The problem of how to present detailed mathematical derivations is confronted... in the animated scenes. ...The comprimise solution... invented while… - David Goodstein

Intellectually, technically and philosophically, physics and television are two separate cultures with almost no bridges between... [I]t is... time consuming and arduous... to span the gap... [T]here is no one... [at] Caltech... capable of reading, much less writing, a television script competently. ...[T]here is no one on the production side who knows enough... physics... to plan an important sequence, much less write a script or produce a program. This situation is a symptom of the malady of science illiteracy that is intended to help cure..."

Let me be more explicit about the differences between a conventional telecourse and The Mechanical Universe. In the conventional course, the production company begins by convening a panel of hired academic consultants. ...Courses ...are basically education by committee, with the crucial job of teaching mainly in the hands of scriptwriters and producers. But... college education is to give... the benefit of learning from people who have spent a lifetime mastering their subjects and... adding new knowledge... The crucial part is organizing a subject and seeing the connections... precisely what telecourses entrust to scriptwriters. ...The Mechanical Universe ...arises out of a real physics course at a real—and excellent—university. It represents a single, unified vision of what physics is about, and how it's connected to its roots in mathematics, history and society. ...[N]ew techniques for had to be invented.

[I]t was no longer a television camera at the back of the room. It was now a production, with programs, and all the production values... [I]t... evolved into something far beyond anything I had imagined.