Dr Stone

H03nn89 · Post by **H03nn89** » 23 Oct 2019, 19:13

Everyone’s entitled to an opinion- but to be fair, the show actually corresponds with real life things- as in the manga, there is citing from specific texts to back up these theories. Personally, this show is a good concept and breaks away from the traditional shonen. To be fair, I would watch this over My Hero any day. And that’s an unpopular opinion then so be it.

unoduetre · Post by **unoduetre** » 23 Oct 2019, 19:26

[mention=104956]H03nn89[/mention]

I need to check the manga then.

unoduetre · Post by **unoduetre** » 23 Oct 2019, 20:32

More examples:

Spoiler:

unoduetre · Post by **unoduetre** » 23 Oct 2019, 21:33

[mention=111587]Endynyp[/mention]

So my previous three posts summarise my opinion.

unoduetre · Post by **unoduetre** » 23 Oct 2019, 21:36

H03nn89 wrote:Everyone’s entitled to an opinion- but to be fair, the show actually corresponds with real life things- as in the manga, there is citing from specific texts to back up these theories. Personally, this show is a good concept and breaks away from the traditional shonen. To be fair, I would watch this over My Hero any day. And that’s an unpopular opinion then so be it.

I answered Endynyp, because he asked. Feel free to enjoy this show, ha ha.

H03nn89 · Post by **H03nn89** » 24 Oct 2019, 11:04

No worries- like I said everyone is entitled to an opinion. Whether you like the show or not. So I respect that and believe me I will enjoy it

Endynyp · Post by **Endynyp** » 25 Oct 2019, 08:21

unoduetre wrote:[mention=111587]Endynyp[/mention]

I saw only 2 or 3 first episodes. Maybe things changed a lot after that. If the answer is yes, please, let me know.

Below is a very critical opinion of this show, but I don't want to spoil the fun for people, I only want to answer [mention=111587]Endynyp[/mention], because he asked. So it's inside spoiler tags (but it only spoils some minor things in the first 2–3 episodes). Most people here probably shouldn't read it.

Spoiler:

Based on what I saw and based on my memory (which might not be 100% correct, but if you need the details I can suffer and watch the first couple of episodes again )

This show is known for its "science". Unfortunately, instead of science I saw a guy who fought with lions barehanded. And people resurrected after hundreds (thousands?) of years after being petrified or whatever it was (does the author know? ).

Also a lot of "science" there seems to be just bullshit. So this show (because it is advertised as containing some science) actually promotes pseudo-science. People watching this show probably feel smart, but they're just misguided.

Characters are very poorly constructed. They don't feel real. Instead they feel more like tokens to act as specific roles. They don't need names. They can be called: "the brain", "the muscles" etc.

The "romance" couldn't be more schematic. The girl seemed to be retarded or something (and the boy was not much better).

The main character is presented as if he knows all branches of science, but he actually doesn't know too much. As far as I remember, even the scientific method and the process of scientific discovery is not done right, not only the details of particular sciences.

In this season we have Ascendance of a Bookworm. Science, crafts and technology there are mostly legit (despite it being a fantasy isekai). The girl is weak, she doesn't know everything. But she knows ENOUGH, and that makes a difference. Ascendance of a Bookworm is much closer to what Dr Stone should be as far as the scientific part is concerned. Have you seen when she attempted to make pseudo-papyrus and how she failed? Yes, she FAILED at that, because it required too much time and work, which is true. She didn't have tools, she tried to do it fully manually. Instead as far as Dr Stone is concerned, we got pseudo-scientific gibberish and a pretty bad shounen.

And response:

Spoiler:

Let me break down some of this into pieces to make it easier to respond:

1. Fighting Lions barehanded, petrification, etc not being scientific

Just because this show tries to incorporate science doesn't mean that it can't include elements of fantasy. The premise is still a fiction and fiction requires the suspension of disbelief. In a standard fictional narrative that generally means that they only have to be internally consistent, but something about the inclusion of real world science tends to shift particular audiences into a hyper-critical mode. This is most easily demonstrable with the audiences of hard sci-fi in which the accuracy of the science is of paramount importance. However, if a person were to judge different sci-fi by hard sci-fi standards they would inevitably fail. It is an inappropriate frame of reference. Yet both types of sci-fi exist and thrive serving different purposes. They can both exist because genre literacy allows audiences to read them in different frames. That said, it is up to the audience to decide whether to use those different frames or whether they meet the frame requirements.

2. The Characters and The Romance

I absolutely agree with you. In the first few episodes the characters are pretty thin. This does change. The tone doesn't, but the characters get better. Spoiler alert: The romance characters leave for the majority of the show and have yet to return, though they probably will. The new characters that get introduced are far more dynamic and interesting.

3. The Main Characters' Scientific Knowledge and Pseudoscience

I disagree with you on this subject. They take lots of shortcuts, but these are shortcuts meant to move the story along. There are a few exceptions (which are arguable in any case) but generally they keep within acceptable scientific theory if not always in scientific possibility. Some of your complaints in this regard are dealt with later (for example, they acquire someone with actual crafting skills). But some of your complaints here are again a question of genre appropriate frames of reference. It doesn't have to be perfect to be good, if it includes a man wrestling a pride of lions into submission, then it is not appropriately a hard sci-fi show and shouldn't be judged like one. I will say, that in some ways, the details (small stuff that most people won't notice or remember) part of the science gets worse and if that is going to be problematic for you then I wouldn't suggest picking it back up.

4. People feeling smart

This is responding to a point you made in your comment outlining your problems with his acquisition of saltpeter and nitric acid. You said that it makes some people feel smart, but I don't think that it does. I think that its viewers aren't overly concerned with how smart they feel, I think they are just being entertained and the science is just part of it. If they are like me and [mention=104956]H03nn89[/mention] (and tell me if I'm wrong, H03nn89) they probably just find this a massively refreshing departure for Shonen that does its job: it entertains. IF it happens to inspire some people to learn more about science, then that is all the better.

[mention=107568]unoduetre[/mention] I think the ultimate point here, is that while you found it disappointing, I did not.

H03nn89 wrote:Everyone’s entitled to an opinion- but to be fair, the show actually corresponds with real life things- as in the manga, there is citing from specific texts to back up these theories. Personally, this show is a good concept and breaks away from the traditional shonen. To be fair, I would watch this over My Hero any day. And that’s an unpopular opinion then so be it.

I have to agree with you.

I don't care for My Hero, but I do like this show.

unoduetre · Post by **unoduetre** » 25 Oct 2019, 09:11

@Endynyp

Spoiler:

Let me answer quickly to one thing first, but I want to create a more complete answer with more analysis of the first couple of episodes later when I have time.

There are four different things. Let's say there is a novel with obvious fantasy elements. I'm fine with that. Let's call the fantasy elements "dragons" just to give an example.
The author wants to write a story about dragons, but they want to incorporate some elements of science. The author has the following choice (or a combination of the following choices):
1. Not incorporate any scientific elements.
2. Incorporate some fantasy science elements. The science of the dragon world is not the science of our world. (This is usually called magic of course.

)
3. Incorporate our world science in a way that is not correct. So it isn't real science the author incorporates, but just an appearance of science. Or what people (who are not interested in science and who have almost no knowledge of science at all) think science is. So it's not science that is incorporated but "perception of science". So e.g. a character can wear a lab coat and use test-tubes and fancy looking pipes etc. But no real science gets incorporated. This trick is often used e.g. in advertisement (fake doctors). This can be done on different levels. One level is just fully external perception (lab coats). One can go one level deeper and use real names of e.g. real chemical names. Like "nitric acid". One can go one more level deeper and use not only real names but some random facts to make the appearance of science more plausible. E.g.
Fact 1: "Saltpeter can be extracted from caves thanks to some chemical reactions happening with bat guano."
Fact 2: "Saltpeter can be converted to nitric acid by a chemical process which requires other substances as well."
Let's say these are scientific facts. The author can then do a leap from these two facts to "Nitric acid can be extracted from caves by using a bucket."
Of course we are still at point 3. No real science has been incorporated, because the sentence above is just not true.
4. Incorporate some real science. E.g. if I remember correctly, alchemists produced nitric acid in a reaction of saltpeter (I suppose it can be extracted from caves) with copper(II) sulfate, a form of which is present in chalcanthite. So the author can make the character go to a cave, get saltpeter and then go to another cave and get chalcanthite. Then the character can combine them, use high temperature etc. and get nitric acid. So things can be of course not said explicitly, but it assumes no things WHICH ARE SAID are wrong. In this way not only an "appearance of science" is incorporated, but some real science as well. It's not necessarily complete, some important steps might not be incorporated or explained etc., but no step which is incorporated and explained should be wrong.

So now it's time for my arbitrary value judgement of course. I think that doing 3 (with using all scientific terms and some scientific facts, not just lab coats and test tubes) but saying or pretending that one does 4 is misguiding the audience. I don't like to be misguided. And I don't think misguiding other people is a good™ thing. People who are less knowledgeable in science might e.g. truly believe that they can learn something valuable from it, maybe not complete knowledge, but at least that they won't be mislead by the author. They can truly believe that they can extract nitric acid by collecting water from a cave full of bat guano for example. Everyone knows that dragons do not exist, so it's obvious. The same with magic. It's also not a problem, if characters use lab coats etc. This is not misguiding in the context of a novel (but it might be in other contexts e.g. advertising). But what Dr Stone does is misguiding.

Of course not everyone might think that 3 pretending to be 4 is a bad thing. I suppose you and H03nn89 might be ok with that. And that's all fine. Nothing forces you to make the same value judgement that misguiding people in this way is a bad thing or you might also not think that people are actually misguided. The second option is testable. One can check by asking random people, if they believe that the "science" in Dr Stone is maybe not complete, but at least correct in principle and the author does not misguide them. If many people say yes, then they're misguided.

And the author and/or the advertisers of the novel are to blame. But if misguiding the audience is fine according to your value system, there is no problem for you at all.

Endynyp · Post by **Endynyp** » 25 Oct 2019, 09:27

unoduetre wrote:@Endynyp

Spoiler:

Let me answer quickly to one thing first, but I want to create a more complete answer with more analysis of the first couple of episodes later when I have time.

There are four different things. Let's say there is a novel with obvious fantasy elements. I'm fine with that. Let's call the fantasy elements "dragons" just to give an example.
The author wants to write a story about dragons, but they want to incorporate some elements of science. The author has the following choice (or a combination of the following choices):
1. Not incorporate any scientific elements.
2. Incorporate some fantasy science elements. The science of the dragon world is not the science of our world. (This is usually called magic of course. )
3. Incorporate our world science in a way that is not correct. So it isn't real science the author incorporates, but just an appearance of science. Or what people (who are not interested in science and who have almost no knowledge of science at all) think science is. So it's not science that is incorporated but "perception of science". So e.g. a character can wear a lab coat and use test-tubes and fancy looking pipes etc. But no real science gets incorporated. This trick is often used e.g. in advertisement (fake doctors). This can be done on different levels. One level is just fully external perception (lab coats). One can go one level deeper and use real names of e.g. real chemical names. Like "nitric acid". One can go one more level deeper and use not only real names but some random facts to make the appearance of science more plausible. E.g.
Fact 1: "Saltpeter can be extracted from caves thanks to some chemical reactions happening with bat guano."
Fact 2: "Saltpeter can be converted to nitric acid by a chemical process which requires other substances as well."
Let's say these are scientific facts. The author can then do a leap from these two facts to "Nitric acid can be extracted from caves by using a bucket."
Of course we are still at point 3. No real science has been incorporated, because the sentence above is just not true.
4. Incorporate some real science. E.g. if I remember correctly, alchemists produced nitric acid in a reaction of saltpeter (I suppose it can be extracted from caves) with copper(II) sulfate, a form of which is present in chalcanthite. So the author can make the character go to a cave, get saltpeter and then go to another cave and get chalcanthite. Then the character can combine them, use high temperature etc. and get nitric acid. So things can be of course not said explicitly, but it assumes no things WHICH ARE SAID are wrong. In this way not only an "appearance of science" is incorporated, but some real science as well. It's not necessarily complete, some important steps might not be incorporated or explained etc., but no step which is incorporated and explained should be wrong.

So now it's time for my arbitrary value judgement of course. I think that doing 3 (with using all scientific terms and some scientific facts, not just lab coats and test tubes) but saying that one does 4 is misguiding the audience. I don't like to be misguided. And I don't think misguiding other people is a good™ thing. People who are less knowledgeable in science might e.g. truly believe that they can learn something valuable from it, maybe not complete knowledge, but at least that they won't be mislead by the author. They can truly believe that they can extract nitric acid by collecting water from a cave full of bat guano for example. Everyone knows that dragons do not exist, so it's obvious. The same with magic. It's also not a problem, if characters use lab coats etc. This is not misguiding in the context of a novel (but it might be in other contexts e.g. advertising). But what Dr Stone does is.

Of course not everyone might think that 3 pretending to be 4 is a bad thing. I suppose you and H03nn89 might be ok with that. And that's all fine. You don't need to agree that misguiding people in this way is a bad thing or you might also not think that people are actually misguided. The second option is testable. One can check by asking random people, if they believe that the "science" in Dr Stone is maybe not complete, but at least correct in principle and the author does not misguide them. If many people say yes, then they're misguided. And the author and/or the advertisers of the novel are to blame.

[mention=107568]unoduetre[/mention] Don't re-watch the first 3 episodes. It's not necessary and they are the weakest episodes IMO. If you don't like it, you don't like it. That's no problem.

Spoiler:

unoduetre · Post by **unoduetre** » 25 Oct 2019, 09:32

Endynyp wrote:[mention=107568]unoduetre[/mention]

Spoiler:

I more or less agree with you, but I think you are attaching way too much importance to this. We don't want amateurs making sulfuric acid out of anything. Moreover, should they desire to, the information exists on the hivemind, I mean internet, and it'd be a pretty impoverished mind that relied on a Shonen Jump anime/manga for that kind of information. It's just supposed to be a bit of fun. Fun.

For what it is worth, I think Dr. Stone has selected 3a. It incorporates real world science while taking calculated shortcuts in service to story, just like many sci-fi stories do. It's very much a grey area.

Spoiler:

Endynyp · Post by **Endynyp** » 25 Oct 2019, 09:36

unoduetre wrote:

Spoiler:

Well, it might appear that it is some sort of a crucial point for me, but it's just one of the many. I can also do a similar (but less scientific, ha ha) discussion about how bad the characters are etc. For me it's probably never just one thing that makes a show bad, but a combination of many smaller and bigger things.

But if you get what I wanted to say, that's fine. You understand why I think this is a disappointment. And it's not only about the "science" part of course. There are other disappointing things I mentioned briefly in my first answer.

[mention=107568]unoduetre[/mention] Do you ever wish the forum would let you respond with an emoji? I often do. Sometimes all you want to communicate is a feeling of acceptance and respect. A nice smiley face would do it.

I completely understand what you're saying and I think we have a perfectly reasonable difference of opinion about this show.

I had fun with this. We should do this with more shows.

unoduetre · Post by **unoduetre** » 25 Oct 2019, 09:38

Yup.

And that's a good thing. If everyone were a copy of myself, the world would be a boring place.

H03nn89 · Post by **H03nn89** » 25 Oct 2019, 11:39

Endynyp wrote:And response:

Spoiler:

Let me break down some of this into pieces to make it easier to respond:

1. Fighting Lions barehanded, petrification, etc not being scientific

Just because this show tries to incorporate science doesn't mean that it can't include elements of fantasy. The premise is still a fiction and fiction requires the suspension of disbelief. In a standard fictional narrative that generally means that they only have to be internally consistent, but something about the inclusion of real world science tends to shift particular audiences into a hyper-critical mode. This is most easily demonstrable with the audiences of hard sci-fi in which the accuracy of the science is of paramount importance. However, if a person were to judge different sci-fi by hard sci-fi standards they would inevitably fail. It is an inappropriate frame of reference. Yet both types of sci-fi exist and thrive serving different purposes. They can both exist because genre literacy allows audiences to read them in different frames. That said, it is up to the audience to decide whether to use those different frames or whether they meet the frame requirements.

2. The Characters and The Romance

I absolutely agree with you. In the first few episodes the characters are pretty thin. This does change. The tone doesn't, but the characters get better. Spoiler alert: The romance characters leave for the majority of the show and have yet to return, though they probably will. The new characters that get introduced are far more dynamic and interesting.

3. The Main Characters' Scientific Knowledge and Pseudoscience

I disagree with you on this subject. They take lots of shortcuts, but these are shortcuts meant to move the story along. There are a few exceptions (which are arguable in any case) but generally they keep within acceptable scientific theory if not always in scientific possibility. Some of your complaints in this regard are dealt with later (for example, they acquire someone with actual crafting skills). But some of your complaints here are again a question of genre appropriate frames of reference. It doesn't have to be perfect to be good, if it includes a man wrestling a pride of lions into submission, then it is not appropriately a hard sci-fi show and shouldn't be judged like one. I will say, that in some ways, the details (small stuff that most people won't notice or remember) part of the science gets worse and if that is going to be problematic for you then I wouldn't suggest picking it back up.

4. People feeling smart

This is responding to a point you made in your comment outlining your problems with his acquisition of saltpeter and nitric acid. You said that it makes some people feel smart, but I don't think that it does. I think that its viewers aren't overly concerned with how smart they feel, I think they are just being entertained and the science is just part of it. If they are like me and [mention=104956]H03nn89[/mention] (and tell me if I'm wrong, H03nn89) they probably just find this a massively refreshing departure for Shonen that does its job: it entertains. IF it happens to inspire some people to learn more about science, then that is all the better.

[mention=107568]unoduetre[/mention] I think the ultimate point here, is that while you found it disappointing, I did not.

I have to agree with you. I don't care for My Hero, but I do like this show.

My word your like my long lost twin! Lol.

And I agree, if everyone had the same opinion in things- life would be boring

Post by **Expendable** » 01 Nov 2019, 00:35

Made it to episode 5.

H03nn89 · Post by **H03nn89** » 01 Nov 2019, 07:23

Nice- it gets better

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