All language subtitles for Cern.and.the.Sense.of.Beauty.2017.1080p.WEBRip.x265-RARBG

[low tones]

[atmospheric sounds]

- [Narrator] When I was a
student I read a fragment of

a Greek philosopher, Heraclitus.

It was a long time ago, but
the phrase stayed with me.

Nature loves to hide, it said.

Just that.

Does it perhaps
mean that the law

which governs everything we see

is invisible to our eyes?

In which case everything that is
apparently there before us...

is hiding from us
at the same time.

But then, how can we know it?

- [Man] We might have
a whole elephant here,

and we just don'’t see it.

Because we don'’t have the
eyes or the questions

to explore that particular
part of nature.

The universe somehow
has given us a shock.

It'’s a shock therapy.

- [Man #2] We who, hundred
thousand years ago,

were apes basically, wandering
around the African Savanna,

we are able to
understand so much

about the way the
universe works.

But it could be that something
completely unexpected shows up.

We'’re just looking where
human beings have never ever

looked before.

[classical music]

[echoes and violin]

- [Narrator] The first
time I came to Geneva

it was almost by chance.

The European Centre
for Particle Physics

was in the throes of an
epoch-making experiment.

I was in the celebrated
citadel of science,

but I was rather disappointed.

My first impression of CERN

was of an unattractive
industrial suburb.

In those early days I got a call
from a friend who worked at CERN

who had managed to
obtain authorization

to enter the great particle
collider, the LHC.

'We can go down into
the cavern,' he said.

It was here, in this tunnel
over 100 meters below ground,

that in the summer of 2012 the
'‘Higgs Boson'’ was captured:

the '‘God Particle'’.

Physicists don'’t
approve of that term,

but it does convey the idea.

Thanks to this discovery

a theory has been
verified which explains,

with remarkable precision,

everything we can
see in the universe.

- The one thing in human history
which I find the closest to what

we do are the Gothic cathedrals.

We don'’t really know
who is the main author.

We are all main authors.

I mean, I'm the spokesman
but I don't count more than

all the others.

Each one, one has
made a little statue,

one has made a glass work,

and in the end, the result has
grown over a very long time--

maybe they take 100 years
to make such a cathedral--

and the result is harmonious,
it'’s beautiful.

[violin music]

- [Narrator] CERN is a community
gathered around the invisible.

The people who make up this
community are united by a common

passion for Nature made
not of concrete objects,

but of pure energy.

They deal with issues
that may seem very far

from everyday life.

Yet here, in November 1990, in
this little ground floor office,

the World Wide Web
was conceived.

If the internet is now free
and accessible to all,

that is due in large part
to the fact that CERN

was born out of a
great European ideal,

whereby all knowledge
must be shared and placed

at the world'’s disposal.

[otherworldly sounds]

- [Man] Today is
also a special day.

Because we heard
two presentations

from the two experiments
ATLAS and CMS.

We should state it:
we have a discovery.

We have observed a new particle
consistent with a Higgs Boson.

[applause]

Peter.

- [Man] To the extent that I am
made of fundamental particles,

does this not have
any relevance to me?

- I think it has a lot of
relevance to you because

if that would not exist, I
think you would not exist

[digital music]

[beeps and door opens]

[beeps]

- [Narrator] The LHC
ring and its detectors

are the largest
machine ever made.

But it is a machine
unlike any other.

It doesn'’t make anything,

it isn'’t part of any
production process.

For me, it'’s a poetic machine,
because it is not useful.

All it can do is
look for answers.

It investigates a mystery
where the words and images

with which we are familiar
can no longer help us.

Everything we see is made
of invisible particles,

of which we possess
no concrete image.

Like hunters, physicists
look for tracks,

the prints left by energy
that reveal their existence.

Some of them we can
discover only indirectly,

from the traces left
by other particles.

Here the word 'imagine'

no longer means to
look for an image.

These are the paths
followed by the particles

in billionths of a second
after a collision.

They are the only pictures
that the LHC can take.

[string music]

[heavy rain]

[calming music]

- [Man] If we were able
to see at the same time

atomic phenomena and
cosmological phenomena

our brain would
probably explode.

We only see something
like an averaging

of all these structures
and to be able to see

this extraordinary complexity
we have to use machines.

[whimsical music]

[discordant music]

- [Narrator] It'’s hard to accept
that Nature is in its essence

so undefinable,

and that only when we observe it
does it take on a precise state.

And yet from nature
so indeterminate

emerges the world that we
know, so solid, reassuring.

A jetty.

An apple tree in blossom.

Artists and physicists find out
that they can no longer describe

nature directly,

using recognizable images.

[harp music]

We are used to seeing elementary
particles as colored balls,

atoms as miniature
solar systems.

But these images are nothing
like the real thing.

Images of something
we cannot see.

There are artists who are
inspired by the discovery

of physics to imagine
the invisible.

- [Man] The way things
look and the way thing are

are very very different.

We are like a man standing on
the top of a cliff looking out

to a sea where he
can see a horizon.

But only imagine what
lies on the other side.

[string music]

We are left in this
place where...

Yeah, we know about our
own lack of knowing.

This for me is a huge
source of inspiration.

- [Narrator] The LHC
ring is being prepared

for the experiment:

Hundreds of millions of
data acquisition channels

are synchronized to a
billionth of a second.

But this experiment
is very different

from the previous ones.

There is no theory to verify.

It'’s a hunt for tracks, in the
hope of finding something.

- [Man] We are jumping
to a new level,

because we'’re increasing the
energy to levels that have never

ever been produced
in a laboratory

so we really don'’t know what
we'’re gonna see there.

I personally hope that we're
gonna see something

completely unexpected.

- We understand 4% maybe 5%
of our entire universe.

That'’s a big problem,
we need to solve that--

what'’s the other 95-96%
that'’s out there?

We need a hint.

[gentle music]

- This is a real event.

This is what actually
happened in the experiment.

In the very center
you have the point

where the two nuclei
hit each other.

It is the densest
and hottest thing

that humans have ever observed,

is the closest thing
to the big bang.

We are going backwards in time
until a few microseconds,

a few millionths of a second
from the big bang and then we

observe how matter
evolved from then.

[classical music]

[drumbeat]

[explosion]

- [Narrator] The Big Bang
recreated inside a machine.

A time machine in which the
history of the universe

goes backwards, in the
freezing darkness,

to a tiny pinhead from which
everything apparently began.

- [Woman] I would
really like to see

something completely unexpected,

really blowing our minds,

and causing us to rethink the
way we view the universe.

That, to me, would be
the most amazing thing

in the whole world.

- We could get lucky, we could
discover new particles like

supersymmetry, we could
discover dark matter.

- I think this is one of those
moments in history where

we really have no clue.

There are all these things we
have imagined, but normally

nature is far more
imaginative than physicists.

So, one thing that we would
like to see is precisely

nature showing some of its
remarkable imagination.

[classical music]

- [Man] What are we?

Where do we come from?

Where are we going?

I had that painting on my wall,
just to remind me

every day when I came
into the office,

why I was coming to work.

I mean, artists,
like scientists,

are trying to understand
the human condition.

What'’s going on in the
universe around us.

Gauguin tried to describe this

in his famous painting

and our impulse is
very much the same.

Of course we use different
tools to address

perhaps similar
metaphysical problems.

The veritable crossroads
of art and science

is a revelatory experience.

A beautiful scientific
experiment is indistinguishable

from an art work.

[percussive music]

- [Narator] The sense of
excitement I can feel in the air

is contagious, liberating.

Slowly, the liquid helium
cools the 27 km ring down

to a temperature of 272
degrees below zero.

[chatter]

On Easter Day an electrical
current equivalent

to the consumption of the
entire city of Geneva

switches on the LHC.

Just like artists, physicists
need to use their imagination

to get closer to the truth.

Before every experiment there
is an intuition, a question.

This time, however, we
are facing the mystery.

- [Man] Atoms and molecules
are actually dynamic entities,

they're in perpetual motion.

So on the atomic and molecular
level the entire world is

actually a massive
perpetual motion machine.

[leaves rustling,
water flowing]

[atmospheric sounds]

Our entire lives,

our reality is actually
embedded in this

interlaced matrix
of energy fields

that's on a level that's
invisible to our eyes.

My human body

is a fancy energy field

that is made from the
same building blocks

as any other object in nature.

And in that sense we all
come from the same material.

[psychedelic music]

So, the motion of any
given atom in the system

depends on and affects
the motion of millions

of other atoms in
its neighborhood.

So you start to imagine a
sort of dance on a stage.

So this sort of insanely
interconnected,

interlaced choreography.

[expansive sounds]

[rushing water]

- [Woman] We'’d like to tune to
objectless world of nature,

and although those things are
invisible, we can sense them,

we can experience them,

so we just want to amplify this
experience and tune to it.

[gong]

[bell sounds]

[low humming tone]

We are interested in
certain wave behaviors

and visualizations of them

and having it live in
front of the observer.

[string music]

- [Gormley] Matter and energy
are dimensions of each other.

Space and time are
dimensions of each other.

As a sculptor, how do I lose
my determinism to shape

particular bits of matter

and acknowledge the
fact that everything

is in flux.

[strings fade in]

- [AÁlvarez-Gaumé] I don'’t think
in our common language

we have metaphors for
the subatomic world.

We visualize it as Galileo who
was telling us with mathematics.

Then you have to use the
language of mathematics

and of course experiment to
get a picture, if you like,

but the picture
is not, you know,

something nice with people,
with landscape and mountains.

It'’s something which you
really have to learn.

[dramatic orchestra music]

- [Man] Math is just a
language like any other:

French or English
or what have you.

And so, when a physicist
comes up with a relationship,

like we do,

it'’s not too far different
from a poet writing a poem

or an artist painting a picture.

It'’s just our medium
for creativity.

[digital tones]

- [Narrator] To cross the
threshold of the invisible

using numbers, it seems absurd.

And yet, as in a mirror,
human beings, too,

replicate the mathematical
structure of Nature.

When we record images,

we use quantum mechanics
and digital codes.

This Mont Blanc is really just a
long series of ones and zeroes,

stored in a memory.

[harp plucking]

- Art, like science, is saying:
"“try looking at it this way"”

Can we conceive of the world
being constituted like this?

And if so, what
does that change?

[digital atmospheric music]

- [Woman] One thing
sonification can do for us

is let us ear things that
would normally be in-audible.

There are patterns and
cycles in the universe that

happened at such a slow rate,

like longer than
a human lifetime

and at the other end of the
scale are things that

take place in yoctoseconds
or septillionths of a second,

and we would never be able
to perceive those things.

I think time and the
sequence of things,

is a really strong perceptual
cue to people, to humans,

and I think we almost,
without even intending to,

we think of things that are
happening in a sequence

we give it a kind of
a narrative, almost.

[digital squeaks play]

And then only a few.

So each line in this file
corresponds to one collision

that they have
gathered data from.

[low tone]

Here, you hear that kind
of low, mysterious sound,

that frequency is about here,
but then every once in a while,

for some of the GEV values,

you'll see a different
frequency pop up like these.

There.

Every little particle that
you heard there was an echo

and it creates almost a
reverberation effect,

like the little echoes you hear
from the walls in the room.

[atmospheric sounds]

- [Man] Sound is much
more complex than vision

and sound can overcome some
of the visualization issues.

Where, for example, we
cannot imagine two things

to take the same physical space,
we can imagine two sounds

to take the same
physical sound space.

This is the energy, the
energy off the particles,

and the energy is then
translated into these numbers,

that are music notes, basically.

Something that comes from
physics, from the LHC,

from the very chord of the
inner nature of matter.

[chorus of xylophone-like notes]

[drumbeat]

- [Domnitch] When humans went
to space, the sense of beauty,

interconnectedness and harmony
were so apparent to astronauts

being outside of the planet,

that they all share this
great feeling of revelation

and when you're floating
in this dark empty space

that they characterize like
"“the black velvet"”...

the immense sense of
beauty dawned onto them.

- [Narrator] The tests are
over, it'’s time to attempt

the great experiment.

The first collisions at an
unprecedented high energy.

At a depth of 100 meters,

the LHC ring must be
completely sealed off.

On the surface, the
experiment is monitored

twenty-four hours a day
in the control rooms.

- [on loudspeaker]
Start powering 56.

Start powering 57.

Start powering 58.

[classical music]
Start powering 59.

[alarm sounds]
Start powering 60.

Start powering 61.

Start powering 84.

Start powering 85.

Start powering 86.

Start powering 87.

Start powering 88.

Start powering 89.

[muffled explosion]

- [Narrator] Five hundred
trillion particles, compressed

by the magnets into two beams
each thinner than a human hair,

move round the ring at
the speed of light,

producing a billion
collisions per second.

[faint music,
muffled explosions]

[music crescendoes]

[digital sounds]

- [Narrator] After billions
of collisions,

something turns up in
the LHC detectors.

This curve reveals
the possible presence

of a new mysterious particle.

In less than a month the
physicists put forward

400 theories to explain it.

How to choose between them?

How will the right
theory be recognized?

- Some of the basics laws of
nature explaining, for example,

quantum mechanics or explain
the behavior of the atom

or the way that the
planets go around the sun

or how the universe expands.

The concepts are very simple.

How, with such few concepts, so
simple, you can explain so much.

- In a very, very simple way
we've managed to boil down

this incredible amount of
complexity in the universe

into just two or three
fundamental aspects.

And to be able to do that is
kind of a form of magic.

[string music]

- [Narrator] 'When the solution
is simple, God is answering,'

Einstein said.

Behind the complex formulae
there is an intuition,

that the universe is hiding
something extremely simple.

To arrive at that simplicity,
physicists use experiments

and equations, but often
that'’s not enough.

Often, they need something else.

- [AÁlvarez-Gaumé] There
seems to be some aesthetics

in the way we work.

For example when you look
at Einstein's description

of how gravitational
forces work...

[breathes deep]

Gives you a sense of
beauty, aesthetics,

because of the simplicity.

- A theory in physics
will have to be beautiful

in order for it to
have much truth in it.

Einstein'’s general theory of
relativity, that'’s so beautiful,

it'’s so beautiful that I find it
very difficult to understand.

[laughs]

[beeps]

[beeps]

- [Narrator] It seemed strange
to me to hear scientists talking

about beauty.

Beauty has to do with taste,
with personal feelings.

How can it help a scientist?

[beeps]

- Physicists, I think, tend to
look at theories and equations

in a similar way.

So, if they are elegant and,
in a certain way, pretty,

appealing to them,

then to us it's an indication
that they are somehow right.

[moody music]

- [Woman] There was
this incredible sunset,

one over the valley in
the back of the mountain

and one looking directly
at Mount Blanc

and I kept looking at it
and I couldn't figure out

what was so...

I knew it was beautiful and
I knew it was attractive

and I knew I just kept wanting
to look at the mountain

and just look at the scenery and
I kept thinking to myself:

'Why do I like this so much?'

- Why would a sunset be
beautiful in the first place?

I mean, you could kinda break it
down like scientists and say,

'Well, it'’s red because of
Rayleigh scattering and

the blue photons are
scattered at hard angles,

so it doesn't get through
to your eyes to see it.

But, uh...

And so you can kind of break
down why it looks this way

and why it does that,
but there'’s no

inherent beauty in the
actual thing itself.

So, the beauty would have
to therefore be coming from

the conscious mind.

So, 'beauty,' I guess, would
be a beautiful thought.

- If the solution is simple,

if there's nothing which
you can remove anymore,

if it's kind of

reduced to the core.

That'’s beauty for me.

- What attracted me to
physics was basically that

we don'’t understand how
the universe is created,

where it is going to.

Yeah, I think the mystery of the
universe makes it beautiful.

- I'’m very keen on finding
out if there is simplicity

behind the world we see.

We see a lot of forces,
we see a lot of particles,

and more and more
particles get discovered,

but what we need to do as
physicists and as humans

is understand the world
in its most easy sense.

- I don'’t know, the beauty...
[laughs]

I cannot describe it.

- The beauty that I see is
the beauty of the creation

of our mind.

How a person mind can develop
such skillful skills like...

How someone could think
of beyond their mind.

[string music]

- [Ellis] I think it'’s
difficult to describe beauty

in physics, in
science in general.

Often it is not something which,
just, you see with your eye,

it'’s something that you
feel with your brain.

[harp plucking]

- [Narrator] Beauty is in
the eye of the beholder,

runs the proverb.

I wonder

where else could it be?

In which detail?

Others say one can
never know where it is,

because it is just
a secret harmony...

a relation between things.

[fanciful orchestra music]

[distant bell tolls]

[classical music]

- [AÁlvarez-Gaumé] It is
remarkable that the laws of

nature have a symmetry that
we cannot see with their eyes

and we cannot see with
simple instruments.

So this is the hidden
beauty we are looking for.

- [Narrator] Is this
the secret of Nature?

Is it symmetry that
protects us from chaos?

Where did the intuition of
the Greek temple come from?

Its parts are in mathematical
relation, one with the other,

as in musical harmony.

[harp music]

Elementary particles have
relations between one another

which are more like
those of a temple

than those in Nature that we
can see with the naked eye.

- I think a completely
symmetric world

would not be very interesting.

Life we'’ll be impossible.

- You might say that the
beautiful universe is one where

all the symmetry are respected,
nothing is broken.

However, the beautiful world
we live in is where somehow

all the symmetries
are in a broken face.

[windchime sounds]

[harp music]

People often are more
attracted to men or women

who are not necessarily
representing perfect beauty.

So, it is the asymmetry
and the imperfection

that makes the
person attractive.

- I think that if you look at a
composite image of the Mona Lisa

in which this part is reflected
to be the same as that part,

it would not be a very
interesting picture.

So, I think that this
idea of broken symmetry

is something that
artists also understand.

[harp music]

- [Narrator] The story goes that
carpet makers would deliberately

weave a slight defect into
their symmetrical designs.

They were afraid that, if the
symmetry were too perfect,

their souls would be trapped
in the carpet for eternity.

[atmospheric sounds]

- I think that the universe
knows nothing about beauty,

it knows nothing
about people,

it knows nothing
about consciousness.

Scientists and people perceive
beauty in the universe

but I think that this
concept of beauty

is for me a human construct.

- [AÁlvarez-Gaumé] One thing that
is interesting is that Weinberg,

who is certainly someone who
admires and likes the beauty

that we see around us, says
something that is shocking,

and many people find it
shocking, which is that

the more we know
about the universe,

the more it seems pointless.

That means that we begin
to learn that somehow

the laws of nature
have no purpose.

[discordant orchestra music]

[drumbeat]

- [Gelfand] There is an infinite
spectrum of shades of beauty.

Beauty to me is the abyss,

that which cannot
by any means be

defined or categorized
or simplified...

It is something that
is transcendent.

[dark orchestral music]

- [Gormley] I prefer
truth to beauty,

because I think truth has
less to do with taste

and more to do with fact.

And I think this is
true in science,

in the same way that
science has escaped from

traditional ideas of beauty.

And the reassurances of
those notions of beauty

are over.

And we are left with, yes,
doubt as our yardstick.

- [Man] Humans are
predisposed to see beauty,

and maybe that's the
most interesting thing,

is that we detect beauty.

And the LHC is a giant detector.
It's detecting something else,

maybe that is what
it's detecting,

is the foundation of beauty, not
just the foundation of matter.

[violin music]

- [Narrator] The heart of
matter is free, unpredictable.

Billions of collisions,
and every time the result

is different from before.

Here, matter shows its
character of energy and dance.

The search goes on, no one can
know whether the LHC will reveal

a fresh surprise in a month,
a year, or never again.

I'’ve come to understand
that true scientists love,

above all else, what
they do not yet know.

We are ministers of
doubt, one said to me.

- [Narrator] Scientists are not
afraid of chaos and uncertainty.

But when telling a story,
so as not to get lost,

you need something that
puts things in order.

Every story has an ending
because human beings have

a weakness, they always try
to see a meaning in things.

[atmospheric music]

Not far from Geneva,
forty thousand years ago,

somebody ventured into this
cave in the south of France.

We do not know exactly why.

There is a widespread
tradition among many peoples

that if a hunt is
to be successful,

it must be preceded by a vision.

Of the human beings who painted
these figures we know nothing.

The only thing we
can be certain of

is that they retreated
from the visible world

to trace images of Nature
made of order and beauty.

In the darkness and silence of
a cave they held their breath

and then blew spittle
and paint onto the rock.

[high notes]

[discordant orchestra music]