The Most Unknown

Recently I've been reading about the chronology of the distant future. The distant future of humanity and of the universe and I'm not talking about thousands of years into the future, but billions of years into the future. Obviously all of this are theories based on equations and deductions from fields such as that of astrophysics and the truth is that it gives you enough to think about even taking into account that our lives, our bones and civilization will not even be dust at that point in time. Watching this documentary only made me think more about it and not because it has to do with what I was reading but because of the amount of knowledge that we are still discovering, and it's clear that we still need to discover a lot. I cannot even begin to fathom what humanity will learn in the centuries to come. It definitely makes you feel really small, but that's not bad because I've realized that this is precisely how we should feel. The magnitude of what surrounds us is immeasurable.

I have no doubt that this movie is made with good intentions, but I cannot but help to be irked by it. More of that later. Let's first go to the title. 'The most unknown' might make you think that this is about that what scientists do not know (yet), but it is also about the scientists themselves. That in the US science is under attack from religious groups is evident. There is a strong suspicion that the scientists all belong to a nefarious society whose purpose is to ridicule that what is ridiculous. If you believe that the planet is 6000 years old, flat and ruled over by an invisible all-powerful, all-knowing, all-good being that has a plan that is unalterable but you pray to it so it changes its plan for your personally and you get told that the nonsense you believe in doesn't sit well with any scientific research or logic, you can either adapt, ignore it or do away with it. Since the first is undesirable and the second doesn't work, the latter is what remains. Hence the extreme religious groups influence politics to have their view imposed or, lacking that, at least push back the influence of science that contradicts their religious views. Queue for this movie that introduces us to science as much as their scientists. And so we get to see is all the areas where the friction between religious convictions and science is the most obvious; the origin of life, the universe, the planet. And we get nothing on anything else. It also introduces us to nine scientists of which about six are native English speakers and five of them are Americans. The suggestion is clear. Look at all these nice American scientists, see they are not nasty evil people, but funny and cute and dedicated. And mostly American. What is irksome is that five out of nine scientists are portrayed as American scientists. And if you allow for those that are English native speakers or working in the US the number goes up to seven. Reality begs to differ. The US is a strong dominating force, but the reality is that 3 out of 9 are perhaps US born, whole 1 of 9 might be a non-Us born scientist working for an US university. Making 5 out of 9 for the rest of the world who work elsewhere and 6 out of 9 a Non-American. And this number is changing rapidly. This documentary is neither about science or the scientists. It is a piece of propaganda that is to tell the American audience that (American) scientists are mostly harmless. As if that is going to work.