Wow, you sound very confused to me. Your "false expectations" bit is nonsense. Using your logic, kids shouldn't be told to wash their hands before they eat because it creates the "false expectation" that by washing their hands they're getting rid of all harmful germs. (re: They often produce the feeling of understanding without conveying actual understanding (and the limitations thereof)
Reality is complicated and kids already know that. Its just that they're way better than adults at being comfortable with not knowing everything.
> Human brains simply are not designed to understand, at a deep intuitive level, things like the geometry of four-dimensional pseudo-Riemannian manifolds.
"Hey kids ! Lets get real.. you won't understand this stuff at a "deep intuitive level" but please choose physics as a career." - Doesn't sound motivational to me.
You're not giving the above comment the respect it deserves.
Whenever you offer up an analogy, you want to choose it carefully, and be sure to convey its limitations. The video didn't discuss its limitations (which is OK, it's just a video showing off a rig). So we're left to do it here. And trust me, learning GR with Kip Thorne (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kip_Thorne) makes the above commenter qualified to offer an opinion.
>Whenever you offer up an analogy, you want to choose it carefully, and be sure to convey its limitations.
Yes, maybe if you're presenting at a conference or a lecture or something like that. Not if you want to get a bunch of kids motivated/interested in a topic. In the case of this video, the limitations can only be understood by people in that field. Sure, You can hand-wave a general clarification like "this isn't actually how it is, because <insert boring text that nobody will remember>" - which would be pointless (IMO) and convey no real information. Because the "real" information takes several years of academic training to understand and comprehend.
Sorry but it changes nothing in my mind. If the OP had said "Hey I would have said it this way and guess what I've successfully used it to motivate X, Y and Z into taking up science" - I'd have been way more impressed and given the "above comment the respect it deserves".
Reality is complicated and kids already know that. Its just that they're way better than adults at being comfortable with not knowing everything.
> Human brains simply are not designed to understand, at a deep intuitive level, things like the geometry of four-dimensional pseudo-Riemannian manifolds.
"Hey kids ! Lets get real.. you won't understand this stuff at a "deep intuitive level" but please choose physics as a career." - Doesn't sound motivational to me.