Does Time Exist?
The Infinite Monkey Cage
BBC
4.7 • 9.4K Ratings
🗓️ 26 August 2020
⏱️ 44 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Brian Cox and Robin Ince are joined by actor and writer Mark Gatiss, theoretical physicists Carlo Rovelli and Fay Dowker to ask timely questions about time. Is time real, does it exist in the fundamental laws of physics, and if it doesn't, why do we experience the sensation of time passing? They look at the idea of the block universe, where our future is as real as our past, which worryingly leads to Robin's favourite question about free will...is that an illusion too? A timely look at the question of time and hopefully just in time...
Producer: Alexandra Feachem
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | BBC Sounds, Music, Radio, Podcasts. |
| 0:04.8 | Hello, I'm Brian Cox. |
| 0:06.0 | And I'm Robin Inc. This is the Infinite Monkey Cage. |
| 0:09.2 | And today I suppose, well, we should start with one of the great quotes of physics. |
| 0:13.4 | Time is an illusion. |
| 0:15.4 | And of course, that was said by Ken Dodd, |
| 0:18.3 | when he was playing the Bradford Alambra back in 1972. |
| 0:22.9 | It was just before dawn. |
| 0:24.4 | It was the beginning of the third act. |
| 0:26.0 | And all the Diddy men came out dressed as Einstein |
| 0:29.0 | and started singing tears. |
| 0:30.3 | It was a beautiful moment where physics and variety met. |
| 0:33.6 | Right, for our many listeners outside the UK and or the 1970s, |
| 0:38.2 | Robin's production will need some additional cultural context. |
| 0:41.4 | So much in fact, that we need more time than we have. |
| 0:45.0 | In any case, to be complete, we'd have to know what time is, |
| 0:47.8 | which is, coincidentally, the subject of today's Monkey Cage. |
| 0:51.4 | But of course, I know what it is, because there's the great famous quotation from physics, |
| 0:55.5 | which is Times and Illusion, which was first said by Ken Dodd, |
| 0:59.1 | the Bradford Alambra. |
| 1:00.8 | It was just turning towards dawn, |
| 1:02.8 | as the Diddy men came on for the beginning of the third act, |
... |
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