Comment by stevenhuang
2 years ago
Yeah, your confusion there is like being confused from the use of a literary device. The intent was exactly to illustrate why the implication 'life -> multiverse' may be problematic.
It was communicated just fine, I think you should continue watching?
Are you sure you got the argument I'm presenting? You did quickly make an edit to avoid a rather rude remark.
My point is that their use of literary devices, as you put it, are often misleading if not flat out wrong. The listener needs to he able identify them as such, and I don't think that's a good way to communicate science.
It doesn't mean that PBS is bad. Note that I have made no such statement. I'm just saying that I dislike it, and tried to be constructive as to why. If this offended you, like your initial remark might suggest, perhaps you are reading too much into it.
I did want to avoid implying that videos are harder to understand if you find nonverbal cues hard to understand, but sure. That would genuinely be a reason to avoid PBS videos and that's fine.
The point is their use of the literary device here was not misleading nor 'flat wrong'. It is serving as a jumping off point from the video title 'Does Life Need a Multiverse to Exist?'. You may argue that such a question is ill posed, but then state your argument properly.
Read: they are NOT talking about the anthropic principle here. You are probably confused because you are trying to shoehorn this into discussion when the video is not even talking about this yet. Yes the anthropic principle is cogent to the video but not until later.
Sounds like we agree then.
The difference in opinion is that I don't consider literary devices to validate incorrect or misleading statements. Which is why I dislike PBS. You do, and that's fine. To each their own.
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