Podcast appearances and mentions of Graham Farmelo

Graham Farmelo is an award-winning biographer and science writer. Based in London, he is a Fellow at Churchill College, Cambridge and a regular visitor at the Institute for Advanced Study, Princeton. He was a lecturer in physics at the Open University, 1977-1990. Briefly the youngest tenured academic in the UK. Quickly specialized as a teacher, chaired the team that produced the Science Foundation Course in the late 1980s and conceived its inter-disciplinary science course ‘Science Matters'. Farmelo is author of 'The Universe Speaks in Numbers', published in May 2019. It explores the relationship between mathematics and the search for the laws of physics, and highlights the contributions of several theoretical physicists, natural philosophers and mathematicians, notably Isaac Newton, Pierre-Simon Laplace, James Clerk Maxwell, Albert Einstein and Paul Dirac. Farmelo's Dirac biography ‘The Strangest Man' won the 2009 Costa Prize for Biography[1] and the 2009 'Los Angeles Times Science and Technology Book Prize'.[2] The book was chosen by Physics World as the physics book of the year in 2009,[3] when it was selected as one of Nature's books of the year. Farmelo's 2013 book 'Churchill's Bomb' focuses on Winston Churchill's role in British nuclear research 1939-53, with hitherto unpublished information on its influence by Churchill's science adviser Frederick Lindemann. The book emphasizes conflicts between scientific opportunity and political direction. Farmelo is critical of Churchill's wavering attention and changes of policy as he aged. https://grahamfarmelo.com/ 00:00:00 Intro 00:02:12 Do we need a theory of everything? 00:04:33 Fundamental Physics is a small part of the whole field. 00:06:55 What is the mathematical language of the Universe? Intergers? Rationale numbers? Other? 00:10:10 We're at an odd time in physics! The standard model works better than expected! 00:16:21 Never say never! What is untestable today may be testable tomorrow. 00:17:04 Bridging Maxwell, Yang-Mills and Chern-Simons and the view of Ed Witten 00:24:19 Is there a role for "beauty" in physics and math? 00:26:50 What rubric could be used to grade candidates for theories of everything? 00:32:22 How to break the standard model. 00:38:41 Is string theory already falsified? What can it tell us now? 00:47:57 How do you engage young people to get inspired in physics today? Where should our resources go? 00:52:51 What mysteries are you currently most engaged with? What did Freeman Dyson mean to you? 00:58:14 Discussing Nima Arkani-Hamed. 01:04:00 What do you think about the work of Gerard 't Hooft?  http://briankeating.com/mailing_list.php 

In 1938, Italian physicist Ettore Majorana vanished after taking a sudden sea journey. At first it was feared that he'd ended his life, but the perplexing circumstances left the truth uncertain. In today's show we'll review the facts of Majorana's disappearance, its meaning for physics, and a surprising modern postscript. We'll also dither over pronunciation and puzzle over why it will take three days to catch a murderer. Intro: By design, no building in Washington, D.C., is taller than the Washington Monument. The Vienna Vegetable Orchestra plays instruments made of fresh vegetables. Sources for our feature on Ettore Majorana: Erasmo Recami, The Majorana Case: Letters, Documents, Testimonies, 2019. Salvatore Esposito, Ettore Majorana: Unveiled Genius and Endless Mysteries, 2017. Salvatore Esposito, The Physics of Ettore Majorana, 2015. Salvatore Esposito et al., eds., Ettore Majorana: Notes on Theoretical Physics, 2013. Salvatore Esposito, Erasmo Recami, and Alwyn Van der Merwe, eds., Ettore Majorana: Unpublished Research Notes on Theoretical Physics, 2008. Francesco Guerra and Nadia Robotti, "Biographical Notes on Ettore Majorana," in Luisa Cifarelli, ed., Scientific Papers of Ettore Majorana, 2020. Mark Buchanan, "In Search of Majorana," Nature Physics 11:3 (March 2015), 206. Michael Brooks, "The Vanishing Particle Physicist," New Statesman 143:5233 (Oct. 24, 2014), 18-19. Francesco Guerra and Nadia Robotti, "The Disappearance and Death of Ettore Majorana," Physics in Perspective 15:2 (June 2013), 160-177. Salvatore Esposito, "The Disappearance of Ettore Majorana: An Analytic Examination," Contemporary Physics 51:3 (2010), 193-209. Ennio Arimondo, Charles W. Clark, and William C. Martin, "Colloquium: Ettore Majorana and the Birth of Autoionization," Reviews of Modern Physics 82:3 (2010), 1947. Graham Farmelo, "A Brilliant Darkness: The Extraordinary Life and Mysterious Disappearance of Ettore Majorana, the Troubled Genius of the Nuclear Age," Times Higher Education, Feb. 18, 2010. Frank Close, "Physics Mystery Peppered With Profanity," Nature 463:7277 (Jan. 7, 2010), 33. Joseph Francese, "Leonardo Sciascia and The Disappearance of Majorana," Journal of Modern Italian Studies 15:5 (2010), 715-733. Frank Wilczek, "Majorana Returns," Nature Physics 5:9 (2009), 614-618. Barry R. Holstein, "The Mysterious Disappearance of Ettore Majorana," Journal of Physics: Conference Series 173, Carolina International Symposium on Neutrino Physics, May 15–17, 2008. Joseph Farrell, "The Ethics of Science: Leonardo Sciascia and the Majorana Case," Modern Language Review 102:4 (October 2007), 1021-1034. Zeeya Merali, "The Man Who Was Both Alive and Dead," New Scientist 191:2563 (Aug. 5, 2006), 15. Erasmo Recami, "The Scientific Work of Ettore Majorana: An Introduction," Electronic Journal of Theoretical Physics 3:10 (April 2006), 1-10. Ettore Majorana and Luciano Maiani, "A Symmetric Theory of Electrons and Positrons," Ettore Majorana Scientific Papers, 2006. R. Mignani, E. Recami, and M. Baldo, "About a Dirac-Like Equation for the Photon According to Ettore Majorana," Lettere al Nuovo Cimento 11:12 (April 1974), 568-572. Angelo Paratico, "Science Focus: Italy Closes Case on Physician's Mysterious Disappearance," South China Morning Post, Feb. 15, 2015. Antonino Zichichi, "Ettore Majorana: Genius and Mystery," CERN Courier 46 (2006), N6. Peter Hebblethwaite, "Saints for Our Time," Guardian, April 17, 1987. Walter Sullivan, "Finding on Radioactivity May Upset Physics Law," New York Times, Jan. 14, 1987. Nino Lo Bello, "Is Missing Atomic Scientist Working for the Russians?" [Cedar Rapids, Iowa] Gazette, May 3, 1959. Listener mail: "Farmers Project Is Right on Time," New Zealand Herald, Feb. 6, 2012. "Farmers Opens New Napier Store," Scoop, June 6, 2013. Megan Garber, "The State of Wyoming Has 2 Escalators," Atlantic, July 17, 2013. Brandon Specktor, "Believe It or Not, This State Only Has Two Escalators -- Here's Why," Reader's Digest, Sept. 8, 2017. Audie Cornish and Melissa Block, "Where Are All of Wyomings Escalators?" NPR, July 18, 2013. Natasha Frost, "Spiral Escalators Look Cool, But Do They Make Sense?" Atlas Obscura, July 5, 2017. "Spiral Escalator," Elevatorpedia (accesssed April 17, 2021). "Aussie," Wikipedia (accessed April 16, 2021). "Sir George Cockburn, 10th Baronet," Wikipedia (accessed April 14, 2021). "Naming Cockburn," City of Cockburn (accessed April 14, 2021). This week's lateral thinking puzzle is taken from Anges Rogers' 1953 book How Come?: A Book of Riddles, sent to us by listener Jon Jerome. You can listen using the player above, download this episode directly, or subscribe on Google Podcasts, on Apple Podcasts, or via the RSS feed at https://futilitycloset.libsyn.com/rss. Please consider becoming a patron of Futility Closet -- you can choose the amount you want to pledge, and we've set up some rewards to help thank you for your support. You can also make a one-time donation on the Support Us page of the Futility Closet website. Many thanks to Doug Ross for the music in this episode. If you have any questions or comments you can reach us at podcast@futilitycloset.com. Thanks for listening!

How can mathematics help us understand our lives and predict the world around us? Host Alok Jha speaks to David Sumpter of Uppsala University about the equations that can help people make better decisions. Christl Donnelly, an epidemiologist at the University of Oxford and Imperial College London details the role mathematics plays in modelling covid-19. Moon Duchin of Tufts University explains how maths can stop gerrymandering. And physicist Graham Farmelo on why he thinks the universe speaks in numbers. For more on the pandemic, see The Economist's coronavirus hub.Please subscribe to The Economist for full access to print, digital and audio editions:www.economist.com/radiooffer See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

How can mathematics help us understand our lives and predict the world around us? Host Alok Jha speaks to David Sumpter of Uppsala University about the equations that can help people make better decisions. Christl Donnelly, an epidemiologist at the University of Oxford and Imperial College London details the role mathematics plays in modelling covid-19. Moon Duchin of Tufts University explains how maths can stop gerrymandering. And physicist Graham Farmelo on why he thinks the universe speaks in numbers. For more on the pandemic, see The Economist's coronavirus hub.Please subscribe to The Economist for full access to print, digital and audio editions:www.economist.com/radiooffer See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

Phil Anderson was one of the most creative theoretical physicists of the past century. Among dozens of key contributions, he pioneered our understanding of symmetry breaking and paved the way to our modern understanding of weak and electromagnetic interactions, and the prediction of what became known as the Higgs boson. He did all this without state-of-the-art mathematics and was wary of mathematics-led approaches to our understanding of Nature. In this interview, recorded on 31 July 2014, he talks about his early career and his suspicions of string theory. He also tells me what topics he would advise bright young scientists to study.This is one of a series of interviews given by world-class experts to Graham on the themes he explores in his new book The Universe Speaks in Numbers. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

The second part of leading theoretical physicist Nima Arkani-Hamed's inspiring interview with Graham about the mysterious harmony between pure mathematics and fundamental physics.This is one of a series of interviews given by world-class experts to Graham on the themes he explores in his new book The Universe Speaks in Numbers. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

Cosmologist Martin Rees, a pioneer of multiverse concept, is one of the most productive and respected thinkers about the origins and development of the universe. A former president of the Royal Society, he is also famous for his wise and thoughtful commentary on the state of science, and his thinking about the future. In this interview, he ranges widely over many themes, including the question of whether the pursuit of fundamental physics will one day run out of steam, become too expensive and perhaps too difficult to pursue.This is one of a series of interviews given by world-class experts to Graham on the themes he explores in his new book The Universe Speaks in Numbers. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

The interplay between fundamental physics and pure mathematics has led to many remarkable mathematical insights over the past fifty years. Karen Uhlenbeck is one of the mathematicians who made pioneering insights into geometry when studying the physicists' gauge theory of particle interactions. In this podcast, she talks candidly about how many mathematicians came only grudgingly to accept in the 1960s and 1970s that they could do first-class work by focusing on topics whose importance had first been emphasised by physicists, in connection with understanding the real world.This is one of a series of interviews given by world-class experts to Graham on the themes he explores in his new book The Universe Speaks in Numbers. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

Steven Weinberg is perhaps the most accomplished living theoretical physicist. Now based at the University of Texas at Austin, he has made substantial contributions to our understanding of all the fundamental forces of Nature. In this podcast, he reflects on his career in physics, the 'golden years' in which he and others put the finishing touches to the Standard Model of particle physics, and his views about the future of theoretical physics.This is one of a series of interviews given by world-class experts to Graham on the themes he explores in his new book The Universe Speaks in Numbers. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

Much of understanding of the universe at the finest level is based on modern field theory, rooted in the pioneering contributions of the nineteenth century British natural philosophers Michael Faraday and James Clerk Maxwell. In this podcast of most brilliantly creative young field theorists, Zohar Komargodski tells us why this subject is still so rich in potential, and why he is quite happy to work on it without the stimulus of new and surprising experimental data.This is one of a series of interviews given by world-class experts to Graham on the themes he explores in his new book The Universe Speaks in Numbers. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

I interview award-winning science writer Graham Farmelo. We discuss ideas in his latest book, The Universe Speaks in Numbers, including the relationship between math and physics, whether the laws of Nature are invented or discovered, the history of the relationship between the communities of mathematicians and physicists, current progress in physics, and much more. Shortened transcript of interview - https://areomagazine.com/2019/09/08/the-marriage-between-maths-and-reality-an-interview-with-graham-farmelo/ Dr. Farmelo's website - https://grahamfarmelo.com Dr. Farmelo's Twitter - https://twitter.com/grahamfarmelo Link to The Universe Speaks in Numbers - https://www.amazon.com/Universe-Speaks-Numbers-Reveals-Natures/dp/B07RN9HV8N/ref=sr_1_1?crid=1Q7EK9AKQ4A7K&keywords=the+universe+speaks+in+numbers&qid=1572784191&sprefix=the+universe+speaks+in+number%2Caps%2C132&sr=8-1 Twitter - https://twitter.com/ChipkinLogan Articles - www.loganchipkin.com --- Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/logan-chipkin/support

The discoveries the Simon Donaldson made in the early 1980s about four-dimensional spaces 'stunned the mathematical world', his research adviser Michael Atiyah later recalled. Donaldson was using the physicists' theory of particle interactions to study space itself – with truly remarkable results. In this podcast, Donaldson recalls how he became interested in physics, remembers his most famous discoveries and looks forward to an increasingly close relationship between mathematicians and physicists.This is one of a series of interviews given by world-class experts to Graham on the themes he explores in his new book The Universe Speaks in Numbers. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

Douglas Stanford and Pedro Vieira are two of the most brilliant young theoretical physicists who are seeking to understand nature at its finest level. In these two interviews, Stanford and Vieira talk about their work and explain why they are content to spend their times developing fundamental theories of nature, with little or no surprising new inputs from new observations and experiments. This is one of a series of interviews given by world-class experts to Graham on the themes he explores in his new book The Universe Speaks in Numbers. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

Fundamental physics and pure mathematics have never been so closely intertwined. Over the past few decades, some of the world’s leading theoretical physicists and mathematicians explored these connections at the Simons Center at Stony Brook University. In this podcast, the director of the Simons Center, the Spanish string theorist Luis Álvarez-Gaumé, talks about how best to exploit the miraculously close mathematics-physics relationship and hopes for the future.This is one of a series of interviews given by world-class experts to Graham on the themes he explores in his new book The Universe Speaks in Numbers. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

Physics historian Graham Farmelo talks about his latest book, The Universe Speaks in Numbers: How Modern Math Reveals Nature's Deepest Secrets.

'Black holes have become one of the liveliest areas of theoretical research. By thinking about these cosmic objects, using quantum theory and relativity, theorists are clarifying our understanding of information, gravity and the other fundamental forces of nature. Stanford University’s Lenny Susskind is one of the leaders in this field. In this lively interview, he describes how he made the transition from plumbing to particle physics, and why theoretical physics is now so exciting.This is one of a series of interviews given by world-class experts to Graham on the themes he explores in his new book The Universe Speaks in Numbers. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

One of the hottest topics in modern physics is trying to understand the scattering of fundamental particles with neither shape nor size - one step up from nothingness. Amazingly, attempts to understand these simple processes theoretically require state-of-the-art mathematics. Theorist Ruth Britto, at Trinity College Dublin, is one of the leaders of this branch of physics. In this edition, she describes how she became interested in this subject and why she finds it so fascinating.This is one of a series of interviews given by world-class experts to Graham on the themes he explores in his new book The Universe Speaks in Numbers. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

Graham’s guest in this edition is the membrane pioneer Michael Duff. Soon after the Second String Theory Revolution, which began in 1995, membranes became widely acknowledged to be a crucial part of our understanding of the inner workings of Nature.This is one of a number of interviews given by world-class experts to Graham on the themes he explores in his new book The Universe Speaks in Numbers. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

‘The most perfect microscopic structures in the known universe’ – that is the exquisite description of sub-nuclear scattering amplitudes given by theorist Lance Dixon, based at the Stanford Linear Accelerator in California. Having made his name as a string theorist in the 1980s, Dixon became one of the leading pioneers in the field of scattering-amplitudes, developing a host of ingenious ideas and techniques. In this thoughtful interview, he describes why he switched his research focus, the fascination and importance of the amplitudes, and the prospects for the subject’s future.This is one of a number of interviews given by world-class experts to Graham on the themes he explores in his new book The Universe Speaks in Numbers. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

The Dutchman Robbert Dijkgraaf is a rarity – not only is he a top-class mathematical physicist, he is also one of the world’s finest science communicators. In this bracing interview with Graham, Dijkgraaf lucidly describes the state of modern fundamental physics and the continually surprising – and extraordinarily productive – symbiosis between this science and modern mathematics. As Graham says: ‘Robbert gives us a real tour de force.’This is one of a number of interviews given by world-class experts to Graham on the themes he explores in his new book The Universe Speaks in Numbers. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

Science writer Graham Farmelo in conversation with Greg Moore. Physics and mathematics seem to be in ‘pre-established harmony’, a phrase that has long been popular with physicists and mathematicians working at the subjects’ interface. Greg Moore, based at Rutgers University, has discovered many surprising new relationships between quantum field theories and the string framework and concepts in contemporary mathematics. In this interview, he eloquently describes examples of this and explains why he is promoting the notion of ‘physical mathematics’, a discipline that he believes is now well established, with a bright future.This is one of a number of interviews given by world-class experts to Graham on the themes he explores in his new book The Universe Speaks in Numbers. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

Science writer Graham Farmelo in conversation with Juan Maldacena. Juan Maldacena has been described as the first great theoretician of the twenty-first century. In a series of brilliantly imaginative insights, he has enriched our understanding of gravity, space-time and black holes. During this relaxed and informative interview with Graham, recorded last summer in Princeton, Maldacena describes how he became interested in modern physics, his astonishing discovery of an equivalence between a string theory and a quantum field theory. He also gives his views about the current state of our understanding of the universe and prospects for the future of theoretical physics.Read more in Graham Farmelo's book The Universe Speaks in Numbers. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

What do philosophers of physics do, and what light might they shed on the work of today’s physicists and astronomers? Michela Massimi, a distinguished philosopher of science at the University of Edinburgh, discusses these and other matters with Graham in this lively interview, recorded in Michela’s office. She has a bracingly optimistic vision for her subject in the coming decades, as Graham heard.This is one of a number of interviews given by world-class experts to Graham on the themes he explores in his new book The Universe Speaks in Numbers. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

Science writer Graham Farmelo in conversation with Sir Roger Penrose. Sir Roger Penrose, a hybrid mathematician-cosmologist, is one of the most accomplished scientific thinkers of the past fifty years. In this compelling interview with Graham, Penrose describes some of the key events of his remarkable career.Read more in Graham Farmelo's book The Universe Speaks in Numbers. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

Science writer Graham Farmelo in conversation with Michael Green. Michael Green is one of the pioneers of the string framework. In collaboration with the Caltech theorist John Schwarz, he made a crucial breakthrough that led in 1984 to the what became known as the First String Revolution.Read more in Graham Farmelo's book The Universe Speaks in Numbers. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

Science writer Graham Farmelo in conversation with Edward Witten. Edward Witten is widely regarded as the pre-eminent theoretical physicist of the past four decades. Based at the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton, he has made dozens of path-breaking contributions to both physics and mathematics.Read more in Graham Farmelo's book The Universe Speaks in Numbers. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

Science writer Graham Farmelo in conversation with Val Gibson. Val Gibson is a leading experimental particle physicist and is head of the high energy physics research group at the Cavendish Laboratory at the University Cambridge. She is a prominent member of one of the teams of experimenters at CERN’s Large Hadron Collider, where the Higgs boson was discovered in 2012.Read more in Graham Farmelo's book The Universe Speaks in Numbers. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

Science writer Graham Farmelo in conversation with Simon Schaffer. Simon Schaffer is not only a leading historian of science but also a great teacher. He is without peer in his ability to illuminate how thinking about thinking about the natural world developed into our modern understanding of physics, often in ways unknown to most physicists today.Read more in Graham Farmelo's book The Universe Speaks in Numbers. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

Science writer Graham Farmelo in conversation with Sir Michael Atiyah. In an interview with Graham in November 2018, Sir Michael Atiyah described how he became a ‘quasi-physicist. Ten weeks later, Atiyah was dead. He was one of the most accomplished mathematicians of the past century: no one had done more in the past decades to discover close links between pure mathematics and fundamental physics. Undoubtedly a great mind, he was also an indomitable spirit.Read more in Graham Farmelo's book The Universe Speaks in Numbers. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

Science writer Graham Farmelo in conversation with Freeman Dyson. Freeman Dyson talks about his being both a theoretical physicist and a mathematician, the troubled relationship between mathematics and physics in his youth, the impressive physicist he knew (no, it’s not Feynman) and string theory. This interview was recorded last summer at the IAS, Princeton, in Freeman’s office – and he’s as lively, counter-orthodox and fearless as ever.This is one of a number of interviews given by world-class experts to Graham on the themes he explores in his new book The Universe Speaks in Numbers. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

Leading theoretical physicist Nima Arkani-Hamed gave Graham an inspiring interview about the mysterious harmony between pure mathematics and fundamental physics. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

Kim Kardashian and her sisters speak with something called “vocal fry.” In fact a lot of women do and it is a real problem. This episode begins with an explanation of what vocal fry is and why it is harmful to a person’s vocal health and professional career. http://healthland.time.com/2011/12/15/get-your-creak-on-is-vocal-fry-a-female-fad/Have you ever sabotaged yourself? You go for a goal and somehow screw it up and it was no one else's fault but yours. The really good news is – everyone has done it. It is very human. And there is something you can do to stop it. Judy Ho a triple board-certified and licensed clinical and forensic psychologist and author of the book Stop Self Sabotage (https://amzn.to/2yltujB) joins me to explore this fascinating topic and reveals what you can do to stop it. Ever go to the beach but chicken out when it comes to going in the water? Whether it is an ocean, river or lake, you need to take a dip this summer and I will explain the excellent reasons why it is well worth it. https://www.livestrong.com/article/400377-what-are-the-health-benefits-of-swimming-in-sea-water/When you look at the universe, do you see chaos or order? While it may look chaotic, the great minds of science have discovered a distinct order to the universe. Why is this important? Graham Farmelo, senior research fellow at the Science Museum in London, adjunct professor of physics at Northeastern University and author of the book The Universe Speaks in Numbers: How Modern Math Reveals Nature's Deepest Secrets (https://amzn.to/2MtOJbg) is here to explain. He will fascinate you with his explanation about how the universe is quite mathematical – and not chaotic at all!This Week’s Sponsors-Dashlane. For a 30 day free trial plus 10% off Dashlane Premium go to www.Dashlane.com/SYSK

Streamed live on 18 June 2019. Our guest today takes on some big ideas in his book, but the biggest may be the conundrum that has confounded physicists ever since Newton wrote down his Law of Universal Gravitation: why does mathematics seem to work so well at describing the universe that physicists try to explain? […]

Can advances in theoretical math explain fundamental problems in physics and can experimental physics ever test some of these purely mathematical theories? On this episode, Graham Farmelo discussed his book, The Universe Speaks in Numbers.

An old-fashioned tale of tale of romance and estrangement, of hope and despair. Graham Farmelo's Oxford Mathematics Public Lecture charts the 350 year relationship between Mathematics and Physics and its prospects for the future. Might things be less dramatic in future? Might they just have to be 'going steady' for a while? Oxford Mathematics Public Lectures are generously supported by XTX Markets.

An old-fashioned tale of tale of romance and estrangement, of hope and despair. Graham Farmelo's Oxford Mathematics Public Lecture charts the 350 year relationship between Mathematics and Physics and its prospects for the future. Might things be less dramatic in future? Might they just have to be 'going steady' for a while? Oxford Mathematics Public Lectures are generously supported by XTX Markets.

Sally Potter's new film The Party is her funniest to date with an all-star cast telling a neat little tale of a disastrous dinner party Heisenberg:The Uncertainty Principle is a new play by Simon Stephens. relating physics with relationship advice The Sparsholt Affair is Alan Hollinghurst's new novel about a love affair set in Oxford during the Second World War Degas: A Passion for Perfection is at Cambridge's Fitzwilliam Museum, with works by Degas himself and also looking at those who influenced him and those he influenced A new 3 part series, The Gamble, on BBC Radio 4 looks at the connection between risk and creativity, narrated by the actor Noma Dumezweni Tom Sutcliffe's guests are Sarah Crompton, Kevin Jackson and Graham Farmelo. The producer is Oliver Jones.

Jim al-Khalili was sitting in a physics lecture at the University of Surrey when he suddenly understood the power of equations to describe and predict the physical world. He recalls that sadly his enthusiasm was lost on many of his fellow students. Jim wants to persuade the listeners that equations have a beauty. In conversation with fellow scientists he reveals the surprising emotions they feel when describing the behaviour of matter in the universe in mathematical terms. For Carlos Frenk, professor of Computational Cosmology at Durham University, one of the most beautiful equations is the one that is at the heart of Einstein's theory of general relativity. A century ago, Einstein wrote down his now famous field equations that linked the shape of the universe to the matter in it. Jim and Graham Farmelo, the author of a biography of Paul Dirac called The Strangest Man, discuss why the Dirac equation is not as well known as Einstein's but, in their opinion, should be. Dr Patricia Fara of Cambridge University, and Vice-President of the British Society for the History of Science, explains that although mathematics goes back centuries it was only in the 17th Century that it was applied to the real world. Jeff Forshaw, Professor of Particle Physics at the University of Manchester, talks about when he first realised the power of equations and about why, surprisngly, maths is so effective at describing the real world. Science writer Philip Ball questions whether the beauty that scientists see in equations is really the same as we see in art. And physics A Level students in Dr White's class at Hammersmith Academy in London reveal that they already appreciate equations. (Photo: Jim al-Khalili)

Graham Farmelo is the award-winning author of the Dirac biography The Strangest Man . His latest book is Churchill’s Bomb: How the United States Overtook Britain in the First Nuclear Arms Race

Graham Farmelo is the award-winning author of the Dirac biography The Strangest Man . His latest book is Churchill’s Bomb: How the United States Overtook Britain in the First Nuclear Arms Race

Adjunct Professor of Physics at Northeastern University in Boston, Graham Farmelo, on Paul Dirac and the Religion of Mathematical Beauty. Apart from Einstein, Paul Dirac was probably the greatest theoretical physicist of the 20th century. Dirac, co-inventor of quantum mechanics, is now best known for conceiving of anti-matter and also for his deeply eccentric behavior. For him, the most important attribute of a fundamental theory was its mathematical beauty, an idea that he said was "almost a religion" to him.

Adjunct Professor of Physics at Northeastern University in Boston, Graham Farmelo, on Paul Dirac and the Religion of Mathematical Beauty. Apart from Einstein, Paul Dirac was probably the greatest theoretical physicist of the 20th century. Dirac, co-inventor of quantum mechanics, is now best known for conceiving of anti-matter and also for his deeply eccentric behavior. For him, the most important attribute of a fundamental theory was its mathematical beauty, an idea that he said was "almost a religion" to him.

Adjunct Professor of Physics at Northeastern University in Boston, Graham Farmelo, on Paul Dirac and the Religion of Mathematical Beauty. Apart from Einstein, Paul Dirac was probably the greatest theoretical physicist of the 20th century. Dirac, co-inventor of quantum mechanics, is now best known for conceiving of anti-matter and also for his deeply eccentric behavior. For him, the most important attribute of a fundamental theory was its mathematical beauty, an idea that he said was "almost a religion" to him.

Graham Farmelo is Senior Research Fellow at the Science Museum, London, and Adjunct Professor of Physics at Northeastern University, Boston, USA. He edited the best-selling It Must be Beautiful: Great Equations of Modern Science in 2002. His biography of Paul Dirac, The Strangest Man, won the 2009 Costa Biography Prize and the 2010 Los Angeles Times Science Book Prize. You can listen to my interview with Graham about The Strangest Man by clicking here. And here are Graham’s summer reading choices: Summer reading seems to be synonymous with light reading. Not for me. These relatively quiet months often present the best opportunities to read challenging, off-piste books that I tend to put on the shelf invisibly marked “when I have time”.David Mitchell’s Cloud Atlas has been there for too long. It took an appreciative review of his latest, The Thousand Autumns of Jacob de Zoet, by the notoriously sniffy James Wood to nudge me into taking the plunge. I’m glad I did – though Cloud Atlas is not always easy to read, Mitchell’s virtuosity makes …

Award-winning writer and physicist Graham Farmelo talks with podcast host Steve Mirsky about The Strangest Man, Farmelo's biography of Nobel Prize-winning theoretical physicist Paul Dirac. Part 2 of 2. Web sites related to this episode include www.thestrangestman.com and http://bit.ly/dirac1963

Award-winning writer and physicist Graham Farmelo talks with podcast host Steve Mirsky about The Strangest Man, Farmelo's biography of Nobel Prize-winning theoretical physicist Paul Dirac. Part 1 of 2. Web sites related to this episode include www.thestrangestman.com and http://bit.ly/dirac1963