TV Program Description
Premiere Broadcast on PBS: November 3, 10 & 17,
2009
Nothing is more fascinating to us than, well, us. Where did we
come from? What makes us human? An explosion of recent
discoveries sheds light on these questions, and NOVA's
comprehensive, three-part special, "Becoming Human," examines
what the latest scientific research reveals about our hominid
relatives—putting together the pieces of our human past
and transforming our understanding of our earliest ancestors.
Featuring interviews with world-renowned scientists, each hour
unfolds with a CSI-like forensic investigation into the
life and death of a specific hominid ancestor. The programs
were shot "in the trenches" where discoveries were unearthed
throughout Africa and Europe. Dry bones spring back to life
with stunning computer-generated animation and prosthetics.
Fossils not only give us clues to what early hominids looked
like, but, with the aid of ingenious new lab techniques, how
they lived and how we became the creative, thinking humans of
today.
"Having an understanding of human evolution is key to so many
of the issues we face today," remarks Paula Apsell, Senior
Executive Producer for NOVA and Director of the WGBH Science
Unit. "This fall, 'Becoming Human' will offer a vivid picture
of human evolution that highlights the latest groundbreaking
discoveries and, more importantly, explains how each new
finding fits together with earlier ones to reveal a truly
compelling story of survival."
The first hour examines the factors that caused us to split
from the other great apes. The film explores the fossil of
"Selam," also known as "Lucy's Child"—an amazing, nearly
complete child fossil that helps shed light on our ancestors'
early development and how we began to depart from the
ancestors of chimps. Paleoanthropologist Zeray Alemseged, who
discovered Selam, spent five years carefully excavating the
sandstone-embedded fossil grain by grain. NOVA's cameras are
there to capture the unveiling of the face, spine, and
shoulder blades of the oldest known child fossil, 3.3 million
years old. And, for the first time, NOVA takes viewers "inside
the skull" to show how our ancestors' brains had begun to
change from those of the apes.
Why did leaps in human evolution take place? "Becoming Human"
explores a provocative "big idea" that sharp swings of climate
were a key factor in driving human evolution. Layers of rock
showing evidence of extreme shifts in climate, combined with
fossils unearthed at those locations, indicate that great
steps in human evolution were taken in periods when climate
was swinging wildly from hot and wet to dry and cold. Today,
many think of abrupt climate change as the biggest threat to
humanity's future. But this theory suggests that such sudden
flips may have been an essential creative engine that helped
shape the emergence of our ancestors. Based on new discoveries
about ancient climate extremes, paleoanthropologist Rick Potts
has formulated a new grand theory: "Variability itself was the
driving force of human evolution, and our ancestors were
adapted to change itself."
Producer Graham Townsley worked with a team of animators from
Industrial Light & Magic (ILM), actors, paleontologists, and a
paleoartist, to bring each hominid in the series to life and
to create the landscapes of Ice Age Europe. "It is truly
unique to have artists and scientists collaborating at this
level in order to create the most accurate images of early
humans based on fossil evidence," says Townsley. The arduous
reenactment process included many months of developing the
animation and fitting prosthetic masks. "The result is the
most realistic picture at present of our earliest ancestors as
well as the tools they used and the environment they lived
in," says Townsley. (Hear more from Townsley and see some of
the animation process in
The Producer's Story.)
In gripping forensic detail, the second show in "Becoming
Human" investigates the first skeleton that really looks like
us—"Turkana Boy"—an astonishingly complete
specimen of Homo erectus found by the famous Leakey
team in Kenya. These ancestors are thought to have developed
many key innovations such as hunting, use of fire, and
extensive social bonds. NOVA examines a theory that it was
long-distance running—our ability to jog—that was
not only crucial for the survival of these early hominids on
grasslands filled with vicious predators but also gave them a
unique hunting strategy: chasing and running down prey animals
such as deer or antelope to the point of exhaustion. "Turkana
Boy" also marks the first time in human evolution that there
is strong evidence of an extended period of childhood and
parenting. As anthropologist and primatologist Sarah Hrdy
explains, "This prolonged childhood is one of the most
distinctive features of human society, sharply different from
that of chimps." New analyses of fossil bones and teeth are
giving us direct evidence of how, why, and when humans'
uniquely long childhood and parenting began and how the
empathy of the family bond got started and why it proved
vital.
The final program examines the fate of the Neanderthals, our
European cousins who died out as modern humans spread from
Africa into Europe during the Ice Age. Did modern humans
interbreed with Neanderthals and/or exterminate them? The
program explores crucial new evidence from the recent decoding
of the Neanderthal genome, which until just a few years ago
was thought to be an impossible technical feat.
So how did modern humans take over the world? New evidence
suggests that they left Africa and colonized the world far
earlier, and for different reasons, than previously thought.
As for Homo sapiens, we have planet Earth to ourselves
today, but that's a very recent and unusual situation. For
millions of years, as far back as science can take us, many
different kinds of hominids co-existed and shared the globe
simultaneously, and there was no guarantee that any of them
would survive the many threats along the way. For example, at
one time Homo sapiens shared the planet with
Neanderthals, Homo erectus, and the mysterious
"Hobbits"—three-foot-high humans who thrived on the
Indonesian island of Flores until just a few thousand years
ago. (To get a sense of our numerous hominid cousins, see
Who's Who In Human Evolution.) "Becoming Human" examines why "we" survived while those
other ancestral cousins died out. And it explores the
question: In what ways are we still evolving today?
Program Transcript
