Talk:MythBusters (2003 season)

Notes for editing the episode table

This is as a reference for people who are editing sections only and not the entire page (they won't be able to see it). It's referenced to from the source. --hao2lian

NOTE FOR THIS TABLE:

• Busted myths should be marked red
• Confirmed myths should be marked green
• Plausible myths should be marked orange
• Any myths tested with inconclusive results or need to be declared in mixed form (Plausible/Busted) should be marked blue
• Do not leave the note field empty. Add a simple hyphen ("-") to fill the space. Also, always try to fill in any note fields which are empty (the more info, the better).
• Be sure to correctly nest myths which include several different trials (see the example on the cola myth)
• If you'd like to suggest a different format for this list, please do so on the talk page.

Note: I added a note that states that "True" was used instead of "confirmed" on the first season (at least the episodes I've seen - for instance, I know the microwave ep used "true"). For the sake of consistency, let's refer to confirmed myths as confirmed, to match the other four seasons - but keep the note that says that "true" was used in season 1. If someone can verify when they switched from "true" to "confirmed", that'd be helpful. TenPoundHammer 18:27, 4 March 2007 (UTC)

Split the table into separate episodes?

I think that the big table is quite difficult to read. I'd rather split the single table into separate tables—one for each episode—with the episode title/date/etc as a section header. That way, the tables would have only 3 columns. Also, we might reconsider using the wikitable class on the tables. --Fred Bradstadt 13:06, 4 January 2006 (UTC)

Sounds good. Go right ahead. I'm going to start dealing with redirects.--Drat (Talk) 13:09, 4 January 2006 (UTC)

I'll work on the conversion tomorrow.--Drat (Talk) 14:24, 4 January 2006 (UTC)

Inconsistent tenses

It should either all be in present tense, or past tense, not both.

Maeglin 14:29, 27 January 2006 (UTC)

A question regarding Episode 12 - Breakstep bridge

• Before they started testing the myth, they show some old bridge (black and white movie) from something like the 50s, that people attempted to destroy it by putting heavy loads on it - didn't work, air strike - missed, artillery - didn't do the job and finnaly they used explosives. So my question is - what's the name of that bridge and where it was located? if you have more info/pics about it'll be great.--212.25.75.36 22:38, 2 October 2006 (UTC)

"Galloping Gertie". TenPoundHammer 22:14, 1 March 2007 (UTC)

Not the bridge in question. He was talking about the concrete or masonry bridge that took a great deal of effort to demolish, NOT the old Tacoma Narrows suspension bridge, which collapsed due to wind. I believe they showed the film sometime during the course of the episode, not necessarily at the beginning. --MarsJenkar (talk) 18:23, 15 February 2008 (UTC)

Jet wash

What were the MythBusters trying to prove in this episode? Was it that jet wash could be enough to overturn a car? Or was it that the output of a jet engine was enough to overturn a car? Top Gear were able to verify the latter, but not the former.

One difference between Mythbusters and Top Gear was that Mythbusters used a 737, while Top Gear used a 747.

They also admitted this myth was confirmed and showed the video from Brazil where a taxi cab was blown over. Their only limit as to why it could not be properly reproduced was due to legalities and Insurances reasons. --Dp67 | QSO | Sandbox | UBX's 06:02, 17 October 2007 (UTC)

Why is the status of this myth marked as "Partly-Plausible"? As the article states itself, the myth was confirmed when Tori, Kari and Grant were able to acquire a real 747 and proved that the thrust from the engines of a 747 could completely blow away a taxi, a school bus and even a small plane. Was the status officially stated as Partly-Plausible on the show? Rajrajmarley (talk) 01:56, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

The episode where Tori, Kari, and Grant confirm the myth was in Supersized Myths in season 6, NOT the season 1 episode. The article deals with the verdict in the season 1 episode, which was Plausible in that episode because they could not actually confirm the myth with hard evidence (i.e. in the test, the car did not flip). --MarsJenkar (talk) 18:17, 15 February 2008 (UTC)

A question regarding Episode 6 - Lightning Strikes Tongue Piercing

The myth statement says "Metal body piercings increase one's chances of being hit by lightning." The status of this is then listed as busted because "The lightning does seem to strike a pierced body more, but not the piercings directly. It would take a piercing the size of a doorknob to attract lightning." But if "the lightning does seem to strike a pierced body more" then the actual myth statement is in fact confirmed (the myth title, "Lightning Strikes Tongue Piercing", on the other hand would be busted). So what should it be?—Preceding unsigned comment added by 84.188.250.224 (talk • contribs)

Eelskin wallet

The text says "In addition, further tests were conducted to see how much magnetism would it take to 'wipe' a card, and was found to be far above what the average person may encounter."

Ummmm... Busted!!!!!!!!!! Put your card next to a handbag clasp and see what happens to it -- or let it sit on or under a fridge magnet... Don't take my word for it, try it. But be ready to apply for a new one. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 122.200.166.120 (talk) 14:11, 15 November 2007 (UTC)

(This is a late reply, I know.)

Good sir, Wikipedia isn't the place to bring this up. The MythBusters episode entries here on Wikipedia deal mostly with the results given in the show, and results to the contrary from anecdotal sources rarely have a place here. If you have an issue with the experiment itself, you're better off taking this to the MythBusters forums on Discovery.com; you'll probably find you're hardly the first one to question the results given.

Also, they did prove that a card could be made unreadable through magnetic exposure, through the electromagnet experiment shown on the show. What's more, in MythBusters Outtakes, they showed that one of Jamie's powerful neodymium magnets could completely wipe a card—a clip not in the original show because they could not get an accurate measure of its strength in gauss. --MarsJenkar (talk) 18:32, 14 March 2008 (UTC)

Season subdivision, reference

Why aren't there any source references to the season subdivisions? Where do you get the information on when each season begins? There seem to bee different information on different websites. And the official MythBusters site doesn't list seasons at all. Wouldn't it be better to just arrange the episodes under year and skip the season subdivisions if there are no secure sources?! / Dreamingtree (talk) 15:39, 2 September 2008 (UTC)

Incompleteness

Even if noone is going to finish this anytime soon, they should at least add stub entries for the rest of the episodes, so the casual reader doesn't get the impression that the season was 8 episodes long. Among other things, the page for cellar spider directs one to this page even though it doesn't mention the daddy longlegs episode. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 75.73.70.113 (talk) 04:59, 23 August 2009 (UTC)

Late reply. The seasons are currently listed by year aired, rather than by their production season. Hence, episodes 9-13 are listed as part of the 2004 "season" (as they initially aired in 2004), even though they were technically part of production season 1. This was done mostly due to confusion as to where each "season" began and ended.

I have no doubt this change has "broken" quite a few older links, and those will need to be fixed. But adding stubs for the other five episodes would not be appropriate in this case. —MarsJenkar (talk | contribs) 19:19, 2 October 2009 (UTC)

Results' Sources?

Apart from the episode overview section, nothing in this article has a source. Where are the show results coming from, original research? As this appears to be the case with every article on a season of MythBusters, would this be better brought up in the MythBusters group discussion? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 66.119.205.190 (talk) 22:03, 25 March 2011 (UTC)

The results come from the episodes themselves, which are primary sources so it's not OR. --AussieLegend (talk) 05:46, 26 March 2011 (UTC)

Super microwave

"It is possible to build a super-microwave by aligning four magnetrons around a metal box. Busted (unofficially) If there is a proper method to build one, the method used in the show is not it. After a glass of water was exposed to the "super microwave"'s magnetrons for thirty seconds, a thermometer found that the temperature of the water had actually dropped by two degrees Fahrenheit(1.1°C)."

IIRC seeing the episode it was quickly clear that they hadn't a clue what they were doing, thus produced a non-working machine, as the results prove. Basic electronic engineering skills make it clear that such a machine can be successfully made.

The result on the page could reflect this more clearly, eg by saying that they failed to get their microwave functional, thus could not reach any valid conclusion. Tabby (talk) 15:36, 26 April 2013 (UTC)

Merger proposal

I believe since the pilot episodes are from the year 2003, it would be more logical to include them in the 2003 season list. Why would the pilots be an exception? You cannot just define your own exceptions. You have to stay consistent, which it is not currently. Even if there are long pauses of episodes in a year, on Wikipedia it is still categorized in the same year (for MythBusters, that is). They can still be distinctly marked as a pilot, but the pilot episode page is fairly small. It contains nothing notable enough to separate it from the 2003 season. Also, the list on Discovery's website here (which is used as a reference on both pages) shows them all in the same season, without mentioning pilots or a pilot season. Many other websites also include the pilots with the 2003 season. This includes the Spanish Wikipedia entry. Although the page in other languages does have a pilot season, those are nearly exact copies of the English Wikipedia article. The Spanish one is unique. Even though the episodes were made separately from the 2003 season, this is the case for most breaks in MythBusters. Yet it is still classified in the same season. IMDb also lists the pilot episodes with other 2003 episodes. Also, in this video on YouTube, Jamie mentions that season 5 starts with the Hindenburg episode. That is the first episode of 2007, meaning season 1 is 2003, season 2 is 2004, season 3 is 2005, season 4 is 2006, and season 5 is 2007 (like stated in the video). This means that the pilot season is not separate from the 2003 season (when Jamie stated this). Although the video is not 100% reliable, it supports this case. SAJ (T) 08:40, 7 June 2014 (UTC) edited 05:29, 27 July 2014 (UTC)

• Strong oppose - The pilot episodes were three episodes that were created completely separately to the 2003 episodes and don't form part of the 2003 season. That's why they are in a separate article. We use years for the articles because of the inconsistent way that episodes have been listed at reliable sources and the way that episodes are released on video. The series does not follow a typical calendar of on and off air periods so it was really too complex to break the episodes into traditional seasons because it was never clear where seasons began and ended. The only exception to that was the break between the three pilots and the start of the first season. The first episode in the 2003 season is the first episode of season 1, while the pilots are effectively season 0. Imdb is not a reliable source for episode information. Your analysis of the Youtube video is WP:SYNTH because season numbers don't directly relate to years. The seasons start and end sometime during the year but it's virtually imposssible to determine when during the year that is because it changes. Season 5 may have started with the first episode in 2007 but that doesn't mean this has been the case with other years. TV Guide actually shows season 5 starting in 2006 and the list of production codes here don't support Jamie's claim. --AussieLegend (✉) 09:24, 7 June 2014 (UTC)

The (confusing) changes made today really don't change anything. The pilots may have aired in 2003 but they were aired before the series started. Strictly speaking they shouldn't even be included but it's common practice to note such episodes, clearly establishing them as having aired outside the series. See, for example, the NCIS backdoor pilots. As I'm sure you realise, Wikipedia articles aren't reliable sources, and what happens on the Spanish Wikipedia is really not relevant to any other Wikipedia. If it were, then the fact that other Wikipedias mimic the English Wikipedia would be justification against a merge, or indeed for changing the Spanish Wikipedia for consistency. --AussieLegend (✉) 09:59, 27 July 2014 (UTC)

Barrel of Bricks

Perhaps reference could be made here to the popular and hilarious Irish song "Why Paddy's not at work today" (author Pat Cooksey, copyright Celtic Music), in which an Irish building worker encounters a barrel of bricks several times in both directions, leaving him with bruises, broken ribs and other injuries.188.230.248.85 (talk) 20:04, 11 January 2017 (UTC)

Requested move 8 November 2019

The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review after discussing it on the closer's talk page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

The result of the move request was: Not moved. There is NPASR for proposing a rename to simply "Mythbusters (<year> episodes)" as mentioned in the late states of the discussion. Primefac (talk) 13:30, 23 November 2019 (UTC)

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• MythBusters (2003 season) → MythBusters (season 1)
• MythBusters (2004 season) → MythBusters (season 2)
• MythBusters (2005 season) → MythBusters (season 3)
• MythBusters (2006 season) → MythBusters (season 4)
• MythBusters (2007 season) → MythBusters (season 5)
• MythBusters (2008 season) → MythBusters (season 6)
• MythBusters (2009 season) → MythBusters (season 7)
• MythBusters (2010 season) → MythBusters (season 8)
• MythBusters (2011 season) → MythBusters (season 9)
• MythBusters (2012 season) → MythBusters (season 10)
• MythBusters (2013 season) → MythBusters (season 11)
• MythBusters (2014 season) → MythBusters (season 12)
• MythBusters (2015 season) → MythBusters (season 13)
• MythBusters (2016 season) → MythBusters (season 14)
• MythBusters (2017 season) → MythBusters (season 15)
• MythBusters (2018 season) → MythBusters (season 16)

– Looking at the sources used in the article you can see that they all use "season #" and not "year season" (Discovery.com official site, Discovery GO, Science Channel, TV Guide, IMDB, TV.com), as such, these should follow standard WP:NCTV disambiguation of "(season #)". Gonnym (talk) 14:41, 8 November 2019 (UTC)

Edit: A followup to Aussie's arguments that the season split is not entirely correct - this proposal is to split per season, with individual fixes to the proposed order where needed. --Gonnym (talk) 17:55, 8 November 2019 (UTC)

This is an RM discussion. Changing the order is a content issue which needs to be in a separate discussion. You can't combine an RM with a merge/split discussion. They're different processes. If you're suggesting anything more than a straight move, then this RM should be closed and a new general discussion needs to be started. --AussieLegend (✉) 18:41, 8 November 2019 (UTC)

Survey

• Obvious support, as per WP:NCTV. --IJBall (contribs • talk) 14:44, 8 November 2019 (UTC)
• Strong oppose - No, this is completely and utterly wrong. As explained in the lede of List of MythBusters episodes, "There is no consistent system for organizing MythBusters episodes into seasons. The show does not follow a typical calendar of on and off air periods. The official MythBusters website lists episodes by calendar year. On the other hand, Discovery sells DVD sets for "seasons", which sometimes follow the calendar year and sometimes do not. In addition Discovery also sells "collections" which divide up the episodes in a different way — each collection has about 10 or 12 episodes from various seasons. This list follows the calendar year, as per the official episode guide." Even the official guide listed episodes by year, not seasons. See, for example, the 2007 episode guide. In some of the later seasons (post build-team departure in 2014) the airing changed slightly and the Discovery episode lists changed but from 2003 to 2014 there were no specific seasons. When episodes were released they released a "bunch" of episodes. Sometimes the episodes were all released within the same calendar year and sometimes they stretched across 2 different years but they were never referred to as seasons by Discovery in the lists prior to 2015. If a change is made, it should be from "MythBusters (20xx season) to "MythBusters (20xx episodes)" but this is really an unnecessary change.

Regarding the sources provided by Gonnym, note that the Discovery list now says 12 seasons (0-11) exist. It puts "Heads Will Roll" in season 11 but that is presently in the 2017 season that Gonnym suggests should be renamed to season 15 so clearly there are inconsistencies in the way Discovery has renamed seasons. Discovery now lists only one episode in season 0. That episode aired in 2010, or Gonnym's season 8. Discovery's season 1 is the pilot episodes which aired before the actual series was produced and released. Season 3 starts with "Myths Revisited" which Discovery now has listed as "Season 3, Episode 14", completely omitting episodes 1-13 which actually don't exist. Gonnym's numbering would have that episode in season 2, not season 3. Clearly, Discovery's current listing can't be trusted. It's all over the place, which wasn't the case with the previous Discovery listings. The Discovery Go source only has 10 seasons, not 11 or 16. It suffers similar inconsistencies to the first Discovery listing. The Science Channel listing says there are 169 episodes, yet 296 episodes have actually aired. TV Guide is not loading for me at the moment and imdb and TV.com are not reliable sources so they have no credibility at all. The LoE page though has multiple sources for all episodes. --AussieLegend (✉) 16:17, 8 November 2019 (UTC)

I didn't check episode per episode on the order, so inconsistencies might appear and can be fixed. This is more of a general split of season order than year order.

The official MythBusters website lists episodes by calendar year can you provide a link? The sources which claimed to be the official websites in the articles I checked are the discovery ones I've posted above.

The LoE page though has multiple sources for all episodes. - did you actually check them or just assumed I didn't?

15 sources link to Discovery GO pages with a 404 error; the new site, which should be followed, splits them by seasons.

13 sources link to TV Guide pages; Only 4 work [1], [2], [3] and [4] - all name the episode specifically by the season.

2 sources link to sciencechannel.com which list the episodes by seasons

11 links to SBS programming schedule listings; Nothing relevant for this discussion. 3 dead BuddyTV links. 1 link to telsu.fi which isn't in English so I have no idea what to look for there. 1 link to futon critic which is irrelevant as well.

The sources available so far all sort these into seasons and none of them sort them by year. If there is no source to back up the lead claim that There is no consistent system for organizing MythBusters episodes into seasons then this is purely WP:OR of editors of these articles and fails WP:V and any closing admin should seriously take note of that. --Gonnym (talk) 17:55, 8 November 2019 (UTC)

inconsistencies might appear and can be fixed - There's really nothing that needs fixing. When I found the pages in 2009 it was a massive job to fix everything then and establish consistency. The pages have evolved in the following 10 years and are now consistent.

can you provide a link? - I posted a link to the 2007 page above. The urls used in the articles for that appear to be dead now, but they're still all on archive.org. Note that what I provided was the second iteration from 2013 (actually the third but that's another story) and that is consistent with the first iteration. This is an example of the first iteration. Every episode should have a source, with most articles having a reference for each year in the official guide.

did you actually check them or just assumed I didn't? - Yes, I did check them, and have done hundreds of times in the last 10 years. As I've said above, because Discovery keeps changing its episode listings, the official guides give you a 404 error but they're all on archive.org. I'm not sure when Discovery changed but I assume it was post 2014 when the program changed its focus and got rid of the build team.

2 sources link to sciencechannel.com which list the episodes by seasons - Did you read what I wrote above? Science Channel suffers similar inconsistencies as Discovery now does. e.g. listing only 169 of the 296 actual episodes.

The sources available so far all sort these into seasons and none of them sort them by year - That's not actually correct. The official listings from 2003 to 2016 list by year (see the examples that I earlier provided and this version from 23 April 2019). Clearly, Discovery Channel was listing episodes by year right up until only 6 months ago. S.A. Julio has now been through all articles and updated the Discovery Channel references so that they are no longer dead.

If there is no source to back up the lead claim that There is no consistent system for organizing MythBusters episodes into seasons then this is purely WP:OR of editors of these articles - It's not OR at all. That was why I went through the entire episode list in 2009. Every source was inconsistent with each other. TV Guide, for example, uses seasons but its organisation of seasons did not match the official guides. As is also stated in the lede Discovery sells DVD sets for "seasons", which sometimes follow the calendar year and sometimes do not. In addition Discovery also sells "collections" which divide up the episodes in a different way — each collection has about 10 or 12 episodes from various seasons. When fixing everything back in 2009, this was looked at and the DVDs didn't match the schedules. As it says, sometimes seasons followed calendar years and sometimes they didn't even to the point of overlapping a previous years calendar listed episodes with the "current" years "season". This was pretty much the same as I earlier explained: Discovery's listing jumps from season 2 episode 13 to season 3 episode 14. Essentially what it's inferring is that season 2 is the first 13 episodes of season 14, which doesn't make sense.

and fails WP:V - There are sources in the articles that list by calendar years. Sources don't become invalid just because they're dead and only available in archives. See WP:DEADREF. --AussieLegend (✉) 18:41, 8 November 2019 (UTC)

• Oppose per AussieLegend. Jeb³_{Talk at me here}^{What I've Done} 16:19, 8 November 2019 (UTC)
• Comment - both the current and proposed schemes are equally valid per WP:TVSEASON which says in part "A consistent naming scheme should be used for all season articles of a TV show". Its also clear that the season numbering is inconsistent in sources and on current streaming services. That being said, I think the current naming is flawed in that there is no defined "2003 season" either. I propose instead we rename these lists as MythBusters (2003 episodes), etc. and continue sorting the lists based on their original air dates. -- Netoholic @ 02:06, 10 November 2019 (UTC)
• Oppose per AussieLegend. I'd be open to Netoholic's suggestion as well. Calidum 02:02, 12 November 2019 (UTC)
• Oppose move as proposed per AussieLegend. Support Netoholic's suggestion... MythBusters (year episodes). --В²C ☎ 23:43, 13 November 2019 (UTC)

Alternative proposal: Mythbusters (year)

@AussieLegend, Netoholic, Gonnym, IJBall, Jebcubed, and Calidum: What about simply Mythbusters (year)? I mean, Mythbusters (2005), for example, is recognizable and concise. Do we really need "episodes" in the disambiguator? —В²C ☎ 17:53, 19 November 2019 (UTC)

• "Mythbusters (2005 episodes)" is much preferable to "Mythbusters (2005)" IMO – the former is much more in the spirit of WP:NCTV. --IJBall (contribs • talk) 17:59, 19 November 2019 (UTC)

  Okay, I would support whichever alternative is supported by consensus over the current title. --В²C ☎ 19:04, 19 November 2019 (UTC)

• I agree with IJBall. Paring it down to just Mythbusters (<year>) makes it too vague, but including "Episodes" makes it better. Jeb³_{Talk at me here}^{What I've Done} 19:33, 19 November 2019 (UTC)

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The above discussion is preserved as an archive of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page or in a move review. No further edits should be made to this section.