大象传媒

The scientific method is briefly described before focusing on the work of Isaac Newton. Brian Cox observes Newton鈥檚 death mask. Cox outlines the historical context of the era when Newton began to be interested in the nature of the visible spectrum that could be obtained using a prism. Cox recreates Newton鈥檚 simple experiment that proved that the colours were the pure components of white light rather than being impurities. Cox explains that Newton observed aspects of the world, came up with theories to explain them and then tested them with experiments.

Cox then looks at pages from the first edition of Newton鈥檚 'Principia Mathematica', before concluding that science is about simplifying the complex world around us, creating controllable and repeatable experiments to test hypotheses and then transferring understanding to the complex world outside the laboratory.