October 23, 2005

Joe Malchow: Can He Read Words?

So Malchow has a little human-interest throwaway post the other day. The headline is "Tests of Archimedes' Solar Death Ray Fail." Text says "The excellent television show Mythbusters has busted Archimedes of Syracuse's infamous sun-channeling death ray."

Now, if you click on that link that is in his text, and I did, you get to a page that says the following:

"More than 2,000 years later, researchers from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and the University of Arizona set out to recreate Archimedes' fabled death ray Saturday in an experiment sponsored by the Discovery Channel program 'MythBusters. Their attempts to set fire to an 80-year-old fishing boat using their own versions of the device, however, failed to either prove or dispel the myth of the solar death ray."

The headline, being the only part of the post which is factually correct or even at all corcordant with the article, he just copied and pasted.

Look, I know this isn't a big deal, and he didn't spend much time on it, or whatever, but honestly is it that much trouble to read and summarize accurately the articles you cite? Why should we believe this guy is accurately quoting anything he sources? There was no reason for him to even spin this, and he still fucked it up.

In fairness, the article say this:

"Peter Rees, executive producer of 'MythBusters,' said the experiment showed Archimedes' death ray was most likely a myth. 'We're not saying it can't be done,' Rees said. 'We're just saying it's extremely impractical as a weapon of war.'"

And also:

"'MythBusters' also tried to recreate the ray last year, and after failing, declared the story a myth."

But then it says:

"The experiment showed it may be technically possible, but didn't answer whether Archimedes used it to destroy enemy ships, MIT professor David Wallace said 'Who can say whether Archimedes did it or not?" he said. "He's one of the great mathematical minds in history. I wouldn't want to underestimate his intelligence or ability.'"

So what the fuck are you trying to say, here, Connor? This all seems pretty convoluted, and Joe was just putting it up because it's kind of funny, and who cares if he didn't get the facts straight about something this silly anyway? Because it demonstrates the same willingness to oversimplify out of laziness and/or desire to distort that has DEFINED the right-wing media for the last decade or so. Malchow had no reason to distort this, so he got it wrong because he just didn't fucking care about writing down what was true. Too involved! Go for the sound bite! Sum that shit up in a sentence! Make it a foppish, inelegant sentence (this is Malchow)!

Depending on how you cut those citations, you could make it sound like the article made a convincing case for either position on this admittedly irrelevant issue. Malchow is down to pull that shit, and I am not. That's the difference between me and him. That and about four inches of penis.

5 comments:

  1. Anonymous3:46 PM

    What a coincidence; the word of the day is "orotund," with a secondary meaning of "pompous, bombastic." Perhaps tomorrow's word will be "overgeneralize." Or maybe "induction."

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  2. BURNED!

    Put your name on there, you giant vagina

    ReplyDelete
  3. Anonymous5:23 PM

    Connor, stop replying to these petty taunts with petty taunts of your own. It undermines your credibility. You bring content to this blog (most of the time), while this anonymous person brings childish sandbox antics: that should be enough to assert your comparative worth here without having to resort to name-calling.

    Anonymous person, I'm happy to see that you're regularly checking the word of the day. Self-improvement is a noble pursuit. That said, it sounds like vocabulary isn't the area you need the most remedial help in.

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  4. Anonymous10:59 AM

    To speak of undermining something implies its existence.

    It's more than a little ironic that "connor's" posts are mostly profanity-laced insults, yet "sandbox referee" chides people for responding in kind.

    One last plea, Seal. Ditch the douchebag (since sandbox referee is offended by "retard"). Reading Malchow's blog and then vomiting a post onto this blog in response hardly passes for "content."


    -GV

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  5. GV? who's that? I don't think I know anyone with a last name that begins with a 'V.'

    George Wukoson, did you forget how to spell your name?

    seriously, just don't read the posts if they make you angry.

    and today's word of the day is 'loquacious,' which I guess applies to me.

    ReplyDelete