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 🤍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 - 🤍youtu.be/spUNpyF58BY ▀▀▀ References: Kristensen, H.M., Korda, M. (2022). Status of World Nuclear Forces. Federation of American Scientists (FAS). 🤍ve42.co/Stockpile2022 Barth, K. H. (1998). Science and politics in early nuclear test ban negotiations. Physics Today, 51(3), 34-39. - 🤍ve42.co/Barth1998 Schmalberger, T. (1991). In pursuit of a nuclear test ban treaty - 🤍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 - 🤍ve42.co/Bowers2009 Incorporated Research Institutions for Seismology (IRIS). (2022). How Often Do Earthquakes Occur? 🤍ve42.co/IRIS2022 Kimball, D. (2022). The Nuclear Testing Tally. Arms Control Association. 🤍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 - 🤍ve42.co/Kvrna2013 Sykes, L. R., & Evernden, J. F. (1982). The verification of a comprehensive nuclear test ban. Scientific American, 247(4), 47-55 - 🤍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. - 🤍ve42.co/Peterson2014 Richards, P. G., & Kim, W. Y. (2009). Monitoring for nuclear explosions. Scientific American, 300(3), 70-77 - 🤍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 - 🤍ve42.co/Jacobsen2021 Schwartz S. I. (1998). The Hidden Costs Of Our Nuclear Arsenal: Overview Of Project Findings. The Brookings Institution - 🤍ve42.co/Schwartz1998 Ricón, J.L. (2016). The Soviet Union: Military Spending. Nintil - 🤍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 - 🤍ve42.co/Heideman1985 Ford, D. (2004). Richard Garwin - Session IV. American Institute of Physics (AIP). - 🤍ve42.co/Ford2004 Aaserud, F. (1986). Richard Garwin - Session I. American Institute of Physics (AIP). - 🤍ve42.co/Aaserud1986 Goldstein, A. (1997). James W. Cooley, an oral history. IEEE History Center, Piscataway, NJ, USA - 🤍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 - 🤍ve42.co/Cooley1969 ▀▀▀ Special thanks to Patreon supporters: Louis Lebbos, Elliot MIller, RayJ Johnson, Brian Busbee, Jerome Barakos M.D., Amadeo Bee, TTST, Balkrishna Heroor, Chris LaClair, John H. Austin, Jr., OnlineBookClub.org, Matthew Gonzalez, Eric Sexton, John Kiehl, Diffbot, Gnare, Dave Kircher, Burt Humburg, Blake Byers, Dumky, Evgeny Skvortsov, Meekay, Bill Linder, Paul Peijzel, Josh Hibschman, Mac Malkawi, Mike Schneider, John Bauer, jim buckmaster, Juan Benet, Sunil Nagaraj, Richard Sundvall, Lee Redden, Stephen Wilcox, Marinus Kuivenhoven, Michael Krugman, Cy 'kkm' K'Nelson, Sam Lutfi, Ron Neal ▀▀▀ 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
Sorry, but what hindered wider use of Fourier Transform earlier was lack of computers. Ironically, wider use of computers also reduced need for testing in development of reliable nuclear weapons.
There was a site with gaussfacts. On that site "facts" (jokes) were collected about Gauss.
One was like "Erdos thinks that the book of Proof is own by God. God thinks that Gauss wrote it and hid it".
nmgFG7PUHfo&t=2m10s 2:10 Even nuclear radiation is afraid of Canadians.
Nothing would’ve happened and the tests would have not stopped. Do you think the Russian and American pigs would’ve cared for inventing nuclear detectors ?
The Gauss twist in this story is really mind blowing. That guy was insane
The video is so good that I watched it a second time immeadiatly after the first watching. I saved it to 10 different categories of playlists in my library.
an unusually good video from V
Excellent history and excellent science. One of the best videos I have seen.
Love the combover friend! Maybe an episode about balding.....? Cheers
3 blue 1 brown deserves shout-outs from every youtuber in any science capacity. They cover everything!
"If they had discovered it sooner, it may have put a stop to the nuclear arms race" is a funny way to say "America could have established its military dominance over every country around the globe, possibly forever".
lol baruc. It means bless in hebrew. The Ch sounds like Hat. It's a common jewish name
The workings of 1 5 2 or is that 2 5 1?
Wow. Imagine someone somewhere in modernity invented a butter spreading device out of a vacuum motor and a cheese grater than ten years later someone randomly stumbled across a video about it on youtube and took the butter spreader than invented an innovative way to disperse a revolutionary new fuel source into a fundamentally brand new transportation vehicle.
Really bad explanation for a lay audience, totally impossible to follow without a huge pre-existing understanding of mathematics
I was mesmerised watching the FFT graphics in Seti@Home when I first got it in 2000. Must have watched hundreds of hours of them. I had no idea what I was watching, but it was mesmerising.
After watching this video... I still have no idea, kinda. 🙃
The nuke arms race wasn’t due to unavailability of proper math. At the time the USSR set off its first bomb the USA had 300 nukes. Any leader as paranoid as Stalin is going to build as many nukes as possible to try to catch up. Stalin never did. Kruschrev was the leader at the time of the Cuban Missile Crisis, and had to back down because of the overwhelming strength of the USA nukes. The USA caused the arms race by trying to maintain superiority, and the USSR did its part by trying to surpass the USA. Do some math and tell me how many schools, hospitals, roads and bridges that money would build.
Yeah for Tukey! FFT
Lamar county Mississippi is the only site east of the Mississippi River where nuclear detonation occurred in the continental US. They hypothesized that the characteristic seismic signature of an under ground nuclear detonation. A nuke was detonated to form a cavity then another similar detonation was done in the cavity. The seismic signal was blunted to look like a similar sized ampho mining detonation.