13 Mar 2015
March 12, 2015 By Rebecca Harrington
Scientific American will make another television appearance tonight (other TV roles include the topic of conversation on episodes of the sitcoms Cheers and Mad about You as well as set dressing on House of Cards and Breaking Bad). In the plot of the Thursday, March 12 episode of The Big Bang Theory, (spoiler alert) the magazine runs a story about a scientific paper that characters Sheldon Cooper and Leonard Hofstadter published about superfluid vacuum theory. A row ensues when Hofstadter realizes that only Cooper was mentioned in our coverage.
Scientific American talked to executive producer and showrunner Steven Molaro about writing for scientist characters and getting the science right.
[An edited transcript of the interview follows.] [Note: edited by Scientific American]
What challenges do you face in writing for characters who are scientists?
I suppose the biggest challenges are getting the science correct and presenting it in a way that’s understandable—and if it’s too complex to be easily understood, it should at least be interesting to hear about.
Do you receive a lot of feedback from real scientists praising or critiquing the science included in the show?
Thanks to Dr. David Saltzberg, our science consultant, we have a solid track record so far. Although I do think people may have complained in the past that his handwriting was sloppy on the whiteboard.