fucking hear what they say. Love it or hate it, you have to share the planet with people that watch it and enjoy it too.
Carl Sagan's Cosmos is a great show and I'm sure any attempt to recreate some of that brand of awesome will be commendable. You know, Carl Sagan wrote in his book "The Demon-Haunted World" that people shouldn't be silenced just because you don't agree with them. Use reason, not emotion. We are all humans, let's start to prove it.
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Thank you. I've been telling this to both Democrats and Republicans alike for the past few years. It's like they don't realize that there's people on this planet that are never, and I mean NEVER, going to see their point of view. A farmer in the midwest is not going to get a New Yorker's point of view and visa versa. But they both need to
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This is not correct, and Sagan would not agree. Sagan spent his whole life trying to fight the forces of superstition and disinformation. In recent years, Fox News has caused "Fair and Balanced" to come to mean bowing to treat conservative viewpoints as equal even when their arguments can be proved factually wrong. Sagan not only wouldn't have approved of Fox News, but many people would be surprised as he would likely be very terse on that issue. We do not need to sugar coat the truth. Fox News is an Orwell
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Fox is not Fox News channel. Knee-jerk anyone? BTW, Fox News channel exists because people want to fucking hear what they say. Love it or hate it, you have to share the planet with people that watch it and enjoy it too.
Even so, a news organization has an ethical obligation to speak the truth, and they really exaggerate it. Fox by far is the worst of any news organization out there short of tabloids when it comes to stretching the truth and outright lying.
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Why would Fox risk being associated with the controversial FoxNews? It's a poor business decision.
Are those who like FoxNews really increasing consumption of Fox products enough to counteract those who despise FoxNews and may thus shun the "Fox" umbrella name?
Re:Fox != Fox News (Score:4)
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I think the concern is less about politics and more about dumbing it down, fucking it up, or cancelling it. Have you seen network television lately?
Where did that come from? (Score:2)
While you are completely correct, they are not the same and Fox Broadcasting doesn't give two shits what the politics of a show are if it is popular, that was not the point. The point is they've killed a to of great shows by through all sorts of mismanagement (like fucking around with time slots continually, playing episodes out of sequence and so on).
The one most geeks will think of is Firefly, which really was a great show to watch and probably would have had a long run but was badly mishandled. There's m
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I'm talking about the comments. Who reads articles on slashdot?
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BTW, Fox News channel exists because people want to fucking hear what they say.
And why shouldn't they? The only station that entertains me more and makes me laugh harder is comedy central. You never know what those comedic writers are going to come up with next over at Fox News.
Love it or hate it, you have to share the planet with people that watch it and enjoy it too.
I think the problem is that people think Fox News is a news channel.
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I know you cannot rationalize this.... but I am a huge Carl Sagan -Cosmos fan and a Fox News Fan.
I get plenty of left wing media from traditional sources.... Fox gives us diversity.
I can be conservative and agnostic, love science and fiscal responsibility and capitalism.
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I'm not saying treat every position as equally valid. I didn't say that. I paraphrased Carl Sagan's words about using reason to prove our points. I didn't say that people that are wrong are still right because every opinion is valid, I was trying to say that even if people watch Fox News because they like it, we can't just say "FOX NEWS sucks and people that watch it are idiots!" because that's as irrational as what we might find wrong with Fox News. Do you understand?
Oh yes they can: (Score:2)
"we can't just say "FOX NEWS sucks and people that watch it are idiots!""
Of coure you can say that. About every fourth post on this article says something quite similar to that.
People can say anything they want.
I know people who say that crystals channel orgone energy and can heal all manner of ills.
Doesn't make it a well thought out viewpoint.
Could be cool... (Score:2)
I remember a friend let me borrow the "Cosmos" book and I've been hooked into science ever since. I like Neil Degrasse Tyson (Except for the whole Pluto thing and making fun of Dr. McKay).
I hope they do it justice.
"FOX" and "new Cosmos" made me do a double-take. (Score:2)
However, "Neil deGrasse Tyson" made me do a spit-take.
I actually only learned about Cosmos when the Science Channel showed it with many re-done graphics, but also with enough cuts that I like the DVD version from the 1990s. I would show that version as-is, or I would splice in some of the updated visuals from the Science Channel airings, except that I would re-do the updates that were already appended to most episodes on the DVD version.
And yes, as (I think) someone above said, Brian Cox has a much more Sag
PR Job, nothing else (Score:2, Troll)
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Given that Tyson is on it (Score:3)
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Glad to hear it will be on fox (Score:4, Insightful)
If it was on PBS, I'd be worried that it would be biased.....
I give up even trying to watch charlie rose on pbs these days....... whenever reporters are brought in to discuss current events, there are always 2 from the editorial wing of the new york times, and 3 from other left leaning news outlets and the conversation always goes around to complaining about tea partiers.
I used to watch frontline, newshour, and other shows on pbs and the BBC....haven't been able to for the last 10 years, especially as even the science shows are no longer willing to consider all sides of an argument, and the bias is as much in what issues are covered as in the content and who they consult as experts. Pretty much ever since gore lost the election, and the AP decided that that fair fact based reporting wasn't informing voters properly, the closest I've found to fair reporting is the wall street journal (assuming you skip the editorial pages) and focus just on the news.
Fox also isn't that bad in the sense that they actually are open about their biases.....CNN/etc not so much.
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There aren't always two sides to everything. Can you give an example of this bias in science shows?
Fox News? Nonsense. They are horribly biased but say "we're unbiased" with a straight face. CNN is wishy-washy and gives too much credence to broken, invalid standpoints. It sounds more like you've lost perspective on what "unbiased" is.
I suspect ma
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Then you must just love to keep yourself ignorant, and out of touch. Which is your prerogative of course, but don't come on here and become an imbecile by spouting nonsense.
I'll say it. (Score:2)
I fucking LOVED Carl Sagan. And I mean "love" in that non-homosexual, but not exactly 'metro' fashion in which male geeks can love another man. It's not quite pure idolatry, but it's pretty similar.
When I was growing up and shows like Cosmos came on once every couple of months, I was mortally transfixed until it was over. Sagan was a god to me.
I wish I could have high hopes for FOX to continue his legacy, but I really don't. Sadly.
I just hope... (Score:2)
... Tyson stays far away from Sagan's hokey, maudlin approach.
Yeah, I said that. That happened. Deal.
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I agree. :)
I *liked* Cosmos, but even as a kid I cringed sometimes at some of the lines and music choices.
On second thought (Score:3)
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Ah yes, Seth MacFarlane... I can see it now:
If you want to make an apple pie from scratch you must first invent the universe... like that one time I went golfing with Barack Obama and Derek Jeter! (Cue random clip of the previous)
Re:10 - No! (Score:4, Insightful)
Well, then I suppose my spouse must have been a lucky man, since we watched every episode together, purchased and read the book, and sought out Sagan's various works of science fiction. Our children were a little young to have benefitted from the original airing of the series, and I don't recall whether they ever saw it in reruns. But both of them read and enjoyed our small collection of books by Sagan. And I'd have to assert that we weren't the only young couple watching and enjoying the series together.
Sagan was a confirmed atheist, and there's no way I can see that Fox will be able to do an honest job of this. I hope Ann Druyan is maintaining some sort of control.
As for me, my husband died last month. I take a great deal of comfort in Sagan's assertion, which I can still hear clearly in my memory, that "we are made of star-stuff."
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I don't think you have to worry about Fox trying to steer the show.. I don't think Dr Tyson will stand for any crap, and I suspect Ann Druyan will be involved or at least had to approve the pitch to redo the series.
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Neil DeGrasse Tyson (Score:2)
Episode 1: Creation ...
Episode 2: Noah's Ark
Unlikely: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HooeZrC76s0 [youtube.com]
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Episode 1: Creation ...
Episode 2: Noah's Ark
THE IGNORANCE! IT BURNS!
FoxNews is not the same as the Fox that airs Family Guy. You are just as ignorant you claim FoxNews viewers are. The sad part is that you don't let it repeatedly proving it in public.
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Why are we here? Where do we come from? These are the most enduring of questions. And it's an essential part of human nature to want to find the answers.
We can trace our ancestry back hundreds of thousands of years to the dawn of humankind. But in reality, our story extends far, further back in time. Our story starts with the beginning of the universe. It began 13.7 billion years ago, and today, it's filled with over a hundred billion galaxies, each containing hundreds of billions of stars.
In this series, I
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With TV channels like Fox... It's no wonder that the US has the Tea Party and all kinds of weird movements where religious beliefs are the normal standpoint and science seems like something abnormal. If nothing else the cry "think of the children" is used as a leverage.
The US is slowly turning into something evil under the cover of trying to protect the democracy - which was thrown out the window right after 9/11 with the Patriot Act and DMCA.
There is total panic as soon as some girl happens to flash a tit