Big History: The Big Bang, Life on Earth, and the Rise of Humanity

By: David Christian, The Great Courses

Narrated by: David Christian

Length: 24 hrs and 26 mins

Publisher's summary

How is it possible for the disciplines of cosmology, geology, anthropology, biology, and history to fit together? These 48 lectures answer that question by weaving a single story from accounts of the past developed by a variety of scholarly disciplines. The result is a story stretching from the origins of the universe to the present day and beyond, in which human history is seen as part of the history of our Earth and biosphere, and the Earth's history, in turn, is seen as part of the history of the universe.

Like traditional creation stories told by the world's great religions and mythologies, this lecture series provides a map of our place in space and time. But it does so using the insights and knowledge of modern science, as synthesized by a renowned historian. While you may have heard parts of this story before in courses on geology, history, anthropology, biology, cosmology, and other scholarly disciplines, Professor Christian provides more than just a recap of those disciplines. "Because of the scale on which we look at the past, you should not expect to find in it many of the familiar details, names, and personalities that you'll find in other types of historical teaching and writing," he explains. "For example, the French Revolution and the Renaissance will barely get a mention. They'll zoom past in a blur. You'll barely see them. Instead, what we're going to see are some less familiar aspects of the past. We'll be looking, above all, for the very large patterns, the shape of the past.

"Prepare yourself for a journey through time and across space, from the first moments of existence to the distant reaches of the far future."

PLEASE NOTE: When you purchase this title, the accompanying reference material will be available in your Library section along with the audio.

©2008 The Teaching Company, LLC (P)2008 The Great Courses

We lost a little objectivity during modern times.

I can't help but to think that we lost a little objectivity during modern times. the analysis of historical evidence before modern times seem to be open minded, Innovative, and virtual avoid of bias. I don't have as much faith in the lecture is analysis in dealing with modernity.

Excellent lecture series

A bit dated now in 2022 but enjoyable and fun. Learn how connected we all are to everything.

Big Story Big History

An amazing interdisciplinary tour of the universe and our place nestled within it. You will have a new appreciation of life if you just listen.

A Must Listen for both the Faithful and the Skeptical

What a wonderful story and presentation. A story you are unlikely to read made accessible through a terrific lecturer and teacher. How better to spend your summer vacation.

Thought provoking

Any additional comments?

I found these lectures to be pretty valuable and helps quite a bit for filling in some blank spots in my internal timeline knowledge. I was fascinated by the big bang stuff and the description of the early universe development. I must admit it lost some luster when he started talking about patriarchy. He has spent all this time describing this Natural unguided spontaneous evolution and development of the universe then its like he has a problem with patriarchy? Really? It was a bit lame. I also noticed he frequently would say something like " We really dont know this, BUT let me tell you how it was." But all in all a very good BIG PICTURE overview for the current "establishment" outlook of the godless universe.

History for all of us

Any additional comments?

Very interesting comprehensive introduction to life. The narration by Professor Christian was fabulous. This is a title that I would recommend as a must-hear for most adults.

Is David Christian God?

At the end of this lecture, Dr. Christian leaves the listener with the possibility that perhaps we are God. We may be the highest lifeforms in the universe, and at least on Earth, the only ones who question the “why” of everything. Dr. Christian has summarized, in an astonishingly approachable fashion, 13.7 billion years of everything. He answers the “why” if almost everything. As he seemingly possesses (and substantiates) most of the answers leaving me to wonder: is he God?

In all seriousness, this is the finest lecture I’ve ever listened to and I’ve crushed a LOT of Great Courses lectures. I thought no one would outdo Dr Vejas Gabriel Liulevicius’ lectures but I’m afraid this one has done it. Hats off to Dr Christian, from an avid listener and massive fan.

Good, but Outdated

Overall this was a good lecture series. It is primarily a history series, however, so if you're looking for an in-depth description of each subject here then you'll need to look elsewhere; this lecture series simply covers the timeline and a cursory justification made by scientific evidence from disparate fields. My biggest gripe is that the information is already outdated in a few places and in some specific cases are outright false. For instance, the entire subject on Neanderthals is now obsolete based on information from the last 10 years, so take information here with a bit of skepticism.

Terrific compilation of the origins of matter/life

Any additional comments?

This wonderful compilation of the scientific facts of the origins of matter, life and the rise of humanity is well organized, interesting and a good review or numerous fields. It is a must for the educated.

Worthy of the "Great" courses

If you could sum up Big History: The Big Bang, Life on Earth, and the Rise of Humanity in three words, what would they be?

Enlightening Epic Journey

What did you like best about this story?

The course accomplishes a HUGE goal, that of giving the listener/student a sense of perspective of the history of the universe, biased on the most widely accepted theories from different - and often seen as unrelated - fields of human knowledge.
There were insights from Cosmology, Astronomy, Archaeology, Anthropology, Geology, Climatology, Chemistry, Physics, Biology, even Mathematics... all arranged just in the right mix of the combination between deepness and broadness over the subjects. They all get combined to form a spectre that puts you in such a perspective that you feel like you're outside of the universe watching the big picture, being able to fully control the Time, going back and forth, and Space, moving from region to region on scales ranging from subatomic particles to galaxy clusters.

Any additional comments?

I understand that much of the content of the course is the best of the scientific accomplishment of the time, on the referred subjects, but they should not be treated as absolute truths. The course that Professor David Christian teaches is dynamic, and follows the new scientific discoveries and best hypothesis. Avoid the urge to stick to these figures and let yourself be moved towards the main inner driver of this course, that is simply human Curiosity at it's best...

One more addition: as a Christian, Engineering graduation student and above all a very Curious human being, I do not necessarily believe that everything said here is true; especially, of course, the disregard of "early traditions" that are used to explain the creation... I mean, there are things in which we simply believe because we can't really test on a lab. We can bring to discussion the best theory, and I like it, but the fundamental point is that evidence is surely helpful, but not definitive to let us know about things that happened that long ago, regardless of it being 10.000 or 13.700.000.000 years ago. Just try to keep that in mind when listening to this awesome collection of knowledge, scientific theories, hypothesis; they are surely close to the very best, state of the art, that we as humans have developed, created and gained so far.