The elegance of mathematics meets the breathtaking complexity of nature
When the Spanish filmmaker and graphic designer Cristóbal Vila looks at nature, he sees numbers, and the remarkable elegance of mathematics. Uniting music and animation with mathematics, Nature by Numbers is a sensory science film, an immersion in the world of the minute and microscopic, and an exciting introduction to some of the great geometric and scientific concepts.
Director: Cristóbal Vila
videoBiology
Dive deep into an egg cell to see how ageing reboots when a new life begins
2 minutes
videoMathematics
After centuries of trying, we’ve yet to arrive at a perfect way to map colour
20 minutes
videoEthics
What’s an idea worth? How prominent thinkers have understood intellectual property
6 minutes
videoMusic
A riveting audiovisual dive into what makes sounds harmonious, or not
28 minutes
videoMathematics
Spiral into the ‘golden ratio’ – and separate the myths from the maths
4 minutes
videoHistory of science
How we came to know the size of the Universe – and what mysteries remain
26 minutes
videoKnowledge
Why David Deutsch believes good explanations are the antidote to bad philosophy
10 minutes
videoHistory of science
Ideas ‘of pure genius’ – how astronomers have measured the Universe across history
29 minutes
videoAnimals and humans
One man’s quest to save an orphaned squirrel, as narrated by David Attenborough
14 minutes