The Big Bang

Two excellent documentaries on BBC4 last night;

Lost Horizons: The Big Bang:
To coincide with the switch-on of the LHC, the world's largest particle accelerator complex, Professor Jim Al Khalili delves into over 50 years of the BBC science archive to tell the story behind the emergence of one of the greatest theories of modern science, the Big Bang.

The remarkable idea that our universe simply began from nothing has not always been accepted with the conviction it is today and, from fiercely disputed leftfield beginnings, took the best part of the 20th century to emerge as the triumphant explanation of how the universe began. Using curious horn-shaped antennas, U-2 spy planes, satellites and particle accelerators, scientists have slowly pieced together the cosmological jigsaw, and this documentary charts the overwhelming evidence for a universe created by a Big Bang.

and

The Big Bang Machine
Professor Brian Cox visits Geneva to take a look around Cern's Large Hadron Collider before this vast, 27km long machine is sealed-off and the experiment to create the simulation of a black hole begins.

When it's up and running, it will be capable of creating the conditions that existed just a billionth of a second after the Big Bang. Brian joins the scientists who hope that the LHC will change our understanding of the early universe and solve some of its mysteries.

Nobody does it better than the BBC. Jim Al Khalili is fast becoming the Attenborough of the quantum world while the incredibly personable Cox jumps off the screen with his enthusiasm and excitement. Great stuff!

here's someone else's thoughts.

FLOW: For Love Of Water

some clips here for an upcoming documentary about water that looks interesting. Water is not yet regarded as a human right mainly because some people would like to sell it to you, more information on the film is here.

Possessed: a documentary about hoarders

fascinating! (via boingboing)


POSSESSED from Martin Hampton on Vimeo.

Dispatches: Holy Offensive

Richards Dawkins website has posted these links the the Channel 4 documentary "Holy Offensive". The documentary that examines two highly publicised clashes between artistic freedom and religious belief in today's Britain.

As usual the men of religion (this time the Sikhs) come off as petulant bullies - have I ever mentioned how sick of them I am???



Part 2: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2xf5Og_0eAw
Part 3: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A4Ou7Pqb6z4
Part 4: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UgMiNQyEktI
Part 5: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0LwpWnjpCuM

The End of the World Bus Tour

from the Guardian;

We're on a coach tour of Israel, with a bunch of mainly middle-aged Americans. So far, so unextraordinary. The reason they're here, though, is that they all believe that the end of the world is just around the corner. Apocalypse-tourism - much more exciting than eco-tourism.

So they visit the valley of Armageddon, which is a real place and looks pretty peaceful today. Not for long, though, because this is where man and Satan will rise up against God, and soon the whole place will be flowing with the blood of 200 million soldiers. Lots of the tourists get baptised, some for the second time, not in the Jordan but in the Sea of Galilee because it's handier for their hotel complex. And, anyway, the Jordan runs through Galilee so it's kind of the same. They're preparing themselves for The Rapture. They spend a day at an Israeli army camp, doing menial tasks to help out the soldiers. Because Palestinians are God's enemies, obviously.

But it's hard to get angry with this lot, because they are all quite mad, with troubled pasts - lost children, drugs, multiple relationship failures. Just look at their eyes: they're clearly bonkers. Lovely.

I watched this peculiar documentary the other night and I haven't much to add to the review above except how keen the pilgrims where to see everyone burn in hell, they where practically gloating! I don't think "bonkers" quite covers them, sure, their ideas are nuts but they alternated between being 'super friendly' to sinister glee when describing Jesus killing everybody (but them). I really admired how the crew how stopped themselves from either bursting out laughing or bashing them across the head during the course of making the film? You obviously need a very steady head to make documentaries.

I would have loved if the film makers had asked some of the Jewish soldiers what they made of this crowd. It must be bizarre, after all, only Christians will be saved in the Rapture and yet these fanatics where helping to clean up an Israeli military base. It's a strange world.

Black Gold

I watched the documentary 'Black Gold' on More 4 last night and it was a real eye opener. I knew the mega corporations wouldn't be paying a fair price to the third world farmers for their coffee but the penitence they actually get was pathetic - a couple of cent per kilo at best!

I'm buying Illy coffee at the moment, at least they came out of the documentary a bit better than most (thank god!).