In the beginning the universe was a bit of a let down really, after the big bang nothing else really happened for millions of years. The big bang was not really the moment of creation, the real moment of creation came 100 million years later and it was a magical, metaphysical moment known as the cosmic dawn, the moment of first light when stars began to form. These first star formations were fu
We like to think that humans are special, and we are but we are not one of a kind. The past thirty to frothy thousand years in human history have been really unique in the sense that we are alone on our planet. Earlier than this and there were always different types of humans around, those that we met and mixed with. Thanks to well preserved DNA we now know that there were at least four other d
It shouldn't have happened that Homo sapiens, our species, managed to survive and overcome the odd which have been against us for over 200,000 years. We are not indestructible and there are many evolutionary dead ends but our ancestors managed to not only survive, but also to spread into every corner of the globe. It was only our ancestors who managed to spread and colonise some of the most dif
In this three part documentary series we see Scottish actor David Hayman set off on a journey to better understand the state in which the Scotch whiskey industry is currently in and how it's world dominance is becoming threatened. In the first episode we see Hayman meet up with coopers and coppersmiths whilst also enrolling in a distilling course in Campbeltown. He is schooled in the alchemy of
The BBC and physicist Brian Cox have teamed up once again in order to bring us Forces of Nature, a four part television documentary series which beautifully combines some of the most amazing sights on Earth with calm and methodical narration by the man himself Professor Cox, all to uncover the underlying forces of nature. Episode 1: The Universe in a Snowflake The opening episode of this ser
Out of all of the seven continents on Earth, none reveal our planets spectacular story through time quite as well as Australia does. In this four part documentary series we are taken on an incredible time traveling adventure, starting out at our planets birth we move forward in time stopping off at key moments or events which helped bring rise to humanity as we know it. Host and scientist Richa
The story of the Iceman is an ancient murder mystery, it involves Europe's oldest natural mummy, known to us today as Otzi. He was a man who was stalked, attacked and left to die alone more than 5,000 years ago. Thanks to the formation of some glacial ice Otzi was preserved and later discovered in remarkable condition. Due to the quality of his remains scientists, historians, and archeologists
There is a theory that was once considered to be quite controversial, so much so that scientists labeled it absurd. It claimed that for millions of years the our planet Earth was covered entirely by ice, every inch smothered by nearly a one kilometre thick sheet. The temperatures would have been -40ºC all over, even in the tropic regions located along the equator. If this was indeed the case then
The Vikings, Scandinavian warriors who plundered and pillaged over a thousand years ago, their brutality became legendary as they left a trail of violence across Europe. For centuries viking longships terrorised people from Ireland to the Caspian Sea, however they were not just raiders they were also traders and explorers who ventured further than any Europeans before them. Now archaeologist ar