In the case of the mathematical theorem it's a statement that you think is true but you need to prove it from a starting point. COHEN: You know, as I said before, we were originally sort of just doing these freak things for ourself. Let's go to Richard in Fremont. And the question is, are the hard questions really hard or could one day they be made easy? You know, and - see? Photograph: Courtesy of Al Jean. Some episodes, such as Treehouse of Horror episodes are divided into three smaller stories which have then been given a title. FLATOW: Right. COHEN: '96. The writers relished the notion of the freeze-frame gag, because it enabled them to increase the comedic density. This interesting and quirky little book works through two decades of prime material to shine light on the nerdy little secrets of The Simpsons.Surprisingly a large number of The Simpsons writers are prestigious mathematicians … And ideally you would like to have them in that nice, neat arrangement where the biggest one is on the bottom, then they're in order up to the smallest one on top. SINGH: And sometimes there's an overlap between different areas of interest. We'll be right back. Yeah. They formed a comedy-writing partnership. Once two people have swapped, they can't swap back. So Ken Keeler, who has a Ph.D. in applied math from Harvard and who was AT&T Bell Laboratories and who's been a writer on "The Simpsons" and "Futurama," he decided to look at this problem from a mathematical point of view. Quick phone call before the break. Got out of the taxi, went in to Ramanujan's room, sat next to his bed and, now, Ramanujan was dying so there wasn't much they could really talk about. Visit our website terms of use and permissions pages at www.npr.org for further information. So only later when we saw people discussing it energetically on the Internet did we realize people were actually getting these jokes that were done really pretty much for our own amusement. I had a question for David. FLATOW: Very close to our heart. So it's a little different in this case. And, you know, it shows the extent of what's going on in "Futurama" and "The Simpsons.". Simpsons writer Al Jean, third from left in the back row, in the mathematics team from 1977 Roeper School yearbook. SINGH: And the prediction is somewhat high. And at that time it was very, very expensive to do this kind of 3-D graphics for television that we were going to attempt to do. And that will certainly have a lot of math and science in it. One is marked p and one is marked np. FLATOW: Have you had - I'm sorry, go ahead. RICHARD: Hey guys. In the simpsons and their mathematical secrets simon singh explains how the brilliant writers some of the mathematicians have smuggled in mathematical jokes throughout the cartoons twenty five year history exploring everything from to mersenne primes from eulers equation to the unsolved riddle of p vs np from perfect numbers to narcissistic numbers and much more. This problem is pretty easy after all if we can do it for TV. COHEN: Wasn't there one episode of "The Golden Girls" that had that also? COHEN: Yeah. This is entirely his creation, that segment of "Treehouse of Horror 6." I say that because I used to be a member of it a long time ago. Talking with Simon Singh, author of the book "The Simpsons and their Mathematical Secrets" and David X. Cohen, former "Simpsons" writer and executive producer of "Futurama." Several episodes of And Al Jean who was a really, really bright young teenager. But essentially what I'm trying to say here is we've got a debate about the outcome of an incredibly important conjecture in mathematics spanning across two animated series. FLATOW: Do you need to have a different mindset to write math for the different shows? That's funny. FLATOW: 1-800-989-8255. Sometimes there are obscure references to history for example or whatever the particular writer's interested in. I know that 24 is the series - very unmathematical. Let me play it first. That episode, like many "Simpsons" episodes, had a background that was calling out to be filled up with something. FLATOW: Hmm. FLATOW: Right. I think it's 12 cubed plus one cubed and it's also 10 cubed plus nine cubed. This seems to be a counter example to the theorem, which I think had just been proven at that time. And our theory was if you put in a very obscure joke in the background, those few people who get it will be so amazed that you hit this obscure thing that only they and a few other people know about, that they'll really be hooked for life. I don't think there's been anything particularly mathematical in those gags but I've seen a lot of people parody it with mathematics. How did it end up in "The Simpsons?". FLATOW: Simon Singh, thank you very much for taking time to be with us today and good luck on the book. 4.3/5 from 9394 votes. So that's why we all kind of hem and haw, because we don't want to give the answer and we don't really want to know. And I started saying, no, there's no connection at all. I mean, I asked all the - I met the writers last year and they were very generous with their time and I asked them this question as well. But, you know, in that one 6- or 7-minute story, there is another false solution to Fermat's Last Theorem, a near miss false solution, very clever one. It really hit me straight between the eyes because that was the first - you know, the first book I'd ever written was all about Fermat's Last Theorem. And the question was how many spatula flips does it take to sort a stack of N pancakes? Singh reports that one of the mathematicians on the Simpsons writing team, J. Stewart Burns, draws a parallel between puzzles, which represent the very essence of math, and jokes. The Simpsons and their mathematical secrets by Simon Singh. Listeners may not have followed it all in detail. In the U.K. we have some of the best comedians, people like Dara O'Briain. FLATOW: I'm going to have to hold you there. COHEN: Did you buy it enough to offer me some grant money? It's not very interesting. Something like that. He is a former Simpson writer and an executive producer of "The Simpsons" sister series "Futurama." SINGH: It reminds me, I mean, it's about almost like scientists talking about the philosophy of science. Instead, he is confident that it was inserted during one of the collaborative rewrites, when the mathematical … The simpsons and their mathematical secrets by author simon singh october 2014 isbn kostenloser versand fur alle bucher mit versand und verkauf duch amazon. But what actually happens is sometimes there is a need for some math that's a little beyond the level of even our retired and lapsed scientists on our staff and that's when we usually call on some of our old friends who are real, actual, working scientists. Not quite the season finale but really a finale of a great piece. For 25 seasons, The Simpsons writers have been smuggling math onto Americans' TV screens. It didn't really matter to us that much if people got them. Also I think, you know, if you have a mathematical mind you just have a different view on the world. FLATOW: You're right. Apparently, the majority of the writers for the show were schooled in mathematics, physics, or engineering, so they are fond of including mathematics into the show, a good deal in cameo. But in the episode "The Wizard of Evergreen Terrace," Homer does something extraordinary. MATTHEW: ...to give me my royalties for that. And on top of that, you're not sure it's possible to get there. Happy to be here. So we couldn't really afford to do it but they fished around a little bit and this company Pacific Data Images ended up volunteering their time to do this very expensive animation for us. Singh reports that one of the mathematicians on the Simpsons writing team, J. Stewart Burns, draws a parallel between puzzles, which represent the … So observation that there's definitely something there but the explanation, yeah, not clear. Simon, you spent a lot of time writing about "The Prisoner of Benda." You have an odd perspective on the world. This is my moment to shine. We left off at a very dramatic moment when I was about to reveal the answer to this problem. That's the question. So I certainly observed that throughout my life. You're slightly an outsider. Do you think - I'll ask both of you - David, do you think that there's sort of a brainiac connection between the two? Now, what's lovely about that is that's never explained to the viewer. FLATOW: So the inmates are running the asylum over there, yeah. Anyway, despite the above litany of complaints, I did actually enjoy the book. Some have seen philosophy embedded in episodes of The Simpsons; others have detected elements of psychology and religion.Simon Singh, bestselling author of Fermat's Last Theorem, The Code Book and The Big Bang, instead makes the compelling case that what The Simpsons' writers are most passionate about is mathematics. So many people tried it out on their calculators and I was very, very pleased the day after it aired to see some people gathering on the Internet to converse about it and saying, what's going on here? The Simpsons' writing room in 1992. And similarly, there was actually another equation if we can go all the way from math to physics, if we can make that huge... COHEN: ...transition for a second, there was another equation floating around in the third dimension relating to astrophysics and it was saying that the universe would ultimately contract and collapse on itself. Hi, Richard. You've got to come over and work with me. FLATOW: Yeah. SINGH: Well, I really think it's my favorite number before I noticed it in "Futurama" but it's 1729 - 1,729. And you might say how many mutations or how many generations it might've taken to get from one point to another. COHEN: But he has provided a lot of the real hardcore math and science, including the estimate of the mass of the Higgs boson that Simon mentioned. So he got on a ship and he came to Cambridge and he flourished. Thanks for calling. And this tradition of putting in mathematical jokes has just gone on for years and years. So the timing just happened to work out to make these things possible. FLATOW: Does it have any practical application at all? SINGH: Well, I mean, I spotted it because, you know, I suppose I've been watching "The Simpsons" for maybe 10 or 12 years before I noticed the mathematics and the reference to Fermat's Last Theorem in "The Wizard of Evergreen Terrace." SIMON SINGH: My pleasure. Certainly not Singh’s best book, but … And maybe that's where humor arises. List of writers But then Bender sees the number reflected in a mirror. So, you know, somebody else could and probably has written a book about "The Simpsons" and history of "The Simpsons" and philosophy. FLATOW: 1-800-989-8255, if you'd like to talk about "The Simpsons" and all the math that's in there. in Computer Science. Stephen Hawking, Stephen Jay Gould and Nobel Prize winners. And on the shelf there are two folders. But there is this physics element to it. But physically he really suffered. It's a little easier. And that's what appears in this episode. So I can tell you 24 - there's like, a, you know, proposition 24 they vote on ending. We see an episode where - a scene where Amy and Fry are in a stationary cupboard. You're not sure how you're going to get there. FLATOW: This is SCIENCE FRIDAY. And I was wondering if, David, you could expound if there's any significance to that. So we have an episode of "The Simpsons" postulating an answer to an unsolved riddle in mathematics. And David, anything on the future for you, what you'd like to do? FLATOW: Simon, how did the Simpsons' writers - how did that room become a magnet for mathematicians? FLATOW: Mm-hmm. After all, the Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) showed … If it is, put it in. He seems to have found a counter example to the notorious math problem Fermat's Last Theorem. He reveals how the writers have drip-fed … SINGH: I think it goes back to the very, very beginning. In The Simpsons and Their Mathematical Secrets, Simon Singh explains how the brilliant writers, some of the mathematicians, have smuggled in mathematical jokes throughout the cartoon's twenty-five year history, exploring everything from to Mersenne primes, from Euler's equation to the unsolved riddle of P vs. NP, from perfect numbers to narcissistic numbers, and … And Ramanujan said, no, no, no, that's really interesting. I don't mean Addish; I mean Escher. Hi, Matthew. 1-800-989 - well, are there things in the hopper that you haven't finished that you'd like to get in, you know, while you still can? His comments about his career as a mathematician can be found below and in A Futurama Math Interview with Dr. Ken Keeler . What's going on here? The following is a list of writers who have worked on the Fox animated television series The Simpsons in the order of first credited episode (by broadcast). The claim: 'The Simpsons' episode predicted Harris' Inauguration Day outfit . There are some of these books. The authoritative record of NPR’s programming is the audio record. The Simpsons and Their Mathematical Secrets is a 2013 book by Simon Singh, which is based on the premise that "many of the writers of The Simpsons are deeply in love with numbers, and their ultimate desire is to drip-feed morsels of mathematics … the writers of the simpsons are deeply in love with numbers and their ultimate desire is to drip feed morsels of mathematics into the subconscious minds of viewers the book compiles all the mathematical references used throughout the shows run and analyzes them in detail about the simpsons and their mathematical secrets the brainy book by the bestselling author of fermats … And Hardy said it was 1729. That's one thing that scientists just hate talking about, the philosophy of science. When you sit them down, they're, you know, it's the mic fright or whatever it is, that they just... COHEN: You know, I studied physics and computer science before I became a comedy writer and I always found that all of my fellow students - maybe not all but a good percentage of them - were funny people. Often my friend David Schiminovich, for example, who's an astrophysicist at Columbia. And a particularly interesting thing about this problem is that one of the earliest papers written on the subject was actually coauthored by Bill Gates of Microsoft fame. And I have a chapter that's kind of all about their different answers. The following is a list of writers who have worked on the The Simpsons.. FLATOW: Thank you. That's one of the most beautiful equations in mathematics if you took a poll of mathematicians. FLATOW: Or are you just doing it for yourself? Now, again, people don't need to follow that bit of math but the important thing is that Ramanujan could pluck these things out of thin air. DAVID COHEN: Thank you very much. SINGH: I've got a feeling that there is a - I was going to say Addish. So what I decided to do, as a former computer science guy, was to write a computer program that would look for very, very near misses to this equation, so close that if you tried them out on a calculator, it would appear correct to the number of digits that most people had available on their calculators, at least at that time. FLATOW: Right. And so a Cambridge mathematician said, look, you've got to come to England. And when I rudely interrupted David Cohen he was telling us about these famous burnt pancake problem. And then occasionally you break the logic. This is SCIENCE FRIDAY from NPR. Nobody sends in any - well, I was about to say nobody sends in anything. And everybody came up with an answer. You have simple questions and hard questions in math. Now I'm going to defer to Simon who's been researching this more recently. Rating: He's more interested in the pie of pastry than 3.14. Simon, what's your favorite number to crop up in "The Simpsons" or "Futurama"? We're talking this hour about the math hidden in "The Simpsons" and "Futurama," two of the most acclaimed animated shows of all time, with my guests Simon Singh, author of "The Simpsons and their Mathematical Secrets." This was back in 1995, is that right, Simon? And so why does this number 1729 keep cropping up in "Futurama"? Singh reveals that many of The Simpsons’ writers are very highly skilled mathematicians having Master’s degrees in maths, physics or computer science and sometimes even PhDs. So in this case it's apparently a counter example to Fermat's Last Theorem, which says that for the equation a to the n plus b to the n equals c to the n, there are no solutions of n is greater than 2. Well, it relates to an Indian mathematician called Ramanujan. And then the mother sees it reflected in the mirror which is Murder backwards, Red rum. It was my uniform number in little league because I was a fan of Willie Mays. In the episode, the "Futurama" episode "The Honking," the crew go to a haunted castle and blood appears on the wall and it's the digits - I think the digits are 01-01-10-01-01. FLATOW: Have "The Simpsons," you know, at the very beginning where they all climb into the couch, has any math ever been used in that little opening there? Congratulations. And, oh, it wasn't very interesting, though. I'm Ira Flatow. But, I mean, vitally a bit about the math and then David can tell you a bit about how this show came to be and the link to "Twilight Zone." So there are lots of sketches on the Internet of Bart doing the chalkboard gag but with complicated math instead, or complicated equations repeated line after line. But the bottom line is that according to the Futurama Theorem, as long as two fresh people are added into the mix, then they give you the flexibility, the wriggle room, you need for everybody else to get back to their original bodies. The Simpsons also contains over a hundred instances of mathematics ranging from arithmetic to geometry to calculus, many designed to expose and poke fun at innumeracy. The Simpsons and Their Mathematical Secrets, by the British scientist and journalist Simon Singh, illuminates some little-known facets of the popular, long-running TV show. Although I visit once in a while. I think it's Bender's unit number. I think observationally there's definitely something there because you have a, you know, huge gang of mathematicians on "The Simpsons" and "Futurama" and then people like Tom Lehrer. FLATOW: In grad school, you studied something called burnt pancake problem. So there was actually an explanation from some of these jokes, the math jokes that Simon's talking about that relates to this, in terms of us saying P equals NP in that episode. That, of course, is the theme of the longest running sitcom in American history. We could just have Bart writing pi and never finishing and that could fill up whatever time we needed to fill up. COHEN: Former writer for a TV show, yes. You changed the outcome by measuring it. I just, you know, it's like a former president or something? He says "The Simpsons" set is populated with number-loving writers who have been smuggling math into the series for years, usually without us noticing. FLATOW: Well, that brings me to a good question. So in both cases you're sort of flying by the seat of your pants and going on your experience and your intuition that there's a way to get from point A to point B. COHEN: And even as I'm saying this I feel like I should have stuck with the answer no. FLATOW: We'll get an answer after the break. And, you know, this is extraordinary stuff. This one, the very plot of the episode was mathematical in terms of Homer entering a higher dimension. That's really interesting because 1729 is the smallest number that's the sum of two cubes in two different ways. Author Simon Singh helps Ira decode the show's numberplay, while former Simpsons writer David X. Cohen remembers how he helped Homer solve Fermat's Last Theorem (sort of). So it was pretty inexplicable. As an example, David X Cohen, one of the writers, graduated from Harvard University with B.A. That was referring to the difficulty of rendering the computer graphics on computers at that time. I'm Ira Flatow. But on one of the blackboards where David put a false solution to Fermat's Last Theorem there's also an equation that predicts the math of the Higgs boson. And Bender gets up and runs away. So when it appears in "The Simpsons," that's something I'm not going to miss. The list includes all the writers from seasons 1 through 29. FLATOW: And as I say, David X. Cohen is a former "Simpson" writer and executive producer of "Futurama.". Accuracy and availability may vary. You know, there may not be a really funny way to deliver the information and there may not be a proof to get to your statement, even if it is true. It never quite seems to end. There is a reference to the Utah teapot which is a way of modeling three dimensional objects which kind of test how good your mathematical modeling is. And we were saying, oh, this isn't so hard. Also, according to Selman, the mathematical writers do have a particular trait: ‘Comedy writers all like to think that we’re great observers of the human condition and that we understand pathos, bathos, and all the -athoses. The writers sometimes portray Bart, Homer, and Lisa as using mathematics in some of their projects. And by the end of the episode, though, everybody wants to get back to their original bodies. I want to play a clip of the episode called "Homer Cubed." He was so bright that he went to Harvard to study math when he was only 16 years old. So up in - late in the show - late in the process of making the show we suddenly say, wait a second, Homer's a genius in this episode writing on a blackboard. COHEN: You know, I've been asked this question a lot and I used to always try to make something up on the spot and it would always sound a little concocted. It's a number of a universe that Fry pops out of in the "Farnsworth Parabox." FLATOW: Mm-hmm. The mathematicians on … But the professors at the Cavendish Laboratory in Cambridge were very impressed and were saying, you know, for 1994 which I think was the date maybe of that episode - no, 1998 - that was not a bad at all prediction for the Higgs boson. Which is what happens to that universe in that episode. COHEN: He wasn't that interested in my answer, apparently. The Simpsons and their mathematical secrets proves that you can be both good at maths and funny. FLATOW: There you go. In The Simpsons and Their Mathematical Secrets, Simon Singh explains how the brilliant writers, some of the mathematicians, have smuggled in mathematical jokes throughout the cartoon's twenty-five year history, exploring everything from to Mersenne primes, from Euler's equation to the unsolved riddle of P vs. NP, from perfect numbers to narcissistic numbers, and much more. Which is an astonishing... SINGH: ...levels of love of mathematics required. Homer enters the third dimension. He joins us from Los Angeles. Now that is binary but in decimal it's 666 which is the number of The Beast and is very terrifying. As a binary number, it's 357. FLATOW: Maybe Harvard ought to put out a course in comedy writing for all those mathematicians. And you'd say, oh, how many flips did it take to get from this starting point to this end point. NPR transcripts are created on a rush deadline by Verb8tm, Inc., an NPR contractor, and produced using a proprietary transcription process developed with NPR. Matthew in Denver. So, you know. COHEN: But you have to say it in a way that's funny. I wondered if Bart in the opening chalkboards has ever written out pi. When a writer worked on only one of these it was indicated in … In this case we had a blackboard. Author Simon Singh wanted to know and he investigates that question plus a lot more in his new book "The Simpsons and Their Mathematical Secrets." The whole story is about math in higher dimensions and what reality and higher dimensions might be like. COHEN: Go ahead. FLATOW: And were you allowed and are the writers still allowed free rein to stick in math whenever they'd like to? I know one area where it may relate is in terms of looking at DNA, where you look at bits of DNA that have broken off and reverse themselves from generation to generation. I'm going to use that from now on. Why are mathematicians willing to give up a career at Harvard and go into comedy writing? I'm Ira Flatow. Simpsons writer Al Jean recalls that the Springfield Googolplex freeze-frame gag was not in the original draft of the script for "Colonel Homer." And I think it's the only paper that he's known to have published, though. Let me put it that way. COHEN: No. "The Simpsons and their Mathematical Secrets." And then in "Futurama" which is the sister series to "The Simpsons"- and David was co-creator of that series, we see another writer, I think it's Jeff Westbrook, in an episode called "Put Your Heads on My Shoulder." But when you get served the pancakes initially they're all out of order and the only way you can sort them is to stick a spatula in, somewhere in the middle of the stack, lift up the ones above it and flip them all over and put them back down. A fascinating look behind "The Simpsons" and, you know, I've been watching it for years, these math things pop in and out. And, again, I don't have a good explanation but I believe it is true. He had very little schooling but he just would invent theorems that were beautiful and elegant and rich and original. SINGH: I talk about "Are You Being Served?" All rights reserved. about how the two mathematicians were implicitly responsible for adding mathematical content to an episode of The Simpsons. COHEN: That's actually a good idea if we ever are a little short on ideas for the episode. After Greenwald was interviewed for NPR’s Science Friday in 2005, some of the writers heard the program. Good to talk to you. And in this clip, Simon, maybe you could tell us about this. SINGH: You're spot on, I think. David, being in scifi there are a lot of science jokes in "Futurama." And again, maybe a lot of comedians and comedy writers are slightly outside to the mainstream. Because these are sort of background jokes, things that you can only see really if you freeze frame later on, at that time a VCR, or nowadays on your DVR. Al and Mike still work on "The Simpsons" and bit by bit they brought other people onboard. I mean, I think the thing they have in common is, again, it's a little more broad than this. And they seem to have been doing this ever since. The famous people who’ve appeared in The Simpsons extends to scientists and mathematicians. Also joining me is David X. Cohen. Stay with us after this break. … And it's not clear that people can therefore get back to their own bodies by maybe alternative routes. "The Simpsons" kicked off its 25th season this year. It sounds like our prediction was not that accurate for our universe but it was very accurate for Homer's universe. The mathematician Bertrand Russell received the Nobel Prize in Literature, if that counts for anything. "The Simpsons" has always been kind of an oddball among TV shows because the inmates run the asylum, meaning the writers obviously in this case. So the head writers, Al Jean and Mike Reiss early on that Simon mentioned, and later Bill Oakley and Josh Weinstein, among others, were very encouraging of people to just put in obscure references to whatever they were interested in. Shortly after Joe Biden and Kamala Harris were sworn in as president and vice president, fans of "The Simpsons" took to social media to claim that the show, once again, had predicted a moment before it transpired in reality. The question is if you have a stack of N pancakes and you are a very smart flipper, what is the fastest - what is the number of flips that it takes to sort this stack of pancakes out into the proper arrangement. So it's now 10-10-01-10-10. There's also an equation which says p equals np which is an answer to a question which is worth a million dollars if you can solve it. And so in that very first series - well, in pretty much the first episode, "Bart the Genius," we have a reference to calculus, in fact a very old joke about calculus. So in the episode Simon's talking about I have one that's correct to ten places. A couple of people, like Mike Reiss who was a really talented young mathematician. So that was my goal. I'm a big fan of "The Simpsons" and I've noticed the number of 37 pops up a lot more than an accident. In The Simpsons and Their Mathematical Secrets, Simon Singh explains how the brilliant writers, some of the mathematicians, have smuggled in mathematical jokes throughout the cartoon's twenty-five year history, exploring everything from to Mersenne primes, from Euler's equation to the unsolved riddle of P vs. NP, from perfect numbers to narcissistic numbers, and … Great read there. There's an episode where a character, Professor Farnsworth, is at the horse races in the future and there's a very close finish, so close that they call it a quantum finish and they have to take a photo. The simpsons and their mathematical secrets by simon singh 2014 09 25 simon singh isbn 0783324828214 kostenloser versand fur alle bucher mit versand und verkauf duch amazon. And by the way, another reason these jokes appeared is because "The Simpsons," the arrival of the Simpsons in the TV schedule was right around the time that everyone pretty much had a VCR for the first time so it became possible to do these freeze frame jokes where you actually were cognizant that the viewer would be able to go back and look at them later. MATTHEW: Hi there. COHEN: That's a better answer. Hardy, the professor who invited him over, went to visit him in hospital, took a taxi. COHEN: "Futurama" just finished up, so that was my main vehicle for sneaking these things in. 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