Monday 30 August 2010

Visions of the Future

Three episodes on latest developments in science: bio, chem & phys. Ideas are all pretty well communicated, however it is a year or so old now. Amazingly, this is the documentary that introduced me to Dr Craig Ventor, credited with creating the first synthetic (man-made) living cell. He lived up to his promise and did it as he said he would about 8 months or so later. Science always raises fascinating questions about God, our purpose and our place in the universe so its well worth watching if you're at all philosophically minded. Read the BBC synopsis here.

Below are some short clips from the series.

1. The Intelligence Revolution



 2. The Biotech Revolution




3. The Quantum Revolution (There is presently a repeat on BBCiplayer of one of the episodes)

here is a clip too:



 


"In this century, we are going to make the historic transition from the ‘Age of Discovery’ to the ‘Age of Mastery’, a period in which we will move from being passive observers of nature to its active choreographers” Dr Michio Kaku (documentary writer & presenter)

Friday 27 August 2010

History of NOW - The Story of the Noughties!

This three part documentary was shown on BBC in January 2010 and explores trends of the last ten years. Perhaps I found this quite poignant because it's the first decade I remember clearly from start to finish, or because it is the decade of overhype, being the first of the new millenium. If you don't mind ignoring some pretty annoying flashy graphics and like the voice of the Jess from Peep Show...

Either way, if you are interested in trend-spotting this has some general and amusing observations which we may have failed to digest, this is worth seeing. Differences in culture, globalisation, the rise of China, perception of youth and countless other ways our lives are different from what they were before. Naturally, being made by BBC it is focused on a particularly British perspective. First episode is generally the most interesting with these things!



1. Growing Young
2. All Together Now
3. Hello World


Here is a clip on 'How China put Britain’s Burglars out of Business'


Another clip on 'How the Cold War Gave us Cheap Flights'


Best place to find the whole thing might be on torrentz or thebox