I used to like Kurz back when he was discussing things I had no knowledge of, but the moment they entered an area where I was experienced in it became clear that it’s primarily on the entertainment side of edutainment.
Nothing they say is explicitly incorrect, just vague and missing critical context.
For example, a video about the potential for a space elevator spoke of an alternative that would require aircraft to be “caught” by an orbital trebuchet style system. The reason the alternative was even conceived was because we don’t have the material for a space elevator given our planet’s high gravity well. During the discussion Kurz let it slip that the system would require an aircraft to fly at MACH 12!
If materials science has developed the technology for an aircraft that could fly that quick with atmospheric friction… We’d just be able to make a space elevator anyways.
I want to like them but I don’t find them trustworthy after watching their climate change optimism video and a takedown that explains how ridiculous it is.
I’m not saying your argument is invalid. I’m saying you didn’t even make an argument. I didn’t have 2 hours at the time. It’s just such a cliche to link a multiple hour long video when asked for details that I got a kick out of it. I probably will check the video out later though.
Kurzgesagt videos aren’t exactly short either. I’m normally pretty irritated when people link to videos like that, but come on, are you really saying you won’t consider criticism just because it’s in the same medium as the material being criticized?
primarily suggested experimental carbon capture system that Bill Gates had invested in as potential solutions
only mentioned the sponsor in the end screen so most people did not notice
Supposedly, several other videos were sponsored by foundations and exhibit similarly subtle biases.
Also, lots of their research comes from their partnered publication, Our World in Data, which was sponsored by philantropists and found to be biased and unreliable on many accounts.
Does it mean they are as crazy and oblivious to science as PragerU? Not even close. However, their claims and presentation should be treated with a pinch of salt even if they provide footnotes. Personally, I find the biases too slight to matter – I would not really watch their videos anyway (I don’t like the pacing, language, obsession with cleanliness and animation style).
Could you reference some of these claims that our world in data was found to be biased? Sounds like a pretty solid judgement was made, but a cursory search didn’t yield anything untoward. Maybe if it’s definite, you could update the Wikipedia entry to reference the controversy, as that’s always a good place to signpost that kind of thing.
Not now, I don’t really have time for that. I suggest you look at this Medium article / opinion piece (?). Sorry that I cannot go deeper into this rabbit hole with you but I need to sleep before a busy week. I am pretty sure it is not as deep and twisted as some think it is.
Thanks, that’s a really interesting piece. I don’t interpret that it’s really about bias though, he’s gone through to offer to some more ideas for context. The takeaway seems to be that while the OWID stats are accurate, historical context changes that changes the way people lived and would be good to add - it’s really clever, but I don’t think there’s much to suggest there’s anything nefarious. In times where we are presented with outright lies, it still seems to me to be a source which shines light
The video title is very misleading, current video “How to win interstellar war” has actual no real science behind it. We can not predict a war, no one has. Another thing, we haven’t even proven if aliens are real. kurzgesagt just made it up.
It expects the communities to be on the post instance or your instance (lemmy.world) if not specified. The community should always be referred to as !Kurzgesagt, which automatically works as a link.
There are a lot of different apps / frontends that can show stuff from Lemmy, and they vary in how well they support different link formats. Here is a short explainer:
Each entry below shows you what you should type (like this) and what you will see as a result (after the dash ‘-’).
For each entry, some apps will support it and others will not. It can be helpful to include a few different link formats so that everyone can use the link easily.
NOTE: There is a bug on the Lemmy website right now. If you start typing a community or username, it will try to autocomplete it. DO NOT click that autocomplete, or it will mess up the link.
This is another way to make a universal link. If you click this link, the community will open in your home instance.
This works well if you can’t use the method above. For example, if you want to stick a link in a shields.io badge, you can use this technique to still include a universal link.
This is a hardcoded link. If you click this link, the community will open on a specific instance. Anyone using a different instance (ex. anything except lemmy.ca in this case) will not be able to subscribe right away, and they will need to redirect it first.
Sometimes you can’t use the methods above. For example, if you want to create a nice thumbnail while promoting your community on !communityPromo, you will need to use this URL.
If you use this method, try to use the other methods as well so people have options.
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