Original subtitles

[ Man Narrating] The world is at war...

and the Nazis rule the seas...

with one of humanity's greatest powers-

a secret code that can win wars.

But can it also reveal the mysteries of the universe?

Ifs a cipher with a key hidden in big history.

We think of history as a time line-

a series of events stretching a few thousand years into the past.

It's time to think bigger.

Instead of a line...

imagine a web of infinite connections interacting over billions of years...

linked together to create everything we've ever known-

our universe, our planet... and us.

History as we know it is about to get big.

Two years into the Second World War...

the Nazis prepare an order to sink a British ship...

but British intelligence can intercept German radio transmissions...

so the Nazis use a sophisticated machine...

to turn their messages into an almost uncrackable code.

It's called Enigma.

By using a series of rotors and a series of plugs...

each letter was turned into a completely random letter.

[ Narrator] Enigma uses a scrambling algorithm...

to convert a word like tag- German for “day”-

into a seemingly meaningless string of letters.

[ Beeping ]

With the Enigma machine, it would be random-completely random-

if you did not have the accompanying code key...

to enter in your Enigma machine after you receive the message.

[ Narrator] Enigma has 159 quintillion variations.

[Speaking German ]

The Nazi code...

seems invincible.

[Ticking ]

Traditional history tells us...

that in war, codes can be the keys to victory or defeat.

But big history connects to our biology...

to reveal how an advanced ability to make and break codes...

sets humans apart.

[Growling 1

[Wailing ]

All animals code and decode messages.

[ Chirping ]

[Croaking ]

[ Howling ]

Simple things like a predator warning. Danger. Run away.

- [ Growling ] - Angry. Stay Clear.

[ Narrator] But human communication is different.

Our brains are more complex...

so we build a world of symbols...

where everything around us is a code to crack.

This green light means “go.”

These numbers mean expensive.

And these mean you're on schedule.

We constantly create new codes and new ways to decipher them.

You're actually thinking in code.

Your brain is figuring out...

what am I going to associate with that word, with that smell, with that thought...

and that becomes hardwired.

[ Narrator] But if our brains are programmed to code and decode...

a mystery remains-

how did we become nature's code breakers?

Big history connects back 600 million years...

to earth's first computer processor.

This prehistoric worm's brain has a new combination of cells...

that lets it decode more information than other animals...

and even learn from experience.

And over time, this cluster of cells mutates...

and evolves to become...

our cerebral cortex.

Here, 16 billion neurons store memory...

control language...

and decode the world.

The connections between nerve cells and what we call "gray matter"...

make the human brain uniquely powerful...

able to process one quadrillion pieces of information in a lifetime-

information that's even more powerful when we share it.

[Speaking Native Language]

The cerebral cortex is our language center.

Here, we create a code...

that communicates thoughts with sound-

the code of speech.

But communicating a single thought...

takes at least five different regions of the brain...

connecting simultaneously in a network so complex...

it lets us not only describe things, but plan for future possibilities.

[ Markley] We can talk about conditional events.

If this thing happens, then this other thing will not happen.

If this thing happens, you should do this.

[ Man ] it becomes this remarkable tool that really separates humans...

and sends human history off on a very different trajectory...

to that of all the other species on our planet.

[ Narrator] But speech also reveals the limits of human memory.

[ Man ] All the world's major civilizations, at some point...

confronted the problem of there being too much information to keep it in your head.

Now, the information load got so heavy...

that they had to develop permanent ways for recording information.

[ Narrator] Big history connects our biology...

to a transformative leap for mankind.

It's 3200 B.C...

and this scribe in Mesopotamia is one of the first to use writing...

to translate the code of speech into images.

Writing is the ultimate secret code that was developed by humans.

Early writing seems to have always started with simple pictures.

But very soon they evolve and become symbolic.

[ Narrator] Modern alphabets conceal this ancient legacy.

The ancient Egyptians write in hieroglyphics.

This is their symbol for water.

The Egyptians trade with the Phoenicians...

who adapt the symbol and call it mem-

a wavy line that evolves over thousands of years...

into the letter “M.”

Writing transforms civilization.

It increases the knowledge we can share across the generations.

And it's also a tool for concealing information in secret codes...

that men use in times of war.

80 how can the human brain crack a code...

that the human brain makes?

With a code breaker that isn't human.

Big history is a new way to see the world.

It reveals that our brain is nature's top code breaker-

a complex living computer...

that can build sophisticated machines...

to share or conceal vital information.

[Speaking German ]

Big history links back to a world at war...

and the code that sparks the future.

[ Explosion ]

At Britain's decryption headquarters...

9,000 code breakers use two captured German Enigma machines...

in their top secret mission-

to crack the Nazis' uncrackable military code.

They look for repeating patterns that might correspond to common phrases...

like “Heil Hitler”...

or names of high-ranking Nazi officers.

It's a classic code-breaking strategy.

Big history connects a breakthrough in code breaking...

to a breakthrough in archeology.

The Rosetta stone unlocks an ancient secret.

This 2,200-year-old tablet features the same message...

in Greek, Egyptian script and the lost language of hieroglyphics.

When 19th century French archaeologists find repeating patterns...

like the name of the Egyptian King Ptolemy...

the stone becomes the key to cracking the hieroglyphic code.

More than a hundred years later...

the British find patterns that help to unravel the Enigma code-

a critical advantage for the Allies.

It gave us an ability to combat, or to confront, the enemy...

wherever the enemy was going to appear.

[ Narrator] But a code war is a cat-and-mouse game.

The Nazis up the ante...

with a new encryption machine called the Lorenz.

It conceals words by turning them into numbers.

It's the cutting edge of cryptography...

but it runs on an ancient idea.

Big history links the Nazis' mega code...

with the symbol that means nothing.

In the ancient world, the idea of zero doesn't exist...

until the seventh century-

when Indian mathematicians develop the concept...

that “nothing” is actually “something.”

When you add the zero, that's a placeholder.

That understands that, “Hey, '10' is a 'one' and a 'zero.”'

Having that placeholder allows much more complex thought.

[ Narrator] Zero ignites a mathematical revolution...

and it' becomes the basis of a new symbolic language-

binary code.

Binary code, to put it simply, is ones and zeros...

off and on, yes and no.

Is it one or is it zero?

[ Narrator] Binary code is both strikingly simple and infinitely complex.

Just two symbols in different combinations...

can form a word...

a book...

or an encrypted message.

Big history connects forward...

to a new generation of top secret machines...

that use the ancient idea of binary code-..

To build the modern world.

Binary seems even more invincible than Enigma...

with more possible solutions...

than a single code breaker could crack in a lifetime.

The British need more processing power...

so they build an artificial brain.

It's called Colossus.

Like the code it's designed to break, Colossus runs on binary.

Ones and zeros control a series of on/off switches...

that tell it what to do.

The human brain looks for repeating patterns to crack codes.

This machine amplifies that ability on a massive scale.

[ Man ] Colossus would sort through...

an enormous, astronomical number of alternatives...

and search for the clue that would lead to the key.

[ Narrator] Colossus lets the British know...

as much about German military movements as Hitler himself.

[ Morgan ] The Colossus was, in many respects...

the world's first computer.

And in that very, very thought-provoking way...

that Second World War produced the world in which we live today.

[ Narrator] Binary is the blueprint for our digital civilization.

The modern age runs on codes.

They're hidden in everything around us...

the secret engines of life on earth.

So could there also be a master code...

that runs the universe?

Big history reveals...

how an ancient code...

programs the modern world.

Bu! what happens when a code begins to think for itself?

Big history zooms in...

to the microscopic world of the virus.

[ Coughs 1

This virus is designed to replicate itself...

and perpetually infect its host.

This virus operates on the same kind of orders.

Whether biological...

or digital...

a virus runs on a code...

with a mission of destruction.

Big history connects microbiology...

to a new age of warfare.

Iran, 2007.

[ Bell Ringing ]

A self-replicating computer virus called a worm...

infiltrates a nuclear facility.

[ Morgan ] We created this computer warfare against an enemy-

warfare in which no one travels overseas...

no one fires a single bullet or drops a single bomb.

[ Narrator] The digital worm is a code...

programmed to disable machines...

by jumping from computer to computer until it finds its target.

[Alarm Blaring ]

Humans create codes that seem to have lives of their own...

echoing the secret code within all of life.

Big history zooms in...

to the code that programs us.

[ Man ] The first creatures that emerged were very small microbes.

And those creatures used D.N.A. to store information.

[ Narrator] Like binary code...

D.N.A. starts simple.

Just four chemicals...

but they combine in millions of complex sequences...

that govern every cell in every living thing on earth.

[Valle] D.N.A., helices-all of that is a type of code.

It's little bits of information to create a larger bit of information...

to create a larger bit of information.

It's like-You take two hydrogen atoms. You take an oxygen atom.

You have water.

You take a bunch of water and you have a sea.

You take a bunch of seas, you have oceans.

Everything has a code.

You can't just think that a code is something in your computer that makes it run.

Code is life.

[ Narrator] So if code is the hidden engine of life on this planet...

could a code also govern the universe?

Some scientists believe that our reality could be nothing more...

than a computer program simulating the world around us.

[ Dyson ] Things that you would think were pretty crazy questions-

such as the question of could our universe actually be running...

as a simulation in a computer-

they don't sound as crazy today as they did 10 or 20 years ago...

because of our ability to do that kind of thing ourselves.

[ Narrator] The code of D.N.A. runs our brains.

A code-cracking marvel that' lets us decipher a world of symbols...

and build machines in our image...

to uncover the ultimate mystery-

a code that rules everything.

But the story of codes is just the beginning.

There's a much bigger puzzle hidden in big history.

Each episode unlocks a clue.

Everyday things like silver...

the sun...

and water...

hold the key.

Watch them all, and you'll see this grand mystery revealed.

The big history of time, of space.

The big history... of us.