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7:49Your Post Code Is the Directions, Not the Destination
3.9M views • 1 year ago
CGP Grey
CGP Grey explains that postal codes are routing instructions for mail rather than geographic regions. He looks at the quirks and problems this causes.
16:37Does It Make Sense To Put Data Centers In Space? Can They Really Cost Less To Operate?
502K views • 2 years ago
Scott Manley
Scott Manley analyzes the idea of putting data centers in orbit, prompted by Lumen Orbit's funding. He examines the claimed advantage of constant solar power against launch cost, cooling and mass.
15:41How anti-theft tags work - magnetostriction
886K views • 10 years ago
Applied Science
Applied Science explains how retail anti-theft tags work. A tiny magnetostrictive strip acts as a mechanical oscillator excited by a magnetic field, and magnetizing or demagnetizing it arms or disarms the tag.
11:11Hauntology, Lost Futures and 80s Nostalgia
451K views • 8 years ago
Jonas Čeika - CCK Philosophy
A video essay explaining hauntology, Mark Fisher's idea of lost futures, and 80s nostalgia. It uses the Fallout games and other media as examples of a retro-futurism that mourns futures that never arrived.
6:42Carl Sagan - Cosmos - Eratosthenes
3M views • 17 years ago
carlsagandotcom
A short clip from Carl Sagan's Cosmos in which he explains how Eratosthenes measured the circumference of the Earth using shadows in two Egyptian cities. It is a clear, visual account of an ancient scientific feat.
7:53Why Are American Health Care Costs So High?
7.7M views • 13 years ago
vlogbrothers
John Green explains why the US spends far more on health care than other countries, going through insurers, drug companies, hospitals and lawyers. He argues the causes are complicated rather than a simple blame game.
6:26Games Should Not Cost $60 Anymore - Inflation, Microtransactions, and Publishing - Extra Credits
678K views • 8 years ago
Extra Credits
Extra Credits explains from a game developer's perspective why AAA games have stayed at $60 despite inflation, and how that pressure drives DLC, microtransactions and loot boxes.
17:52Holy Post - Race in America
1.7M views • 6 years ago
Holy Post Media
Phil Vischer of VeggieTales and Holy Post gives an 18-minute history of racial injustice in America, covering why anger persists despite civil rights laws. It is told from an evangelical Christian perspective and adapted from a class he co-taught.
12:25This Invention Made Disney MILLIONS, but Then They LOST It!
7.3M views • 2 years ago
Corridor Crew
Corridor Crew tracks down Disney's lost sodium vapor prism process, used for Mary Poppins-era transparency mattes. They explain how a narrow sodium wavelength and a beam splitter enabled better compositing than green screen.
7:19The Lively & Liveable Neighbourhoods that are Illegal in Most of North America
2M views • 6 years ago
Not Just Bikes
Not Just Bikes explains how small pockets of shops and restaurants inside residential Dutch neighbourhoods create liveliness and help reduce traffic. It argues this kind of mixed-use design has been illegal in most of the US and Canada for a century because of zoning, and should be brought back.
10:50The most feared song in jazz, explained
10.6M views • 7 years ago
Vox
Vox Earworm explains why John Coltrane's Giant Steps is so hard to improvise over: it is fast and moves through three keys. Musicians Braxton Cook and Adam Neely walk the host through the underlying music theory.
27:15The Most Misunderstood Concept in Physics
31.5M views • 3 years ago
Veritasium
Veritasium's explainer on entropy, presented as one of physics' most important and least understood concepts. It uses examples such as heat engines and the sun's energy flowing through the Earth.
15:07The most mind-blowing concept in music (Harmonic Series)
1.3M views • 6 years ago
ANDREW HUANG
Andrew Huang explains the harmonic series, which he calls the foundation of almost all music. He builds the idea up step by step, with demonstrations of overtones and how harmonies derive from them.
13:29Infinite fractions and the most irrational number
658K views • 10 years ago
Mathologer
Mathologer uses continued fractions to show why the golden ratio is the most irrational number, comparing it with root 2, e and pi and pointing to where this shows up in nature.
10:45The 5 Most Dangerous Chemicals on Earth
11.9M views • 11 years ago
SciShow
A SciShow episode in which Hank Green introduces five of the most dangerous chemicals, from lethal toxins to substances that explode on contact. It is an entertaining overview of extreme chemical hazards.
11:17The Most Radioactive Places on Earth
24.9M views • 11 years ago
Veritasium
Veritasium visits Chernobyl, Fukushima and other places to find who on Earth is exposed to the most ionizing radiation. The answer turns out to be surprising and puts radiation risk in context.
8:16Giving birth costs a lot. Hospitals won't tell you how much.
3.4M views • 10 years ago
Vox
A Vox reporter tries to learn what his son's birth would cost before it happens and fails, showing how opaque US hospital pricing is even for the most common procedure.
4:31The True Cost of the Royal Family Explained
6.8M views • 15 years ago
CGP Grey
CGP Grey breaks down what the British Royal Family costs the UK versus what it brings in, including income from royal-owned land. He concludes the government nets a profit from the arrangement.
6:43The high cost of free parking
4.6M views • 9 years ago
Vox
A Vox explainer on how mandatory parking minimums and free parking impose hidden costs on cities. It draws on Donald Shoup's work and gives the history of parking requirements.
20:28The Most COMPLEX Pop Song of All Time
8.3M views • 5 years ago
Rick Beato
Rick Beato analyzes a pop song he argues is among the most harmonically complex ever, breaking down its chords and key changes. It is a music theory deep dive aimed at general music fans.
9:29The Most Extreme Explosion in the Universe
11.6M views • 3 years ago
Kurzgesagt – In a Nutshell
A Kurzgesagt animation on supernovae, the most powerful explosions in the universe. It explains their role in creating elements and what would happen to Earth if one occurred nearby.
28:23The Fast Fourier Transform (FFT): Most Ingenious Algorithm Ever?
2.3M views • 5 years ago
Reducible
Reducible's visual walkthrough of the Fast Fourier Transform, motivated by polynomial multiplication. It shows how the FFT's key ideas can be discovered by asking the right questions.
12:22Is Most Published Research Wrong?
6.2M views • 10 years ago
Veritasium
Veritasium explains why a large share of published research findings may be false, covering p-values, p-hacking, publication bias and low replication rates. It draws on John Ioannidis's well-known paper and describes reforms such as preregistration.
5:48Most Cities Got More Democratic. This One Didn't.
6.1M views • 14 years ago
CGP Grey
CGP Grey explains the City of London's unusual governance, including the Lord Mayor, guilds, and how it differs from the rest of London.
24:57The Man Who Accidentally Killed The Most People In History
43.5M views • 4 years ago
Veritasium
Veritasium tells the story of Thomas Midgley Jr., who introduced leaded gasoline and CFCs, and covers the science behind lead exposure and ozone damage. It also touches on isotope geochemistry used to uncover the history.
20:13The Most Powerful Computers You've Never Heard Of
13.7M views • 4 years ago
Veritasium
Veritasium traces analog computers from the Antikythera mechanism and Kelvin's tide-predicting machines to fire control and modern analog approaches. It explains how these machines computed continuously rather than digitally.
4:47Noam Chomsky: The five filters of the mass media machine | The Listening Post
2.9M views • 9 years ago
Al Jazeera English
A short Al Jazeera animation narrated by Amy Goodman presenting Noam Chomsky's five filters of the mass media: ownership, advertising, media elite sourcing, flak and a common enemy. It is part of the MediaTheorised series.
11:22Most People Don't Know How Bikes Work
24.9M views • 4 years ago
Veritasium
Veritasium explains why bicycles are stable, arguing that gyroscopic effects are not the answer. The video shows countersteering and an experiment where riders blocked from steering the opposite way cannot turn.
26:33The Most Underrated Algorithm
10.8M views • 4 years ago
Veritasium
Veritasium tells the story of the Fast Fourier Transform, from its use in detecting nuclear tests to Cold War politics, and how it could have changed the arms race. It includes a short, intuitive explanation of what the Fourier transform does.
4:44The Most Common Cognitive Bias
17.4M views • 12 years ago
Veritasium
A Veritasium video that runs the 2-4-8 rule-guessing puzzle on people to show how they test only examples that confirm their hypothesis. It uses this to illustrate confirmation bias and falsification.
24:52AlphaFold - The Most Useful Thing AI Has Ever Done
11M views • 1 year ago
Veritasium
A Veritasium video on AlphaFold, DeepMind's protein structure prediction system, and the protein design work it enabled. It features interviews with John Jumper and with David Baker's protein design group and explains why predicting protein folding matters.
6:00Rhyme: Why Eminem is one of the most impressive lyricists ever
3.7M views • 13 years ago
Library of Alexandria
A re-upload of a video breaking down Eminem's rhyme schemes, showing multi-syllable and internal rhymes in songs such as Lose Yourself. It aims to show why he is considered a standout lyricist.
11:54The Most Complex International Borders in the World
7.9M views • 12 years ago
WonderWhy
WonderWhy surveys complex international borders, including enclaves like Vatican City, San Marino and Lesotho, the enclave-within-enclave town of Baarle, and the India-Bangladesh Cooch Behar region.
3:26How Highways Almost Destroyed Amsterdam - Plan Jokinen
408K views • 7 years ago
Not Just Bikes
A short Not Just Bikes video on the 1960s plans (Plan Jokinen) to cut highways through Amsterdam to accommodate cars. It shows how radically different the city would look had they succeeded.
23:03The Universe is Hostile to Computers
26.5M views • 5 years ago
Veritasium
Veritasium explains how cosmic rays and other particles flip bits in computer memory, with examples including a Belgian election count error, plane incidents and game glitches. It is inspired by a RadioLab episode on bit flips.
15:14The most deadly project on the Internet
6.8M views • 4 years ago
bigclivedotcom
BigClive explains why microwave oven transformer projects are extremely dangerous, since the high voltage and high current can kill. He contrasts them with spot welder builds where the secondary is replaced by low-voltage heavy wire.
10:29Are There Lost Alien Civilizations in Our Past?
14.2M views • 4 years ago
Kurzgesagt – In a Nutshell
Kurzgesagt asks whether advanced civilizations could have existed on Earth in the deep past and left little evidence. It looks at time as a dimension for searching for alien civilizations and the limits of the geological record.
32:32The Strange Math That Predicts (Almost) Anything
13.1M views • 1 year ago
Veritasium
A Veritasium video on how a feud between Russian mathematicians led to Markov chains and the modern prediction algorithms built on them. It covers the history and the math behind them.
2:17The Most Dangerous Stretch of Water in the World: The Strid at Bolton Abbey, Yorkshire
7.8M views • 10 years ago
Tom Scott
Tom Scott visits the Strid at Bolton Abbey in Yorkshire, a deceptively narrow stretch of river with dangerous currents. He covers its reputation and the 12th-century legend of the Boy of Egremont.
4:51The UK Election Results Were the Worst in History
8.1M views • 11 years ago
CGP Grey
CGP Grey explains how the 2015 UK general election showed the flaws of first-past-the-post voting, with parties like UKIP winning many votes but few seats.