Cosmos - With Neil deGrasse Tyson
- Thread starter Greylock Crescent
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That was an absolutely beautiful, poetic ending. Ghosts, indeed.
One of the fringe benefits of having Seth Macfarlane producing.
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I loved it, and yes, I teared up a bit at the end.
Also, Patrick Stewart makes everything better.
Also, Patrick Stewart makes everything better.
Ditto.
I'm a bit impressed with how well the series is handling commercial breaks. They have actual act break cliffhangers!
He HAD to zing the Young Earthers.
My first college roommate was a Young Earther. He genuinely believed that God created the universe with the light from distant galaxies already in motion to give the universe the appearance of being older than it actually was. Scientific evidence, like fossils and cave paintings, that showed the Earth was older than 6,000 years, was God's way of testing humanity's faith.
Yes, Tyson was trolling the Young Earthers, but they know that he's wrong and what he says doesn't matter to their faith.
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I like that he's driving the point home that Creationism is NOT science. There are plenty of people who are too ready to believe they're both equal, and they're not.
Sounds like they believe God is the real troll, going to such elaborate lengths to mislead us about the universe as some sort of convoluted "test of faith." Why is it worth having faith in someone so determined to trick and deceive you?
See, this is my problem with the idea of faith, at least that kind of faith. These people claim they have faith in God, but what they really have unwavering faith in is their own rightness. They're so convinced that they're incapable of error, or so terrified to admit that they could be fallible, that they make up these insanely convoluted excuses to avoid admitting that they could ever be wrong in any of their beliefs. If what they believe is in conflict with all the evidence, then it's not them that's wrong, it's the rest of the universe, because it's impossible for them to be wrong. The sheer unmitigated egomania of that is staggering. It's not about God, it's purely about vanity. People with real faith, people like Mahatma Gandhi or the Dalai Lama or Pope Francis, have humility and selflessness. They freely admit their own fallibility and question themselves all the time. Their faith is that the universe is greater than themselves, that it has truths that lie beyond their comprehension but that are worth striving toward through constant self-questioning.
Which, really, isn't that different from what scientists do.
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^ Nailed it.
Wow another amazing episode of this fantastic series. There was so much covered tonight that I think I might have to watch it again to get all the light year calculations down because he went over that really really fast. One of the things I love about this show is that it is so visually stunning. That event horizon scene might be one of the best scenes I've seen on TV this year. That's where CGI really works, and it's one reason I wish we had more Space Based series on television. Also loved that ending. Ghosts of Stars, and Tyson reminiscing at the bus stop. A beautiful way to wrap up a beautiful episode.
Sorry, it took me right out of it. My first thought: "Why make people think about Captain Picard when they should be thinking about William Herschel?"
At least they did some history-based scenes with real actors instead of that cartoon crap.
In the original Cosmos, Carl Sagan slid down into a black hole on purpose, on the seat of his pants.
Not a spoiler, but I went and watched "Noah" at the theater this weekend, and the film includes an absolutely stunningly beautiful portrayal of Creation. Anyone who loves watching Cosmos will love watching the way Darren Aronofsky portrays the biblical creation. I'm sure it'll piss off some of the super religious folk who go watch Noah because its a bible story, but I know I loved it. It stops just short of outright saying that man came from monkeys, but it heavily implies it.
That's the problem with the "Young Earth" crowd... they believe that the "days" of creation are meant to be taken literally, as in a 24 hour period of time. There is nothing contradictory about science telling us the universe is 14 billion years old, and religion telling us creation took only 6 "days". Genesis never specified exactly how long each day was.
There's nothing contradictory because the Book of Genesis is a myth, not a science book. It's basically an appropriation of the Sumerian Enuma Elish creation myth with the polytheism edited out. It's stuff people made up thousands of years ago when they didn't know how the world worked, and it was included in the Bible because the Bible is an anthology of religious writings from centuries of Judeo-Christian cultural tradition. And thus it includes things that are straight-up myths, as well as poetry and literature like the Song of Songs. Reading it strictly as a literal account of things that happened is missing most of its meaning.
Heck, Chapters 1 and 2 of Genesis seem to contradict each other on some details: Chapter 1 says that God created animals first, then man and woman simultaneously (with no names given), while Chapter 2 says Adam first, then animals, then Eve. It's always seemed to me that the compilers of Genesis combined various separate texts, that each "chapter" was originally its own independent work, subtly different versions of the myths being recorded. After all, the traditions in question were probably mostly oral, so written versions would've been hard to find and thus the selection may have been somewhat piecemeal.
Heck, Chapters 1 and 2 of Genesis seem to contradict each other on some details: Chapter 1 says that God created animals first, then man and woman simultaneously (with no names given), while Chapter 2 says Adam first, then animals, then Eve. It's always seemed to me that the compilers of Genesis combined various separate texts, that each "chapter" was originally its own independent work, subtly different versions of the myths being recorded. After all, the traditions in question were probably mostly oral, so written versions would've been hard to find and thus the selection may have been somewhat piecemeal.
Actually, the different versions of the creation story were probably explained by Einstein. The order of perceived events can be different for different observers moving at a large fraction of the speed of light, and angels are very very fast.
Also, while Adam and Eve did eat an apple from the tree of knowledge, it was more accurately called an Apple iFruit.
Also, while Adam and Eve did eat an apple from the tree of knowledge, it was more accurately called an Apple iFruit.
With one of those actors being... Brandon Braga himself! I nearly fell out of my chair when he appeared onscreen.
I don't know, to me that has always seemed like such a convenient rationalization. One can believe in a Creator who set everything in motion if they wish, but to argue that the writers of the Bible really meant for those "days" to represent billions and billions of years just seems silly. Given the extremely limited level of understanding of science and the universe on display in the rest of the text (which is remarkable for something supposedly inspired by the Creator of that universe), it seems pretty clear that they really did intend it to be a literal 6 days. And would have had no reason to believe otherwise.
Of course it is a convenient rationalization. It's clearly a myth. That doesn't mean it can't be interpreted in such a way that the facts of the universe don't contradict it... something which would give peace to someone who actually believes in nonsense. (hence my appreciation for the way Aronofsky portrayed it.)
There is no way that any of those bible stories are 100% true. Some are probably based on incomplete facts of things that actually happened, most are probably oral history and straight up stories.
Someone who doesn't change their mind when presented with evidence is simply a moron, and the fact that anyone believes the Earth is only 6500 years old falls directly in that camp. But that doesn't mean taking their stories away from them, it just means they have to think about their stories differently.
Well, what's irritating to me about Noah's Flood is that it doesn't even make sense within the Biblical mythology.
So God had to get two of each animal to board a ship, where they ate and pooped and took up space, and it was Noah's job to save them all? But wait, flip back a couple of pages and God had just created all those animals and plants from scratch. Wouldn't it make more sense to just stick Noah and his family on a smaller boat and then recreate all the animals and plants once he landed? Less lumber, less labor, and lower costs all around. But wait once more. Wouldn't it have made even more sense just to wipe out the evildoers with a plague or something? That would save both water and lumber. How about just inspiring the evil doers to get with the program and skipping the whole mess?
So God had to get two of each animal to board a ship, where they ate and pooped and took up space, and it was Noah's job to save them all? But wait, flip back a couple of pages and God had just created all those animals and plants from scratch. Wouldn't it make more sense to just stick Noah and his family on a smaller boat and then recreate all the animals and plants once he landed? Less lumber, less labor, and lower costs all around. But wait once more. Wouldn't it have made even more sense just to wipe out the evildoers with a plague or something? That would save both water and lumber. How about just inspiring the evil doers to get with the program and skipping the whole mess?
