Clouds Are Not Spheres

Jan 1, 2010

0h 55m

★ 7.7

The life and work of a Maverick Mathematician

Overview

Until recently geometry was 'cold', incapable of describing the irregular shape of a cloud, the slope of a mountain or the beauty of the human body. With fractal geometry, Benoit Mandelbrot gave us a language for our natural world. In this captivating documentary, the man himself explains this groundbreaking discovery.

Genres

Documentary

Production Companies

Gordon Films UK

Clouds Are Not Spheres Trailers

Cast

Self

Benoît B. Mandelbrot

Self - Host

Martin Shaw

Self - Physicist & Nobel Prize-Winner in Biology

Ivar Giaever

Self - Philosopher

Pierre Roubinet

Self - Mathematician

Heinz-Otto Peitgen

Self - Physicist

Carl Evertsz

Self - Theoretical Physicist

Martin Gutzwiller

Self - Former Head of Research IBM

Ralph E. Gomory

Self - Mathematician

Ronald Coifman

Self - Physicist

Bernard Sapoval

NOVA leads viewers on a mathematical mystery tour -- a provocative exploration of math's astonishing power across the centuries. We discover math's signature in the swirl of a nautilus shell, the whirlpool of a galaxy and the spiral in the center of a sunflower. Math was essential to everything from the first wireless radio transmissions to the prediction and discovery of the Higgs boson and the successful landing of rovers on Mars. But where does math get its power? Astrophysicist and writer Mario Livio, along with a colorful cast of mathematicians, physicists and engineers, follows math from Pythagoras to Einstein and beyond, all leading to the ultimate riddle: Is math an invention or a discovery? Humankind's clever trick or the language of the universe?

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5.8

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0.0

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6.9

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8.0

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0.0

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6.5

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6.3

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6.7

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4.5

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7.2

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7.5

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7.0

Albert Einstein: l'homme et le génie

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No overview available.

9.0

Pythéas, l'astronome voyageur

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No overview available.

8.0

A Brilliant Madness

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0.0

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8.0

Great Pyramid K 2019

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6.5

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