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Human Universe (Brian Cox)
starry
Posts: 12,434 Forum Member
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Couldn't see a thread, maybe it underwhelmed others like it did me.
The egocentric view of how special humans are and how we have colonised beyond the Earth (we haven't) didn't seem helpful when we basically depend on our planet and the natural world around us. Without that we will become extinct sooner rather than later, and take other species with us along the way. The space theme seemed tacked on, better to concentrate on the Earth.
The one major point he made about climate change causing our brains to grow wasn't really explained fully. And there were a few follow up ideas on water, agriculture and writing that were briefly touched on.
The egocentric view of how special humans are and how we have colonised beyond the Earth (we haven't) didn't seem helpful when we basically depend on our planet and the natural world around us. Without that we will become extinct sooner rather than later, and take other species with us along the way. The space theme seemed tacked on, better to concentrate on the Earth.
The one major point he made about climate change causing our brains to grow wasn't really explained fully. And there were a few follow up ideas on water, agriculture and writing that were briefly touched on.
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Switched it off after his lame attempt to knock a piece from a lump of glass whilst wearing the biggest pair of protective gloves ever seen in the desert. Even the camels were pissing themselves laughing & they'd not had a drink for two months!
lol nice one.
The first episode really seemed pretty pointless.
The second one however was definitely an improvement for me. I'm still puzzled why he calls it 'The Human Universe' though, he should call it the Universe of Life. And the second episode actually focusses on life and even just aspects of nature like water/earth in general and not humans, that's why it was better and why he could actually make some scientific points.
Some on here act as if they run through the Theory of Relativity for light reading. Pure snobbery.
I like Brian Cox, I think he is trying to do science etc. for Everyman, although (despite the fact that everybody on here is a genius) he loses me sometimes.
One of the best bits about it was that I discovered Carl Sagan (he was quoted at the end of the programme) :
“For small creatures such as we the vastness is bearable only through love.”
How cool is that! What about this one:
“The nitrogen in our DNA, the calcium in our teeth, the iron in our blood, the carbon in our apple pies were made in the interiors of collapsing stars. We are made of starstuff.”
Science tended to intimidate me but I like most of what I can understand of the show. It was interesting seeing the swab from the camels mouth in last weeks episode and showing it under the microscope - how similar the cells looked, compared to humans. Fairly basic things I can just about understand
Oh and the dolphins supposedly knowing the answers to the 'less' or 'more' question - well it was always going to be 50/50 wasn't it? lol how do we know they hadn't put food behind the right board or something lol (only kidding).
It must be nice for him to be able to go abroad and visit all these exotic countries. I imagine it looks impressive on a big TV - there are some nice graphics of space and the various countries.
I agree with Brian's conclusion too - as far as the Milky Way goes we're on our own and always have been!
Yes he could have mentioned the Fermi paradox which really states the idea that if the galaxy was full of intelligent civilisations then where are they all? You think we might have picked up their version of EastEnders by now. Even if we were to die out our weak radio and TV signals along with other stronger signals beamed to probes would carry on through space for thousands of light years.
Yet we hear nothing. I think we are alone at least in our galaxy.
IzzyS - he didn't mention universes I think, it was simply about our galaxy and then the universe we are in. We can't see other universes.
Tiggywink - I think he can lose people as he normally keep it general and so finds it a strain to suddenly explain in more technical detail when it isn't prepared for. In this series though he is keeping it all general.
MR. Macavity - philosophy is arguably what is behind the drive of science anyway, it's about life (including us) and the world we live in.
It was never detected again and without that we will never know.
What this doesn't take into account is that the galaxy is 100,000 light years across. If a civilisation at the opposite side of the galaxy had started using radio 1000 years ago from this point in time, we wouldn't know anything about for another 90,000 years due to the time it would take for the signal to travel. In fact, I doubt any radio signals from the opposite side of the galaxy could even make it past the super-massive black hole at the centre.
In reality, we will probably never know either way.
In view of his conclusion, the whole programme was a bit of a tease.
On earth, only one civilisation - Western Europe - has made the fundamental scientific leaps you need to be able to make your presence known, or detect any possible extra-terrestrials
If it were not for the "DWEMs" our planet would truly be alone in the universe.
Yes, I'm most surprised that the BBC didn't force Brian Cox to put that point of view across....
But bear in mind that though the Earth is around 4.5 Billion years old, only within the last 100 years or so have humans become been capable of inter-stellar communication - not even the blink of an eye never mind the vast distances that make even just planets within the Milky Way remote. As the programme pointed out perhaps intelligent life-forms capable of this arise but then self-destruct too quickly for 2 equivalents to be around at the same time to make contact?
Ah yes, sorry I got the terms mixed up. I had a look at my tweets as I remember tweeting what he'd said at the end. Apparently it was 'There could be 30 billion earthlike worlds in our galaxy!. How can there be no-one else out there? fascinating' well that was my tweet anyway.
I suppose I'd have to look up the difference between a galaxy and a universe - at a guess, there could be multiple galaxies within a universe? if one galaxy can potentially contain 30 billion planets similar to Earth, they must be pretty large(!)
I'm more interested in the philosophical side of things. Science tends to confuse/bewilder me
That's a bit of an understatement.
Trouble is, they're so far away, which in a way is a good thing otherwise they'd rip apart our galaxy.
A quote that has always stayed with me is, "The universe is not bigger than you imagine, it's bigger than you CAN imagine."