All language subtitles for Evolution Ep 1 Darwins Dangerous Idea

(barking)

No, thank you.

No.

No, no.

No.

Venga.

�Quieren un poquito
de agua?

Me...

Me llamo
Charles Darwin

y �l
Captain FitzRoy.

Me soy naturalista.

�Hay hueso?

�Hueso?

Bones.

S�, hueso, hueso.

�S�? �Hueso gigante?

�Aqu�? Here?

Aqu� estan los huesos.

DARWIN:
FitzRoy!

FITZROY:
A flood washed down
part of a bank of earth.

Mi hijo le peg�
con una piedra

y le sac� los dientes.

Por eso que se ca�
tan afuera.

It was perfect, but the boys
knocked out some of the teeth

throwing stones at it.

How much?

�Cu�nto cuesta?

(conversation continues)

I wonder why these creatures
no longer exist.

Perhaps the ark
was too small

to allow them entry

and they perished
in the flood.

(laughing)

What is there
to laugh at?

Nothing, nothing.

Do you mock me,
or the Bible?

Neither.

What sort of clergyman
will you be, Mr. Darwin?

Dreadful.

Dreadful.

FITZROY:
"And God said, 'Let the waters
bring forth abundantly

"'the moving creature
that hath life

"'and fowl that may fly
above the earth

"in the open firmament
of heaven.'

"And God created great whales

and every living creature
that moveth..."

Hello.

FITZROY:
"...which the waters
brought forth..."

What are you doing here?

Why such beauty
where no one can see?

(FitzRoy continues
scriptural reading)

You can't have been blown here.

FITZROY:
"And God saw that it was good."

MAN:
If I were to give a prize

for the single best idea
anybody ever had

I'd give it to Darwin for
the idea of natural selection...

ahead of Newton,
ahead of Einstein

because his idea unites

the two most disparate features
of our universe:

the world of purposeless,
meaningless matter and motion

on the one side

and the world of meaning and
purpose and design on the other.

He understood that
what he was proposing

was a truly
revolutionary idea.

MAN:
The Darwinian revolution

is about who we are,

it's what we're made of,
it's what our life means

insofar as science
can answer that question.

So it, in many ways,
was the singularly deepest

and most discombobulating
of all discoveries

that science has ever made.

MAN:
In Darwin's day, the idea
of evolution was regarded

as highly unorthodox

because it went against
all of natural history

in Great Britain.

It jeopardized
the standing of science;

it did jeopardize the standing
of a stable society, the Bible

and the church as well.

Darwin kept his thoughts
to himself for many years

and agonized over the problem.

If it ever got out
that he was doing something

that ran slap counter
to established science

it would ruin his career,
ruin his reputation.

He was a respectable man
with a dangerous theory.

MAN:
Did you never get
your sea legs?

Not once in five years.

Whenever the sea was up

so was the contents
of my stomach.

What a delightful
thought.

We should be able
to squeeze 400 a year

out of the governor.

Why? What has he said?

He hasn't said anything,
but I've seen it

in his eyes, the way he
pored over your letters.

A very proud father.

I told him you were
going to publish

a journal of your travels.

There was a definite
flicker of interest.

Publish?

Yes, of course.

No country parsonage
for you, my boy.

You're under
my wing now.

I'll take charge
of your affairs;

introduce you
to all my clever,
witty friends.

Trade on your...
your celebrity.

Celebrity?

Certainly!

Everyone wants
to meet you,

hear stories of naked
Tahitian women

and giant sloths
or whatever.

(bird cawing)

DARWIN:
Captain FitzRoy!

This is my brother,
Erasmus.

Mr. Darwin.

Captain.

Good God!

A man can collect a lot
of rubbish in five years.

It's a wonder you didn't
sink the ship, Charles.

Named, I take it,
after your grandfather?

Yes, and an uncle...

who drowned himself
in the River Derwent.

And are you
a free thinker like him?

I'm more of
a free drinker, really.

And how was the voyage
for you, Captain?

That's not for me to say.

No?

40 views of the coast
as seen from the sea

80 plans of harbors
and 82 coastal maps,

all for the Hydrographic
Department of the Admiralty.

Bravo.

Dinner at sea must
have been a jolly affair.

Here... from the
Galapagos Islands.

DARWIN:
Puma roasted over
an open fire...

rather like veal.

(laughing)

Armadillo, roasted in its
shell... a lot like duck.

Tortoise, of course.

(chuckling)

Of course.

Some of them weigh
as much as 500 pounds.

One I measured was
96 inches around the waist.

If one of them ever
needs a suit of clothes

we must send it
to father's tailor.

(all laughing)

What else?

Llama, ostrich...

People wonder how it is

some animals come
to be extinct.

Now we have the answer:
eaten by Charlie Darwin.

(all laughing)

ERASMUS:
You look as though you're
going to the scaffold!

Dignity!

Poise!

Smile!

Remember, all eyes
are on you.

The judging has begun.

Mr. President...

my lords, ladies
and gentlemen...

No, no, no!

Start with a bang.

Men of Athens!

What?

Friends, Romans,
countrymen!

That sort of thing.

Right.

I can't do this.

Yes, you can.

You mustn't let the fact

that every leading geologist
in the land will be there

put you off.

Oh, God!

Now, let me hear
an interesting bit.

There aren't any.

The earthquake.

Oh, stand still.

And don't wave your arms
around like that.

Leave your tie alone.

Don't squint.

And speak up!

The earthquake ran for
400 miles along the coast

accompanied by the simultaneous
eruption of a line of volcanoes.

We found fresh mussel beds
lying above high tide

the shellfish all dead.

The land had risen eight feet.

Mountains must be the product

of thousands and thousands
of such rises

occurring again and again
throughout history.

Even at the very crest
of the Andes

we found marine remains...

The fossilized shells
of creatures

that once crawled about
at the bottom of the sea

elevated nearly 14,000 feet
above its level.

Time...

unimaginable tracts of time...

is the key.

(Erasmus applauding)

(others join in
enthusiastically)

MEN:
Bravo! Bravo! Well done!

Mr. Darwin,
splendid.

Thank you,
thank you very much.

Congratulations.

Interesting paper.

Thank you.

Where have you placed
your fossil specimens?

I was thinking of
the British Museum.

Ah... you're happy
to have them languish

in some dusty
Bloomsbury cellar?

No, not at all.

You'd better let me look over
them for you then.

We'll let you know.

Thank you.

Pompous oaf.

Who does he
think he is?

He thinks he's
Richard Owen

the most brilliant
anatomist in Europe.

And you're
Erasmus Darwin's
little brother.

Darwin of
the Beagle Darwin!

Lord it while you can.

I don't want
to lord it.

Liar.

What a brilliant red!

Brighter than
the actual plumage.

I try to allow for
the loss of color

that comes with death.

Can you do this

with my Galapagos birds?

I haven't finished identifying
them yet, Mr. Darwin.

I do know that your
"wren" is a finch.

Your "grosbeak"
is a finch.

Even your blackbird
is a finch.

And they're unique, all
new, never described before.

There's even evidence
that there are

separate species for
each Galapagos island.

But I didn't label
mine by island.

You didn't label
them by island?

FITZROY:
Why do you want them?

DARWIN:
Why, I told you.

I failed to label
mine by island.

No, I mean, why are
the birds I collected

suddenly of such
interest to you?

The vice governor of
the Galapagos told me

he could identify which island
a tortoise came from

by its markings.

Yes, yes... small
variations are possible

from island to island.

Adaptations to climates
and so on.

Yes, but the islands all
have the same climate.

My expert, John Gould,
tells me he's found

different species
of finches.

What if these finches were blown
to the Galapagos

from South America

and then began to change,
adapt, if you will...

become more and more different
from their ancestors

generation
after generation?

First into varieties,
then into new species

each new species marooned
on its own island.

What are you
talking about?

"What if the finches were blown
to the Galapagos"!

God put those
creatures there.

That makes no sense.

Why would God
put different birds

on almost
identical islands?

I have no idea.

It's not a question
that requires an answer.

Species were commanded
into existence by God.

They are perfect forms

and they've been perfect
since the day of Creation.

It's divine law,
God's will.

I'll see to it that your expert
receives my birds.

Thank you.

It's God you should
give thanks to.

Come on!

Tonight, and for one night only,
ladies and gentlemen

a guided tour of
Charles Darwin's Boneyard.

Shh!

And for goodness'
sake, hurry up!

Yes.

OWEN:
This is a large, extinct

llamalike creature...

(observers murmur)

and this is a giant ground sloth

discovered by Mr. Darwin
at Punta Alta.

Lastly...

The remains
of Mr. Darwin's
breakfast.

This skull belongs
to a huge rodent...

(observers exclaiming)

a relative of
the South American capybara.

If that's the
size of a rat

imagine how big
the cats must have been.

(laughing)

I have named it Toxodon.

Thank you, thank you,
Professor Owen

for identifying and describing

the extraordinary array of
fossils discovered by Mr. Darwin

on his voyage to South America.

We allow the planets
and the Sun

to be governed
by natural laws

but the smallest insect

we wish to be created
by a special act of God.

Surely the creation of
life has to be explained

in the same way as geology

using natural, ordinary,
everyday causes.

Well, in
theory, yes.

But in practice

there can be
no question

about the
prime cause:

divine will.

Shouldn't men of science
be free to investigate

each and every means

by which new species
come into being?

If by that you mean wild
accusations

about man's
ancestry

the answer
is no.

To destroy man's
unique status

is to open the floodgates
to anarchy.

You might
just as well

throw muskets
to the rabble.

ERASMUS:
People like Owen think

that if there was
no Church of England

cucumbers wouldn't grow.

If the globe
has undergone

such profound changes

in its history,
geologically

then surely all
living creatures

must have changed
with it

to adapt to their
new conditions.

Otherwise they
would have perished.

Some did perish,
it seems.

Yes, but the continued
existence of life on Earth

can only be explained
by the assumption

that a creature
like this was replaced

by the modern-day
armadillo.

There must be a law

which causes new
species to appear

in place of
the extinct ones.

Oh, that, my boy,
is the mystery of mysteries.

The person who can
solve that riddle

will take all of
the scientific prizes.

GOULD:
It's the variety of their beaks
that's so amazing.

They graduate perfectly in size.

From this large parrot-like beak
similar to a hawfinch

perfectly designed
for cracking nuts

to this tiny warbler finch

fine as
a chaffinch

to feed
on insects.

And they're all descended
from this one:

the common ground finch.

I've started to prepare
some color plates.

They'll put
my words to shame.

Ras?

Ras!

Oh.

Ras.

Wake up!

What time is it?

Lunch time.

(groans)

Well, then go away

and come back at tea time.

The Galapagos Islands
are almost identical,

the same geology,
the same climate.

I'm glad to hear it.

Now go away.

So why should
different finches

inhabit
identical islands?

Ras?

(groans)

Small changes
over ages and ages

can throw up
mountain ranges

and sink
continents.

If mountains
can move

and rivers
can move

then why can't
animals?

Finches.

Tortoises.

Iguanas.

If you trace
animals

across the surface
of the earth

or dig down and trace them
back through time

you come
face to face

with the same
truth.

Which is?

New beings can appear
on the earth.

Perhaps everything
is part

of one
ancestral chain.

Man... mouse...
armadillo.

No.

It's nonsense
to think of animals or man

as climbing
some ladder...

to talk
of one animal

being higher
than another.

No.

No.

I think... it's
more like a tree.

A tree of life.

Each new species

springs from the parent tree
like a shoot.

These shoots branch and divide
in their turn

and so on
and so on.

Some branches
die out;

others keep
developing.

The trunk, the ancient
common ancestor.

The stock...

the stock from which
all animals and plants sprang.

"Nurs'd by warm sun-beams
in primeval caves

"Organic life began
beneath the waves

"Hence, without parent
by spontaneous birth

Rise the first steps
of animated Earth."

Grandfather's Zoonomia.

"Would it be too
bold to imagine

"that all warm-blooded
animals have arisen

from one living filament?"

It's in
our blood, Charles.

And grandfather was
vilified for it.

It's in our blood.

NARRATOR:
What Charles Darwin glimpsed
over 150 years ago

is now the bedrock of biology:

All forms of life on Earth
have evolved

on a single,
branching tree of life.

MAN:
One of the most important ideas
that Darwin had was

that all living things
on Earth were related.

How can you realize

that you are part
of this single tree of life

and not be
fundamentally moved by that?

It's... it's something
that stirs the soul.

NARRATOR:
Following in Darwin's path

biologist Chris Schneider
and his colleagues

have come to South America
to a remote region of Ecuador

near the base
of the Andes Mountains.

The rain forest may be home
to more species of animals

than anywhere else on Earth.

Darwin had been awestruck
by its endless variety of life.

He wrote that he felt like
a blind man being given sight

and that the sounds
of the rain forest were

like a great cathedral
at Evensong.

For biologists today

the lowland rain forest and
the nearby Andes Mountains

are laboratories
for exploring Darwin's ideas.

(chirps)

Did he bite you?

NARRATOR:
Over the next several days

Schneider's team will track down
rats and frogs

bats, birds and lizards
through day and night

both here in the rain forest
and high up in the mountains.

By comparing the two groups
of animals

they hope to better understand

how changing environments
might trigger

the evolution of new species.

SCHNEIDER:
You just can't help
but be awestruck by the fact

that there are so many
different kinds of things here.

There are 12 species
of primates.

There are 550 species of birds
that have been identified here.

There are 100 species of frogs
right here in this little area.

(low conversation)

SCHNEIDER:
Why is there
such diversity here?

We got some good stuff.

(laughs)

We got a mindblower
or two.

MAN:
Did you?

MAN 2:
I'll show you
this one.

NARRATOR:
Ornithologist Tom Smith wants to
compare the size of birds' beaks

from the rain forest

with those he hopes to find
in the mountains.

(bird squeaking)

Even subtle differences
may offer clues

about how and why
new species arise

just as it was
the beaks of finches

from the nearby
Galapagos Islands

that spurred Darwin's thinking
in the 1830s.

Darwin saw that the finches
he brought back

had uniquely shaped beaks

adapted to the different foods
on the islands.

He envisioned that these
different species of finch

had all descended
(with modifications)

from a common
ancestral population

that had flown over
from the mainland.

Darwin's bold insight was
to apply this vision

to all of life

to see that the great variety
of life on Earth,

leopards and lichens,
minnows and whales

flowering plants and flatworms,
apes and human beings,

all descended from one root,
one common ancestor.

MAN:
It was indeed another one
of his radical proposals

not only to say
that evolution happened

but that there was
a root of common ancestry

to everything that lived
on this planet, including us.

You could construe it
in other ways

that, as I like to say,
are more user-friendly.

You could have thought

well, God had several
independent lineages

and they were all moving in
certain preordained directions

which pleased His sense of how
a uniform and harmonious world

ought to be put together.

And Darwin says, "No,
it's just history all coming

with descent, with modification,
from a single common ancestry."

The key to Darwin's thought
in every realm is

that given enough time
and innumerable small events

anything can take place
by the laws of nature.

So whether it's
the raising of mountains

or the evolution of new species

all of these things happen
through time and change.

NARRATOR:
The rain forest holds
striking examples.

SCHNEIDER:
Take a look at this mantis here.

This thing is almost
perfectly disguised as a leaf

but you can see,
if you look at the underside

that it's a praying mantis

just like you'd find
in a garden in North America.

But this one is highly modified.

Its thorax is flattened out
to look like a leaf

and its wings are modified
to look like leaves.

You can even see the veins.

If you imagined
a population of mantises

and some looked more
like leaves than others

those ones that look like leaves
may tend to survive

and reproduce more than others.

And so a series of modifications
could build up over time

to result in an almost
perfectly leaflike mantis.

But if you put it
on a background

on which it doesn't belong

I mean, it just sticks out
like a sore thumb.

It would almost certainly...
hey, where you going there, pal?

It would almost certainly
get eaten by something.

NARRATOR:
Before heading
into the mountains

Smith collects more birds

to add to what he's learned
in the rain forest.

Bill length...

NARRATOR:
How different will the highland
birds prove to be?

...is 9.2.

Common is 10.

NARRATOR:
Different enough to be
considered new species

branching off in a new direction
on the tree of life?

SCHNEIDER:
When the Andes were uplifted

it created a whole variety
of new habitats.

The animals that were
in the lowland rain forest

had an enormous opportunity
to colonize these new habitats

and they did so.

The real question is

whether adaptation
to these new environments

can lead to the formation
of new species.

NARRATOR:
Flying less than one hour

Schneider and Smith move
from the steamy lowlands

to the windswept Andean peaks.

Animal populations made
the same journey

but gradually,
over many generations.

And as the environment changed

from rain forest
to the high, cool grasslands

animal populations
were forced to adapt.

These grasslands lie nearly
two miles above sea level.

Seasons never change here,
so close to the equator

but it is said that
winter visits every night.

Temperatures often drop
below freezing.

Animals not well adapted
will not survive.

SMITH:
Hummingbirds are amazing.

It turns out

that they can drop their
body temperature 50 degrees

and go into a state
of hibernation

to withstand
the frigid nights here.

You can imagine

a small-billed hummingbird
living in cloud forest

some thousand meters
down slope from us.

And if those individuals were
to expand their range

up into this habitat where
perhaps flowers are much longer

you could expect

that individuals
with slightly longer bills

might survive better.

And in fact, there are many
examples in hummingbirds

where we know that small changes
in bill length

can make important differences
in how that bird extracts nectar

and how well it survives.

We're seeing that changes
in the environment

can be very important

in changing the characteristics
of those animals

as they move
between environments.

And we believe very strongly
that, in many cases, anyway

that this can be very important

in the progression
to new species.

NARRATOR:
From one species of bird,
the common ancestor

hummingbirds with beaks
of different lengths evolve

over many generations.

And if these populations
change so much

that they can no longer
reproduce with one another

they are considered separate
species on the tree of life.

Smith and Schneider want to see

how closely related
the highland birds are

to the birds they examined
in the lowland rain forest.

They compare color,
beak length, wingspan...

just as Darwin would have done.

But they have another tool that
Darwin never even dreamed of...

DNA.

Darwin was convinced that traits
were passed on

from generation to generation,
but he didn't understand how.

We now know

that the sequence of the four
chemical building blocks of DNA

determines the traits
of all living things.

Each generation passes on
this text of As, Ts, Cs and Gs

to its offspring.

But occasional mistakes
in copying (mutations)

can result in new traits.

SCHNEIDER:
By comparing DNA

we can determine who is most
closely related to whom

we can determine when they had
a common ancestor

and when they diverged
from that common ancestor.

NARRATOR:
Laboratory analysis reveals

that DNA from
the rain forest hummingbirds

differs only very slightly

from that of
the highland hummingbirds.

They must have diverged
from a common ancestor

relatively recently in
the history of life on Earth,

about three million years ago.

SCHNEIDER:
We're examining
the genetic material

that makes organisms
what they are.

And written in that DNA is
the history of their evolution.

NARRATOR:
The fact that the blueprints
for all living things

are in the same language,
the genetic code of DNA,

is powerful evidence

that they all evolved
on a single tree of life.

SCHNEIDER:
How is it that organisms that
are so different can be related?

That we are related
to a flatworm or a bacteria?

Darwin emphasized

that small changes would accrue
every generation

and these changes could build up
to amount to enormous changes.

It's not really hard
to understand

how major transitions
could come about

given that life has been around
for 3� billion years.

Darwin really had it right.

(man chuckling and applauding)

WOMAN:
Come here, Squib.

There.

There we are.

Well, Emma, you're
a remarkably good shot!

(both chuckle)

Hello, Parker.

Miss Wedgwood.

You've met my cousin,
Mr. Darwin, before?

Sir.

He's fast, eh?

The fastest
in the county.

Did you breed him
yourself?

I mated him

with a bitch
who was pretty swift.

And how would you breed
a fellow like Squib here?

From the runts, I suppose.

(men laugh)

How dare you!

Squib is quite as nice
as any of your rotten dogs.

It's true.

It's from the runts
and monsters

that breeders can
produce tailless cats

or pygmies like Squib.

I'm not listening
to any more of this.

Take me back to the house
at once

and stop saying horrid things.

From wolves
to greyhounds

from bulldogs to
fellows like Squib

in what, a matter of
a few hundred years.

I take it
you don't find

talk of dogs all
that interesting?

I can think of more interesting
topics of conversation.

Such as?

The novels
of Miss Austen.

And what does she have to say
about selective breeding?

Nothing, as I recall.

Well, that's
a great pity.

Why shouldn't nature
produce such differences

these different
breeds of dog?

Why should it?

What would be the point?

Survival.

In nature, a little
poppet like Squib

who was the smallest
in her litter, would die.

You nearly did die,
didn't you?

Yes, that's true.

But what about the one
with a little more vigor

or a head start

because of some
peculiarity?

Such as?

A puppy born with an extra-thick
coat in a hot climate

would be a monstrosity

but in a cold climate that
would be a good adaptation.

That puppy would have
an advantage.

Got you.

Charles.

Emma.

Let me go.

Not until you've
paid the toll.

Which is?

A kiss, for me
rather than the dog.

You can make a big dog
or a small dog

but you can't produce
feathers on a dog

nor can you create
organs as miraculous

as the heart
and the eyes.

That can only be
the work of God.

Hurry up.

It's these
blasted ties!

"Marry. Not marry.

"Marry. Children,
if it please God..."

Give me that!

It's private.

I'm your brother;
you've no secrets from me.

Yes, I do; I have
secrets from everybody.

Give it to me.

ERASMUS:
Thank you, Garmon.

"Constant companion
and friend in old age."

Ras!

(sighs)

"Object to be loved
and played with

better than a dog anyhow."

(laughing)

You old romantic!

Well, it's intolerable
to think of oneself

spending one's life
like a neuter bee

working, working,
working.

And all this
is a response

to your trip
to Cousin Emma's?

Not necessarily.

You don't know
anyone else.

(both chuckle)

No, it's true,

your collection
won't be complete

without that most
interesting specimen

in the whole series
of vertebrate mammals.

And why haven't
you married

if it's such
an enviable state?

Oh, I'm too lazy to take on
anything requiring

as much effort
as a wife and family.

But you're
the marrying kind.

(glass breaks)

Good Lord,
what was that?

We're being mobbed!

(yelling)

They probably think we're
Poor Law Commissioners.

(people shouting)

Why would they
think that?

It's enough that we're top-
hatted toffs in a smart carriage

and they're scavenging on
rubbish heaps, starving to death.

ERASMUS:
Too many people,
not enough food!

Thank God we'll always
have food on our plates!

Speaking of which,
I think I'll have

the turbot
in the white sauce.

Cabbage, sprout,
cauliflower,

all bred from
the same ancestor.

Cabbage, the leaves;
sprouts, the side buds;

cauliflower, the flower head.

All monstrously enlarged.

Sitting opposite me is that
strange creature, Homo thesis:

half man, half theory.

A word of advice.

In my entire life

I have known only three women
who were skeptics

and two of them were not
permitted in polite society.

Keep your theory
from Emma.

It's too late.

I told her... sort of...
not a theory.

I don't have a theory,
just thoughts.

How did she take it?

She asked me to read

her favorite part
of the New Testament...

(laughs)

our Savior's farewell
to his disciples.

You see what I mean?

"I am the vine,
and ye are the branches.

If man abide not in me..."

ERASMUS:
Wilberforce's ears
have pricked up!

(softly):
"If man abide not in me,
he is cast forth as a branch

"and is withered;
and men shall gather them

and they shall be cast into
the fire, and they are burned."

And how is your sole?

What?

Your fish?

Oh... delicious.

I understand your
carriage was stoned tonight.

Well...

We're meeting the threat
on the streets head-on.

We're drilling with the
Honorable Artillery Company.

Gentleman
volunteers.

In the event
of riots

we will back
the police.

Every man,
as long as he obeys

the law of the land

should be free
to pursue

his own interest
in his own way.

Yes, of course.

Charge what he
likes for bread

or anything else
for that matter.

Laissez-faire.

Let individuals
compete and struggle

for their
advantages.

Good night.

Good night.

Good night.

(snores)

(snoring lightly)

Whenever I
can't sleep

I reach
for Malthus.

Or, as I prefer
to think of him

the Reverend T.R. Morpheus.

Still warm.

Two brandies, hmm?

Yes, sir.

"The natural tendency of mankind
is to reproduce.

"Humans can double their numbers

every 25 years."

But they don't.

A struggle for resources
slows growth

and death and disease, war
and famine check the population.

I know the argument.

Yes, but don't you see

exactly the same struggle
takes place throughout nature?

I don't know

why I didn't make
the connection before.

Why are we not overrun
with insects and frogs

given the rate
at which they reproduce,

the number of eggs produced
by each and every female?

Nature's broom sweeps away
the ugly ducklings, the runts.

Yes, but it's
not that simple.

(clears throat)

(quietly):
It's not that simple.

Sometimes it's
the ugly ducklings

that are better adapted
to the situations of life.

They have longer legs
and can run faster.

They have bigger beaks

that can crack harder nuts
and seeds in harsh winters.

They survive,
have more offspring.

Nature selects them
to pass on their traits

to future
generations.

And where do we fit in?

Hmm...

Well, the sun does not revolve
around the earth.

Nature does not revolve
around man.

Man must fall into
nature's cauldron.

He's no deity, no exception.

Once you accept that species
can pass into one another

the whole fabric totters
and falls.

They'll burn you at the stake
for this.

Yes.

But now you have a theory.

So I said, "Don't come down
the ladder, Mother;

I've taken it away."

Good evening.

(pours brandy)

MOORE:
Darwin's work began
with the observation

that individuals differ
from each other.

And these minute differences,
Darwin believed

might be advantageous.

It might give each individual
an edge

when it came to getting food

or finding a place to survive
in nature.

NARRATOR:
Darwin realized that in nature

individual organisms compete
for limited resources.

Those with some kind
of advantage

in coloration, for example...

or in speed...

or in vision...

are more likely to survive
and reproduce

and pass on these advantages
to their offspring.

Those who are less fit
will not succeed.

Darwin called it
"natural selection"

because the forces of nature

select which organisms
will survive.

STEPHEN JAY GOULD:
The survivors will be those

whose variation
fortuitously adapts them better

to changing local environments.

And then because they pass on
those traits to their offspring

the population changes.

That's natural selection;
that's all it is.

It's not a principle
of progress.

It's just a principle
of local adaptation.

You don't make better creatures
in any cosmic sense;

you make creatures
that are better suited

to the changing climates
of their local habitats.

That's it.

NARRATOR:
Darwin couldn't actually see

natural selection
acting in real time

but today, scientists can,

by observing the evolution of
HIV, the virus that causes AIDS.

Jeff Gustavson has been infected
with HIV for over a decade.

He takes a host of medications,
but to little avail:

the virus keeps adapting

evolving into new strains
that evade the drugs.

GUSTAVSON:
There's a pervasive feeling

that all you have to do is
take your medicine

and you'll be okay, and that
really isn't the case, you know.

HIV has the capacity to evolve
no matter what you give it.

MAN:
There are 19 HIV drugs on the
market today, and of those 19

I've already been through
14 of them.

NARRATOR:
Clarence Johnson, too,
is locked in a daily struggle

against the
rapidly evolving virus.

JOHNSON:
Sometimes I feel like
I'm fighting a losing battle.

I haven't given up yet
but there have been times

that I just want to lay down
and give up, but, um...

I can't leave
my family behind.

NARRATOR:
Clarence Johnson's doctor,
Michael Saag

has seen HIV evolve
into new varieties

over the last dozen years.

The virus is constantly changing

subject to the forces
of natural selection

in the environment
of a patient's body.

Imagine we didn't have
the concept of evolution

and we started giving drugs
to a patient

that in the test tube
looked great

and all of a sudden
the virus starts coming back

and it's not susceptible
to the drugs anymore.

What a mystery!

How in the world
did that happen?

There's only one way that
it happened: through evolution.

NARRATOR:
Once inside a patient's
white blood cells

HIV replicates
at an alarming rate.

Billions of new viruses
are spawned every day

and each time it reproduces

random genetic
copying mistakes

(mutations)

result in slightly different
varieties of the virus

bursting forth
into the bloodstream.

Some of these new varieties,
just by chance

will have traits that make them
resistant to certain drugs.

So when drugs enter
the bloodstream

natural selection favors
the drug-resistant forms:

they survive and reproduce.

Before long, drug-resistant
viruses dominate

in the patient's body.

SAAG:
Evolution seems pretty easy
to understand

when we look at big animals.

We can kind of see it,
in a sense.

But that's evolution
that took centuries to develop.

When you're talking about
something like a virus

that you can't see
in everyday life

its hard to image
how it changes.

In the case of HIV, we're
talking about minutes to hours

to move from one species
to another.

It's mind-boggling

in terms of the speed
with which HIV can replicate.

Clarence?

SAAG:
How are you feeling overall?

I'm doing okay.

Great.

SAAG:
Every time I see a patient

in the back of my mind
I'm thinking

"What is the virus doing in the
environment of that patient?"

The virus is producing itself

on the order of billions
of copies a day.

Those few that happen to be able
to work in the presence of drug

say, "Hey, this is my chance,"
and they emerge.

So it creates the appearance

that the virus has
thought this through

but in fact it's just
a matter of chance.

It's a matter of
a virus being there

that's not susceptible
to the drugs.

It emerges, and the virus
begins to win the war.

NARRATOR:
That's just what happened
to Jeff Gustavson.

Each time he tried a new drug,
the virus evolved to resist it.

Even a cocktail of multiple
drugs made little difference.

GUSTAVSON:
Here's this puny little virus
that doesn't have a brain

and yet it can outwit some of
the top scientists in the world.

All the virus has
going for it is

it can't copy itself too well.

I mean, that's pretty
awe-inspiring and scary.

STEPHEN JAY GOULD:
All that happens in evolution,

at least under
Darwinian natural selection,

is that organisms are struggling

in some metaphorical
and unconscious sense

for reproductive success,
however it happens.

MAN:
The process of natural selection
feeds on randomness.

It feeds on accident
and contingency

and it gradually
improves the fit

between whatever organisms
there are

and the environment in which
they're being selected.

But there's no predictability
about what particular accidents

are going to be exploited
in this process.

NARRATOR:
For millions of HIV patients,
evolution is the enemy.

If only there were a way to take
advantage of natural selection

to make it work
in a patient's favor.

In 1997, at Goethe University
in Frankfurt, Germany

a researcher may have
discovered such a way...

quite accidentally.

WOMAN:
We had a patient

and even though he was
being treated with five drugs

his virus replication
could not be controlled

and, at the same time,
he was suffering

from a lot of side effects
of the medications.

So at that point
he asked his physician

if it wouldn't make sense

to just stop taking
the drugs for a while

since he was really having
nothing much from them

other than the toxicities
he was experiencing.

NARRATOR:
After three months off drugs

the patient's virus population
was tested for drug resistance.

Dr. Miller could not
believe the results.

At first I thought a mistake
had happened

because the lab
that did the resistance test

was not able to detect
any resistance whatsoever

in this virus population.

We sent a second sample
and this result was confirmed.

Within a matter of three months

his virus population
had changed completely

from being resistant
to every single drug

to appearing to be susceptible
to every single drug

that we currently have.

NARRATOR:
Here's what had happened.

With drugs present in
the patient's bloodstream

only the drug-resistant strains
of the virus could replicate.

But some of the nonresistant
virus (the "wild type")

still lingered
in the white blood cells.

When the patient stopped
taking drugs

the environment changed,
and the wild type came back.

It replicated extremely rapidly

and soon outnumbered
the drug-resistant strains.

In Darwinian terms

the wild type virus was more fit
in this drug-free environment.

NARRATOR:
Dr. Miller's findings have led

to a new experimental
treatment strategy:

take a patient off drugs
for a time

and if the virus reverts
to the nonresistant wild type

hit it hard with
a combination of drugs.

Clarence!

How are you?

SAAG:
The concept of a treatment
interruption is a new strategy

that we might be able to apply
in Clarence's case

but we've just got to make sure

that we aren't putting him
at too much risk

if we choose that route.

SAAG:
So one of
the options

is to take all the drugs
away for a while

let the virus spring back
into its natural state

of not having any mutations

and then pounce on it again
with the regimen,

and it might even be the same
regimen that we used before.

SAAG:
On first blush,
the evolution back to wild type

would seem to be a great thing:

the drugs all of a sudden
can work again.

But it's a double-edged sword:

as the virus goes back
to wild type

it becomes more dangerous
for the host,

it's a much more effective
killer of cells.

And so we have to find a way
to balance those two things out.

NARRATOR:
Jeff Gustavson is also beginning
a treatment interruption,

despite the risks.

GUSTAVSON:
I feel like I've played all
the cards that I have in my hand

with the medicines
that are available.

I feel like it's worth the risk
to try and take another card

or a different strategy and just
stop taking medicine altogether

and hope that the next time
that I do go on medicine

that it will actually work.

NARRATOR:
After five weeks off drugs

Clarence Johnson is enjoying
being free,

at least temporarily,
from their debilitating effects.

If the wild-type virus is
staging a comeback

it doesn't yet appear to be
affecting his immune system.

SAAG:
We took a bit of a gamble.

I think, so far, you know,
it's paid off.

And the virus has gone from
being resistant to certain drugs

and now that population
has shifted

so that now they're
susceptible again.

SAAG:
What I hope for Clarence is that
we can find the right course...

find a way to stretch his
survival out even further

so that he's healthy and happy

until the next
new approach to treatment

is able to get him to a point
where he can live to 80.

JOHNSON:
My greatest hope is that
when I do go back on medications

those drugs will bring
my viral load down

to an undetectable amount.

I don't know what it feels like
to be undetectable

so that would be
a great experience.

NARRATOR:
Six weeks into his
treatment interruption

Jeff Gustavson's virus
also has changed

to the drug-susceptible
wild type.

He's now on a new course of
medication, and responding well.

SAAG:
From day one of this epidemic

we were put into a race
with HIV.

Over the last decade
or so we've been catching up;

we've learned a lot about it;
we've scouted out the enemy;

we've learned how it replicates;

we've learned how
it tries to survive;

we learned how it evolves.

And we're now taking those
principles that we've learned

and applying them

to putting the brakes
on the virus in this race.

(birds chirping)

DARWIN:
Towards me... towards me...

There!

The angle needs
to be more acute.

DARWIN:
More acute...

(knock at door)

Let's see
if it works.

And... open!

Good God!

Ras!

What a horrible shock.

Thought I'd
surprise you.

Welcome to Down House.

When is the moat
to be dug?

When the drawbridge is
in place.

Who are you trying
to keep out, Charlie?

Everyone, especially you.

EMMA:
Ras...

What a wonderful
surprise!

My dear,
what a journey.

It's not far.

Nature abhors
a journey of 16 miles

almost as much
as a vacuum.

Hello, Annie.

Tea, the man
needs tea.

(laughing)

ERASMUS:
One, and a two,
and a three

and off you go!

I've thought of a new
name for the village.

DARWIN:
Oh, yes?

"Down-in-the-Mouth."

If you speak

I can find you
really easily.

Shh!

How's your work
progressing?

I've sent the manuscript
off to be copied.

I've no idea what I'm going to
do with it when it comes back.

Everyone
be quiet!

Aren't we glad
we're not blind?

If you're blind
you can't see the sky...

BOTH:
...or the flowers.

Or anything else,
for that matter.

I can get any of you
any time I want!

Well, go on, then!

We feel sorry
for moles, don't we?

DARWIN:
Moles don't need
to be able to see

because they live
underground.

That's why their eyes have got
smaller and smaller

BOTH:
...and owls' have got
bigger and bigger.

WILLIAM:
I can't play.

Everyone's talking
about eyes all the time!

Oh... you going to talk
to William, hmm?

Go on, Brodie.

William?

(chuckling)

William, wait for us!

She'll soon
talk him round.

She has the knack.

You look pale.

My stomach
rejects food.

I'm not strong
anymore.

I'll never achieve anything
in science now.

What rot!

You're coming back
to London with me.

No, I'm not.

Yes, you are!

I'm not letting you
stagnate down here

while your rivals make
all the progress.

You must visit
your publisher.

You don't
understand, Ras.

Even when I talk about
my theory with you

I feel like I'm
confessing a murder.

No, I can't publish.

Well, you're coming back
to London with me, Charlie

whether you
like it or not.

If only to remind
the opposition

you're still
alive and kicking!

EMMA:
Take care.

And make sure you get
plenty of rest.

Erasmus, he's not to spend
all night at the club with you.

No, Mother...

I mean it, or he'll be
utterly done for the next day.

Yes, Mother.

Don't worry,
it'll do him good.

Come on.

Your sloth
awaits you, sir.

(gasps and chuckles)

What a magnificent beast,
eh, Ras?

My word.

Owen's done
a remarkable job.

He really is
a splendid specimen.

Yes, I thought
you'd be pleased.

Come through.

See what I've been
working on.

The chimpanzee

being the highest
organized four-handed ape

every difference between
its anatomy and a human's

is instructive.

I've been studying...

For example

the irrational ape
has doglike canines

used as weapons
of destruction

quite unlike the masters
of the animal kingdom.

DARWIN:
Yes, though...

OWEN:
And the human foot

is of decisive
taxonomic value.

Our feet are made for walking
upon, our hands for grasping.

This brute's hands
and feet are made

for nearly
the same purpose.

There is a striking
similarity...

I'm writing a book
on the subject.

ERASMUS:
My brother is working
on a new book, too.

Come here, let me show you
what I mean.

All the same
pattern.

DARWIN:
The bone structure
in the hands and feet

are all nearly
identical.

The blueprint,
if you will

that existed first
in the Creator's mind.

Of that there can be
no doubt.

Utter tosh!

The similarity of structure
indicates one thing

and one thing only:

an ancient common
ancestor.

Real, flesh-and-blood
parents.

Why didn't you
say so, then?

Hmm?

You must publish
your ideas.

If only to establish
your priority.

What's holding you back?

(playing soft, lyrical piece)

(stops playing)

What is it?

I've completed a sketch
of my species theory.

I believe it's a considerable
step in science.

If anything should
happen to me...

What do you mean?

If I should die...

Die! Charles,
for goodness' sake...

Please, my love,
it's important.

If anything should happen to me

I'd like you to see to it
that it gets published.

�400 should be enough

to see it
printed and promoted.

Nothing's going
to happen to you.

You say here
that the human eye

"may possibly have been acquired
by gradual selection

of slight, but, in each case,
useful deviations."

Yes.

That's a very great assumption,
Charles.

Well, if I'm wrong about that,
I'm wrong about everything.

My entire theory's in ruins.

Can your theory account
for the way

my eyes and ears and hands
and heart combine

to reproduce the sounds
that Chopin heard in his head?

Isn't that
a God-given gift?

It's given.

But not, I think, by God.

You are a man of science.

You don't want to believe
anything until it's proved.

But some things
are beyond proof.

It would be a nightmare to me
if I thought

we didn't belong to each other
forever in Heaven.

MOORE:
Emma was a sincere believer

in the Christian plan
of salvation

and that those
who trusted in Jesus

and his resurrection
from the dead

would spend eternity in Heaven.

She saw
that her husband's speculations

about the origins
of species and of humanity

would jeopardize
the Christian plan of salvation.

God was being made remote
in her husband's universe.

Now, if nature by itself,
unaided by God

could make an eye

then what else
couldn't nature do?

Nature could do anything,
it could make everything.

In Darwin's day,
the very existence

of an organ of extreme
perfection like the eye

was taken by many
as proof of God

as proof of a designer.

How else could all

of the intricate organs
and substructures of the eye

have come together
in just the right way

to make vision
so possible and so perfect?

But it turns out the eye isn't
exactly perfect, after all.

In fact, the eye contains
profound optical imperfections.

And those imperfections
are proof, in a sense

of the evolutionary ancestry
of the eye.

NARRATOR:
Eyes are imperfect because
evolution does not create things

the way a designer
or an artist does.

Natural selection simply favors
random changes

that make an organism
more fit to survive

and imperfections in design
often result

from evolution's
constant tinkering.

One such imperfection
proved traumatic

for artist Valerie Young.

YOUNG:
We had just come home
from a party

and I saw a lot of lights
flashing inside my eye,

especially on the outside edge
of the right eye.

And I thought, "We may be
in trouble here."

And it took me a while
to really see

that it was my... this was
coming from inside my eye.

Luckily, my husband was with me

because I wouldn't have been
able to drive to the hospital.

So my vision
was pretty obscured.

The only way I can describe it
is like a jellyfish

with lots of little bubbles
in it

and it just kept turning and
floating in front of my eyes.

NARRATOR:
Valerie had a retinal tear,

not an uncommon problem

due to the way human eyes
evolved

from light-sensing patches
of brain tissue

in our ancient ancestors.

In the human embryo

eyes develop from bulges
in the brain's neural tube

that pinch in to form cavities.

This top layer, the retina,

(which tore
in Valerie Young's eye)

contains cells
that collect light.

It rests
against a second, darker layer

that lines the back of the eye.

But the two layers
are not attached to one another.

And when the jelly
that fills the eye

liquefies as we age

it can cause the retina to tear.

The jelly can then seep
into the space underneath

leading to a retinal detachment
and, in some cases, blindness.

WOMAN:
When Valerie Young came in

her floaters
were an immediate clue

that she could have
a retinal tear.

We were able to successfully
apply laser treatment

in the office that day

to seal it off, like applying
sandbags around something

to wall it off
so that the vitreous jelly

would not get in the break
and detach her retina.

NARRATOR:
Valerie Young's retinal tear

is just one example
of imperfections

in the design of human eyes.

Another occurs because nerve
cells and blood vessels

evolved to lie
in front of the retina

where they interfere with its
ability to form sharp images.

It's like trying
to take a picture

through a foggy piece of glass.

And the optic nerve itself
evolved

to connect to the brain
through a hole in the retina.

So the eyes of all vertebrates
have a small blind spot,

right near the middle
of the visual field.

KENNETH MILLER:
Evolution starts
with what's already there

tinkers with it and modifies it

but can never do
a grand redesign.

So even the eye, with all
of its optical perfection

has clues to the fact
that its origin

is of the blind process
of natural selection.

NARRATOR:
Darwin believed
that what he called

"an organ of extreme
complexity," like the eye

could evolve by small steps,
given enough time.

Any trait that improved vision

would aid in the search
for food, or a mate

or in the avoidance
of predators

so natural selection would most
certainly favor those traits.

STEPHEN JAY GOULD:
And what Darwin was able to do
was to point out

that you might think, in logic

that it's difficult to imagine
a set of intermediary stages

between the simplest little spot
of nerve cells

that can perceive light

to a lens-forming eye
that makes complex images.

But, in fact, these intermediary
forms do exist in nature.

NARRATOR:
At the University of Lund
in Sweden

zoologist Dan-Eric Nilsson
has developed models

to show how a primitive eyespot

could evolve
through intermediate stages

to become a complex,
humanlike eye

in less than
half a million years.

NILSSON:
I've been interested
in eye evolution

for a long time.

In particular, I've been
interested in the question

of how long time it would take
for an eye to evolve.

NARRATOR:
Nilsson envisioned
a sequence of stages

by which a flat patch
of light-sensitive cells

on an animal's skin

could evolve
into a camera-type eye.

As a first step,
nature would favor any changes

that made the flat patch
more cuplike.

NILSSON:
As soon as you've created

even the slightest depression
in the center

means that the edges of the cup

will actually shade light
from parts of the environment.

And of course,
all the light-sensitive cells

in this little cup

they won't measure light
in exactly the same direction

so already this cup has
some pictorial information.

NARRATOR:
Another model demonstrates

what a primitive cup-eye can do.

The brightly lighted skulls
cast an image

onto a translucent screen

Nilsson installs at the back
of the cup

to act like a retina.

But the image is not at all
well-defined.

The cup-eye can do little more
than detect movement.

This kind of eye can be found
in nature today, in flatworms.

Their eyes evolved no further.

In their environment,
that's all they needed.

NILSSON:
But if the animals need
to move faster

or evolve to become
fast predators

or to see other fast predators

then the construction needs
to be improved.

And one way of doing that

is to constrict the opening.

To make it smaller.

NARRATOR:
That's just what happened
to creatures

like the chambered nautilus.

Over thousands of generations

natural selection favored those

with slightly more constricted
eye openings

which focused light
more sharply.

This worked well,
up to a point.

NILSSON:
Since this strategy
of making a sharp image

also has the drawback
of creating a very dim image

it's not very popular
in the animal kingdom.

And, um...

There is an alternative solution

which has become very popular
in the animal kingdom

the solution that we use
in our own eyes

and that is to put in a lens.

NARRATOR:
Nilsson's model lens uses two
thin layers of clear plastic.

He can inject water
in between them

to make the plastic windows
bulge out like a convex lens.

This mimics what natural
selection might have done

over a few hundred thousand
generations

favoring animals with
a rounded, transparent layer

in their eyes

that caused light to be focused
more sharply on the retina.

So we can make it gradually
from no lens at all

and just continue
to inject more water...

making the lenses bulge
more and more

and the image becomes
gradually sharper and sharper.

So we can go all the way,
gradually, in very small steps

from a simple pigment cup-eye

which has barely got the ability

to determine the direction
of a light source

all the way to a complete
camera-type eye

of the same type
as we have ourselves.

And that is really exactly

the way eye evolution
must proceed.

NARRATOR:
The extreme complexity
of the eye

left Darwin "in a cold sweat,"
he wrote to a friend.

But still he was convinced
that an eye could be formed

by natural selection.

He later wrote
that eyes must have evolved

by "numerous gradations
from an imperfect and simple eye

"to one perfect and complex

with each grade being useful
to its possessor."

Nature, unaided by a designer,
could produce an organ

of seemingly miraculous
complexity.

What a horrid smell.

Annie. Come and look.

When I first
started looking

I thought lots of the barnacles
had tiny parasites.

That's an animal
or plant

that lives on another
animal or plant

and gets its food
from it,

like mistletoe
on an apple tree.

But they're not.

Do you know
what they are?

No.

They're little,
tiny husbands.

The females carrylittle,
tiny males around with them

clinging to their
skirt tails.

Just like you and Mama.

(chuckles)

Just like me
and Mama.

I think it's the most
interesting barnacle

in the whole
wide world.

What do you think
we should call it?

"Barnabus."

"Barney," for short.

"Barney Ickle."

(laughs)

The tiny parasitic males
are rudimentary

in a way that I believe
can hardly be equaled

in the whole
of the animal kingdom.

They have no mouth
or stomach.

They are really little more

than a tiny head atop
an enormous coiled penis.

A bit like me, really

apart from the bit about
the mouth and the stomach.

(both laughing)

What's funny?

Nothing, nothing.

(gasps)

Charles!

Charles, are you
all right?

(gasping)

Erasmus,
take him home!

(gasps)

Why must you work so hard at
your... horrid little mollusks?

Ooh!

DARWIN:
They're not horrid
little mollusks

they're horrid
little crustaceans.

And I have horrid pigeons
and horrid worms, too.

They're providing the evidence
I need for my theory.

(gasps in pain)

I don't have the right
to publish the idea

unless I have the evidence.

We must do something
about you.

(gasping)

Your stomach condition
is nervous in origin,

brought on as a result
of excessive mental exertion.

(gasps)

Cold water is used
to stimulate the circulation

and draw
the blood supply away

from the inflamed nerves
of the stomach.

(panting)

No sugar, no salt,
no bacon

no alcohol, no tobacco.

In fact, anything at all
that's good is forbidden.

(continues panting)

(children giggling)

(panting)

I don't know
how or why

but I feel
so much better.

(chuckles)

I look around me...
and I don't care two hoots

how any of this
came to be created.

(thunder rumbles)

Children!

Last one back to the house is
a rice pudding.

(laughing):
Come on, William, you're last!

(children shouting)

Come on, run,
quick, quick, quick!

Come on, Etty.

(chuckling)

(children laughing)

Annie!

Annie, you won!

(laughing)

Come here, my darling!

(grunts and laughs)

Oh, Annie,
my dear and good child!

(kiss)

(chuckling)

Come on.

Come on, darling.

(church organ plays intro
to "Rock of Ages")

CONGREGATION:
"While I draw
this fleeting breath..."

(Erasmus singing
loudly, out of tune
and out of sync)

"When my eyelids
close in death"

"When I soar
through tracts unknown"

(children giggling at Erasmus)

"See Thee on
Thy judgment throne"

"Rock of Ages, cleft for me"

"Let me hide myself in thee."

(children laughing noisily)

"Amen."

Papa, Annie's woke me up.

Annie's woke me up.

Mum, wake up, wake up,
Annie's crying.

(crying softly)

Oh, now, what's
the matter, my darling?

What's wrong?

Does your head hurt?

Ah, there's no fever.

Does it hurt here?

(groans in pain)

(baby cries)

(cries softly)

That's all right,
my darling.

You'll be all right.

The doctor's coming.

You go and get dressed.

I'll stay with her.

What if she's inherited
my wretched digestion?

She'll be fine.

(Annie continues to cry)

EMMA:
Poor dear.

What did he say?

Itisher stomach,
but he has no idea what's wrong.

Perhaps I should take her
to go see Dr. Gully.

He cured me.

EMMA:
You'll be back soon

and Papa will look after you.

Soon there's going
to be a new baby

and I shall need your help.

Say good-bye to Etty now.

DARWIN:
I want you to sit up.

Now, come on, girl,
take one big gulp of this.

Come on,
that's a good girl.

That's a good girl.

Oh, quickly.

(crying)

Oh.

Come on, lie back.

(whispering):
That's a good girl.

She seems so weak.

Isn't there anything
you can do?

All you can do is pray.

It's my fault.

First-cousin marriages
always produce weak children.

It's my fault.

(breathing noisily)

(screaming):
Why?!

(crying)

(sobbing hysterically)

I've given
the cause of death

as bilious fever
with a typhoid character.

The Lord gives
and the Lord takes away.

Please!

Don't!

Oh, Charles,
God grant us strength.

(weeping)

(sniffling)

(bird calling)

Please, Charles, please.

Come along, children.

(church organ playing "All
Things Bright and Beautiful")

CONGREGATION (inside church):
"All things bright
and beautiful"

"All creatures great
and small"

"All things wise
and wonderful"

"The Lord God made them all."

MOORE:
What Annie's death did
to Darwin's faith

was mainly to destroy
Christianity.

He could no longer see

that a good God ordered
and superintended

all the events of human life
and of the universe.

And he believed that she
did not deserve punishment

by God, or by nature either.

She had simply fallen victim
to the struggle for existence:

the amoral, purposeless struggle

that ran according
to laws of nature.

STEPHEN JAY GOULD:
Darwin certainly didn't think

that evolution spoke
either for or against

the unprovable existence
of... God, or a form of God.

He didn't desire
to cast disparagement

on anyone's religious
convictions.

He regarded it
as a private matter

which he was never able to hold
with conventional zeal

following the tragedy
of his life.

CHILDREN:
"All things bright
and beautiful"

"All creatures great
and small"

"All things wise
and wonderful"

"The Lord God made them all"

"The purple-headed mountains"

"The river running by..."

NARRATOR:
Today scientists hold all
conceivable views on religion:

from atheism to agnosticism
to a general spirituality.

And many,
like biologist Ken Miller

adhere to very traditional
beliefs.

KENNETH MILLER:
I am an orthodox Catholic,
and I'm an orthodox Darwinist.

My idea of God
is a supreme being

who acts in concert with
the principles and the ideas

that Darwin explained to us
about the origin of species.

My students often ask me,
"You say you believe in God.

"Well, what kind of God?

"Is it a fashionable,
new-age God?

"A pyramid-power kind of God?

"Do you think,
like some scientists do

that God is the sum total
of the laws of physics?"

And I shake those off

and say that my religious belief
is entirely conventional.

PRIEST AND CONGREGATION:
Our Father, who art in heaven

Hallowed be thy name.

MILLER:
It surprises students very often
that anyone could say that

that kind of very traditional,
conventional religious belief

could be compatible
with evolution, but it is.

PRIEST:
...peace and unity
of Your Kingdom

where you live forever and ever.

CONGREGATION:
Amen.

I find this absolutely
wonderful consistency

with what I understand
about the universe from science

and what I understand
about the universe from faith.

ANNOUNCER (on radio):
Tennessee's premier morning
radio talk show;

the Hallerin Hilton Hill
Morning Show

on NewsTalk 99, WNOX-AM/FM,
Loudon/Knoxville.

(electronic beeping)

12 past
the hour of 6:00.

It's my pleasure
to welcome

to the broadcast
this morning

Dr. Kenneth Miller.

He's a professor of biology
at Brown University.

His book is entitled

Finding Darwin's God:
A Scientist's Search

for Common Ground
between God and Evolution.

He's in town tonight.

Let me ask you this:
as a cellular biologist

when in your experience...
are you studying something

reading something,
or doing some research...

when do you come to the point
where you go, "That's God"?

As an experimental scientist,
I don't find God

in the insufficiency of science
to explain things.

In other words,
I don't find God in ignorance;

I don't find God because we say,
"Well, we can't explain that,

that must be something
that God's doing."

But what did God do?

Did he just create some kind of
primordial soup and say, "Go"?

Well, a long time ago people
were sufficiently unknowing

of how things worked
in the natural world

to see when the Sun
moved across the sky

they imagined that God had to
push that Sun across the sky.

And gradually
we began to realize

that the world works
according to physical laws.

Science investigated
those laws.

So, what room is there for God
in... in present-day life?

Well, I think if you ask people
who are believers

"How does God act?"

they would say he acts
in a variety of ways:

he answers our prayers,
he inspires us.

No doubt there are events
that take place

that are part of what some
people might call "God's plan."

And what I would suggest

is if you look back
in Earth's history

if God is working today

in concert with
the laws of nature,

with physical laws
and so forth.

He probably worked in concert
with them in the past.

In a sense... in a sense

He's the guy who made up
the rules of the game

and He manages to act
within those rules.

NARRATOR:
For Miller, and millions of
followers of all major religions

notions of God and evolution
are fully compatible.

CONGREGATION:
"You take away the sins of..."

NARRATOR:
But not everyone agrees.

DENNETT:
When we replace

the traditional idea of God,
the creator, with the idea

of the process of natural
selection doing the creating

the creation is as wonderful
as it ever was.

All that great design work
had to be done.

It just wasn't done by
an individual; it was done

by this huge process distributed
over billions of years.

God created man in His image.

In the image of God,
He created him.

Male and female,
He created them.

DENNETT:
Whereas people used to think
of meaning coming from on high

and being ordained
from the top down

now we have Darwin saying, "No,
all of this design can happen

"all of this purpose can emerge

from the bottom up,
without any direction at all."

And that's a very unsettling
thought for many people.

In Darwin's day, science
and politics and religion

were all of a piece

when you talked about the
origins of life and of species.

Astronomy could
go along pretty well

because it could testify
to the wisdom and power of God

in holding
the planets in place...

but the idea of evolution

or "transmutation,"
people said with a snarl,

put in jeopardy the whole
established social order.

What is in this
"Big Book" of his

do you think?

Transmutation.

(sighing)

Another Darwin

blotting God
out of creation.

We want
to support

your scheme for a museum of
natural history.

Some people
see it

as rash, extravagant,
grandiose.

If it's grand, it's because
it should house

as wide a display
as possible.

But we need your help
in return.

It is up to you

as the country's leading
anatomist and paleontologist

to prove man's
superiority.

We won't have street ruffians
tout man's monkey origin

in Her Majesty's museums.

You can rely on me,
Bishop Wilberforce.

OWEN:
The human brain differs markedly
from that of all other mammals.

In man, not only do the cerebral
hemispheres overlap

the olfactory lobes
and the cerebellum...

but they extend
in advance of the one

and farther back than the other.

Their posterior development is
so marked, that I have assigned

to that part the character
of a third lobe

peculiar to Homo sapiens:
the hippocampus minor.

(audience murmuring)

Peculiar mental faculties
are associated

with this highest form of brain,
and I am led, therefore

to regard man not merely
as representative

of a distinct subclass...

(approving laughter)

but as the inhabitant of one
reserved for him alone.

The human brain
is in itself proof

of man's moral
and religious faculties.

Such are the powers with which
we, and we alone, are gifted.

(audience cheering)

DARWIN:
I wonder what a chimpanzee
would have to say

about that, Mr. Huxley.

HUXLEY:
I think it's priceless.

His theory is a house
built on sand,

a Corinthian portico on
cow dung.

DARWIN:
Yes.

Damn all the sanctimonious
meddlers

who try and stifle
troublesome research.

The ultimate court
of appeal of science

is observation
and experiment

not authority,
wealth and rank.

Your disagreements with Owen
should not be personal.

I can't help it.

He's so pompous.

The prospect
of his slipping

on one of his
pickled brains

is just too good
to be true.

Bad feeling will
only cloud the issue

and lead to bad science.

Tell that to Owen.

ERASMUS:
Huxley's saying in public

what you think
in private.

Charles, you've
stalled long enough.

You've collected
enough barnacles

to sink
a ship-of-the-line.

Meanwhile, you're
being upstaged.

That's not important.

My book is the thing...
once my work is done.

Will it deal with man?

It's too surrounded
by prejudices.

Well, whether it
does or it doesn't

you must publish.

Oh, my God.

Ras...

What is it?

ERASMUS:
Who is Alfred Wallace?

DARWIN:
My dear Huxley

it's like a pr�cis
of my theory.

All my originality, whatever
its worth, has been smashed.

Had Wallace a copy of the essay
I'd written in '44 in front of him

he couldn't have written
a better short abstract!

Variations being pushed further
and further from parent species

by a struggle
for existence...

overpopulation...

it's all there.

Is your book ready
for publication?

Publish!

How can I publish?

Honorably?

I'd sooner burn
the blasted thing

than have him, or
anyone else, think

that I behaved
in a paltry spirit.

Then publish
a joint paper,

excerpts from your work

along with Wallace's essay.

And then you must prepare
a manuscript for publication.

Who knows?

It may all be for the best.

At last we'll finally get
to learn your views in full.

(gasping)

Charles, what is it?

(breathing heavily)

This book will be
the death of me.

Oh...

Shh...

What a miserable wretch
I'd be without you near me.

DARWIN:
When on board H.M.S.Beagle
as naturalist

I was much struck with certain
facts in the distribution

of the organic beings
inhabiting South America...

and in the geological relations

of the present to the past
inhabitants of that continent.

These facts seemed
to throw some light

on the origin of species...

that mystery of mysteries...

EMMA:
The Times is very positive.

I should think so,
it's Huxley.

The Athenaeum wants me tried, in
the Divinity Hall, the College

the lecture room and museum.

My book is no more unorthodox
than the subject demands.

I don't discuss
the origins of man;

I don't discuss Genesis.

Charles, don't
be so naive.

It's clear you think
man is no exception.

Whether you're right or wrong

you must finish
what you started.

OWEN:
Darwin?

Darwin!

Ah, Owen!

How dare you?!

How dare you paint me
as a reactionary?!

I didn't paint you
as a reactionary.

How dare you
put my name

with the defenders
of immutability?

Is my concept of the ordained
continuous becoming

of living things
to be ignored?

But what
does it mean?

I don't know
what it means.

It means...

It means animals appearing out
of thin air!

Not at all!

You believe
that selection

is the only possible
creative law.

Pure chance,
the roll of the dice.

In fact, new species
are created

by natural birth
according to God's law!

Well, I don't
believe...

I know who's put
you up to this.

Huxley!

Please,
Richard.

I will have
absolutely no truck

with the Huxleys
of this world

and nor should you!

It is an abuse
of science.

You should be ashamed
of yourself!

Your book is a snub
to the clergy

and an insult
to humanity.

It's nihilism!

Only a man
devoid of a soul

could find solace
in a bestial ancestry.

(laughing)

Well, it's as respectable
to be modified monkey

as modified dirt.

Huxley, please...

I think it's splendid.

Old ladies of both sexes say
it's a dangerous book.

Splendid.

Don't worry.

I'll deal with him.

I'm sharpening my beak
and claws in readiness.

(sighs)

(men cheering and clapping)

Any contribution
to our natural history

from the pen
of Mr. Charles Darwin

is certain to command attention.

His latest publication,
The Origin of Species,

is manifestly regarded by him

as the opus upon which his
future fame is to rest.

Mr. Darwin claims

that every living thing,
every fish, plant, fungus...

(audience laughing)

fly...

(laughter)

elephant...

(laughter increases)

man...

(laughter and applause)

turnip...

are all equally
the lineal descendants

of the same common ancestor.

Such a notion is
absolutely incompatible

with the word of God.

MEN:
Hear, hear.

Man was made in the image of God
and redeemed by the Eternal Son.

Natural selection is an
ingenious theory for denying

the working, and therefore
the existence, of the Creator.

In fact, the human brain
differs markedly

from that of all other mammals.

HUXLEY:
Unfortunately, my Lord Bishop

you have been misinformed.

If we are unprejudiced judges,
we have to admit

that there is as little
interval (as animals)

between the gorilla and the man

as there is between the gorilla
and the baboon.

It is... it is speech alone,
and not some spiritual gift

that makes man
a reasonable being.

That is the source of our
unlimited intellectual progress.

But that does not
disguise the fact

that to the very root and
foundation of his nature

man is one with the rest
of the organic world.

(booing and jeering)

No one... no one who has ever
dissected the brain of an ape

agrees with Professor Owen.

His findings are wrong.

I can only assume
that Professor Owen's brain

must have shrunk
in the pickling jar.

I meant, of course

the chimpanzees' brains
he had examined.

Oh, Lord!

It was then that God
delivered Wilberforce

into my hands.

(audience clamoring)

I wonder, Mr. Huxley.

Is it through your grandfather
or your grandmother

that you claim descent
from an ape?

(uproarious laughter)

I stood up...

very quiet, very grave

and said my say with
perfect good temper.

If the question...

if the question is put to me

would I rather have a miserable
ape for a grandfather

or a man, highly intelligent

possessed of great
means of influence

and yet who employed these
faculties and that influence

for the mere purpose
of introducing ridicule

into a grave scientific
discussion

I unhesitatingly affirm
my preference for the ape.

You didn't!

I said that,
or something very like that.

How dare you attack

a live bishop in public?

Have you no respect
for the purple waistcoat?

HUXLEY:
Lady Brewster fainted,
had to be carried from the room.

And then Admiral FitzRoy

got to his feet.

FitzRoy?

(audience clamoring)

This!

Believe in this!

Believe in God, not man!

Oh, my.

DARWIN:
We'll probably
never know the truth.

ERASMUS:
Well, the truth, Charles,
is in your book.

It's the most interesting
thing I've ever read.

The reasoning

is so entirely
satisfactory to me

that... if
the facts don't fit

then, well...

so much the worse
for the facts.

The shakes.

Time I was
naturally selected.

DENNETT:
For more than a century,
people have often thought

that the conclusion
to draw from Darwin's vision

is that Homo sapiens,
our species

that we're just animals too,
we're just mammals;

that there is nothing morally
special about us.

I myself don't think

this follows at all
from Darwin's vision

but it is certainly the received
view in many quarters.

NARRATOR:
Ever sinceThe Origin of Species
was published

strict believers
in biblical creation

have attacked Darwin's vision.

Their concerns aren't only
about the science of evolution.

At stake, many believe

is nothing less
than the human soul.

MOORE:
To suggest
that animals and plants

and us, humans, came into being
in a natural law-like way

in the way the planets move

was to put in jeopardy
the human soul.

And the human soul
is the crux of the matter

because if we are
not different from animals

if we don't live forever
in heaven or in hell

then why should we behave other
than like animals in this life?

MAN:
In the 19th century,
in Darwin's time

it was audacious to claim

that humans and chimps
were closely related.

There wasn't
that much scientific evidence.

But since that time
the evidence has become strong.

First, we saw
the fossil record appear.

Evidence of human ancestors
that had apelike features

established the plausibility
of the idea

that humans and chimps
had common ancestors.

And then in the last 20 years

we've seen the emergence
of a whole new type of data

that's established
a close relationship

between chimps and humans.

And that comes
from the analysis of DNA.

PAGE:
This is DNA.

We've got DNA,
chimps have got DNA,

bacteria have got DNA,
petunias have got DNA,

crabs have got DNA.

Every living animal, plant,
fish, frog has got DNA

and if we compare the DNAs
of any two species

we can establish how closely
related they are one to another.

NARRATOR:
In the early days
of DNA research

a double strand of DNA
was extracted

from each species
to be compared.

When heated,
the strands split apart.

When the single strands
from each creature

were put together
and allowed to cool

the two always combined to form
the familiar double helix.

The degree to which the strands
mated successfully

was a measure
of their similarity.

It turned out
that human DNA and chimp DNA

combined almost perfectly.

Today, this similarity
can be seen even more precisely.

DNA sequences can now be "read"
letter by letter.

PAGE:
Here we're looking
at the DNA sequences

of one particular gene
as found in human and chimp

and what's immediately evident

is that humans and chimps have
DNAs that are 98% identical.

They're basically the same;

there are just a couple
of spelling changes.

Why are there only
a couple of spelling changes?

Because we and chimps
had a common ancestor

only a few million years ago

and these few spelling
differences

have accumulated during
the propagation of this DNA

during those few million years.

If more time had passed since
we had our last common ancestor

more spelling changes
would have accumulated.

NARRATOR:
If the same gene
from a rat is compared

many more
spelling differences are seen.

That's because our common
ancestor with the rat

lived about 80 million
or 100 million years ago

and there's been much more time

for spelling differences
to accumulate.

NARRATOR:
Chimpanzees and humans

are made from blueprints
that are 98% the same.

But what about the ways

humans and chimps
think and act in the world?

Are there similarities
there as well?

WOMAN:
Boy, doing some pull-ups.

Oh... be careful.

NARRATOR:
Psychologist Sally Boysen
explores the commonalities

between the minds
of chimps and humans,

a quest that may help explain
how the human mind evolved.

BOYSEN:
The developmental milestones

really, throughout
the life of a chimp

are almost exactly
the same as humans.

Everything is so similar.

They respond
to new things and new toys

and they have the same kinds
of rough-and-tumble play.

Harper's rough and rowdy

and runs all over the place
and climbs.

And Emma really can
almost entertain herself.

One of the things
that our work allows us to see

is that chimpanzees can acquire

very sophisticated,
complex cognitive skills

like learning to count

which they normally
wouldn't learn in the wild.

One, two, three...

four, five!

Ooh...

Yet they have the requisite
neural capacity to do that.

Where did that come from?

Okay, Sheeb, we're going
to do another turn now.

Here we go.

One of those.

Ooh, and a malted milk ball.

Can you tell me
the answer to this?

With blue and brown?

Show me, yeah, go ahead.

(screen beeps)

Excellent!

BOYSEN:
There's almost nothing

that the chimps
haven't been able to learn

that we've tried to teach them.

We've seen their ability to
grasp extremely complex notions

like the concept of zero,
for example.

BOYSEN:
Okay, Sheeb, look.

What if I didn't put
any candy here at all?

What would you say?

(computer beeping)

Zero, that's right.

There's no candy here.

Oh, that's too bad...

BOYSEN:
There's no way the chimps
would be able to do this

if they didn't have
a great deal of commonality

in, literally,
the neurological structure

that supports their ability
to learn... just like we do.

Those things
are absolutely comparable

and had to come
from a common ancestor.

KENNETH MILLER:
The similarities that we have
with our primate relatives

are extraordinary.

We share so much of our DNA

we share
so much of our morphology

we even share our blood types.

But for all
of those similarities

there are striking differences.

I think the reason for this
is really very simple.

And that is, the line
of evolution that led to us

led, for reasons which we are
only beginning to understand

to an explosive development
of mental capacity.

And what clearly happened
is that natural selection

favored the evolution of
organisms that could communicate

that could manipulate symbols,
and could construct language.

Darwin's great idea is a grand
and marvelous explanation

that shows us that we are united
with every other form of life

on this planet.

And I find that an exciting

and maybe even an ennobling
way to look at things.

(choir singing hymn)

MOORE:
Darwin died in April 1882,
at the age of 73.

The family thought
he would be buried

in the parish churchyard.

Darwin had said,
months before he died

that he would
have to look forward to it

as the sweetest place on earth.

It was not to be.

In London, Darwin's friends

determined to make his death
and burial a state occasion.

They went to the Royal Society
and they got signatures.

They went
to the House of Commons

and got up a petition.

They telegraphed
the Dean of Westminster

who was abroad
and got his approval.

A special anthem was even
written for the occasion.

And on the 26th of April,
a week after the death

Darwin's body
was borne mightily in procession

down the aisle
of Westminster Abbey

to be interred in the shadow of
the grave of Sir Isaac Newton.

Darwin's interment celebrated
the vast social transformation

that England was undergoing.

There were new colonies,
new industries

and new men to run them.

Darwin's body was enshrined

to the greater glory
of these new professionals

for he had naturalized creation

and delivered human nature and
human destiny into their hands.

Society would never be the same.

Darwin's vision of nature

was, I believe,
fundamentally a religious vision

one with which
he ended his most famous work

On the Origin of Species.

"There is grandeur
in this view of life

"with its several powers

"having been originally breathed
into a few forms or into one

"and that whilst this planet
has gone cycling on...

(Darwin's voice joins Moore's)

"according to
the fixed law of gravity

"from so simple a beginning,
endless forms most beautiful

and most wonderful have been
and are being evolved."

Continue the journey

into where we're from
and where we're going

at the Evolution web site.

Visit www.pbs.org.