The most important numbers in the universe
5/29/202654 min
Numbers get their due credit in this podcast. Even if we're not aware of them, numbers are essential to how we experience the world. IDEAS explores the most bizarre, surprising, mind-blowing and fundamental numbers in the universe.
This panel discussion was recorded live at The Perimeter Institute for Theoretical Physics in Waterloo, Ontario.
Guests in this episode:
Asimina Arvanitaki is a particle physicist and the Aristarchus Chair in Theoretical Physics at the Perimeter Institute.
Ben Webster is an associate professor in the Pure Mathematics Department at the University of Waterloo, and he’s an associate faculty member at the Perimeter Institute.
Matthew Johnson is an assistant professor of physics and astronomy at York University.
Clips
Transcript preview
First 90 secondsSpeaker 10:00
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Asimina Arvanitaki· Guest0:28
[upbeat jingle] This is a CBC podcast.
Nahlah Ayed· Host0:32
[gentle music] Welcome to Ideas. I'm Nahlah Ayed. Our understanding of the universe keeps expanding, a little like the universe itself. New discoveries and ever more powerful telescopes reveal a cosmos full of wonders that dazzle the eye and fuel the imagination. But when scientists look under the hood of the universe, they see equations and numbers whirring away, underlying all of it. Some of those numbers are staggeringly huge or unimaginably tiny. Some, like pi and the golden ratio, have been known for thousands of years. Others are still the subject of debate, and yet others still remain