Watch PBS Evolution Series

PBS Evolution - Extinction

Five mass extinctions have occurred since life began on Earth. Some 99.9 percent of all the species that have ever lived are now extinct. Are humans causing the next mass extinction? And what does evolutionary theory predict for the world we will leave to our descendants?

PBS Evolution - Why Sex?

In evolutionary terms, sex is more important than life itself. Sex fuels evolutionary change by adding variation to the gene pool. The powerful urge to pass our genes on to the next generation has likely changed the face of human culture in ways we're only beginning to understand.

PBS Evolution - The Mind's Big Bang

Fifty thousand years ago, something happened -- the modern human mind emerged, triggering a creative, technological, and social explosion. What forces contributed to that breakthrough? Where might our power of mind ultimately lead us?

PBS Evolution - The Evolutionary Arms Race

Survival of the fittest: Raw competition? Intense cooperation? Both are essential. Interactions between and within species are among the most powerful evolutionary forces on Earth, and understanding them may be a key to our own survival.

PBS Evolution - Great Transformations

What underlies the incredible diversity of life on Earth? How have complex life forms evolved? The journey from water to land, the return of land mammals to the sea, and the emergence of humans all suggest that creatures past and present are members of a single tree of life.

PBS Evolution - What about God?

Of all species, we alone attempt to explain who we are and how we came to be. This final episode explores the struggle between science and religion. Through the personal stories of students and teachers, it offers the view that they are compatible.

PBS Evolution - Darwin's Dangerous Idea - Part 1

PBS Evolution - Darwin's Dangerous Idea - Part 2

Why does Charles Darwin's "dangerous idea" matter more today than ever, and how does it explain the past and predict the future of life on Earth? The first show interweaves the drama of Darwin's life with current documentary sequences, introducing key concepts of evolution.

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Animal Rights?

Rational argument about the right and wrong way to treat animals is made more difficult by the deep love that many of us feel for animals.

For philosophers it raises fundamental questions about the basis of moral rights.

To learn more about the issue, click here http://www.bbc.co.uk/ethics/animals/

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Is Abortion Ethical?

The abortion debate asks whether it can be morally right to terminate a pregnancy before normal childbirth.

Some people think that abortion is always wrong. Some think that abortion is right when the mother's life is at risk. Others think that there is a range of circumstances in which abortion is morally acceptable.

To find out more about this debate, visit this site http://www.bbc.co.uk/ethics/abortion/

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Cyber War

In "Cyber War!" FRONTLINE investigates a number of cyber attacks that have already occurred in recent years, including "Slammer," which last January took down the Internet in South Korea and affected 911 systems and the banking system in the United States, and the "Nimda" virus that quietly attacked Wall Street in 2001.

FRONTLINE talks to cyber security experts about what these defining wake-up calls reveal about the vulnerabilities of cyberspace. This report also follows efforts by the United States to go on the offensive.

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/cyberwar

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Diet Wars

Americans spend $40 billion a year on books, products, and programs designed to do one thing: help us lose weight. From Atkins to Ornish and Weight Watchers to South Beach, today's dieters have a dizzying array of weight loss programs from which to choose -- yet the underlying principles of these diets are often contradictory.

In "Diet Wars," FRONTLINE examines the great diet debate. Viewers follow FRONTLINE correspondent Steve Talbot, whose discovery that those "few extra pounds" have put him perilously close to the clinical definition of obesity prompts him to evaluate the myriad diets now available to overweight Americans.

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/diet

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The Age of AIDS

On the 25th anniversary of the first diagnosed cases of AIDS, FRONTLINE examines one of the worst pandemics the world has ever known in "The Age of AIDS." After a quarter century of political denial and social stigma, of stunning scientific breakthroughs, bitter policy battles and inadequate prevention campaigns, HIV/AIDS continues to spread rapidly throughout much of the world, particularly in developing nations. To date, some 30 million people worldwide have already died of AIDS.

"It's a very human virus, a very human epidemic. It touches right to the heart of our existence," says Dr. Peter Piot, executive director of UNAIDS. "When you think of it, that in let's say 25 years, about 70 million people have become infected with this virus, probably coming from one [transmission] ... it's mind blowing."

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