I find something very disturbing about the Brian Cox style of science programme. He usually presents something along the lines of the current “Wonders of the Universe” (his other recent outing being the astronomy week on BBC2 where his irritation factor was doubled by the contributions of his co-presenter Dara O Briain). The subject matter should be right up my street. I’ve had a lifelong passion for the wonders of Nature and the Universe. So, what’s the problem?
Two things – a certain contempt for human knowledge and wisdom prior to the present day which feeds an arrogant implication that everyone in the entire history of mankind was thick as two short planks until our current cohort of scientists who have finally found out the truth about everything. Secondly, an apparent view that only science can reveal truth. (Consider instead Ken Wilber’s Integral model which shows that science is a way of understanding surfaces, but that we need other ways to understand the depths)
Mark Vernon nails the issue perfectly.
At the start of the second programme, Cox is filmed on the banks of a holy river amidst Hindus attending to their dead. He notes that Hinduism, along with other religions, has a story to tell about people’s origins and the meaning of their lives. Only, that story is flawed. He has a deeper story to tell. ‘The path to enlightenment is not to understand our own lives and deaths,’ he intones, ‘but to understand the lives and deaths of the stars.’ He then proceeds to describe how the elements in our bodies are made from the explosive death of stars. Which is true. Only that’s not nearly enough to deliver on the enlightenment promise at the top. That would be like saying the meaning of Michelangelo’s David can be found in the quarry where the marble came from.
Nicely put, Mark! He concludes –
Science of itself does not do the meaning part. Only a human interpretation of the science can achieve that. But to do so, the interpretation must make raids on the language of values and metaphysics. It needs the beauty of colour and the harmonies of music – qualities which, of themselves, again are unknown to physics as physics.
I think it’s a shame to hear scientists trying to present science as a kind of “the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth” activity. Scientific enquiry and exploration is such a wonderful human enterprise, but it goes seriously off course when it turns into scientism.
Heroes Not Zombies 
I also found myself shying away from this series, while not quite thinking about it enough to understand why. Like you, the subject matter _should_ appeal greatly to me. I think you’ve captured the essence of what I felt – but did not consciously realise I felt – about the program beautifully.
When done thoughtfully, the BBC has produced some superb scientific documentary series. This is not one of them. In an effort to make us feel Wonder, the presenter and script turn instead to more absolutist Shock & Awe tactics.