The Planet Earth Problem
There has been widespread media praise for the “scientific program Planet Earth”, so what’s wrong with the BBC spending license payers’ money funding the making of a science program, which utilizes cutting-edge technology to film the worlds wildlife?
The problem I feel is that the BBC have missed an opportunity to link cutting-edge film with thought-provoking science.
Due to time constraints of 50 minutes upon each habitat there’s nowhere near enough time to show the diverse range of adaptations to an environment, and what’s actually shown is a brief look at a few more recognizable creatures, with some rarities thrown in for the “wow-effect”. The BBC should be making scientific programs that encourage thought. Their own founding policy is that programs should “inform, educate and entertain”. And whilst I have no argument that Planet Earth doesn’t entertain, to say it informs and educates is debatable. I understand that there’s a balance between the amount of science and the accessibility to people, yet on modern television, with many animal programmes, people are more aware of the diversity of species, so programmes should be able to present more in-depth information, rather than acting as highlights shows of the Earths biodiversity. The BBC however compromises this and confines the science to 3 one hour slots upon BBC Four and radio4, which have significantly smaller audiences. A great chance to link environmental issues to natural beauty has been missed due to the BBC not wanting to risk audience numbers.
5 comments:
I think that raises some interesting points. But you seem to complain that the time slots are too limiting... can you really expect people to devote more time than that to this topic over all others?
I don’t think that it is necessarily a case of devoting more time to this than other issues, I think that if they spend 11 programmes showcasing the natural world then more could be incorporated into them to raise awareness of climate change, in context of what is occurring. They had over 10 hours of airtime on prime time slots which I feel they could have used more productively in terms of detailing the effects, in ways that people could relate to.
I was also disappointed that in the last programme in the series, Ocean Deep, the summing up of climate change and its effects on all of the previous biomes was summed up in the last three sentences.
fair enough.
I don't know how many people saw this story on the top 100 green campaigners. David Attenborough was 4th, which the article suggests, is slightly controversial because green campaigners long complained that he doesn't always take up opportunities to discuss environmental issues.
I had a look at the list and I thought it was quite interesting that though there were many famous environmental campaigners, to be honest I did not recognise their names, though I did recognise what they had achieved, in terms of theories and charitable organisations. Thus when looking at the top 100 campaigners you may think David Attenborough may get higher than deserved in terms of green campaigning as he is more recognisable as a general public figure.
To support your argument, Andrew, this research showed that high production-value programmes might give the wrong idea about evolution. Ironic, really, when Attenborough is a vociferous opponent of intelligent design.
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