Why Do We Talk? (BBC Horizon)

Talking is something that is unique to humans, yet it still remains a mystery. Horizon meets the scientists beginning to unlock the secrets of speech - including a father who is filming every second of his son's first three years in order to discover how we learn to talk, the autistic savant who can speak more than 20 languages, and the first scientist to identify a gene that makes speech possible. Horizon also hears from the godfather of linguistics, Noam Chomsky, the first to suggest that our ability to talk is innate. A unique experiment shows how a new alien language can emerge in just one afternoon, in a bid to understand where language comes from and why it is the way it is.

Related Links:
Fry's Planet Word

Copernicus and His Revolutions

This video surveys the background and work of Nicolaus Copernicus, leading up to his De revolutionibus and its initial reception. It is NOT recommended for watching in a single session, due to its compact and very dense exposition. Divide it into about 3 episodes. Total length: about 75 mins. (Written and produced by Kerry Magruder. Not polished, but hopefully better than a PowerPoint.)

This show provides an overview of the life and work of Nicolaus Copernicus, with an explanation of the advantages and disadvantages of his heliocentric model as they were perceived at the time. this show places Copernicus and the “Copernican revolution” in historical context by providing a sense of the state of mathematical astronomy when Copernicus was educated as a young man, and also briefly surveying the reception of Copernican ideas up to about 1620. (from Copernicus and His Revolutions)

Related Links:
Books and Films - Nicolaus Copernicus

Impressionism: Revenge of the Nice

Impressionism: Revenge of the Nice is a art documentary presented by Matthew Collings, reappraising Impressionism by examining the lives and works of Courbet, Manet, Cezanne and Monet. The art critic and presenter Matthew Collings sets out to re-establish the Impressionists' reputation as revolutionary artists whose paintings sent shock- waves through the art world. In the early 19th century, the art of the establishment was formulaic and inspired by fantasy. Paintings were, by and large, a glorification of the past; by contrast, the Impressionists advocated a kaleidoscopic palette, sweeping brush strokes and a subject matter that was firmly rooted in the everyday. Impressionism, we are told, is the first movement in modern art. Collings's investigation begins with the realist painter Gustave Courbet, a rebel who attacked the government through allegories such as The Painter's Studio, in which a barely disguised Napoleon is depicted as a poacher who stole the Empire. Collings then traces the thread of rebellion through the work of Edouard Manet, Claude Monet and Paul Cezanne. In terms of shock value, he argues, Monet's Impression: Sunset, the painting that gave the movement its name, was on a par with Damien Hirst's shark and Tracey Emin's bed.

Related Links:
The Impressionists: Painting and Revolution
This is Modern Art

Van Gogh: Painted with Words

Van Gogh: Painted with Words is a BBC drama-documentary presented by Alan Yentob, with Benedict Cumberbatch in the lead role as Van Gogh. This is the story of Vincent Van Gogh, with dialogue sourced from his own words. Every word spoken by the actors in this film is sourced from the letters that Van Gogh sent to his younger brother Theo, and of those around him. What emerges is a complex portrait of a sophisticated, civilised and yet tormented man.

Related Links:
Vincent: The Full Story
Simon Scham's Power of Art - Van Gogh

Metamorphose: M. C. Escher, 1898-1972

Metamorphose: M. C. Escher, 1898-1972 is a 1999 documentary directed by Jan Bosdriesz, about the life and works of the artist - M. C. Escher. Maurits Cornelis Escher (1898-1972) usually referred to as M. C. Escher, was a Dutch graphic artist. He is known for his often mathematically inspired woodcuts, lithographs, and mezzotints. These feature impossible constructions, explorations of infinity, architecture, and tessellations.
(from wikipedia.org)

Related Links
Art of the Western World

Who’s Afraid of a Big Black Hole? (BBC Horizon)

Black holes are one of the most destructive forces in the universe, capable of tearing a planet apart and swallowing an entire star. Yet scientists now believe they could hold the key to answering the ultimate question - what was there before the Big Bang? The trouble is that researching them is next to impossible. Black holes are by definition invisible and there's no scientific theory able to explain them. Despite these obvious obstacles, Horizon meets the astronomers attempting to image a black hole for the very first time and the theoretical physicists getting ever closer to unlocking their mysteries. It's a story that takes us into the heart of a black hole and to the very edge of what we think we know about the universe.

Related Links:
Books and Films - Black Holes

In Search of Haydn

In Search of Haydn is a biographical documentary directed by Phil Grabsky, about the life of Joseph Haydn. Through intimate and revealing interviews with the greatest living exponents of Haydn’s music, and detailed extracts from Haydn’s personal letters, the film offers tremendous insight into Haydn's music and an appreciation of the artist's wit, humanity and insatiable creativity.

Related Links:
Joseph Haydn
In Search of Beethoven

Attenborough’s Ark (BBC Natural World)

David Attenborough chooses his ten favourite animals that he would most like to save from extinction. From the weird to the wonderful, he picks fabulous and unusual creatures that he would like to put in his 'ark', including unexpected and little-known animals such as the olm, the solenodon and the quoll. He shows why they are so important and shares the ingenious work of biologists across the world who are helping to keep them alive.

Related Links:
Before It's Too Late
Life on Earth

The Mystery of the Sphinx

This documentary about the Great Sphinx of Giza was originally seen on NBC. Narrated by Charlton Heston, the film searches for answers to questions about this most enduring of mysterious monuments. Who built the Sphinx? How were the 200-ton stone blocks lifted into place? Does the face on Mars, as seen in official NASA photographs, have a connection with the Sphinx? Do the predictions of psychic Edgar Cayce about the Sphinx have validity? The program has been expanded to include recently discovered evidence of rain erosion that suggests that the Sphinx is thousands of years older than was previously thought. This fact gives credence to the idea that the Sphinx was created by a vanished civilization, long before the time of the Egyptians.

Related Links:
The Revelation of the Pyramids
Engineering an Empire

Inside the Volcano (History Channel)

Travel around the globe, and below its surface, to plumb the mysteries of the always-fascinating volcano. From gorgeous, pyrotechnic lava floes on Hawaii to awe-inspiring mushroom-clouds, humans cannot help but be fascinated by the earth-shaking grandeur of volcanoes. For four billion years, volcanoes have impacted life on earth. Empires have been destroyed, civilizations decimated – not to mention the possible extinction of dinosaurs and spurring of Ice Ages. And, like tuning a car engine by measuring its emissions, we can learn how our planet works by measuring the elements emitted from its diabolical vents.

Related Links:
How the Earth Was Made
Volcano Live

Seven Ages of Starlight

This is the epic story of the stars, and how discovering their tale has transformed our own understanding of the universe. Once we thought the sun and stars were gods and giants. Now we know, in a way, our instincts were right. The stars do all have their own characters, histories and role in the cosmos. Not least, they played a vital part in creating us. There are old, bloated red giants, capable of gobbling up planets in their orbit; explosive deaths - supernovae - that forge the building blocks of life; and black holes, the most mysterious stellar tombstones. And, of course, stars in their prime, like our own sun.

Related Links:
Wonders of the Universe
The Cosmos: A Beginner's Guide