PickVidsBest Fundamental physics Videos
The 164 Fundamental physics videos here were recommended by different people across different months. Choose by who it is for: 12 introductory, 23 intermediate, 122 for a general viewer, and 7 for someone who wants the harder derivation. Most of them are an explainer. What they share is that one picture or analogy is used to supply a missing concept. Channels you will keep seeing include Veritasium, PBS Space Time, Christopher Sykes.
What keeps a train on the track?
A short clip of Richard Feynman explaining how a train stays on its tracks, through the conical shape of wheels and how it handles curves without differentials.
Imaging at a trillion frames per second | Ramesh Raskar
Ramesh Raskar presents femto-photography, a technique that captures a trillion frames per second, fast enough to show light itself moving through a scene.
Feynman: 'Greek' versus 'Babylonian' mathematics
A clip of Richard Feynman contrasting the Greek and Babylonian traditions of mathematical reasoning.
TMS Bicycle, stable without gyros or trail (TMS=two-mass-skate)
Arend Schwab demonstrates a research bicycle, the two-mass-skate design, that balances itself without gyroscopic effects or trail.
Self-filling water bottle: BUSTED!
Thunderf00t debunks the Fontus self-filling water bottle, arguing that pulling meaningful amounts of water from air with a small solar-powered device is thermodynamically impractical.
The artificial gravity lab
Tom Scott tours the rotating room artificial gravity facility at Brandeis University's Graybiel lab.
Can A Metal Bowling Ball Survive Inside a Nuclear Explosion?
Scott Manley explains the Cold War experiments in which steel and aluminium spheres, known as Lew Allen's Balls, were placed near nuclear detonations.
Freeman Dyson - Fermi's rejection of our work (94/157)
Freeman Dyson recounts how Enrico Fermi rejected his team's meson scattering model, noting that it had too many free parameters.
The Extreme World of Ultra Intense Lasers - with Kate Lancaster
Royal Institution lecture by Dr Kate Lancaster on the most powerful lasers in the world and the extreme conditions they create.
Calculating a Car Crash - Numberphile
Numberphile's Ben Sparks works through the physics of a car crash, showing how kinetic energy grows with the square of speed and why stopping distance climbs so quickly as velocity increases.
Richard Feynman: Can Machines Think?
An excerpt of Richard Feynman's 1985 lecture Q&A about whether machines can think.
Could The Universe Be Inside A Black Hole?
A PBS Space Time episode asking whether our universe could sit inside a black hole.
The Surprising Secret of Synchronization
Veritasium explores how synchronization arises spontaneously in nature, with metronomes, fireflies and bridges, drawing on Steven Strogatz's work on chaos and complexity.
Dropping Things Into The Sun is Hard....
Scott Manley uses a realistically scaled Kerbal Space Program setup to show why dropping something into the Sun is far harder than it sounds.
Is the Universe a Simulation? | 2016 Isaac Asimov Memorial Debate
The 2016 Isaac Asimov Memorial Debate, moderated by Neil deGrasse Tyson, in which a panel of physicists and philosophers debates whether the universe is a simulation.
Feynman: How the train stays on the track FUN TO IMAGINE 7
A short clip from the 1983 BBC series Fun to Imagine in which Richard Feynman explains how a train stays on the track.
Why Railroads Don't Need Expansion Joints
Practical Engineering explains how continuous welded rail copes with thermal expansion by restraining it, using the relationship between temperature, stress and strain.
Superheating of water (Mythbusters)
A short clip of the Mythbusters demonstrating superheated water in a microwave, which can erupt violently when disturbed.
The problems with Helion Energy - a response to Real Engineering
A short, humorous critique of Helion Energy's fusion approach, framed as a response to a Real Engineering video.
White holes and wormholes are probably real. Here's why.
Veritasium explores what general relativity says about black holes, white holes and wormholes, with help from physicists Geraint Lewis and Juan Maldacena.
Filming the Speed of Light at 10 Trillion FPS
The Slow Mo Guys visit a lab with a camera capable of filming at 10 trillion frames per second, fast enough to see light travel.
Spinlaunch: BUSTED!
Thunderf00t critiques SpinLaunch, the startup that proposes flinging payloads to space with a giant centrifuge.
Synchronization of Metronomes
A Harvard lecture demonstration in which five metronomes on a movable board gradually fall into synchronization through coupling.
Richard Feynman: Magnets and Why Questions
A clip from a BBC interview in which Richard Feynman is asked why magnets repel and attract.