Albert Einstein, the most famous scientist of all time, was a world-renowned celebrity, greeted like a rock star when he appeared in public. An anti-war firebrand, Einstein also spoke out on issues ranging from women's rights and racism to immigration and nuclear arms control. But today, his image has been neutered into that of a charmingly absent-minded genius. He was, in fact, a powerful force for social change and a model for political activism. Using a wealth of rarely-seen archival footage, correspondence, and new and illuminating interviews, filmmaker Julia Newman makes the case that Albert Einstein's example of social and political activism is as important today as are his brilliant, groundbreaking theories.
We face one of the greatest challenges in the history of humanity, to eliminate the fuels that have driven progress and technology for over a century, while our thirst for energy only grows. The sun is the biggest source of energy in the solar system. It's like a nuclear reactor in the sky, and it provides endless power. If we can harvest just fractions of this, it can power all our consumption. Innovators are searching for new ways to capture more of the sun’s power, and make it available through the night, everywhere.
35 years after the Chernobyl disaster, Ben Fogle travels to the most radioactive place on Earth. He spends a week living alone inside the Chernobyl Exclusion Zone, gaining privileged access to the doomed Control Room 4 where the disaster first began to unfold. 'The planet faces unprecedented challenges - many of them, like Chernobyl, of our own making. What I've discovered in Chernobyl is that nature's reclaiming it. This is the greatest, accidental rewilding project of the globe. For me, the really exciting part of the Chernobyl story is the accidental hope that came from it. '
It is the greatest technological challenge ever undertaken by humankind. The quest to produce the ultimate energy solution, Fusion, a reliable source of clean power. What if we could create here on earth, our very own version of a star, a machine that makes power from nuclear fuel? But so immense are the challenges, the goal of a power-producing fusion reactor has so far remained elusive and out of reach... until now.
The search for climate change solutions requires passion, resources and a sense of urgency -- three qualities Bill Gates clearly possesses. Bill has founded a start-up called TerraPower. After extensive computer modelling, the idea showed promise. Its new reactor greatly reduced the chance of human error. Fuelled by depleted uranium, the travelling wave reactor functions like a slow-burning candle and requires refuelling only once every decade. Bill and his team believed they had finally developed the ideal energy source, a reactor that was clean, efficient, and most importantly, safe.
Inside the heart of the atom, its nucleus houses energy. This hidden treasure was forged billions of years ago in distant stellar furnaces. The secret of starlight is nothing to fool with. It can bring a civilization to life and it can burn it to the ground. Two atoms from different parts of the universe meet on a small planet. A deadly embrace between science and state altered the fate of the world and a gripping cautionary tale of others who grew used to living in the shadow of grave danger until it killed them all except one.
Using a wealth of rarely-seen archival footage, correspondence, and new and illuminating interviews, filmmaker Julia Newman makes the case that Albert Einstein's example of social and political activism is as important today as are his brilliant, groundbreaking theories.