To Infinity and Beyond

The Infinite Monkey Cage

BBC

Comedy, Science

4.7 • 9.4K Ratings

🗓️ 9 December 2013

⏱️ 35 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

This week on the Infinite Monkey Cage, Brian Cox and Robin Ince are joined by comedy producer John Lloyd, mathematician Colva Roney Dougal and writer Simon Singh, to explore the universality of mathematics, the nature of infinity and the role of numbers in everyday life. Producer: Rami Tzabar.

Transcript

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0:00.0	Hello, I'm Robert Enz.
0:01.2	And I'm Brian Cox.
0:02.2	And welcome to the podcast version of The Infant Monkey Cage,
0:05.3	which contains extra material that wasn't considered good enough for the radio.
0:09.1	Enjoy it.
0:10.0	Hello, pie by two radians to my left is Brian Cox.
0:13.5	A further pie radians counterclockwise or Robert Enz?
0:16.4	This is The Infant Monkey Cage and today we talk mathematics,
0:19.2	which requires precision, hence the precision introduction.
0:22.4	Mathematics is a subject that has a reputation for confusing people,
0:25.6	even though it lies at the very foundation of our understanding of the universe.
0:29.5	So, for instance, when I look at Maxwell's wave equations and I do often,
0:34.0	I'm told anyway that it's all about the unerring precision
0:39.0	and elegance of the behaviour of light itself.
0:41.6	But how do I know?
0:42.8	It's just squiggles.
0:43.8	Is it just some kind of mathematical game?
0:46.0	Other mathematicians up to something and coding everything,
0:48.5	making their cheering machines?
0:53.0	Our panel today.
0:54.3	Colver OnlyDougall is a senior lecturer in pure mathematics
0:57.4	and has been working on solving word problems
	...

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