Cosmos: The Universe Gets a Much-Needed Reboot

[SGA76]

You are not wrong because I said so, you are wrong because you do not understand basic facts. Facts such as what a scientific theory is or that the term "missing link" is nonsense rather transitional forms is accurate, and we have plenty of transitional form fossils.

No, I'm wrong because I don't agree with you.
You say I have no understanding but fail to explain as to how I'm wrong which translates to a nagging wife saying "Because I said so."

 

[Tuthmose]

And yet we've no "missing link" animals that are in between one species and another.

Punctuated Equilibria, the modern understanding of evolution, reflects the idea that evolution doesn't move in a slow, ponderous and steady pace, but rather in fits and starts. Biological and archaeological evidence strongly backs this, and modern studies of regulatory DNA are beginning to illustrate how exactly this happens. The transition between one species and other takes place at such a comparatively rapid pace that, given the very course time-scale of fossil evidence, we don't stand much of a chance of finding a transitional fossil. I, as do many others, tend to think we may have found something close in the finds at Dmanisi, Georgia, but that's too complex for me to wax on about here. Nevertheless, the whole "missing link" thing is based on a flawed understanding of the evolutionary process dating back from the "grand synthesis" nonsense of the 1940s.

I honestly don't know where everything came from and neither side has ever made compelling arguments, so I choose to believe in god.
That being said, I am open minded and am willing to listen to proof, just not "You're wrong because I said so" statements.

The second part of what you said is perfectly fair - that's all anyone can ask of anybody. I might point out, as I do to all my students before we dive into the subject, that evolution doesn't purport to say anything at all about God(s) or the divine, the "soul", or even the ultimate origins of life, -pro or -con It's just a study of the change in biological form in species, and the relationships between them, over time. Simple as that.

 

[Draax]

Whether you agree with me or not is inconsequential. A fact is a fact, regardless of what one believes. I would suggest becoming familiar with the definition of both "scientific theory" and "transitional / intermediate form". I would also suggest some reading on evolution as evolution does not stipulate one straight path, from which all species came from, but rather many branching paths.

 

[Talyrius]

 

[Retronym]

are the cartoon scenes really necessary?

 

[Draax]

Perhaps not necessary however it is understandable considering the producer, channel and time slot.

 

[sfsuphysics]

I just watched a commercial for this and I am confused by the wording. In the commercial they use the term "theory of evolution". Evolution, as a process, is a fact. Evolution of humans can be considered a theory.

Bottom line is most people use the term "theory" like sciences use the term "hypothesis", in science a hypothesis is simply an untested idea on how something is supposed to work with no backing at all, when that hypothesis gets tested, when it stands up to scrutiny and independent testing by 3rd parties, then it is classified as a "theory" and it doesn't go any further than that.

 

[TFchris]

 

[Ur_Mom]

Bottom line is most people use the term "theory" like sciences use the term "hypothesis", in science a hypothesis is simply an untested idea on how something is supposed to work with no backing at all, when that hypothesis gets tested, when it stands up to scrutiny and independent testing by 3rd parties, then it is classified as a "theory" and it doesn't go any further than that.

This is what I thought. I thought that "hypothesis" was defined as the educated guess. Whereas theory was a conclusion of those experiments and gone through peer review and all that. Then scientific fact was where you could do an experiment, observe the actual findings and prove, without a doubt, that x happened. You have the data, the observations all complete (and reproduce able).

 

[Dekoth-E-]

So all in all, it was pretty darn good. Looking forward to seeing what they do with it.

 

[[RIP]Zeus]

I remember taking the journey with Carl Sagan watching Cosmos in the 80's when I was a kid.

Here I am in my mid 30's taking the journey again with Neil deGrasse Tyson.

This show gets me choked up every time.

 

[haz_mat]

Never thought I'd see an evolution denier on a technical forum. Whats so hard to understand about the idea that creatures can adapt to their changing environments?

I don't think that evolution and creationism have to be in conflict. Go ahead and believe that God sent alpha particles from space to mutate nucleotides and create the "illusion" of evolution. Just know that there are observable and (somewhat)predictable mechanics behind the phenomena of life. And in understanding and respecting those mechanics we might be more likely survive and thrive.

Mass extinctions are widely documented in fossil records gathered from around the globe, and you can debate the age of these things all you want, but my point is that we are probably the first creature on this planet that is actually aware of these extinctions. I think that makes us a perfect example of evolution, finally a creature that has the potential to NOT just sit there and die the next time an asteroid wanders too close.

 

[sfsuphysics]

So all in all, it was pretty darn good. Looking forward to seeing what they do with it.

Didn't do much for me, the intro music sounded like the beginning of Contact with Jody Foster (my wife told me that it was the same composer who did both). It made me remember what the Discovery Channel and The LEARNING Channel used to be about though, fancy CG work to bring visuals to the wonderous. Overall the show seemed a bit too simple for me, I know it was the intro show and it wanted to hook a larger audience but man I found myself wanting to pop open the laptop and do something else, perhaps it will get better. I don't dig that flying silver fishing cap space ship either... meh.

Also I didn't care for the Obama intro, not that I didn't think it was relevant, its just our country is way too polarized now and there will be many MANY people who automatically dismiss the show just because Obama "had something to do with it"

 

[Godmachine]

Didn't do much for me, the intro music sounded like the beginning of Contact with Jody Foster (my wife told me that it was the same composer who did both). It made me remember what the Discovery Channel and The LEARNING Channel used to be about though, fancy CG work to bring visuals to the wonderous. Overall the show seemed a bit too simple for me, I know it was the intro show and it wanted to hook a larger audience but man I found myself wanting to pop open the laptop and do something else, perhaps it will get better. I don't dig that flying silver fishing cap space ship either... meh.

Also I didn't care for the Obama intro, not that I didn't think it was relevant, its just our country is way too polarized now and there will be many MANY people who automatically dismiss the show just because Obama "had something to do with it"

To be fair the show isn't for people like you and me. We have a very healthy respect and/or love for science.

The original Cosmos and the new series are both meant for those without a keen interest in science in general.

I also agree about Obama's appearance. It distracts from the point of show and immediately brings up many sociopolitical issues as well as his hard work at defunding the space program.

 

[USMCGrunt]

I was hoping it was going to be a bit more in-depth and less elementary in its delivery. I like Neil but his delivery was...annoyingly airy...if that makes any sense..

I was expecting something along the lines of Into the Universe.

 

[MindBuster]

the intro music sounded like the beginning of Contact with Jody Foster (my wife told me that it was the same composer who did both).

Well, "Contact" is based on a Novel written by...drumroll....Carl Sagan, so there is a connection

 

[nilepez]

Didn't do much for me, the intro music sounded like the beginning of Contact with Jody Foster (my wife told me that it was the same composer who did both). It made me remember what the Discovery Channel and The LEARNING Channel used to be about though, fancy CG work to bring visuals to the wonderous. Overall the show seemed a bit too simple for me, I know it was the intro show and it wanted to hook a larger audience but man I found myself wanting to pop open the laptop and do something else, perhaps it will get better. I don't dig that flying silver fishing cap space ship either... meh.

Also I didn't care for the Obama intro, not that I didn't think it was relevant, its just our country is way too polarized now and there will be many MANY people who automatically dismiss the show just because Obama "had something to do with it"

Honestly, if having a president do an intro to a show is to political for the viewers, then there's no way they're going to watch all the episodes. The problem in this country is too many people think if the other party is in the Whitehouse, it means Hitler took over. I'm not sure I saw pictures of Bush made to look like Hitler, but I certainly saw comparisons. It was ridiculous then and it's ridiculous now.

I'm going to watch the show tomorrow or the next day. Still need to watch the True Detective Finale too.

 

[raz-0]

Well I got around to the first episode. I'm curious what others opinions are of it as a whole.

I'll give my issues in order of what annoyed me most.

1) The stupid space ship. You are supposed to be showing me all this fascinating stuff, but you jam your crappy space ship in front of it for like 25% of the episode. It was very annoying. The calendar visualization was good use of modern CGI, the spaceship version of NDT sitting in front of you at the planetarium wearing a shiny 10 gallon hat is not.

2) Get the president off the frikin screen. Do not replace with any other politicians. Professional lying scumbags are not something that adds legitimacy and credibility to anything IMO. Politicizing research has never brought it closer to good science IMO. Also, we aren't short of STEM people. We are short of world class STEM people with awesome new ideas. Focusing on processing more people through the STEM fields might get you more, but it will also get you a buttload more of unemployed bottom 20%ers. Which won't be good for that state of scientific research.

3) Nice spending most of the episode on a story of religious persecution. Awesome way to keep it on topic of science. Even worse, talk about someone who made a guess and never applied the scientific theory to it. Just some dude with a dream and believing was enough, which is the epitome of science, right?

4) NDT doesn't hold up well in terms of being interesting when he is narrating for extended periods on actual location. He also seems less compelling in this than in other things he has done, which leads to...

5) I think I have been spoiled by the years and years where the discovery group produced kick ass educational programming. Despite me liking the original cosmos, this just seems to all over the place and shallow so far.

I'll give it a couple more episodes, but it's not quite cutting it so far and needs to pull it together. You can talk about political hot topics, Planet earth brought things up repeatedly without pushing my buttons, but this one annoyed me. The thing was 30% political crap that more or less undermined the scientific principle, 30% was NDT cockblocking some aciency stuff with good eyecandy, and 30% was some good sciency eye candy. Those ratios need to change drastically.

 

[kbrickley]

Well I got around to the first episode. I'm curious what others opinions are of it as a whole.

I'll give my issues in order of what annoyed me most.

1) The stupid space ship. You are supposed to be showing me all this fascinating stuff, but you jam your crappy space ship in front of it for like 25% of the episode. It was very annoying. The calendar visualization was good use of modern CGI, the spaceship version of NDT sitting in front of you at the planetarium wearing a shiny 10 gallon hat is not.

2) Get the president off the frikin screen. Do not replace with any other politicians. Professional lying scumbags are not something that adds legitimacy and credibility to anything IMO. Politicizing research has never brought it closer to good science IMO. Also, we aren't short of STEM people. We are short of world class STEM people with awesome new ideas. Focusing on processing more people through the STEM fields might get you more, but it will also get you a buttload more of unemployed bottom 20%ers. Which won't be good for that state of scientific research.

3) Nice spending most of the episode on a story of religious persecution. Awesome way to keep it on topic of science. Even worse, talk about someone who made a guess and never applied the scientific theory to it. Just some dude with a dream and believing was enough, which is the epitome of science, right?

4) NDT doesn't hold up well in terms of being interesting when he is narrating for extended periods on actual location. He also seems less compelling in this than in other things he has done, which leads to...

5) I think I have been spoiled by the years and years where the discovery group produced kick ass educational programming. Despite me liking the original cosmos, this just seems to all over the place and shallow so far.

I'll give it a couple more episodes, but it's not quite cutting it so far and needs to pull it together. You can talk about political hot topics, Planet earth brought things up repeatedly without pushing my buttons, but this one annoyed me. The thing was 30% political crap that more or less undermined the scientific principle, 30% was NDT cockblocking some aciency stuff with good eyecandy, and 30% was some good sciency eye candy. Those ratios need to change drastically.

I liked the original spaceship with its snowflake or crystal quality to it (the new spaceship seemed too much of a concession to modern graphical sensibilities) ... the original series was kind of a mixture of pure science, philosophy, history, and other social sciences so I would expect we will see more of the same here (it was one of the elements I liked from the original series that reminded me of the famous BBC series Connections)

 

[Retronym]

 

[sfsuphysics]

Well, "Contact" is based on a Novel written by...drumroll....Carl Sagan, so there is a connection

HA! Well you learn something new every day, ok I knew CS wrote Contact but I didn't make the connection

1) The stupid space ship.

Yup

2) Get the president off the frikin screen. Do not replace with any other politicians.

Also, we aren't short of STEM people. We are short of world class STEM people with awesome new ideas.

Yes. No. We have plenty of world class STEM people, they're simply not where they need to be.

3) Nice spending most of the episode on a story of religious persecution

Was it? I'll admit I made it about half way through before turning it off, but truth of the matter is "Western astronomy" basically lived in the dark ages for 1500 years believing the Earth was the center of the Universe because of religious persecution (or fear of it). Meanwhile the rest of the world were advancing science at a good pace while those "Euro-trash" monkeys decided putting their faith in ... faith was a better use of time.

4) NDT doesn't hold up well in terms of being interesting when he is narrating for extended periods on actual location. He also seems less compelling in this than in other things he has done, which leads to...

He definitely got a way about him, and in a different setting he's great to listen too, it seems his way he talks puts me to sleep now though.

5) I think I have been spoiled by the years and years where the discovery group produced kick ass educational programming. Despite me liking the original cosmos, this just seems to all over the place and shallow so far.

Don't forget the "golden age" of the Discovery channel never featured NDT on one show, he was one cog of many different people who all know a lot of shit.

 

[blade52x]

I didn't find the episode too interesting. I guess it's becasue these shows are getting to the point where I just "know everything" they talk about it. That is at least know everything in layman's terms.

Start talking about stuff like the universe's shape being a dodecahedron and what may lie outside of it, before the big bang, the holographic universe, or what we believe may be going on the Plank Length (computer simulation argument) and I'll start getting interested again.

Planets, stars, black holes, etc. are all so two decades ago.

 

[Ur_Mom]

I didn't find the episode too interesting. I guess it's becasue these shows are getting to the point where I just "know everything" they talk about it. That is at least know everything in layman's terms.

Start talking about stuff like the universe's shape being a dodecahedron and what may lie outside of it, before the big bang, the holographic universe, or what we believe may be going on the Plank Length (computer simulation argument) and I'll start getting interested again.

Planets, stars, black holes, etc. are all so two decades ago.

I found it interesting, but it didn't have any new information in it. Decent presentation. Like you said - this is stuff most of us already know. We're not the target audience, though. It's for the common people that don't know anything about the sciences.

 

[Frankie]

And yet we've no "missing link" animals that are in between one species and another.

They've found metric shit tons of transitional fossils. Every time they find more some creationist pops his head out of his own anus and says "well, you haven't found this yet!" and then they actually do find it, and then the cycle repeats.

 

[PornoSatan]

The first episode could have been better. The special effects varied between good and amateurish. Tyson did well but I didn't feel as inspired as I did when watching Sagan. It's no surprise though, Sagan is legendary, and I feel that even though Tyson can't truly replace Carl Sagan, he's probably a better candidate than most anyone else. Overall I think it was a good episode and I'm looking forward to the other episodes.

 

[USMCGrunt]

The first episode could have been better. The special effects varied between good and amateurish. Tyson did well but I didn't feel as inspired as I did when watching Sagan. It's no surprise though, Sagan is legendary, and I feel that even though Tyson can't truly replace Carl Sagan, he's probably a better candidate than most anyone else. Overall I think it was a good episode and I'm looking forward to the other episodes.

I think Michio Kaku would be a great candidate, every show that I've seen him in I've really enjoyed listening to him. I think Tyson is better when he gets to be natural...not having to be stuck to script.

 

[nilepez]

Well I got around to the first episode. I'm curious what others opinions are of it as a whole.

I'll give my issues in order of what annoyed me most.

1) The stupid space ship. You are supposed to be showing me all this fascinating stuff, but you jam your crappy space ship in front of it for like 25% of the episode. It was very annoying. The calendar visualization was good use of modern CGI, the spaceship version of NDT sitting in front of you at the planetarium wearing a shiny 10 gallon hat is not.

2) Get the president off the frikin screen. Do not replace with any other politicians. Professional lying scumbags are not something that adds legitimacy and credibility to anything IMO. Politicizing research has never brought it closer to good science IMO. Also, we aren't short of STEM people. We are short of world class STEM people with awesome new ideas. Focusing on processing more people through the STEM fields might get you more, but it will also get you a buttload more of unemployed bottom 20%ers. Which won't be good for that state of scientific research.

Presidents have done stuff like this for a long time. It's really fucking sad that people get so upset when a sitting president does a little intro for a science program. And I'd say that if it was Bush or any other president. This is what's wrong with this country. Right wingnuts that believe Obama is the 2nd coming of hitler, while left wingnuts said Bush was the 2nd coming of hitler.

Show a little respect for the office.

 

[DeathFromBelow]

From what we've seen so far it feels like the Star Trek reboot vs Star Trek the Motion Picture. They're both using the same stuff to tell a story. The new one is faster paced, the old one is more philosophical. They're both good. I think the new series will compliment the old one.

I think Michio Kaku would be a great candidate, every show that I've seen him in I've really enjoyed listening to him. I think Tyson is better when he gets to be natural...not having to be stuck to script.

I don't think so. Kaku does a lot of futurist pop science, his writing is dry, and I don't think he's really all that good at explaining things outside of string theory. Sagan and Tyson's style is more about spreading an understanding of the history and philosophical implications of the scientific perspective.

There is no optimal host. The original Cosmos series script was basically Sagan's own writings converted into a TV series. There just isn't anyone else like him right now.

are the cartoon scenes really necessary?

I preferred the live action historical sequences from the original Cosmos. I was worried that the animated sequences wouldn't work well, but it was ok.

I'm surprised by the level of hostility over the Bruno sequence. I thought it was a good transition from talking about the observable universe and the possibility of an infinite multiverse to discuss the first man to imagine an infinite Cosmos at the dawn of the enlightenment. The conflict between mysticism and science was a key theme to the original Cosmos series. The best episode (IMO) was episode 7 (The Backbone of Night) where Sagan walked through the dawn of science in the Greek city states and how and why it was eventually suppressed by the Platonists. Science has flickered in and out of existence for all of human history for various reasons. The scientific enlightenment of the last 400 years is a exceptional phenomenon, and one of the key reasons it endured seems to be the breakdown of the authority of the Catholic church. Suddenly you had a bunch of educated people who could read, write, and do math, but were not restricted by the church. Bruno, Kepler, and Galileo all suffered for their work, but the church could not prevent their ideas from spreading.

You can say I'm wrong and swear evolution is a fact, but in truth evolution is just a theory still, and you learn "theory" means "educated guess" in the 9th grade.

No, just... no. You had a terrible 9th grade science teacher. You start with ideas, what you might call an 'educated guess'. If you can test that idea it becomes a hypothesis. A theory is an idea that has been repeatedly been tested and confirmed by observation and experiment.

Evolution is not a theory, evolution is an observation, the observation that living things change over generations. Darwin's theory of evolution by natural selection is the model which explains how this change occurs. It is extremely well supported by evidence. Why do you think you can get the flu more than once? Speciation of birds has been observed in the wild, novel mutations have been observed in bacteria in the lab, and we have thousands of years of experience domesticating plants and animals via artificial selection. I can't show you every step in the evolution of, say, the American Pit Bull Terrier from wolves (or even the dogs they were bred from in the 1800s). That doesn't mean there's a 'missing link' that can't be explained by natural selection.

 

[raz-0]

Presidents have done stuff like this for a long time. It's really fucking sad that people get so upset when a sitting president does a little intro for a science program. And I'd say that if it was Bush or any other president. This is what's wrong with this country. Right wingnuts that believe Obama is the 2nd coming of hitler, while left wingnuts said Bush was the 2nd coming of hitler.

Show a little respect for the office.

I'm an opponent of doodie head politics where you say stupid shit about whoever is on the opposite team.

That aside, which presidents have done this? Granted, my experience of presidents only goes back to Carter, but I don't recall presidents putting their face on social initiatives and jumping in front of the camera every opportunity to appear as part of entertainment television.

I don't recall carter doing it outside of the usual news media communication process. Under regan, it was always some spokesperson or cabinet person or the first lady, president' council on physical fitness.. arnold, just say no was Nancy, AIDS and Koop. Bush 1.. don't recall him ever doing much of anything. Clinton loved showing up on talk shows.

Maybe I just missed it, so I'll ask, what are the parallel situations. I'm sure I missed something. IT also probably would have come off less annoying if he... you know... seemed vaguely interested in it. Or alternatively they inserted some archival footage of one of his STEM speeches and commented on how the show was going to show you what a fascinating universe we live in and try to spark your curiosity.

 

[mavrocket]

I'm surprised by the level of hostility over the Bruno sequence...Suddenly you had a bunch of educated people who could read, write, and do math, but were not restricted by the church. Bruno, Kepler, and Galileo all suffered for their work, but the church could not prevent their ideas from spreading.

Except this is revisionist history, retold to make the church look bad and support the idea that in order to be considered an intellectual or intelligent you must be an atheist.

Was it mentioned that Bruno was imprisoned on the basis that he believed in Hermetism, another mysticism, and was ultimately sentenced for not denouncing his belief that the sun was in fact God? No it wasn't.

Evolution is not a theory, evolution is an observation, the observation that living things change over generations. Darwin's theory of evolution by natural selection is the model which explains how this change occurs. It is extremely well supported by evidence. Why do you think you can get the flu more than once? Speciation of birds has been observed in the wild, novel mutations have been observed in bacteria in the lab, and we have thousands of years of experience domesticating plants and animals via artificial selection. I can't show you every step in the evolution of, say, the American Pit Bull Terrier from wolves (or even the dogs they were bred from in the 1800s). That doesn't mean there's a 'missing link' that can't be explained by natural selection.

I see nothing wrong with challenging the theory of evolution, as there are plenty of reasons to challenge it; the easiest being that there has yet to this day been found a transitional record of evolution in the fossil record, only fossils that appear then disappear for seemingly no reason (hence what Darwin's theory attempts to explain). Another reason would be the many living fossils that have been found around the world, from insects to fish that are still swimming or flying in the exact same shape and size as fossils found that have been dated to millions of years ago.

I think we have a lot more to learn about our Earth, universe and the things inhabiting it (including ourselves), and to not question what is accepted as truth is the same reason why things like the Spanish Inquisition happened in the first place.

 

[maverikv]

Except this is revisionist history, retold to make the church look bad and support the idea that in order to be considered an intellectual or intelligent you must be an atheist.

Was it mentioned that Bruno was imprisoned on the basis that he believed in Hermetism, another mysticism, and was ultimately sentenced for not denouncing his belief that the sun was in fact God? No it wasn't.

The Bruno segment was clearly meant to highlight challenging Dogma. They seemed to go to a lot of trouble to highlight how it wasn't anti religious. Bruno also believed in God. The point was that he challenged the orthodoxy with new ideas and reconciled them with his faith.

I see nothing wrong with challenging the theory of evolution, as there are plenty of reasons to challenge it; the easiest being that there has yet to this day been found a transitional record of evolution in the fossil record, only fossils that appear then disappear for seemingly no reason (hence what Darwin's theory attempts to explain). Another reason would be the many living fossils that have been found around the world, from insects to fish that are still swimming or flying in the exact same shape and size as fossils found that have been dated to millions of years ago.

1. Every fossil is a transitional fossil
2. Finding an animal alive today that we have fossils of says what exactly about evolution?

 

[kbrickley]

I see nothing wrong with challenging the theory of evolution, as there are plenty of reasons to challenge it; the easiest being that there has yet to this day been found a transitional record of evolution in the fossil record, only fossils that appear then disappear for seemingly no reason (hence what Darwin's theory attempts to explain). Another reason would be the many living fossils that have been found around the world, from insects to fish that are still swimming or flying in the exact same shape and size as fossils found that have been dated to millions of years ago.

I think we have a lot more to learn about our Earth, universe and the things inhabiting it (including ourselves), and to not question what is accepted as truth is the same reason why things like the Spanish Inquisition happened in the first place.

Challenging Evolution is fine if you offer an alternative theory that is scientifically valid and explains the gaps in the theory you are replacing (people who offer creationism do not meet that bar ... and I haven't heard any alternate theories to evolution from the scientists) ... Newton's theories of Gravity remained in effect until Einstein offered a better theory

Just because some creatures have failed to evolve doesn't mean anything ... one of the principles of evolution is that a species responds to need ... if it is in a stable environment and there are no strong forces to make it evolve then it can stay fairly stagnant (until a force requiring it to evolve is presented) ... humanity is evolving very very slowly now since we have mastered much of our environment and aren't under any strong evolutionary pressures ... we are gradually evolving out of the presence of Wisdom Teeth (since we don't use them with our omnivorous diet) and our little toe is gradually atrophying away as well) ... we might get a little evolution of our brain but as the dominant species on our planet we aren't experiencing the pressure to evolve that we had millions of years ago

 

[Kongar]

So I watched it last night and I thought it could have used more science and less religious rebuttal. Science and scientists don't care about what religious nuts think. We deal with facts and that's it. Stooping to that level - engaging in the argument, cheapens the whole thing...

They should have cut that whole Bruno segment, and instead gone into more details. Like, I dunno, explain what "you're made of star STUFF" means. pffft

 

[kbrickley]

So I watched it last night and I thought it could have used more science and less religious rebuttal. Science and scientists don't care about what religious nuts think. We deal with facts and that's it. Stooping to that level - engaging in the argument, cheapens the whole thing...

They should have cut that whole Bruno segment, and instead gone into more details. Like, I dunno, explain what "you're made of star STUFF" means. pffft

We have had lots of hard science shows like Stephen Hawking's Universe and such, and most don't have mass appeal ... the original Cosmos was a mixture of science, history, and philosophy and it was very successful with the mass audience (one of the most accessible science programs ever made) ... Astronomy is inextricably linked with religion because for 1500 years the science of Astronomy was governed by religious thinking ... most of the pioneering Astronomers that broke us out of that mold experienced severe religious persecution ... one can certainly argue whether they should have chosen Kepler or Galileo over Bruno but all three were persecuted for their scientific heresies against the church

 

[mavrocket]

The Bruno segment was clearly meant to highlight challenging Dogma. They seemed to go to a lot of trouble to highlight how it wasn't anti religious. Bruno also believed in God. The point was that he challenged the orthodoxy with new ideas and reconciled them with his faith.

1. Every fossil is a transitional fossil
2. Finding an animal alive today that we have fossils of says what exactly about evolution?

Exactly. Questioning the theory would amount to... challenging dogma.

I don't think I communicated it clearly enough before. I meant a transitional fossil record of one species.

Challenging Evolution is fine if you offer an alternative theory that is scientifically valid and explains the gaps in the theory you are replacing (people who offer creationism do not meet that bar ... and I haven't heard any alternate theories to evolution from the scientists) ... Newton's theories of Gravity remained in effect until Einstein offered a better theory

Just because some creatures have failed to evolve doesn't mean anything ... one of the principles of evolution is that a species responds to need ... if it is in a stable environment and there are no strong forces to make it evolve then it can stay fairly stagnant (until a force requiring it to evolve is presented) ... humanity is evolving very very slowly now since we have mastered much of our environment and aren't under any strong evolutionary pressures ... we are gradually evolving out of the presence of Wisdom Teeth (since we don't use them with our omnivorous diet) and our little toe is gradually atrophying away as well) ... we might get a little evolution of our brain but as the dominant species on our planet we aren't experiencing the pressure to evolve that we had millions of years ago

I'm not challenging evolution with another theory, such as creationism.

I find it unrealistic to assume that something would not change at all over millions of years, as I bet many evolutionary scientists would. Data like this is routinely disregarded because it challenges the theory, which people are afraid to challenge in fear they will be labeled cretins and unintelligent.

 

[kbrickley]

I find it unrealistic to assume that something would not change at all over millions of years, as I bet many evolutionary scientists would. Data like this is routinely disregarded because it challenges the theory, which people are afraid to challenge in fear they will be labeled cretins and unintelligent.

Why, the whole principle of Natural Selection is based on environmental factors favoring one mutation over another ... if a creature lived in a very stable environment (like the Coelacanth) then there is nothing to say that a species couldn't go long periods with no mutational benefits for one mutation over another (which would greatly retard evolution)

We also have situations like the Peacock and the Japanese Heike Crab where Artificial Selection (rather than Natural Selection) resulted in the evolutionary changes to the species ... they don't invalidate Evolution or Natural Selection though

 

[DeathFromBelow]

They should have cut that whole Bruno segment, and instead gone into more details. Like, I dunno, explain what "you're made of star STUFF" means. pffft

Maybe you should pay more attention next time?

During the cosmic calendar segment he explained quite clearly that stars fuse hydrogen into heavier atoms, and when those stars die those atoms are ejected and recycled into new generations of stars. The carbon in your muscles, the calcium in your bones, the iron in your blood... everything in your body that isn't hydrogen was forged in the hearts of long-dead stars. We are all made of star stuff.

 

[kbrickley]

I don't think I communicated it clearly enough before. I meant a transitional fossil record of one species.

Why do you think we don't have this record ... there will of course be gaps in the record since we cannot physically get fossils for every species that has ever lived but we have sufficient fossils to trace most species back to ancestors tens and sometimes hundreds of millions of years back ... the cockroach alone goes back about 300 million years or so ... and we can trace the whale back to its land based ancestor ...

even humanity (which was for the longest time the best example of scientists ignoring their own theory) has now progressed from a straight line (impossible) to the branched tree of human subspecies that has resulted in the one remaining one left (homo sapiens)

 

[Ocean]

And yet we've no "missing link" animals that are in between one species and another.
We've nothing that bridges the gap between cold and warm blooded creatures.
Evolutionists have as little proof as creationists and both preach endlessly about how they're right and the other is wrong with no physical tangible proof other then poking back and forth at each other with "You're wrong I'm right" statements.
You can say I'm wrong and swear evolution is a fact, but in truth evolution is just a theory still, and you learn "theory" means "educated guess" in the 9th grade.
I honestly don't know where everything came from and neither side has ever made compelling arguments, so I choose to believe in god.
That being said, I am open minded and am willing to listen to proof, just not "You're wrong because I said so" statements.

Creationism: for people who think God is too fucking stupid to be able to use the process of evolution.

 

[Tuthmose]

I don't think I communicated it clearly enough before. I meant a transitional fossil record of one species.

As kbrickley pointed out, we've got a decent fossil lineage on the whale. Perhaps the best documented lineage is that of the horse, back to the dog-size, multi-toed Eohippus. As I said earlier, if by "transitional fossil", you mean some "half-this, half-that" chimera, you're operating on an outdated understanding of evolution. Under the modern Punctuated Equilibria model of the theory, it is now understood that the process moves in fits and starts, and that minor changes in regulatory DNA can precipitate speciation-level structural changes without much, if any of an intermediary between it and its ancestor.

I find it unrealistic to assume that something would not change at all over millions of years, as I bet many evolutionary scientists would. Data like this is routinely disregarded because it challenges the theory, which people are afraid to challenge in fear they will be labeled cretins and unintelligent.

Changing environmental challenges are what drive evolution, giving the advantageous nod to one variation or another among the pool of offspring. If the environment doesn't change, then there is little pressure for the old form to be "weeded out" of the gene pool in favor of some better-adapted one.
Evolutionary isolation also plays a key role. Its called allopatric speciation - the rise of a new species from a geographically-isolated population cluster. It is thus possible for both an evolutionary descendant of a species and the original species to exist simultaneously in the fossil record. The bulk of the species, in an area with little change, doesn't evolve much. The isolated population, facing new issues, evolves in a divergent way. Similarly, one species can evolve into several new ones, and the progenitor species may or may not disappear along the way. Allopatric speciation (or the lack thereof) also perhaps explains why, of the creatures which have changed little or not at all over millions of years (coelacanth, horse-shoe crab, sharks, etc.), most if not all are sea creatures. The sea, by its very nature, offers far less of a chance of isolation of one pocket of a species in an area offering different environmental challenges that does a land environment.
As for people being afraid to challenge the theory, that's not true at all. Challenges like this are specifically what caused the "grand synthesis" model of evolution, with its linear "family stick" model of human evolution, to be tossed out on its ear in favor of Punctuated Equilibria. The evidence didn't fit the model, so the model was changed. It's how science works