THE VIDEO SHELF · transfinite numbers
How To Count Past Infinity
Vsauce's Michael Stevens takes viewers past infinity using transfinite numbers, ordinals and cardinals, with input from mathematician Hugh Woodin. It is a fast-paced, mind-bending tour of different sizes of infinity.
Why HN readers recommended it
HN recommends it as the most accessible introduction to what lies beyond infinity.
This is a summary from the source dataset, not an endorsement by Hacker News or the video creator.
Video & recommendation details
- Creator / channel
- Vsauce
- Topic
- transfinite numbers
- Format
- explainer
- Level
- general
- HN recommenders in dataset
- 6
- HN mentions in dataset
- 10
- Recommendation years in dataset
- 2016–2022
These counts and years describe the included Hacker News records; they are not YouTube views or the video’s publication date.
From the original HN conversations
Excerpts from the recorded comments. Follow each source for the full comment and surrounding discussion.
My personal favourite to illustrate infinity (as possible) and some math concepts around it is still the video "How To Count Past Infinity" from Vsauce: [VIDEO] "This is math, not science." (~12:30)
okket on Hacker News · 2016-08
In Life on the Infinite Farm [pdf]Completely offtopic, except for math and title, but highly recommended while waiting for the movie: "How To Count Past Infinity" [VIDEO]
okket on Hacker News · 2016-04
In The Man Who Knew InfinityThe issue is that there are different infinities. The infinity the parent is talking about, the one that you generally run into in calculus class and the like, is straightforward. The research in the past century was about what happens _past_ infinity, e.g. ordinal numbers. …
lasfter on Hacker News · 2016-08
In What I learned as a hired consultant to autodidact physicists
Summaries, classifications and recommendation records are from the HackerTube source dataset. Read about this library and its limitations.