Loading...Science is undeniably an incredibly important part of society. It’s built up our civilizations to what they are today, from agriculture to automobiles to computers and the Internet. But, as the Carl Sagan quote goes,
“We live in a society exquisitely dependent on science and technology, in which hardly anyone knows anything about science and technology.”
For some odd reason, knowing science hasn’t been pushed to the standard of knowing math or English, leaving people with good knowledge of many studies, but only the people independently interested having a good idea of how the world works through science. A survey from Pew Research Center tests your basic scientific literacy, and if you take the quiz (HERE) you’ll be surprised how hard basic scientific knowledge is. Science is one of the most interesting and fun topics, so it really shouldn’t be that way. I’ve featured many science YouTube channels that’ll teach all about many areas of science. And that’s great, but only one large science channel covers all areas of science, including science news, frequently asked science questions, and more; and that channel is SciShow.
Created by Hank Green of vlogbrothers and hosted by Hank himself and Michael Aranda, SciShow is a great general science channel that makes 4 videos a week on everything science. From quantum computing to pandas, SciShow covers a plethora of science-related topics in enough depth to allow you to significantly increase your basic science literacy in that area, whether it be de-extinction or sea slugs. Their videos all have the same basic aesthetic, and all involve Michael or Hank talking to the camera with occasional visual aides in the form of text and images. Although many science YouTubers opt for animation and voiceovers, SciShow does a good job of making the videos get dull or too lecture-esque with great content and, as I said before, visual aides.
SciShow runs 8 series on their channel: SciShow Dose, Quick Questions, Great Minds, SciShow List Show, SciShow Quiz Show, SciShow News, SciShow Talk Show, and SciShow Infusion. Each one of those series are great in their own right, although the only ones currently regularly running are Dose, Quick Questions, and News on Mondays, Tuesdays, and Fridays. (Wednesdays vary between the rest of the shows) Although I wish I could talk about every one the of the series, it would make this article boring, fast. So instead I’ll talk about the video I featured above, which is part of the series SciShow Dose.
SciShow Dose is essentially the basic premise behind every other science YouTube channel: your weekly dose of science on an interesting science-related topic. This video above happens to be a SciShow Dose episode from a while back on an animals that has captured out attention since we laid eyes upon them: giant pandas. And more importantly, how they exist. You see, as Hank explains in the video, pandas are naturally very ill-suited for, well, living, because of eating and reproduction habits genetically ingrained in them from birth. The video is very interesting and well put together, and I can assure you that by the end you’ll know more about pandas than you ever wanted to know.
Altogether, SciShow is the ultimate general science YouTube channel. Hank and Michael aren’t afraid to tackle any subject, and they always make their videos interesting and informative. Their variety of series allows you to learn lots of science and keep your basic science literacy up as science progresses year by year. If you’re interested in science, or simply like knowing about the world around you, SciShow is a great channel for you.