WTF Mythbusters

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**Kizmet**

Why do they always say don't try this at home..........

Just in case you have some parachutes a plane a lot of guns and a few hundred pounds of explosives just lying around.

**Cheesecat**

Probably have to due to legal obligations.

**Avatar 720**

Cheesecat wrote:
Probably have to due to legal obligations.

This.

People are stupid, and are always on the lookout for ways to blame other people for their actions.

**rodgers37**

Personally, I find TV Shows saying 'Don't try this at home' to be actually encouraging me to try it...
If they didn't say it, I probably wouldn't even consider doing the stupid thing they are telling me not to do, but since they are telling me not to do it, i'm now tempted.

**Cheesecat**

Basically MythBusters is a cock tease. They also give detailed instructions on how to do there stuff despite saying you can't do it at home.

**daedalus**

I was expecting something awesome. Worst thread ever.

Also, what's with those warnings on my bottle of bleach?!? What do they know anyway?

**Goliath**

They're not really detailed instructions, it's occasionally stuff like "Jamie sets it up so that the boiler will go off" or "Adam removes the safety rope so that the lift will fall".

I distinctly remember an episode about spontaneous combustion where they made the liquid used in gun cotton and soaked some overalls in it, and whilst they were making it all of the instructions were bleeped and blurred out.

**KingCracker**

Kizmet wrote:
Why do they always say don't try this at home..........

Just in case you have some parachutes a plane a lot of guns and a few hundred pounds of explosives just lying around.

I actually know a couple farmers that have all of those things youve listed. But yea, if they say "dont try this at home!" then you cant sue them for blowing your hand off for trying it at home. Same reason those warning hot labels are on coffee. Because dumbshits dont grasp that steam coming from your coffee makes it hot

**Locclo**

Goliath wrote:
They're not really detailed instructions, it's occasionally stuff like "Jamie sets it up so that the boiler will go off" or "Adam removes the safety rope so that the lift will fall".

I distinctly remember an episode about spontaneous combustion where they made the liquid used in gun cotton and soaked some overalls in it, and whilst they were making it all of the instructions were bleeped and blurred out.

There are also quite a few episodes where they're very careful to tell you that they left one or more steps out of a process so you can't do it solely from the show. The one I remember is from one of the Crimes and Mythdemeanors episodes, when the goal of the team was to steal someone's thumbprint to fool a scanner. I forget the details, but I recall them going through a whole process to turn the thumbprint into some kind of 3D version using ballistics gel, IIRC.

Given how many episodes deal with common household objects turning deadly, I imagine they have to dance around this issue a lot.

**hotsauceman1**

You mean you dont have a Boeing 747 laying around.
And here i was thinking everyone did.

**mattyboy22**

In a world where companies have to put "Caution: Contents May Be Extremely Hot" on coffee cups to avoid lawsuits you're surprised about this?

**SagesStone**

It's only so they can't be sued. It's not really going to stop the type of people who were going to do it anyway, just stop them from being paid for it.

Not all of them are that crazy in terms of what's needed as well. Remember the hwacha or the frozen chicken cannon? Quite a few could probably manage that.

**InquisitorVaron**

Actually I haven't experienced the bleeps and blurring.
They showed me the steps to make thermite and warned me not to do it incase it combusts and burns my retinas.

Still just going to get a welding mask and melt things with thermite, the stuff that can screw a black box over.

**SilverMK2**

Thermite is awesome.

**Mannahnin**

mattyboy22 wrote:
In a world where companies have to put "Caution: Contents May Be Extremely Hot" on coffee cups to avoid lawsuits you're surprised about this?

Off topic tangent, but on the subject of busting myths:

It makes me sad that people still use this as an example of silliness or inappropriate lawsuits. When the McDonald's "hot coffee" lawsuit happened, they had a standard requirement that coffee be served at the absurd temperatures of 180-190 degrees. A temperature too hot to actually drink, which will cause third degree (your skin peeling off) burns in two to seven seconds. This lawsuit has been called "the poster child for frivolous lawsuits", but in point of fact that temperature was actively dangerous, and a lot of people had been badly hurt and injured due to quite normal coffee-handling spills.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/McDonald%27s_Hot_Coffee

On February 27, 1992, Stella Liebeck, a 79-year-old woman from Albuquerque, New Mexico, ordered a 49-cent cup of coffee from the drive-through window of a local McDonald's restaurant located at 5001 Gibson Boulevard S.E. Liebeck was in the passenger's seat of her grandson's Ford Probe, and her grandson Chris parked the car so that Liebeck could add cream and sugar to her coffee. Liebeck placed the coffee cup between her knees and pulled the far side of the lid toward her to remove it. In the process, she spilled the entire cup of coffee on her lap.[11] Liebeck was wearing cotton sweatpants; they absorbed the coffee and held it against her skin, scalding her thighs, buttocks, and groin.[12] Liebeck was taken to the hospital, where it was determined that she had suffered third-degree burns on six percent of her skin and lesser burns over sixteen percent.[13] She remained in the hospital for eight days while she underwent skin grafting. During this period, Liebeck lost 20 pounds (9 kg, nearly 20% of her body weight), reducing her down to 83 pounds (38 kg).[14] Two years of medical treatment followed.

Liebeck sought to settle with McDonald's for $20,000 to cover her actual and anticipated expenses. Her past medical expenses were $10,500; her anticipated future medical expenses were approximately $2,500; and her loss of income was approximately $5,000 for a total of approximately $18,000.[15] Instead, the company offered only $800. When McDonald's refused to raise its offer, Liebeck retained Texas attorney Reed Morgan. Morgan filed suit in New Mexico District Court accusing McDonald's of "gross negligence" for selling coffee that was "unreasonably dangerous" and "defectively manufactured". McDonald's refused Morgan's offer to settle for $90,000.[6] Morgan offered to settle for $300,000, and a mediator suggested $225,000 just before trial, but McDonald's refused these final pre-trial attempts to settle.[6]

Other documents obtained from McDonald's showed that from 1982 to 1992 the company had received more than 700 reports of people burned by McDonald's coffee to varying degrees of severity, and had settled claims arising from scalding injuries for more than $500,000.[6] McDonald's quality control manager, Christopher Appleton, testified that this number of injuries was insufficient to cause the company to evaluate its practices. He argued that all foods hotter than 130 °F (54 °C) constituted a burn hazard, and that restaurants had more pressing dangers to warn about. The plaintiffs argued that Appleton conceded that McDonald's coffee would burn the mouth and throat if consumed when served.[19]

A twelve-person jury reached its verdict on August 18, 1994.[16] Applying the principles of comparative negligence, the jury found that McDonald's was 80% responsible for the incident and Liebeck was 20% at fault. Though there was a warning on the coffee cup, the jury decided that the warning was neither large enough nor sufficient. They awarded Liebeck US$200,000 in compensatory damages, which was then reduced by 20% to $160,000. In addition, they awarded her $2.7 million in punitive damages. The jurors apparently arrived at this figure from Morgan's suggestion to penalize McDonald's for one or two days' worth of coffee revenues, which were about $1.35 million per day.[6] The judge reduced punitive damages to $480,000, three times the compensatory amount, for a total of $640,000. The decision was appealed by both McDonald's and Liebeck in December 1994, but the parties settled out of court for an undisclosed amount less than $600,000.

**kronk**

I'm familiar with that ruling, Man (my ex worked for McD's at the time). While one shouldn't put scalding hot coffee that close to your crotch, that coffee maker was set way too hot and McD's got what they deserved on that one.

As for why on Mythbusters, don't forget that both Jackass and Beavis And Butthead were sued after kids/teenagers were injured copying stuff they saw on TV. Jackass started putting the "Don't try this at home" at the beginning of their shows and Beavis was no longer allowed to say "Fire! Ffffffire!" if you recall.

**Grey Templar**

n0t_u wrote:
It's only so they can't be sued. It's not really going to stop the type of people who were going to do it anyway, just stop them from being paid for it.

Not all of them are that crazy in terms of what's needed as well. Remember the hwacha or the frozen chicken cannon? Quite a few could probably manage that.

And people do much more dangerous things then those 2 things all the time.

But its really just there so they are free from legal issues.

Now I wonder how long till a lawsuit comes along about that one myth they said you can try at home? You know, the phonebook one where it took 2 tanks to rip the book apart.

**DIDM**

why does McDonald's put "Caution Contents are Hot" on their coffee

cause the world is full of 2 things, stupid people, and lawyers

**pretre**

DIDM wrote:
why does McDonald's put "Caution Contents are Hot" on their coffee

cause the world is full of 2 things, stupid people, and lawyers

Way to completely miss the previous post on this subject. Although you may have just proved your own axiom.

**DIDM**

pretre wrote:
DIDM wrote:
why does McDonald's put "Caution Contents are Hot" on their coffee

cause the world is full of 2 things, stupid people, and lawyers

Way to completely miss the previous post on this subject. Although you may have just proved your own axiom.

um?

who cares?

I answered the original question, because they asked one.

**Lordhat**

pretre wrote:
DIDM wrote:
why does McDonald's put "Caution Contents are Hot" on their coffee

cause the world is full of 2 things, stupid people, and lawyers

Way to completely miss the previous post on this subject. Although you may have just proved your own axiom.

Lawyered!

**pretre**

This will make for a great really obscure insult.

"Dude, I am completely a lawyer and you know what that makes you."

**Locclo**

pretre wrote:
This will make for a great really obscure insult.

"Dude, I am completely a lawyer and you know what that makes you."

"No, I don't know what you mean."

"Exactly!"