Kurzgesagt – In a Nutshell
2019
In a world of complex ideas, especially scientific ones, getting one's head around them to comprehend them properly can be a difficult task. This video series endeavors to help with animated illustrations of those concepts loaded with careful insight and leaven with a sense of humor. Whether the topic is about the cosmos itself, medicine or the sometimes uneasy mix of humanity and technology, the series can help you understand.
Where to Watch 2019
21 Episodes
- The Origin of Consciousness — How Unaware Things Became Aware
E4The Origin of Consciousness — How Unaware Things Became AwareConsciousness is perhaps the biggest riddle in nature. In the first part of this three part video series, we explore the origins of consciousness and take a closer look on how unaware things became aware. - The Most Dangerous Stuff in the Universe — Strange Stars Explained
E6The Most Dangerous Stuff in the Universe — Strange Stars ExplainedInside neutron stars we can find the weirdest and most dangerous substance in the universe: Strange matter. What is strange matter, how dangerous is it and what can it tell us about the origin of the universe? - Is the EU Democratic? Does Your Vote Matter?
E8Is the EU Democratic? Does Your Vote Matter?Being a citizen of the European Union means that many aspects of our lives are regulated by a weird entity. It feels like a huge bureaucracy is making decisions over our heads. How democratic is the EU really and does your vote actually affect anything? - Could Your Phone Hurt You? Electromagnetic Pollution
E10Could Your Phone Hurt You? Electromagnetic PollutionElectricity is all around us, all the time. It makes our lives easier, safer, more fun and most of us never think about it. But is there such a thing as too much electricity? Electronic devices emit an electromagnetic field, which is suspected to cause cancer. We read countless sources on this topic to summarize the results of the latest research for you. - Tiny Bombs in Your Blood — The Complement System
E11Tiny Bombs in Your Blood — The Complement SystemOne of the key players of our immune system is the complement system. An army of millions and trillions of tiny bombs, which work together in a complex and elegant dance to stop intruders in your body. - What’s Hiding at the Most Solitary Place on Earth? The Deep Sea
E14What’s Hiding at the Most Solitary Place on Earth? The Deep SeaSometimes the world feels boring. All the remote islands are visited, the arctic conquered, the dense jungles discovered. Except, there is still a place to explore: A wet deadly desert where mysterious creatures live in total darkness: The deep sea. Let us dive down. - The Billion Ant Mega Colony and the Biggest War on Earth
E15The Billion Ant Mega Colony and the Biggest War on EarthIn nearly every corner of the Earth, ants wage war against each other. Their weapons are what nature gave them. Some have strong armour, deadly stingers or sharp mandibles. And then there is this tiny, and not very impressive ant. But it rules the biggest empire any ant has ever built. A colony spanning continents and fighting wars that leave millions of casualties. Let’s take a look at this unlikely warrioress: Linepithema humile, the Argentine ant. - What If We Nuke a City?
E16What If We Nuke a City?As you may have noticed, we like to blow stuff up on this channel. So when the International Red Cross approached us to collaborate on a video about nuclear weapons, we were more than excited. Until we did the research. It turned out we were a bit oblivious off the real impact of nuclear weapons in the real world, on a real city. And especially, how helpless even the most developed nations on earth would be if an attack occurred today. So hopefully this video demonstrates how extremely non fun a real world nuclear attack would be, without being to gruesome. This collaboration was a blast (no pun intended) and we want to say a huge thank you to the International Red Cross! - Neutron Stars — The Most Extreme Things That Are Not Black Holes
E17Neutron Stars — The Most Extreme Things That Are Not Black HolesNeutron stars are one of the most extreme and violent things in the universe. Giant atomic nuclei, only a few kilometers in diameter but as massive as stars. And they owe their existence to the death of something majestic. - 1,000 km Cable to the Stars — The Skyhook
E181,000 km Cable to the Stars — The SkyhookGetting to space is incredibly hard, expensive and needs a lot of resources. A more efficient way to get there is a Skyhook (or Spacetether), an ever rotating cable with a counter weight, that catapults spaceships from earth orbit into the depths of space. - An Antidote to Dissatisfaction
E19An Antidote to DissatisfactionEverybody is familiar with the feeling that things are not as they should be. That you are not successful enough, your relationships not satisfying enough. That you don’t have the things you crave. In this video we want to talk about one of the strongest predictors of how happy people are, how easily they make friends and how good they are at dealing with hardship. An antidote against dissatisfaction so to speak: Gratitude. - Overpopulation & Africa
E20Overpopulation & AfricaFor most of our history, the human population grew slowly. Until new discoveries brought us more food and made us live longer. In just a hundred years the human population quadrupled. This led to apocalyptic visions of an overcrowded earth. But the population growth rate actually peaked in the 1960s. Since then, fertility rates have crashed as countries industrialize and develop. World population is now expected to balance out at around 11 billion by the end of the century. But the big picture conceals the details. - How to Move the Sun: Stellar Engines
E21How to Move the Sun: Stellar EnginesNothing in the Universe is static. In the milky way, billions of stars orbit the galactic center. Some, like our sun, are pretty consistent, keeping a distance of around 30,000 light years from the galactic center, completing an orbit every 230 million years. This dance is not an orderly ballet - more like a skating rink filled with drunk toddlers. This chaos makes the galaxy dangerous. Our solar neighbourhood is constantly changing, with stars moving hundreds of kilometers every second. Only the vast distances between objects protect us from the dangers out there. But we might get unlucky in the future. At some point we could encounter a star going supernova. Or a massive object passing by and showering earth with asteroids. If something like this were to happen we would likely know thousands, if not millions of years in advance. But we still couldn’t do much about it. Unless… we move our whole solar system out of the way.
