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The Infinite Monkey Cage

Quantum Worlds

The Infinite Monkey Cage

BBC

Comedy, Science

4.79.4K Ratings

🗓️ 10 February 2020

⏱️ 43 minutes

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Quantum Worlds

Brian Cox and Robin Ince are joined by comedian Katy Brand, and physicists Sean Carroll and Jim Al-Khalili as they enter the strange and bizarre world of quantum mechanics. Schroedinger's famous thought experiment stuck a cat in a box and asked if it is dead or alive. Quantum physics says the cat is both dead and alive, until we open the box. This mind-bending idea may seem the realm of philosophy, but is actually the science that underpins most of modern life as we know it. Once the panel have dealt with the controversial issues surrounding cats in boxes, they explore whether quantum physics is really an accurate description of reality, and if it is, are there, as the theory suggests, infinite copies of you, me and everything in our universe all existing in every possible combination of ways of existing? If that is the strange but true reality of existence, will we ever be able to prove it?

Transcript

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0:00.0

BBC Sounds, Music, Radio, Podcasts.

0:04.8

Welcome to the Infinite Monkey Age podcast with me, Brian Cox.

0:07.4

And I'm Robin Hnts.

0:08.5

And if you'd like to complain about this programme,

0:10.7

after listening to it right to the BBC Broadcasting House,

0:13.2

London W1A1AA.

0:15.3

Why not complain about it before listening to it?

0:17.4

It was save time.

0:18.8

Have you enjoyed the podcast?

0:20.6

Hello, I'm Robin Hnts.

0:21.7

And actually, those are probably the last words

0:23.7

I'm going to say for the whole of this show.

0:25.3

Yeah, because today's show is all about quantum mechanics.

0:27.7

And Robin actually does have a clue.

0:30.1

No, I don't.

0:31.4

Though apparently, in another world,

0:34.1

I made some different choices when I was younger.

0:36.8

And I do have a very deep understanding

0:39.3

of quantum mechanics, wave functions,

0:42.1

emission operators, and Hilbert space.

0:45.0

Emission operators, Robin, what are they then?

0:46.8

I don't know.

...

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