The Mechanical Universe
| The Mechanical Universe | |
|---|---|
| Created by | Dr. David Goodstein |
| Starring | Dr. David Goodstein |
| Narrated by | Aaron Fletcher |
| Country of origin |
 United States
|
| Original language(s) | English |
| No. of seasons | 1 |
| No. of episodes | 52 |
| Production | |
| Location(s) | Pasadena, California |
| Release | |
| Original network | PBS |
| Original release | 1985 – 1986 |
| External links | |
| Website | www |
The Mechanical Universe... And Beyond, is a 52-part telecourse filmed at the California Institute of Technology, and produced by Caltech and INTELECOM Intelligent Telecommunications (a non-profit consortium of California community colleges). The series introduces university level physics, covering topics from Copernicus to quantum mechanics.
Produced starting in 1985, the videos make heavy use of historical dramatizations and visual aids to explain physics concepts. The latter were state of the art at the time, incorporating almost 8 hours of computer animation created by computer graphics pioneer Jim Blinn. Each episode opens and closes with a "phantom" lecture by Caltech professor David Goodstein. After more than a quarter century, the series is still often used as a supplemental teaching aid, for its clear explanation of fundamental concepts such as special relativity.
The Mechanical Universe lectures are actual freshman physics lectures from Physics 1a and 1b courses at the California Institute of Technology. The room seen in the videos is the Bridge lecture hall.
The series can be streamed from services including Dailymotion and YouTube or purchased from Caltech.
The first 26 episodes are titled The Mechanical Universe on the show itself. The last 26, episodes 27 through 52. are titled The Mechanical Universe ...and Beyond.
Annenberg/CPB provided the funding for the production of The Mechanical Universe. The show was one of the first twelve projects funded by the initial $90 million pledge the Annenberg Foundation gave to the Corporation for Public Broadcasting in the early 1980s.
Funding to broadcast the show came from the following.
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