We sure lucked out with Planet Earth. Blue skies, rolling hills, water everywhere. But our home didn't come like this out of the box. Earth was a real fixer-upper, and it took some seriously hard work to build this paradise. Nearly four billion years of renovation. Some tiny, some huge, to make this house a home. Creatures on Earth don't just live and die. They actually change the world around them. The story of how for nearly 4 billion years, microbes, plants and animals have emerged and sculpted the planet's surface and atmosphere in the strangest of ways.
Every day Astronomers are finding a new planetary system that looks pretty similar to Earth. The possibilities of life somewhere else other than Earth I think are very high. If there is life out there what would it be like? Could we talk to it? Is there anything out there like you and me? To find out, we can't just look into space, we also need to look down here. The story of how a miraculous event transformed life on Earth into a complex interconnected food web; Astronauts and experts question other intelligent life in the universe.
What makes us human is the squishy triple-pounder inside our heads. It lets us build skyscrapers, and lift a special few of us into space. We are the only species on this planet that can construct realities in our mind and then go actually build it. The story of how our mind evolved on this one strange rock is one of chance, coincidence and impossible odds. This episode is an investigation into the mystery of the human brain and the chain of events that produced the anomaly of human intelligence.
Morgan Freeman will take viewers on a global journey to meet with people from all cultures whose lives are shaped in surprising ways by different fundamental forces, this time exploring themes that unite us all. Each episode will explore a single fundamental force or topic, including love, belief, power, war and peace, rebellion and freedom. In the first episode, Freeman travels around the world in search of a greater understanding of the concept of freedom. From solitary confinement and forced labor camps, to social taboos and laws that hinder speech and expression, freedom seems to be a constant struggle. As individuals and as entire nations, we are confronted with the question: Will we all ever be truly free?
Can we find a way to distribute power so that everyone has their say? A U.S. president explains the challenges of making decisions that affect hundreds of millions of lives, and Freeman learns about an African woman who has created a society without men. He explores how the rise of the internet may fundamentally change how democracy works.
It's known as the Alamo of the ancient world, the story of a band of Jewish rebels and their final stand against the Roman Army. The siege of Masada, recorded nearly 2,000 years ago by Jewish military leader Flavius Josephus, is more than a tale of resistance against impossible odds. It's part of the founding narrative of Israel. But how much of it is true? We take a look at the events that inspired the CBS television miniseries 'The Dovekeepers' and go to the site of the mountain fortress itself, uncovering new truths about this epic conflict.
The story of how for nearly 4 billion years, microbes, plants and animals have emerged and sculpted the planet's surface and atmosphere in the strangest of ways.