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Gravity and Me The Force that Shapes our Lives

   2017    Science
Professor Jim Al-Khalili investigates the amazing science of gravity. A fundamental force of nature, gravity shapes our entire universe. It sculpts galaxies and warps space and time. But gravity’s strange powers also affect our daily lives in the most unexpected ways. This is a story with surprises in store for Jim himself. In telling the story of gravity, his own understanding of the nature of reality comes to be challenged. Finally, Jim discovers that, despite incredible progress, gravity still has many secrets to unveil.

Mystery Signal from Space

   2018    Science    HD
Deep in the mountains of West Virginia, the Green Bank Observatory has been receiving a mysterious signal from deep space. A team of astronomers has been detecting high-energy bursts erupting from unknown sources far off in space since years ago. But one of them is different from the rest. They call it FRB 121102.
What is actually giving rise to this very powerful flash? Could this be a message from an advanced civilization, or is it a much stranger and violent occurrence? Visit the largest steerable radio telescope on the planet for answers.

Weirder and Weirder

   2018    Science
Dr Hannah Fry explores a paradox at the heart of modern maths, discovered by Bertrand Russell, which undermines the very foundations of logic that all of maths is built on. These flaws suggest that maths isn't a true part of the universe but might just be a human language - fallible and imprecise. However, Hannah argues that Einstein's theoretical equations, such as E=mc2 and his theory of general relativity, are so good at predicting the universe that they must be reflecting some basic structure in it. This idea is supported by Kurt Godel, who proved that there are parts of maths that we have to take on faith.
Hannah then explores what maths can reveal about the fundamental building blocks of the universe - the subatomic, quantum world. The maths tells us that particles can exist in two states at once, and yet quantum physics is at the core of photosynthesis and therefore fundamental to most of life on earth - more evidence of discovering mathematical rules in nature. But if we accept that maths is part of the structure of the universe, there are two main problems: firstly, the two main theories that predict and describe the universe - quantum physics and general relativity - are actually incompatible; and secondly, most of the maths behind them suggests the likelihood of something even stranger - multiple universes.
We may just have to accept that the world really is weirder than we thought, and Hannah concludes that while we have invented the language of maths, the structure behind it all is something we discover. And beyond that, it is the debate about the origins of maths that has had the most profound consequences: it has truly transformed the human experience, giving us powerful new number systems and an understanding that now underpins the modern world.
Series: Magic Numbers

When Will Time End

   2012    Science
Discover the Eras of the Universe and the answer to this big question: When Will Time End? Once the notion that the universe started with a rapid inflation nicknamed the Big Bang became accepted by the majority of scientists, many possible fates are predicted by rival scientific hypotheses, including futures of both finite and infinite duration. The ultimate fate of the universe is dependent on the shape of the universe and what role Dark energy will play as the universe ages.

Sea Rex Journey to a Prehistoric World

   2010    Science
Experience a wondrous adventure from the dinosaur age with 'Sea Rex Journey to a Prehistoric World'. Join Julie, an imaginative young woman, as she travels from a modern-day aquarium to the Triassic, Jurassic and Cretaceous periods. Explore an amazing underwater universe inhabited by larger-than-life creatures including the powerful Liopleurodon, long-necked Elasmosaurus and gigantic Shonisaurus which were ruling the seas before dinosaurs conquered the earth.
Thanks to state-of-the-art ultra-photorealistic imagery in 3D or 2D, see science come alive in a unique and entertaining manner. Immerse yourself in a lost age, 200 million years back in time, and get ready for a face-to-face encounter with the T-Rex of the seas. Directed by Ronan Chapalain and Pascal Vuong.

The Joy of AI

   2018    Technology
Professor Jim Al-Khalili looks at how we have created machines that can simulate, augment, and even outperform the human mind - and why we shouldn't let this spook us. He reveals the story of the pursuit of AI, the emergence of machine learning and the recent breakthroughs brought about by artificial neural networks. He shows how AI is not only changing our world but also challenging our very ideas of intelligence and consciousness.
Along the way, we'll investigate spam filters, meet a cutting-edge chatbot, look at why a few altered pixels makes a computer think it's looking at a trombone rather than a dog and talk to Demis Hassabis, who heads DeepMind and whose stated mission is to 'solve intelligence, and then use that to solve everything else'. Stephen Hawking remarked 'AI could be the biggest event in the history of our civilisation. Or the worst'. Jim argues that AI is a potent new tool that should enhance our lives, not replace us.