by Matthew Cobb
The BBC 5-part series ‘Wonders of Life’ starts tonight at 9:00 pm on Discovery Science. Full schedules here. There’s also a rather lovely book that accompanies the series.
The programme is presented by my University of Manchester colleague Professor Brian Cox, and aired in the UK at the beginning of the year. Brian is a particle physicist, so his take on the natural world is refreshingly different. I was one of the scientific advisors on the series (along with Nick Lane from UCL) and can therefore be held responsible for at least some of the mistakes. During the two years of planning and filming, Brian said that he really understood the importance of Darwinism, and I hope you’ll see that it runs through every episode.
As I wrote here at the beginning of the year:
The series consists of five episodes, will begin broadcasting on BBC2 on 29 January, and continues two earlier and highly successful series,Wonders of the Solar System and Wonders of the Universe. As Cox is a particle physicist, he is especially interested in the physical underpinnings of life and evolution, and the physical constraints within which evolution operates.
The series has its usual beautiful USP – Brian wandering around the world pointing at things. Seriously, the series is stunning and very different from traditional BBC natural history programmes.
Please let us know what you thought of it!
And as they are pretty funny, here *again* are a) a trailer for the series complete with new version of the Eric Idle Universe song, and b) a couple of spoof of Brian’s style on his previous programmes.
This was/is another excellent series from our Brian – check out also the new series of Infinite Monkey Cage http://www.bbc.co.uk/podcasts/series/timc
in the latest Brian Cox and Robin Ince discuss space tourism with actor Brian Blessed, Dr Kevin Fong and Virgin Galactic’s Steven Attenborough
I love the Monkey Cage! I’m behind in my podcasts too!
TIMC just got 50% longer, which isn’t going to help . . .
only 6 episodes in the season 🙁
Yep, one of my faves!
Almost makes me wish I had a TV….
b&
I checked the Canadian listings for our so called Science/Discovery channel (what a joke they are) and of course nothing doing.They do have a very nice lineup of cars and motorcycles smashing into each other. I’ll probably get to see it by picking it up at Costco in six months.
Ha ha, come on….we’re Canadian! You know we’ll get this waaaaay late. I remember ranting when Doctor Who was delayed one year when CBC actually co-funded it. 🙂
Someone on Brian Cox’s Facebook page asked if they had to remove the word “evolution” & the age of the earth. 🙂 What a joker!
In the US, “Discovery Science” has been called “The Science Channel” since 2002. On DirecTV it’s channel 284 and on Dish it’s 193.
Yea, I think they changed it here too, but that’s all that changed. Not much science on the science channel. More like trailer park mentality.I put out some feelers on how to get more science from some of my geeky friends and received some fine answers, but I’de have to improve my computer skills. Worth a try though.
Many folks find they are able to navigate the postings on Filestube, and are sometimes able to figure out how to negotiate the captchas and get to content for free.
(leans and speaks slowly into the vase on the table next to me) But. that. would. be. wong…
Can you get this on Comcast I ‘ve seen Through the Wormhole very good show. will have to look for it.
Right,that’s another good one we didn’t get.Science/Discovery channel don’t even acknowledge e mails. grrr.
Slightly off topic, but…
I’m not sure how I feel about the word Darwinism (as used in this post and just generally). Does it actually mean anything? Should it be used at all? Is it different from “evolutionist?” I’d love to get some feedback here from the other readers (and our hosts).
Yeah, I don’t like “Darwinism”. The “ism” suffix refers to a philosophical concept, not a well established scientific theory. No one calls gravity “Newtonism”. I suspect by using “Darwinism” to refer to evolution by natural selection, we are playing into the hands of our enemies. Best avoided IMHO.
This may explain our aversion (from Wikipedia):
The meaning of “Darwinism” has changed over time, and varies depending on its context. In the United States, the term “Darwinism” is often used by creationists as a pejorative term in reference to beliefs such as atheistic naturalism, but in the United Kingdom the term has no negative connotations, being freely used as a shorthand for the body of theory dealing with evolution, and in particular, evolution by natural selection.
Link: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Darwinism
Thanks. That’s helpful.
Well I’m from the UK and I don’t like it because it sort of implies that the Theory of Evolution hasn’t changed since Darwin’s time. Whereas we all know he got some bits wrong, for example, his ideas about the mechanism of inheritance don’t work, and he sort of avoided the mechanism of speciation (according to WEIT at least).
You’re not alone. I always thought the word Darwinism sounds sort of cult-ish and implies that Darwin was right about everything evolutionary speaking.
I don’t care much for the word evolutionist either because it implies that evolution is a philosophic belief.
Luckily, evolution doesn’t care about what we call it and it just keeps on going regardless of our small quibbles.:-)
Wonders of Life has been showing here in Australia for the last 2 weeks, tonight is episode 3. It is, of course, excellent. Bryan Cox is one of the best populisers of science in the world, imho.
I got frustrated at my wife’s and daughter’s talking over it with inanities several times by last week’s ep, so I bought the DVD. $20 on ebay and worth every cent.
That’s not the Universe Song as I remember it! Awesome update, ta Eric!
The first episode of the series ran this evening on the Science Channel, carried by Comcast (Xfinity) in Houston. It was very good as I expected it would be. Looking forward to the rest of the series.
I can’t wait to watch this on youtube. ( or some other dubious site )
No Wonders of Life in Denmark. /:
I LOVE Brian’s shows. He and his team create The best educational/entertainment ever made in my opinion. I would really like to see more stuff created by Brian Cox. The Science Channel isn’t promoting this well enough though. Next to nothing on their website about it.
Ohio, USA
Damn, I really love that trailer and would be so happy to show it to my brand-new high school students in 10 days.
But I really can’t with that reference to god at 1:40 or so.
Does anyone know how to get rid of that bit? Or maybe subtract some other words. I don’t have any software to edit that.
I think my students would really love it though.
Can anyone help? Please?