Seth MacFarlane and Fox have teamed up with astrophysicist Neil DeGrasse Tyson to recreate the classic TV show “Cosmos” for the 21st Century.  “Cosmos” originally aired 34 years ago on the Public Broadcasting Service (PBS), then hosted by Cornell astronomer Carl Sagan, and successfully exposed millions of Americans to different aspects of science, history and the cosmic perspective of mankind in the universe.
   This new “Cosmos” follows the general outline of Carl Sagan’s original show but this time with the help of modern cinematic advances.  With the help of Fox and MacFarlane, the show wows its audience both visually and intellectually in ways previously left solely to the imagination.  The show focuses on Tyson’s journey around the cosmos in his spaceship of the imagination, which cannot fully explore what we do not know and helps us get a better, larger perspective on what we do know.
   According to Tyson in a “National Geographic” interview, the show aims to help us identify our place in the universe.
   “I want people to come away compelled to recognize the cosmic perspective on their own lives,” Tyson said. “Once they recognize that the universe is bigger than we can imagine, it’s supremely humbling. But it really compels us to take better care of this tiny, pale blue dot that we live on.”
  This brings up the recent contention between religious, philosophical concerns that “Cosmos” advocates and the indignant repudiations of these kinds of attempts from people that nitpick at details.  Already, the TV show has garnered complaints from the Answers in Genesis (AiG) creation science and Christian apologetics group.  
  On its blog, AiG reviews the first episode of “Cosmos” and attempts to poke holes in Tyson’s reasoning. The tendency for both sides in any debate to not allow for any compromise between their pre-established worldviews causes this sparring match between many Christians and Tyson, who is mostly uninterested in religious metaphysics in his show.  Unfortunately, both parties think their views are in opposition to the other’s, but this usually comes from not taking the time to properly analyze the philosophical grounds and ramifications of both sides’ largely faith-based assumptions.
    There should be an active conversation between the two groups, but the source of confrontation comes not from the fact there are different opinions, but from the domain in which these opinions reside.  Creation scientists are much more inclined toward making philosophical and religious claims, primarily because their principle premise, which is that God created the world in some metaphysical fashion, prevents them from doing unbiased science and accepting evidence as it is.  This is fine for the debate across disciplines and religious presupposition boundaries until the other party, those who are uninterested in the religious realm or who are explicitly atheistic, tries to use its expertise in empirical science to make refutations about philosophical or religious matters.
   The issue would go away if the creationists would stop demanding their historical account of creation trump empirical science, or if the empirical scientists would stop demanding their observations, that do in fact contradict a strictly literal historical account of creation, must also contradict the religious conclusions that are too heavily reliant on those creationism assumptions.
   The problem is not some incompatibility between science and religion, but simply an incompatibility between militant scientists and militant theologians who have accidentally fallen into seeing each other as somehow enemies.  This rift is new and artificial. It is something scientists like Isaac Newton and Johannes Kepler would be astonished to witness, and we must act fast to stop the growing divide between religion and science.  The “Cosmos” TV show acts to better inform us of previous infractions in the religion vs. science debate, and, hopefully, we can learn from them to prevent further conflict in the future.