evolution

"Where did we come from? What makes us human? NOVA's...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...computer-generated animation, [these programs] bring early hominids to life, examining how we became the creative and adaptable modern humans of today...In the first episode...encounter..."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...[T]he second episode investigates the riddle of "Turkana Boy" -- a tantalizing fossil of Homo erectus, the first ancestor to leave Africa and colonize the globe...[T]he final episode...explores the origins of "us" -- where modern humans and our capacities for art, invention, and survival came from, and what happened when we encountered the mysterious Neanderthals..." -- Container.

"Looks at the story of evolution and examines the two sides of the debate including artificial and natural selection, links to a common ancestry, and criticisms of evolutionary biology"--Provided by publisher.

Discusses the life and scientific discoveries of Charles Darwin.

An overview of natural selection that covers adaptation, Charles Darwin's work and objections to his theories, Mendel's findings about inheritance, and other related topics.

An overview of the important events and individuals associated with the Scopes Monkey Trial that details how and why John Scopes was accused of violating Tennessee state legislature by teaching Charles Darwin's theory of evolution in a high school classroom; and features photographs, illustrations, biographical sketches, and excerpts from primary source documents.

This nonideological analysis of the debate regarding intelligent design and evolution reveals the intentional distortions and unseen influences of modern media that skew the public's view of world events and controversial issues.

The theory of evolution takes hold-transforming ideas about survival, extinction, and life itself. Can species change? Or go extinct? In the eighteenth century, most people answer no to both questions. But in the century that follows, that certainty gets challenged as some people in Europe question the common belief that all creatures are the same as they've been since life's creation.

"From learning to make fire and using the stars as guides to cooking meals in microwaves and landing on the moon, prepare to uncover the secrets and superpowers of how we evolved from our first appearances millions of years ago"--Provided by publisher.

"The notion of a living world is one of humanity's oldest beliefs. Though scorned by scientists in the sixties and seventies, the facts supporting this concept have now become tenets of modern Earth system science, a relatively young field that studies the living and nonliving components of the planet as an integrated whole. Life did not evolve passively in response to its environment, as scientists have long assumed. Instead, it evolved with Earth, shaping its climate and terrain at every scale, one part in a great orchestra, in which non-living elements-the air, rocks, and water-are the instruments that life, in its multitudes, has emerged to play"--Provided by publisher.

". . . [tells the] story of the brilliant team who discovered the "Ardi" skeleton, a human more than a million years older than the famous Lucy, and their twenty-year quest to redefine our understanding of human evolution"--Provided by publisher.