Documentary AreaSimply the best Documentaries

Dr Thomas Dixon delves into the BBC's archive to explore the troubled relationship between religion and science. From the creationists of America to the physicists of the Large Hadron Collider, he traces the expansion of scientific knowledge and asks whether there is still room for God in the modern world. He looks at what happens when new scientific discoveries start to explain events that were once seen as the workings of God, and explains how some of our most famous scientists have seen God in the grandest laws of the universe. Finally, he finds intriguing evidence from brain science which hints that belief in God is here to stay.

Take an exhilarating, unprecedented exploration of the seven most amazing wonders of our solar system. Our virtual tour begins with a trip to Enceladus, one of Saturn's outer moons, where icy geysers spout from its surface. Then venture to Saturn's famous rings, which contain mountain ranges that rival the Alps. Next dive into the eye of the biggest storm in the solar system--Jupiter's Great Red Spot. Soar through the Asteroid Belt, containing millions of leftover rocks from the formation of the solar system. Trek up Mount Olympus, the largest volcano, located on Mars. Have a close encounter with the searing surface of the Sun, and finish the journey by exploring our home planet Earth.

They've discovered water on other planets, and snatched the actual building blocks of life from a comet's tail. But can space probes find a new Earth...and even make contact with alien life? In the 21st century, space probes are photographing, drilling and even sniffing new worlds in the quest for life, and scanning thousands of distant suns trying to detect Earth-like planets. It's only a matter of time before space probes unlock the secrets to extra-terrestrial life and the universe itself.

Once they were dreaded and thought to be dragons eating the sun--but modern science has dispelled mythology and we now look forward to total Solar Eclipses as one of the most spectacular phenomena in the heavens. Explore the complex movements of Earth, Moon and Sun that produce these unusual events and hear details why we may be the only intelligent beings in the known Universe to witness eclipses like we see on Earth. Man-made eclipses also figure into the science in the form of instruments called "coronagraphs." They blot out the sun and reveal its corona, uncovering secrets which, while enlightening, also warn of a disaster that could make our advanced technology crash and burn. Finally, travel into deep space, where the tiny eclipses caused by planets circling distant stars is now beginning to reveal hundreds more stars where "exoplanets" exist... perhaps even those in habitable zones like the Earth.

Where did we come from? What makes us human? Groundbreaking investigation explores how new discoveries are transforming views of our earliest ancestors. Featuring interviews with world-renowned scientists, footage shot in the trenches as fossils were unearthed, and stunning computer-generated animation, Becoming Human brings early hominids to life, examining how they lived and how we became the creative and adaptable modern humans of today. In the first episode Selam, the amazingly complete remains of a 3 million year-old child, packed with clues to why we split from the apes, came down from the trees, and started walking upright.

Andrew Graham-Dixon begins his exploration of German art by looking at the rich and often neglected art of the German middle ages and Renaissance. He visits the towering cathedral of Cologne, a place which encapsulates the varied and often contradictory character of German art. In Munch he gets to grips with the earliest paintings of the Northern Renaissance, the woodcuts of Albrecht Durer and the cosmic visions of the painter Albrecht Altdorfer. Andrew also embarks on a tour of the Bavarian countryside, discovering some of the little-known treasures of German limewood sculpture.