BBC Horizon 2010: 1/6 To Infinity and Beyond

By our third year, most of us will have learned to count. Once we know how, it seems as if there would be nothing to stop us counting forever. But, while infinity might seem like an perfectly innocent idea, keep counting and you enter a paradoxical world where nothing is as it seems.

Mathematicians have discovered there are infinitely many infinities, each one infinitely bigger than the last. And if the universe goes on forever, the consequences are even more bizarre. In an infinite universe, there are infinitely many copies of the Earth and infinitely many copies of you. Older than time, bigger than the universe and stranger than fiction. This is the story of infinity.

Category:

Science & Technology

Tags:

• BBC HORIZON
• INFINITY
• MATHEMATICS
• GOOGLEPLEX
• GRAHAM'S NUMBER

[godly04]

the black kid counted from 19 to 21

Fail

[bishoptutuspants]

@SASNIGHTCRAWLER question is.. who, or what, is consciousness? the more of the code deciphered, through maths and science, the more humans can manipulate the hologram. so i guess that means as part of this infinite universe we are infinite too.. so everything we can ever know (including our maths and science) are simply just another level of illusion, since there is no end and no beginning to infinity. we're seeing the same thing everywhere we look.. it's a beautiful thing!!

[bishoptutuspants]

@SASNIGHTCRAWLER that's the ticket! one is the all, and the all is one.. finite but forever infinite

[seemlyme]

4:47 Wow 

[RJL738]

Ponder about this Yoctation, Zeptation, Autation, Femptation, Pication, Nanation, Micration, Millation, Centation, Negative Decation, Noventation, Negative Octation, Septation, Sexation, Quintation, Quadation or Negative Tetration, Negative Exponentiation, Division, Subtraction, Zeration, Addition, Multiplication, Exponentiation, Tetration, Pentation, Hexation, Heptation, Octation, Nonation, Decation, Hectation, Kilation, Megation, Gigation, Terration, Petation, Exation, Zettation, Yattation.

[manny298]

When central bank, feds, big bank, wall street and special interest groups go cashless. They will have all the power because they can just create money out of thin air for them while denying ordinary people more money... Think about that for moment...

[miffification]

chuck norris counts to infinity threee times a day

[Forceofhabbit]

@MinotawrTV Graham's number + 2 = even more Winning!. Hey, We could go on forever :-)

[MinotawrTV]

Graham's number + 1 = I WIN !

[coolbreeze922]

At the beginning, I thought he was going to say, "I've seen things you people wouldn't believe. Attack ships on fire off the shoulder of Orion. I watched C-beams glitter in the dark near the Tannhauser Gate. All those moments will be lost in time like tears in rain. Time to die."