Very interesting and entertaining presentation of the subject. However, thinking-people must point out the obvious. Sure, cigarette smoke may damage cells, but it is ridiculous to mention one small specific cause of cell-damage when so many other things in modern life are exponentially more damaging. Anyone who drives a car should never complain about cigarette smoke. The pollutants emitted from a small car from a short trip to work are thousands of times greater than decades of smoke exposure. The difference is that most people are not forced to breath car-exhaust in confined spaces. Likewise, chemicals in food, water and air from industrial waste and power production are millions upon millions times greater than smoking. Smoke-exposure is transient and local; Whereas environmental threats are constant and ubiquitous. No one, least of all me, would say smoking is actually "good" but we must stop obsessing about the small things and focus on the truly important things. Instead of mentioning smoking, start from the top down... One could argue about the order, but certainly power-generation and transportation through burning fossil-fuels must be toward the top of the list. Given the sheer number, volume and potency of potential carcinogens modern our modern world creates, mentioning smoking in the top three is rather like worrying about a gnat when there is an angry gorilla in the room.
Well, it's perfectly reasonable to mention 1 or 2 causes of cell damage that are common knowledge and need no further explanations in a short video about chromosomes. If it was a video specifically about carcinogens then it still would be impractical to mention the millions of factors that can lead to cancer but it should at least mention and explain a bit the things that you included in your comment.
Great video but it left me hanging for more details. After delving into your site I found the full lectures are on BBC channel something (I am in Australia) Thankfully they are said to be posted on the web in full on Jan 2014 (Yay) Perhaps you might want to add that detail in the video description to make it easy for others interested. PS Thank you very, very much for producing these videos and making them available. Beyond copyright BS maybe someone will lean something to help others that would otherwise be in the dark. Merry Christmas and a happy new year. SystemRat :-)
The best thing a little video like this can do is get people interested to look for more details, I guess? The internet is full of details, just a search away.
