This one includes some familiar and some new ‘singers’ (including someone without a penis for the first time in the series): Michael Shermer, Jacob Bronowski, Carl Sagan, Neil deGrasse Tyson, Richard Dawkins, Jill Tarter, Lawrence Krauss, Richard Feynman, Brian Greene, Stephen Hawking, Carolyn Porco, and PZ Myers.
(Whoops. As a commenter pointed out, Jane Goodall was in the last one. But this one has two women, so, uh, there.)
Is it fair to be suspicious of an entire profession because of a few bad apples? There are at least two important differences, it seems to me. First, no one doubts that science actually works, whatever mistaken and fraudulent claim may from time to time be offered. But whether there are any “miraculous” cures from faith-healing, beyond the body’s own ability to cure itself, is very much at issue. Secondly, the expose’ of fraud and error in science is made almost exclusively by science. But the exposure of fraud and error in faith-healing is almost never done by other faith-healers.
The simplest thought like the concept of the number one
Has an elaborate logical underpinning
The brain has its own language
For testing the structure and consistency of the world
I recently watched a BBC America special by David Attenborough titled Charles Darwin and the Tree of Life. It was excellent. I’m familiar with Attenborough. Any fan of science probably is. However, I’ve had limited exposure to the man. He isn’t as popular in America as he is across the Pond as far as I can tell. At the very least, he isn’t promoted much on most of the science shows and networks I watch. I’ve been missing out. He has a passion about him that is as strong as the passion that was within Carl Sagan. I was especially struck by an absolutely beautiful segment in the show which broadly walked through the history of life. The video description says it will make one feel insignificant. It should. At the same time, though, it shows a grandness in Life, and that’s something of which we are all apart.
For the Sake of Science 