[FPSPACE] Penn and Teller do space exploration

[Jim Oberg]

Penn and Teller do space exploration

JimO: A lot of misidentified Russian space footage, and a repeated 'old favorite fake' of
Armstrong jumping off the LM ladder to say 'One small step', and an eye-popping
sadly-unforgettable scene of Penn naked in zero gravity, but also a very authentic
account of experiencing a shuttle launch, and some heroes as well as bad guys...
 



      PENN & TELLER: BULLSH#T!: NASA (TVMA - L) (2003)
     
      In episode 603, it's time to take a closer look at the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, a government agency that spends scads of taxpayer money to achieve what private industry might be able to do more profitably and efficiently.

      Showtime Advisories: Brief Nudity, Graphic Language, Adult Content
     

http://www.sho.com/site/schedules/product_page.do?episodeid=130997&seriesid=134

 

posted by Mark Whittington at 8:32 PM

 

Thursday, July 03, 2008

 

I've been a fan of Penn and Teller's Bullsh#t since the first episode. Where else can one find the account of a fake petition circulated at an environmentalist rally calling for the banning of dihydrogen oxide (water for those not familiar with chemistry.) 

So, knowing that the two magicians are also very committed libertarians, I was fascinated by the news that they were going to call bullsh#t on NASA. There's enough NASA bashing (some of it justified, some not) on the Internet so that one could imagine would would transpire.

Surprisingly, the episode was not a rant, but actually had a balanced view of the state of space exploration at the dawn of the 21st Century. There was a lot of stuff about safety lapses that led to Challenger and Columbia, but that was well documented and not in dispute by anyone. 

Mind, they did have Robert Park as a guest, which is always a red flag, but there were also other guests who answered his anti humans in space blather. Penn said the F word a lot, which he always does, and his micro gravity strip tease was kind of gross. But even the commercial space vs NASA portion was well balanced and fair; COTS was even given a prominate mention, something our friends in the Internet Rocketeer Society rarely do. And there was a swipe at President Bush that was tiresome.

The conclusion seemed to be that yes NASA is government and we hate government and yes NASA has had accidents and we hate those too. But NASA does things that are so very cool, after all, and if the commercial folks are getting in the game too, space is big enough for everyone.

 
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