Johnny Ball
speaker
103 appearances
3 recordings
1 series
first heard Sep 2012
last heard May 2013
Johnny Ball’s voice in public audio — every appearance, attributed to the second.
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Appearances
So you can't have the number before infinity.
It goes on forever.
And that's the infinity.
It is, because virtually everything we talk about is finite.
The number of molecules of air in the atmosphere is finite.
They could be counted.
There's a number you can't go beyond.
But infinity goes beyond that.
We talk about the big bang started the universe, and it seems like a model that works, but we don't know where the edge of the universe is or whether the universe goes on to infinity forever and ever.
We probably will never know that.
If you have a square, it's got four sides, and it will fit into a circle.
If you have a hexagon that fits into a circle, it's six sides, and it still fits into a circle.
If you have an octagon with eight sides that fits into a circle, all well and good.
How far can you go?
How many sides can you have to a figure...
that will still fit in a circle.
Well, the definition of a circle is an infinite number of points, a set distance from a central point that together make up that circle.
And it's wonderful that human brains will always want to stretch it and stretch it.
So if you like, the human brain's thinking...
will go on to infinity, hopefully.
Showing 81–100 of 103 · page 5 of 6
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