The Fast Fourier Transform is used everywhere but it has a fascinating origin story that could have ended the nuclear arms race. This video is sponsored by 80,000 Hours. Head to http://80000hours.org/veritasium to sign up for their newsletter and get sent a free copy of their in-depth career guide.
A huge thank you to Dr. Richard Garwin for taking the time to speak with us.
Thanks to Dr. Steve Brunton of the University of Washington for his help with understanding the Fast Fourier Transform.
Thanks to Dr. Cliff Thurber of the University of Wisconsin-Madison, Dr. Paul Richards of Columbia University, and Dr. Steven Gibbons of the Norwegian Geotechnical Institute for their expertise.
Thanks to Grant Sanderson of 3Blue1Brown for his helpful feedback on the script. His great video on the Fourier Transform is here - https://youtu.be/spUNpyF58BY
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References:
Kristensen, H.M., Korda, M. (2022). Status of World Nuclear Forces. Federation of American Scientists (FAS). https://ve42.co/Stockpile2022
Barth, K. H. (1998). Science and politics in early nuclear test ban negotiations. Physics Today, 51(3), 34-39. - https://ve42.co/Barth1998
Schmalberger, T. (1991). In pursuit of a nuclear test ban treaty - https://ve42.co/Schmalberger1991
Bowers, D., & Selby, N. D. (2009). Forensic seismology and the comprehensive nuclear-test-ban treaty. Annual Review of Earth and Planetary Sciences, 37, 209-236 - https://ve42.co/Bowers2009
Incorporated Research Institutions for Seismology (IRIS). (2022). How Often Do Earthquakes Occur? https://ve42.co/IRIS2022
Kimball, D. (2022). The Nuclear Testing Tally. Arms Control Association. https://ve42.co/TestTally2022
Kværna, T., & Ringdal, F. (2013). Detection capability of the seismic network of the International Monitoring System for the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty. Bulletin of the Seismological Society of America, 103(2A), 759-772 - https://ve42.co/Kvrna2013
Sykes, L. R., & Evernden, J. F. (1982). The verification of a comprehensive nuclear test ban. Scientific American, 247(4), 47-55 - https://ve42.co/Sykes1982
Peterson, J., & Hutt, C. R. (2014). World-wide standardized seismograph network: a data users guide (p. 82). US Department of the Interior, US Geological Survey. - https://ve42.co/Peterson2014
Richards, P. G., & Kim, W. Y. (2009). Monitoring for nuclear explosions. Scientific American, 300(3), 70-77 - https://ve42.co/Richards2009
Jacobsen, L. L., Fedorova, I., & Lajus, J. (2021). The seismograph as a diplomatic object: The Soviet–American exchange of instruments, 1958–1964. Centaurus, 63(2), 277-295 - https://ve42.co/Jacobsen2021
Schwartz S. I. (1998). The Hidden Costs Of Our Nuclear Arsenal: Overview Of Project Findings. The Brookings Institution - https://ve42.co/Schwartz1998
Ricón, J.L. (2016). The Soviet Union: Military Spending. Nintil - https://ve42.co/Nintil2016
Heideman, M. T., Johnson, D. H., & Burrus, C. S. (1985). Gauss and the history of the fast Fourier transform. Archive for history of exact sciences, 265-277 - https://ve42.co/Heideman1985
Ford, D. (2004). Richard Garwin - Session IV. American Institute of Physics (AIP). - https://ve42.co/Ford2004
Aaserud, F. (1986). Richard Garwin - Session I. American Institute of Physics (AIP). - https://ve42.co/Aaserud1986
Goldstein, A. (1997). James W. Cooley, an oral history. IEEE History Center, Piscataway, NJ, USA - https://ve42.co/Goldstein1997
Cooley, J., Garwin, R., Rader, C., Bogert, B., & Stockham, T. (1969). The 1968 Arden House workshop on fast Fourier transform processing. IEEE Transactions on Audio and Electroacoustics, 17(2), 66-76 - https://ve42.co/Cooley1969
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Written by Derek Muller & Felicity Nelson
Filmed by Derek Muller & Raquel Nuno
Animation by Ivy Tello, Jakub Misiek, Alex Drakoulis, and Fabio Albertelli
Edited by Albert Leung & Derek Muller
Research Assistant: Katie Barnshaw
Additional video/photos supplied by Pond5 and Getty Images
Music from Epidemic Sound
Produced by Derek Muller, Petr Lebedev, and Emily Zhang
If you're thinking about how to make a positive impact with your work, get a free in-depth career guide from 80,000 Hours: 80000hours.org/veritasium
@tamish9939 Says:
The biggest mistake of mankind was to let MEN alone rule the world. Jerks.
@derekconlin1180 Says:
If it's a cosign wave, it just means you have less than steller credit. 🧐
@sinisadovijanic Says:
Man I love your videos...Respect
@andreash3906 Says:
Mindblowing.
@msnraju97 Says:
I wish my math teacher explains as you do😊
@ajlp Says:
Loved this! Interesting and educational.
@Suzuki_Hiakura Says:
The way other nations checked to see their rivals were keeping in line with the disarmament was covered in my classes recently. Amusing tid bit I felt like sharing after finding a video I missed :D
@TheSubpremeState Says:
You lost me at......... frequency.....
@shubhxms Says:
ofc it was gauss
@Povcollector Says:
It's Friday night 10pm. God I'm a looser 😂
@parad0x200 Says:
So this is what my dad keeps going on about when he tells me about how great Fourier transforms are👍
@badhombre4942 Says:
Great to see that the radioactive fallout did not go past the border into Canada. /s
@bgold2007 Says:
Wow Derek the time I feel I understand Fourier!
@cameronthomas4767 Says:
4:31 so it’s France’s fault..
@sibusisomazibuko9936 Says:
I don’t understand most of this but I do hope that someday I do
@dylanzeman3966 Says:
I'm sure it was a nice video, but unintelligible to the avg person.
@vtherv Says:
The arms race has been a persistent feature of human history since ancient times; Russia had their hands in the cookie jar before the USA dropped the bomb.
@SkyFaber Says:
FFTs are also one of the few algorithms that are faster on a quantum computer due the fact that quantum computers can compute imaginary numbers natively.
@ElJulius67 Says:
I really love your videos. But this one time, I'm going to talk about your bias for certain things. The nuclear race did not start because the Soviets rejected the Baruch plan as you imply. It started because the US detonated a nuclear bomb. You always have to see things from the other point of view. If the Soviets had detonated a nuclear weapon, would the Americans have said "ok, I promise not to make nuclear bombs if you dismantle the ones you already have"? come on, don't be naive
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@Lance-lightning Says:
Just think of all that radiation humanity could have been saved from if we weren't such a self destructive species to begin with.
@Ztimes22 Says:
Holy crap that was interesting!
makes me think about aliens "Yeaaah unlike many others, our species survived because we found FFT before we built our nukes"
@ViperNRM Says:
24 seconds like 37 in some forms of math
@wildmonkiesJR Says:
So MIT came out with videos talking about Chernobyl's fallout vs a nukes fallout and it was said that the amount of plutonium needed for criticality was significantly lower that fallout wouldn't be as devastating, meanwhile in chernobyl the reactor spilled out several hundreds magnitudes more of radioactive active beta decaying particles that became a driving factor for thyroid cancer. Im sure we are all fine judging by the fact we are eating wheat from the midwest.
@antebagaric1970 Says:
Gauss couldn't have possibly known that his discovery would be THAT important. Because it only takes off when you have millions of datapoints, and without computers, even his method wouldn't help you all that much.
@GDawg2K2 Says:
If you were living in the 40s and bough that bullsht story about giving up the knowledge. OK! But for anyone today. to believe for 1 sec, that the US is trustworthy? Lol..
@Dan-dj5qe Says:
The IBM PC computer from the video did not date from the 60's. Probably is used as an illustration only.
@joshuarobinson6030 Says:
Imagine how much further ahead tech would be if Gauss had published
@SorinSilaghi Says:
This is how math should be taught in school. Instead of solve for x the nth indistinct equation. Awesome content.
@quicksilver9892 Says:
I like your funny words magic man.
@mostafayounes9490 Says:
Thank You❤
@Andrewjenkin-kt7jq Says:
It looks like a form of decryption.
@daviddewar6008 Says:
9:53 Now I can always unlock doors in Arkam City!!
@orionred2489 Says:
i was failing calculus hard while in EE school. I leaned on fft to figure out the real life equations instead of doing the differentials.
@slypperyfox Says:
So, if Gauss had published his work, wouldn’t it be called “Fast Gaussian Transform”? I’m a retired MD and recall getting a glimpse of something like this in my freshman year of college (1977) - Integral calculus and Differential Equations- We were primarily tasked with coming up with the correct equations to solve mostly AUC and Area inside varying geologic shapes problems - not with actually solving to completion. This posed a new challenge to me - for the first time there was more than one variable in play. Many times way more than one. Fortunately, the end result would be in the form of an equation as many times the variables weren’t given numerical values. The point of the class was to make you learn how to solve complex problems and introduce you to the mathematics you would likely face if you pursued math based engineering careers. Unfortunately, the only computer classes available, to undergrads at least, was FORTRAN.
I will say that the AUC lectures returned in med school. Nearly every lab value in the world is compared to a bell shaped curve of “healthy” people but you can have a lab outside the bell curve and be perfectly normal. Also helpful for calculating microbial threats in the blood stream from blood draws separated by some length of time. These are measured (electronically) as AUC and many drug levels are also measured by AUC. So, very pertinent in the real wold.
@maybe_11 Says:
😂 😂 😂 😂 😂 😂 😂 bro tooo specific names
@notagain3732 Says:
Learning can be fun you proved this here
@conradomartinezp Says:
Why "the most important" instead of "one of the most important"? FFT is in any list of the 10 most important algorithms ever without doubt... but whether it is the most important algorithm in history or not could be a matter of passionate debate.
@CalebMorgan Says:
People's naivete about humanity is interesting. The nuclear arms race has been a net positive. Mutual Assured Destruction has stop us from having any world wars since the bomb was dropped. How many wars do you think we would have had with Russia if not for Nuclear weapons? The two largest world powers going at it over and over would have been devastating. We were on track to have more world wars when we had two back to back.
@juanrossi3 Says:
Thanks a lot for this incredible video, man, great information, I like your way of explaining de FT, and the video production is great too, looks like a lot of hours of work. This is positive impact :)
@immortalpotato5376 Says:
Imagine the world without gause and euler
@Cahangir Says:
Amazing video. Thank you for your efforts.
@thedrytortuga7421 Says:
History sucks! We are ruled by morons/Trumpanzees/flat-earthers.
@sparksmcgee6641 Says:
This is an asinine video. That ends with standard white mans burden.
His stupid comment about it being a paridise before is stupid. The readon there was so few people there was because they died.
@yarednigussie7630 Says:
Thanks
@jgarbo3541 Says:
Who would trust the Americans - serial liars about everything. The Russians were right.
@b43xoit Says:
There is no "fizhion", no gender, no god.
@charles401 Says:
just saw this.
I am a BSEE and this is my comment:
Outstanding.
Simply outstanding.👍
@brucepenich1012 Says:
I love how the fall out at 2:15 in the video stopped at the Canadian border. That was some very polite radioactive fall out. :-)
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