Be afraid, for the forever lost consciousness of a tree now has the infinite power of the metric system, it’s forever expanding laws and space seek for either the simple destruction of our very existence, or the complete replacement of all matter that exists or ever will exist. Be afraid... be afraid.
You need not fear an existential crisis such as this. Personally, I find it almost more freeing that we may be utterly insignificant in the scale of the universe, observable or otherwise. I think it allows us to set our own limits, our own expectations, rather than trying to find some sort of universal expectation of what should be.
I always find it interesting that there are more subdivisions down than we have doublings up. the planck length is at 226, where the observable universe ends at 184
@@zanorok5896 sure it does; it means that on a log scale from planck length to observable universe, a piece of paper is on the larger half of that scale. Many people might find that surprising, as the person who commented that did.
That one is pretty common knowledge for anyone who's worked with any kind of office supplies, you'll typically see A4 all over the place, A5 a fair bit, some A3. What made me go "Wha, really?" is that A0 is exactly 1 square metre.
Normal people: "hey A4 sheets fold in half and maintain the exact ratio. Cool!" CGPGrey, having his fifth existential crisis this week: "Everything is mostly nothing."
@@oliverhumphreys8141 Who knows? Why have we done anything? Why do we focus so much on this size of paper when there are planets that must be discovered? People to meet? We could’ve done so much, but our own limits we have created have stopped us.
@@edvardsauzins7041 , but however, you only live once. You only get to experience your own existence for only one time, so try to live happily, make the most of it and don't be an asshole to anyone around you
there is no reality to transend for there is nothing. in the smallest virtues of reality we see nothing and from the farthest reaches beyond our comprehension, there is nothing.
@Luís Andrade That is true! our current understanding of nothing is the lack of existence there is if there is a theoretical measurement of nothing and emptiness then that nothing becomes an ever-expanding ball of something in the distance of what we perceive as the reaches that our lights can't even see. So therefore in nothing, there is always the possibility of something so something will always exist in our existence.
@@birbthetopicman2851 Zoomed in on maps to the rough area in England based on the river shown in vid, found the location based on the streets and buildings shown. biggest clues were the trident shaped road to the south-east, the two circular roads in the north corners, and the blobby shaped building next door to Grey
@@Yorie1234 The place he used was in the kind of borough called "City of London" (It's not technically part of the UK's capital city called London) It's one of the densest built, and has the tallest skyscrapers in the region Also has been around for so long, noone actually knows how long it has been around for.
This video makes me realize how much of a giant I am, bigger than so many things, but it makes me realize how tiny I am, and how earth is basically a quark inside an atom inside a grain of sand in a desert the size of a galaxy
Going further, that galaxy-sized desert is itself but a quark within the grain of sand that is our galactic cluster. Within the great desert that is the observable universe. And beyond, as the video states, for who knows how long.
What's your point? Edit: Ok ok I get it people, we don't "actually" know the speed of light, just how long it takes to get from point A to point A after bouncing off of point B.
If you think about it, this is evidence that we may live in a simulation. In 3d re dering we only render what is necessary. We don't fill the inside of a 3d object with data points to make it an object. We just use triangles to construct its shell.
@@thesaltybeard1793 How is this evidence of a simulation? All those particles in a nucleus interact with each in a combinatory way. This ensures any calculation using less particles than the original situation is also slower, because it can't sustain the same level of complexity. Although the speed doesn't matter for a simulation hypothesis using a Zenonian argument (Achilles and the Tortoise), the nucleus itself still counts like a multi-dimensional polyhedron; a multi-particled system. So even though matter looks empty it most certainly doesn't model with the complexity of nothing. Just because we use triangles in simulations, and nature uses triangles in real-life; doesn't make real-life a simulation.
Grey 10 years ago: "So this is why we should get rid of pennies" Grey now: "After studying a sheet of paper, I've been reminded that everything is nothing, everything we've ever known and loved is all foggy shapes in the ethereal."
If you haven't listened to HI, he used to practice his scripts in an office with thunderstorms as background noise pacing back and forth and I know this one was at home but I can just imagine how strange this one would sound especially
The speed of light being described as heartbreakingly slow really speaks to me. There is so much cool stuff in the universe, but even at the fastest conceivable speed, almost all of it will forever be out of range.
@@definitelynotjustasquirrel8319 Exactly, its just that halving the thickness only gives you one more fold, and a paper is so thin that its hard to make it thin enough to fold it many more times. If you make it larger you can do it, but still, if its to thin it will break instead of fold, so its a matter of physics and material. I think aluminium foil should be foldable more times since its thinner than most paper but I have not tried it.
This just made me reaize that we live at the most exciting scale. Go smaller and it gets incedibly empty, go bigger, the same happens. I’m thankful for our insignificantly small scale in the universe.
Well, yes, as far as we know, but what if it's the same as you go up and down? If you think about it, the same forces are at work on all levels so what if it just starts over at the top? What if, above us, is a scientist studying our star as an atom, looking at all the emptiness between the planets and saying that it's made of mostly nothing? It could be the same below and we'd never know because our perception is limited. I have literally nothing to back this point up but I like that idea better than the infinite nothing.
I never realised how poetic reality is. At the smallest and largest scales, things are dotted in the nothing so as only to create the illusion of solid matter.
Light is heartbreakingly slow, and life is heartbreakingly short, the fastest thing we know and the longest thing we know we experience are simply not enough to explore the stars
Unless we find a (feasible-to-implement-in-a-way-that-actually-produces-tangible-results-instead-of-hypothetical-thought-experiments) way to circumvent the speed limit of light. Perhaps not likely, but it's hard to say how unlikely that really is, and impossible to say for certain (at least so far) that we won't someday break into or stumble upon that knowledge.
That problem would exist no matter how fast we could travel or how long we would live (except for if speed was instant or life was eternal). If we were fast enough to explore neighbouring stars we would feel the same feeling towards not being able to explore neighbouring universes and so on
Was looking for this, I remember this so vividly, that although this video a quirky way of showing the same, I still like powers of ten because of the retro aesthetic. It is nice that we go a little deaper, and a little further out, and that the emptiness is extra acknowledged. But then again I would maybe rather not think about the illusion of life and material, and focus more on the privilege and scarcity of it.
@@Mrpersonman0 I think it's because verified people get higher placement on the comments section of YT videos. Sorry! But glad to hear I wasn't the only one thinking of this!
The most impressive thing is how fast exponential growth is. I mean u only have to double 400 times to get from the smallest thing that can possibly be to the size of the whole observable universe
Imo, the coolest thing about scaling the universe exponentially is that human neurons fall right in the middle. Human neurons can be about a hundred microns wide (1 x 10^-4 m). A micron is a millionth of a meter, so a hundred of them would be a tenth of a millimeter. If we convert the unit of measurement from one meter to one-tenth of a millimeter, then human neurons have an average length of 1. Make the same conversation to the planck length and the diameter of the observible universe, and you end up with 1.6x10^-31 and 8.8x10^30.
@@bigman25plus25 400 really isn't a lot when you think about how you're going from the smallest possible measurement to 8.8 × 10^26 meters. I mean, just compare 400 to 8.8 × 10^26 and you'll see what Whynachtsmann is talking about.
The existential dread that doesn't give us despair but hope for the infinite possibilities of the known universe! Now just ignore that giant black hole coming for us.
Congratulations CGP Grey, you have now joined "Kurzgesagt - in a nutshell" on the list of UA-cam channels that can fill me with a sense of existential dread.
@@saraqael. the depression turtle can either fill you up with an existential dread so terrifying that death itself isn't enough to put it out, or a sense of unity for the better future of humanity that is yet to come
Technically, problem of space-"travel" is a problem of space-"time" and if you can just switch places (like with quantum entanglement) then you arent faster, but you are timeless. Then there is a bored teenager that just wants to watch his latest spaceshow from the other side of the galaxy but cant because his device is broken and he/she is pissed why the hell it wont do that one job it is designed for, worthless.
@@5daboz actually photons themself are timeless. they experience all of time at one time, from the moment of there creation to the moment they cease, all is as one moment for them. the interior of black holes is more apt, as time becomes space itself, and space becomes time as we know it.
This video is very powerful for understanding everything we are as far as scaling goes, but also just goes to show how our own scale, where we live and observe, is really the most important to us because it fits us. The rest of this stuff we know exists, but will never truly observe or understand, at least for a very long time. The things on our scale are explained with our communication, using the senses that are tuned for this level of understanding. Look what we’ve done with the scale we’ve been given, the scale we are bound to. We have limits, but do we really know where they are? The limits haven’t stopped our own expansion of understanding, and unlike a lot of other levels, our scale is full of life, compared to the vast nothingness on both ends. If nothing matters on both ends where nothing happens, I wanna stay where things do happen and I can bring myself to comprehend, but I think that’s more easily said, and I’m probably pretty ignorant compared to what things could be but I just wanna say to those who are having existential crises that it’s not a concern and will never be a concern, in our lifetime. And if it is we can cross that bridge when we get to it.
Teacher: Okay, class, please take out your A4 sheets of paper and fold them in half. CGP Grey: ...this A4 is a door... to the exponential spiral of everything...
Me, an Australian who grew up with this kind of paper: yeah our paper system is the best, I know exactly what this video is going to be about. CGP: The organs of the bee... Me: Whelp, I was wrong.
Psychiatrist: What do you see when you look at the A4 paper? CGP Grey: Folding the paper make the same size ratio as its original...we're all lambs to the cosmic slaughter.
@@Uarehere Now I'm thinking of how many A-184 cardboard walls a box should have to contain it, since a six-walls box won't do the job - for being just tridimensional.
This was spectacular. I pretty much love everything Grey does, but this was a new high for me. He managed to take something generally considered mundane and used it to explore the very limits of space, time and human knowledge without ever breaking from his central theme. Truly beautiful. I can see why he became a teacher now.
Fun fact, in a podcast he explained that he chose teaching primarily because no other career gives you that much time off. Also metric paper isn't mundane to Americans, but beautiful magic which those who learn of it are doomed to merely long for the rest of their days. I can't get even printer designed for it.
Hiring an animator was one of the best thing Grey did for this channel. It lets him focus on writing and let’s specialists do the animations. I really love it.
I thought this was going to be a cute video on paper and how the metric system is superior but here I am dealing with my umpteenth existential crisis instead. A hell of a way to wake up! I have never felt this empty before.
In the early 1970s, I saw Powers of Ten in a science museum. I was fascinated, and I watched it over and over while my family looked at other exhibits. Fifty years later, it's great to see that the concept still affects people so strongly.
I was hoping someone was going to mention Powers of 10. I think this concept with folding paper is fun, but I think one of the compelling parts of Powers of 10 was also how the acceleration of the camera zooming in and out was directly tied to the field of view.
Probably the Henry Ford Museum. This is where I saw the video. I think it's really cool to have an updated video of the same type that includes some of the discoveries we've made about the universe since the Eames made their video. (Which is a fantastic video.)
Small things: mostly empty space, that sometimes contains an illusion of something solid Large things: mostly empty space, that sometimes contains an illusion of something solid
All hail A4, all hail the metric system! Seriously though. I don't know if this video is meant to be poetic or an existentialist piece, but I love it, for sure.
Rest in the solace that there's a small chance, when we die, we become entities capable of understanding all that there is. Probably not, but if not, everything will be black and you'll be dead so you won't care.
Or "This is just a normal sheet of paper, right? WRONG! it contains the key to the universe, from the smallest things, to the largest." (@FurretWalc Kurzgesagt)
Props ro the camera man who tool a picture of the observable universe and the milky way last to the guy in 3021 who found a another part of observable universe trillions of light years away
Such is the journey we will all one day make. Spontaneous evolution of consciousness throughout infinity resulting in countless amounts of awareness... but for what purpose is the question no one can answer.
@@ksalarang Purpose is the only question worth asking. If there is no purpose there is no meaning to the unimaginable amount and degree of suffering that constantly takes place and has occurred for eons. To live in an apathetic universe without meaning which causes much more suffering on average is a hell no one should choose to experience.
Speaking as a former Design Student, the Metric Paper system is a Godsend and I recommend utilizing it whenever possible, a philosophy CGPGrey has taken to its logical conclusion
I have never sent such small or such large paper letters. But an A4 letter folded twice fits nicely in a C6 envelope. Because A4 paper is folded twice, it is A6 size.
I've seen a lot of UA-cam videos about things I learned in science class, or history class... never would have guessed drafting class would bring one of the most interesting of them all.
Well, I didn't think I'd see you commenting HERE... but then again, such a small world it is, after all. :D Legend tells you can still hear a faint "ʰᶦᵈᵉᵒᵘˢ" crying out from earth if you travel so far out away from observable universe.
"Everything physical you care about is an electron cloud creating the illusion of something over nothing" I can always count on CGP Grey to humble me to the extreme degree
It's also misleading. It's not that solidity is an illusion. You can't put your hand through the table just by knowing quantum mechanics. Solidity still works just fine, it's just not what you thought it was.
@@vyl4650 I would say yes to this aswell cause he’s mad sick videos. But apparently he’s being accused of some stuff atm that I don’t know the details of
The real problem is when you fold a sheet of paper, you halve it's length but you double it's thickness, so folding it 2^100 times would give it a spike with almost zero "lengh" and unimaginable "thickness" of ~2^98 meters - you would need a very thick folder :)
I watch too many of these types of videos. My mind always defaults to thinking about how things are so small and insignificant when I have nothing to do. I think I may have gone insane. Also, there was no point in writing this comment. I’m just going to forget about this, people who read this will also just forget it, UA-cam will probably stop being used sometime in the future, the Internet will probably be replaced by something, all life on earth will die eventually, the sun will eat up our solar system, then it will also die, along with all the other stars forming a universe of black holes which will also die, then the universe itself dies. Our lives are just a microscopically tiny fraction of all that, so what’s the point of continuing the misery and the shittyness of life? Why don’t we all just collectively kill ourselves so we don’t have to deal with this?
Content of video: if you made a really big piece of paper......... uuuhhh...... it would be really big! (it's sad that anyone could find this interesting)
@@geckowizard9058 It's not the paper that we care about, it's the things we compare it to, and how easy it is to move so fast from something to nothing.
@@geckowizard9058 It's sad anyone finds any marvel movie entertaining, it's all fake, really. Or that people find any games entertaining, it's all pixels, really. It's sad that anybody lives life, we barely matter in the bigger picture of the universe, really. It's sad that you try to make people feel bad about themselves for enjoying a video made to be enjoyed.
I've seen many scale of the universe videos but never one that was filled with such a sense of cosmic horror
try the video on size of black holes by kurzgesagt
And paper.
same, he perfectly encapsulates that feeling of innate, inescapable dread
he should be a horror writer
Indeed, this video was soo deep I got a paper-cut from it.
This was positively uplifting compared to Kurzgesagt.
I'm not sure what this video was supposed to teach me but I'll be more careful around paper from now on
Be afraid, for the forever lost consciousness of a tree now has the infinite power of the metric system, it’s forever expanding laws and space seek for either the simple destruction of our very existence, or the complete replacement of all matter that exists or ever will exist. Be afraid... be afraid.
@@AmphiStuG, uhh what? Explain in simpler terms please?
@laith, nope, I got nothing srry
@laith, oh wow. Ok then
@@aura_flower3385 it was a joke
I came here for light entertainment.
I left with an existential crisis.
yep
You need not fear an existential crisis such as this. Personally, I find it almost more freeing that we may be utterly insignificant in the scale of the universe, observable or otherwise. I think it allows us to set our own limits, our own expectations, rather than trying to find some sort of universal expectation of what should be.
Well, there is mostly nothing to worry about.
Lol
Part of me agrees with you but the other part is left infinitely hopeful.
I always find it interesting that there are more subdivisions down than we have doublings up. the planck length is at 226, where the observable universe ends at 184
Yeah, we are in the larger part of the middle of everything.
Well I mean it's based off a piece of paper so that doesn't really mean much tbh
proportionally, our cells are in the middle
@@zanorok5896 sure it does; it means that on a log scale from planck length to observable universe, a piece of paper is on the larger half of that scale. Many people might find that surprising, as the person who commented that did.
226-184=42
2^42=4 trillion😳
2^226=107 unvigintillion
2^184=24 septendecillion
It's sad CGP Grey had to leave the observable universe to make this.
Ya but he came back
His rocket must have been huge
this is gold wooosh bait
Yet he didn't tell us what he found there. He told us mostly nothing.
@@uknownadait’s cause he discovered the universe aren’t hexagons
...so I'm honestly impressed metric paper folds in half to the same ratio.
Welcome to the magical world of metric thinking... They're trying to connect everything.
That one is pretty common knowledge for anyone who's worked with any kind of office supplies, you'll typically see A4 all over the place, A5 a fair bit, some A3. What made me go "Wha, really?" is that A0 is exactly 1 square metre.
very cool
Fibonacci Fibonacci Fibonacci
I know it's not the Fibonacci sequence exactly but it looks similar enough
If you didnt have an existential crisis in the first half, don't worry, CgpGrey got you in the second half
nah
nope i don't have existential crisises on any video
Yeah you’re just weak minded.
He hits you with the double whammy
@@onxiaftw you don’t use big words with small words in the same sentence that’s just stupidence.
Paper getting infinitely small: Has an existential crisis
Paper getting infinitely big: *Has an existential crisis*
man i watched this high
Normal people: "hey A4 sheets fold in half and maintain the exact ratio. Cool!"
CGPGrey, having his fifth existential crisis this week: "Everything is mostly nothing."
why
@@oliverhumphreys8141 Who knows? Why have we done anything? Why do we focus so much on this size of paper when there are planets that must be discovered? People to meet? We could’ve done so much, but our own limits we have created have stopped us.
@@sheeloesreallycool ah
"It all~ returns~ to nothing~"
@@sheeloesreallycool human knowlage and curiosity what else
So what you're saying is.. this perfectly-shaped rectangle... is the bestangle?
No such thing, hexagon is bestagon.
@@pinkneko13 not bestagon. Bestangle
You may multiply multiple hexagonal bits to tile t-wards infinity as well
Lol
it has the one thing the bestagon doesn't, it divides into itself. So it should be the bestangle
Came for cool paper facts.
Left with existential dread.
now imagine looking at A4 every single day!
Dido
I don't think living is important anymore... maybe it's all... maybe everything we do is for nothing.. maybe there's no point in living at all.
@@edvardsauzins7041 , but however, you only live once. You only get to experience your own existence for only one time, so try to live happily, make the most of it and don't be an asshole to anyone around you
😆
Love the re-use of "Illusion of something solid" at two completely different scales: A4 x 2^(-76) and 2^140
And "the reality of x, it is made of mostly nothing."
"I need a way of describing reality"
*looks down at blank paper*
"I've got it!"
-CGP Grey, overcoming writers block by embracing it
Writers block...metric paper...metric block!
great
Batman
A blank sheet of paper has always been inspiring, but it takes a certain kind of mind to see it in a different way.
"Hey Grey, look at this sheet of paper for a second."
Grey: (transcends reality)
CHIM
there is no reality to transend for there is nothing. in the smallest virtues of reality we see nothing and from the farthest reaches beyond our comprehension, there is nothing.
@Luís Andrade That is true! our current understanding of nothing is the lack of existence there is if there is a theoretical measurement of nothing and emptiness then that nothing becomes an ever-expanding ball of something in the distance of what we perceive as the reaches that our lights can't even see. So therefore in nothing, there is always the possibility of something so something will always exist in our existence.
doctor: what you see in this picture
Grey: a sheet of paper, to be exact a metric paper on which is everything that is made of nothing...
@@Shaymin0 Why do you assume that in nothing is always the possibility of something, maybe there is true nothing but you can't comprehend it?
Fun fact: the house Grey is in doesn't exist. That location has a building holds a gas company and a telecommunications provider.
That’s interesting!
How did you find this out?
@@birbthetopicman2851 Zoomed in on maps to the rough area in England based on the river shown in vid, found the location based on the streets and buildings shown. biggest clues were the trident shaped road to the south-east, the two circular roads in the north corners, and the blobby shaped building next door to Grey
I was wondering that,
i couldn't imagine he'd use his real house
@@Yorie1234 The place he used was in the kind of borough called "City of London" (It's not technically part of the UK's capital city called London) It's one of the densest built, and has the tallest skyscrapers in the region
Also has been around for so long, noone actually knows how long it has been around for.
What I liked most about this is that a) I learned that A0 paper exists, b) it is a satisfying, perfect 1m^2
Yeah usually used in huge posters and architecture working drawings
I thought you learn that as a small kid when you ask: "Why is it called A4 and not A37?" :)
It is also made of mostly nothing.
1m x 1.41m akchully
@@gabrielkind2970 No! A0 has 1 m² area. That is 0.841 × 1.189 m
“look at this sheet of paper”
*8 minutes later*
“we are now at the edge of the universe”
*mind blown*
We got taken for a ride for sure.
And that happens to be how long it took photons to leave the photosphere of the sun and reach earth.
well that escalated very quickly
@@simon-pierrelussier2775 If that was intended then I believe Grey is the best story teller I have seen
I... just became an A4 convert. It's been nice letter size 🙋♂️
why are you here
I converted after the Hexagonism video
Yeah that's... not how life works? Like, are you planning to move? Buy your office a new printer? What exactly do you mean by "convert"????
@@tech99070 it means he'a gonna use metric paper for printing purposes from now on i guess
which is great,
metric system makes everything better
Now THIS is my kind of party. -John
factually frustrating though, for ex. his inaccurate description of Planck length.
wow
Existential angst party!
@@evanpearson2612 What did he say that was incorrect?
+
This video makes me realize how much of a giant I am, bigger than so many things, but it makes me realize how tiny I am, and how earth is basically a quark inside an atom inside a grain of sand in a desert the size of a galaxy
Going further, that galaxy-sized desert is itself but a quark within the grain of sand that is our galactic cluster. Within the great desert that is the observable universe. And beyond, as the video states, for who knows how long.
@@agnetalykins7564 Terrifying is not what there is to be afraid of but is instead the inability to comprehend the unknown.
I mean you *think* it takes a second for light to reach the moon...
I didn't expect to see you here
What's your point?
Edit: Ok ok I get it people, we don't "actually" know the speed of light, just how long it takes to get from point A to point A after bouncing off of point B.
@@hobogrifter you didn’t? These channels are both sciencey channels that explain things that are very hard to understands lol
@@russianacorns8080 lol, I didn't think he was a cgp Gray fan. I thought he just watched smarter every day and vsauce
But there is no moon
I clicked on this video thinking how on earth could there be 9 minutes of content about metric paper. I was not disappointed.
After all, it's CGP Grey
I find it fascinating how this channel can turn an ordinary piece of paper into an existential crisis for so many people
If you think about it, this is evidence that we may live in a simulation.
In 3d re dering we only render what is necessary. We don't fill the inside of a 3d object with data points to make it an object. We just use triangles to construct its shell.
That is to say: the illusion of matter when most of what is being interacted with is nothing.
Why would this make you feel empty? It inspires me with awe.
@@thesaltybeard1793 How is this evidence of a simulation? All those particles in a nucleus interact with each in a combinatory way. This ensures any calculation using less particles than the original situation is also slower, because it can't sustain the same level of complexity. Although the speed doesn't matter for a simulation hypothesis using a Zenonian argument (Achilles and the Tortoise), the nucleus itself still counts like a multi-dimensional polyhedron; a multi-particled system. So even though matter looks empty it most certainly doesn't model with the complexity of nothing. Just because we use triangles in simulations, and nature uses triangles in real-life; doesn't make real-life a simulation.
Kurzgesagt: *Im four parallel universes ahead of you*
Man really explained the entire universe and nothingness with a piece of A4 paper.
Grey 10 years ago: "So this is why we should get rid of pennies"
Grey now: "After studying a sheet of paper, I've been reminded that everything is nothing, everything we've ever known and loved is all foggy shapes in the ethereal."
Grey 10 years from now: "....
@@benjaminzerr6708 "hovers above ground ominously"
@@NN-mh4bj **speaks in reverse**
Grey 4 months ago: hexagons are the bestagons
I bet reading a book upside down is a simple enough challenge for him now.
Thanks for this, grey, now I can’t look at a sheet of paper without having an existential crisis.
@@CGPGrey damn you
@@CGPGrey Grey i have a question.
When is it too late to say “Yeetus to the fetus”?
@@CGPGrey Wait, is that a PICTURE? In a UA-cam comment section?!
@Mek_T ඞ
Can we all take a moment to appreciate how well the voice is synced with the zooming?
If you haven't listened to HI, he used to practice his scripts in an office with thunderstorms as background noise pacing back and forth and I know this one was at home but I can just imagine how strange this one would sound especially
At 3:55?
ok
The speed of the zoom also changes a bit to sync up with his speech.
Technically more so the other way around. Video is synced to audio
The speed of light being described as heartbreakingly slow really speaks to me. There is so much cool stuff in the universe, but even at the fastest conceivable speed, almost all of it will forever be out of range.
Smallest metric: here is something that is actually nothing
The largest metric: here is nothing that is actually everything
Also, mostly nothing.
Damn...
** The largest metric: here is nothing that is actually something
🙌🏻
@Noah H most likely. I guess.
"What are you watching?"
"...mostly nothing."
He isn’t wrong
dont let this distract you from the absolute fact that bungee gum has both the properties of rubber and gum
This statement is true regardless of what exactly you're watching.
why
@@HideFromIt in Lithuanian rubber and gum is the same word
"You can only fold a sheet of paper in half 6 times. No more than that."
CGP Grey: ...and now we're at the Planck length.
A perfect example between the difference between practical and theoretical mathematics.
True, though you could also make the argument he cuts them in half, which is - as docincredible remarks - theoretically (near) infinitely possible.
I just folded it 7 times
sure it doesn't have its ratio anymore, but still
The world record is twelve. Its a myth that the size and thickness don’t matter.
@@definitelynotjustasquirrel8319 Exactly, its just that halving the thickness only gives you one more fold, and a paper is so thin that its hard to make it thin enough to fold it many more times.
If you make it larger you can do it, but still, if its to thin it will break instead of fold, so its a matter of physics and material.
I think aluminium foil should be foldable more times since its thinner than most paper but I have not tried it.
I don’t think I’ll be able to look at a sheet of paper again without having an existential, gut-wrenching reality check
This just made me reaize that we live at the most exciting scale. Go smaller and it gets incedibly empty, go bigger, the same happens. I’m thankful for our insignificantly small scale in the universe.
Well, yes, as far as we know, but what if it's the same as you go up and down? If you think about it, the same forces are at work on all levels so what if it just starts over at the top? What if, above us, is a scientist studying our star as an atom, looking at all the emptiness between the planets and saying that it's made of mostly nothing? It could be the same below and we'd never know because our perception is limited. I have literally nothing to back this point up but I like that idea better than the infinite nothing.
This is such a beautiful comment, thanks for sharing that thought
@@un7n0wing85 the boundaries of observability being effectively a mirror is terrifying in its own right.
Fore sure! Irrespective of time and space being relative, it's trully a remarkable thing!
It's pretty much inevitable that we'd be at a scale where there tends to be something rather than nothing, of course.
I'm impressed that a piece of paper would give someone an existential crisis.
Ok???
This is CGP Grey, the guy who became fixated with hexagons for a while, and who went on a crusade to find out who owns Staton Island.
I feel like CGP Grey can have an existential crisis over anything.
Yo Mama!
I read this comment before and after watching the video. It didn't make sense before, but boy did it hit hard after.
Normal people: "Hey, could you hand me a sheet of paper?"
CGP Grey: *contemplates life, existence, and nothingness*
CGP Grey is on steroids
How can a piece of paper give me stress I never felt befor
Epic and philisophical
No such thing as nothingness, please drop this facile cynical nihilism mindset.
yeah about that i still have a question nobody can answer: Why is i? why is us? why is existence?
I wasn’t aware I was about to go on an existential journey guided by a piece of paper but there it is…
i thought this was gonna be about how brilliant Metric Paper design is. Still glad tho
it wasn't not that
Its still that
I thought it was going to aim for the golden ratio
It does
It does all of that
I never realised how poetic reality is. At the smallest and largest scales, things are dotted in the nothing so as only to create the illusion of solid matter.
wow, i love “dotted in the nothing”
At all scales, really.
ruined 666 likes
And they're not even dots as much as vibrations - more like musical notes than hard points.
Interesting how that is worded. I'll have to think on that.
2:27 "where hexagonal arrangements..."
Because of course they're bloody hexagons.
My heart jumped in fear, thinking he would go on another bestagons rant
@@CGPGrey No words needed.
@@CGPGrey praise the hexagon!
@@CGPGrey could not have been more true
3:45 if I'm right, if we would fold a paper to that little, it would be taller than the observable universe
1:07 it's happening. He's finally snapped. We love you grey, thanks for everything.
L
I mean F
It was only a matter of time.
Squaragon is the bestagons.
I’ll miss his psyche
Light is heartbreakingly slow, and life is heartbreakingly short, the fastest thing we know and the longest thing we know we experience are simply not enough to explore the stars
Unless we find a (feasible-to-implement-in-a-way-that-actually-produces-tangible-results-instead-of-hypothetical-thought-experiments) way to circumvent the speed limit of light. Perhaps not likely, but it's hard to say how unlikely that really is, and impossible to say for certain (at least so far) that we won't someday break into or stumble upon that knowledge.
It's interesting though as you travel faster you live longer (relative to others back home)
Hopefully we can find irl cheat codes and find out about everything
That's quitter talk, simply obtain immortality.
That problem would exist no matter how fast we could travel or how long we would live (except for if speed was instant or life was eternal). If we were fast enough to explore neighbouring stars we would feel the same feeling towards not being able to explore neighbouring universes and so on
This is such a great updated version of powers of 10!
Was looking for this, I remember this so vividly, that although this video a quirky way of showing the same, I still like powers of ten because of the retro aesthetic. It is nice that we go a little deaper, and a little further out, and that the emptiness is extra acknowledged.
But then again I would maybe rather not think about the illusion of life and material, and focus more on the privilege and scarcity of it.
@@Mrpersonman0 I think it's because verified people get higher placement on the comments section of YT videos. Sorry!
But glad to hear I wasn't the only one thinking of this!
@@Mrpersonman0 yeah, mine's 23 hours old, and also talked about the powers of 10 documentary, but it's not got any either.
Hello
That was by UChicago right?
If I had a dime for every time Grey changed the title or thumbnail of this video, I’d be able to afford a channel membership. Oh wait!
“A reality pixel, which is best not to think about”. That one hit me hard, but so true
*"S-Sir... All I wanted to know is if you wanted the receipt..."*
Oof
This made me lohle
Sir this is a wendys >:I
this made me chuckle
A cvs receipt is longer than the width of the observable universe
The most impressive thing is how fast exponential growth is. I mean u only have to double 400 times to get from the smallest thing that can possibly be to the size of the whole observable universe
And then remember that diseases spread exponentally 😬 (although the exponent is not always 2).
Imo, the coolest thing about scaling the universe exponentially is that human neurons fall right in the middle. Human neurons can be about a hundred microns wide (1 x 10^-4 m). A micron is a millionth of a meter, so a hundred of them would be a tenth of a millimeter. If we convert the unit of measurement from one meter to one-tenth of a millimeter, then human neurons have an average length of 1. Make the same conversation to the planck length and the diameter of the observible universe, and you end up with 1.6x10^-31 and 8.8x10^30.
'only'
@@bigman25plus25 400 really isn't a lot when you think about how you're going from the smallest possible measurement to 8.8 × 10^26 meters. I mean, just compare 400 to 8.8 × 10^26 and you'll see what Whynachtsmann is talking about.
@@andrius0592 not always some have a grow rate of ,5 meaning for new infection only a half new one gets infected this is how we removed the measles.
“Sir this is a Wendy’s.”
This is a sheet of paper
*3 minutes later*
We have now reached the edge of human understanding
Isn't that what paper is for? Creating ideas as far as the mind can imagine?
A video titled "Metric Paper" is the last place I thought would give me an existential crisis
Same dude I just came here because I thought that he was going to roast imperial measurements 😭
Trust me... there are much... MUCH further places
The original title was “Metric Paper and Everything in the Universe”
This is exactly the existential dread I needed
I like getting an occasional reminder of the scale of things. It helps to keep my day to day life events in the right perspective.
@@Tim_SmallYes. Me too. I actually find this kind of thing very relaxing
Existential dread? Bro look how big things are, that’s cool!
The existential dread that doesn't give us despair but hope for the infinite possibilities of the known universe! Now just ignore that giant black hole coming for us.
I like to think of it as "existential awe". Much easier to process and enjoy the universe in it entirety that way.
A4/2^64 could also just be called A68. Not a very common paper size, but well defined.
Congratulations CGP Grey, you have now joined "Kurzgesagt - in a nutshell" on the list of UA-cam channels that can fill me with a sense of existential dread.
Vsauce is pretty much the king of that
We have found the holy trinity of mind fuckery
You forgot the most important one: exurb1a
@@saraqael. the depression turtle can either fill you up with an existential dread so terrifying that death itself isn't enough to put it out, or a sense of unity for the better future of humanity that is yet to come
exurb1a causes the most existential dread
Moral of the story: the fastest known object is the camera zooming away from CGP Grey’s desk.
It’s both the slowest moving object, fastest moving object and fastest accelerating object in different parts of the video
Grey has quite an arm, doesn't he.
Lies, my batcopter is faster.
Technically, problem of space-"travel" is a problem of space-"time" and if you can just switch places (like with quantum entanglement) then you arent faster, but you are timeless. Then there is a bored teenager that just wants to watch his latest spaceshow from the other side of the galaxy but cant because his device is broken and he/she is pissed why the hell it wont do that one job it is designed for, worthless.
@@5daboz actually photons themself are timeless. they experience all of time at one time, from the moment of there creation to the moment they cease, all is as one moment for them. the interior of black holes is more apt, as time becomes space itself, and space becomes time as we know it.
**Starts zooming out from the plank length**
“Ok, maybe he will stop making me have a crisis”
**Starts doubling paper**
“Oh no”
Same I feel like I am going to cry
Just wait until he does a video on the C and the B formats...
Anyways.
If you didn't expect him to go the other way, idk what to tell you
the crisis only got worse
This video is very powerful for understanding everything we are as far as scaling goes, but also just goes to show how our own scale, where we live and observe, is really the most important to us because it fits us. The rest of this stuff we know exists, but will never truly observe or understand, at least for a very long time. The things on our scale are explained with our communication, using the senses that are tuned for this level of understanding. Look what we’ve done with the scale we’ve been given, the scale we are bound to. We have limits, but do we really know where they are? The limits haven’t stopped our own expansion of understanding, and unlike a lot of other levels, our scale is full of life, compared to the vast nothingness on both ends. If nothing matters on both ends where nothing happens, I wanna stay where things do happen and I can bring myself to comprehend, but I think that’s more easily said, and I’m probably pretty ignorant compared to what things could be but I just wanna say to those who are having existential crises that it’s not a concern and will never be a concern, in our lifetime. And if it is we can cross that bridge when we get to it.
Man, that was a ride!!
Im first c:
@@pacanaca2 Whom is last though the truth is we will never know.
Opa reset, você aqui? como vai?
@@adrianafamilymember6427 that is in fact through kinds of like a sheet of a4 paper the more we expand the more we want to see
@@adrianafamilymember6427
There is a 500 reply cap
Kutzergast: Our videos cause existential crises
CGP grey: Hold my bees
Truly an admirable attempt at spelling curts-gay-socked
Pls don't hold bees.
@@marafolse8347 KURZ GESAGT
ACHTUNG!
It's Kurzgesagt
Why stop at that spelling! Go all the way:
Kotsergast = puker guy in Dutch! (Yes, we left German behind)
The literal second you mentioned paper being halved, I could feel the oncoming existential dread
Is it just me, or would anyone else love to experience this in VR
Beginning of the video: A paper ratio that easily scales!
End of the video: Existential dread!
Exactly correct
Precisely
Exactly
But why is this an existential crisis?
Grey is what you call a lateral thinker.
Teacher: Okay, class, please take out your A4 sheets of paper and fold them in half.
CGP Grey: ...this A4 is a door... to the exponential spiral of everything...
that will A5 mr
A5 then A6 And so on The Spiral Of insanity continues
Sadly we only have 8 proper sizings, A0, A1, A2, A3, A4, A5, A6, and A7.
When you reflect on what you did with your day and come up with, "Mostly nothing", you are yourself, the truest reflection of the universe
Legend hahahahahah
You deserve a philosophy major title
Needed this today
Appropriate profile picture
The most fascinating thing about his videos is that they are so mind blowing and amazing that it makes you less regret on watching UA-cam videos.
CGP Grey: "In conclusion, I like A4 paper."
I like A999 paper
@@YALMSL I like A-140
Maybe he should study a course about brevity 🤣
the end is not true, if we can't see out we can' t tell what there is out: could be other universes less than a centimeter from our universe
Paper
Me, an Australian who grew up with this kind of paper: yeah our paper system is the best, I know exactly what this video is going to be about.
CGP: The organs of the bee...
Me: Whelp, I was wrong.
It was at Reality Pixel aka Planck Length I realized we got duped. This was going to be an existential crisis ride.
...Wait, you mean not every country uses the A4 system?
@@Nalehw Huh Letter is still very popular. I thought both was still a thing.
@@Nalehw America is always the exception for metric
Plus sometimes Canada, a few other countries in the Americas, and the Phillipines
@@Nalehw Americans have a bunch of weirdly shaped paper sizes with no relation to each other.
"... so anyways, welcome to Kinkos. What size paper did you want me to copy this onto again?"
The size of the observable universe
@@Qwertytsuna I accidentally folded it, it’s now half the observable universe.
"Yeah, can I get that in A184 please?"
@@micobob2883 congrats, you've just folded space time and created a wormhole!
A -184 please
The concept of the infinite rectangle ratio is huge in the Steel Ball Run manga. I recommend it to manga fans!
and i thought the only way a paper could harm me was a papercut. turns out it can give you a never ending, yet somehow equal exsistential crisis.
You called?
@@eyeballpapercut4400 Your paper cut is so horrifying, I wouldn't wish that upon my enemies.
That is 1000% every English major's entry essay thesis.
Psychiatrist: What do you see when you look at the A4 paper?
CGP Grey: Folding the paper make the same size ratio as its original...we're all lambs to the cosmic slaughter.
Ha i got that reference
@@J4WURSED I don't.
Care to explain.
@@Banana_boat Rick and Morty's "true level"
Psychiatrist: If you're not screaming in terror then you are insane. Those who aren't screaming are the insane ones.
Conclusion: "damn that is a large sheet of paper"
And apparently, the universe should be called A^-184.
@@Uarehere Now I'm thinking of how many A-184 cardboard walls a box should have to contain it, since a six-walls box won't do the job - for being just tridimensional.
@@guilhermesartorato93 There is the change from 1 to 6. Six times. 36 walls for a four-dimensional box, perhaps?
@@Uarehere your galaxy should be called A4x2144
Yes I’m at a different galaxy rn okay just don’t question it
I think Grey went insane during quarantine, this scares me, and I don’t get scared unless it’s something like this
Alternate title had to be, "Metric Paper & Nothing"
This is the only thing that can top how mindblowing your pyramid is.
haha yes
Hey cub
Metric Paper & Existential Crisis
Omg cub
This was spectacular. I pretty much love everything Grey does, but this was a new high for me. He managed to take something generally considered mundane and used it to explore the very limits of space, time and human knowledge without ever breaking from his central theme. Truly beautiful. I can see why he became a teacher now.
Fun fact, in a podcast he explained that he chose teaching primarily because no other career gives you that much time off. Also metric paper isn't mundane to Americans, but beautiful magic which those who learn of it are doomed to merely long for the rest of their days. I can't get even printer designed for it.
Ya he chose teaching cuz the holidays..
Hiring an animator was one of the best thing Grey did for this channel. It lets him focus on writing and let’s specialists do the animations. I really love it.
Just came here to learn something about metric paper. Now I am having an existential crisis, thinking about reality pixels and the endless void.
Yeah, and that everything we experience is mostly nothing with a very thin cloud of things that barely even exist masquerading as something.
I thought this was going to be a cute video on paper and how the metric system is superior but here I am dealing with my umpteenth existential crisis instead. A hell of a way to wake up! I have never felt this empty before.
My head hurts and it's In the afternoon for me so uh... ya.... being fully awake Don't help
Death
spin
Though it is not the reason why you feel so, you still are mostly empty.
Hahaha same
In the early 1970s, I saw Powers of Ten in a science museum. I was fascinated, and I watched it over and over while my family looked at other exhibits. Fifty years later, it's great to see that the concept still affects people so strongly.
I was hoping someone was going to mention Powers of 10. I think this concept with folding paper is fun, but I think one of the compelling parts of Powers of 10 was also how the acceleration of the camera zooming in and out was directly tied to the field of view.
Eames
Probably the Henry Ford Museum. This is where I saw the video.
I think it's really cool to have an updated video of the same type that includes some of the discoveries we've made about the universe since the Eames made their video. (Which is a fantastic video.)
I remember seeing this video and being mesmerized in the same way. Definitely glad someone brought it up.
Small things: mostly empty space, that sometimes contains an illusion of something solid
Large things: mostly empty space, that sometimes contains an illusion of something solid
As above, so below. Things repeat themselves.
People are having all the epiphany’s I had years ago, like how the universe basically doesn’t exist.
@@ironsheep9867 I'm pretty sure it does exist
Our minds:
(Should have made a transition into the quantum circles at the end,)
All hail A4, all hail the metric system!
Seriously though. I don't know if this video is meant to be poetic or an existentialist piece, but I love it, for sure.
This is fascinating and heartbreaking.
This statement can pretty much sum up human existence as well.
i found it very comforting
Rest in the solace that there's a small chance, when we die, we become entities capable of understanding all that there is.
Probably not, but if not, everything will be black and you'll be dead so you won't care.
Batman doesn't have a heart.
Yet oddly relaxing
"This is a normal sheet of paper."
"-Or is it?"
*Vsauce music plays*
Ngl CPGray doing a collaboration video with Michael Stevens would be so cool.
"what defines something as a sheet ?"
HEY VSAUCE MICHAEL HERE
Or "This is just a normal sheet of paper, right? WRONG! it contains the key to the universe, from the smallest things, to the largest." (@FurretWalc Kurzgesagt)
Props ro the camera man who tool a picture of the observable universe and the milky way last to the guy in 3021 who found a another part of observable universe trillions of light years away
POV: your philosophy teacher when you ask for another piece of paper
Lmao
Lmao
Lmao
I really thought it is going to be like how did they come up with this system...I didn't expect this at all.
You know, at least when kuercragzat gives me existential dread, they at least show me cute birds
maybe you meant kurzgesagt
Kurzgesagt not "kuercragzat"
@@Aminal321 Maybe he meant kuercragzat
But CGP Grey has Bees
@@SurnSensei kurzgesagt is very hard to spell, its resonable he spelled it wrong
i'm so crushed that at the end you didn't take us back home by zooming back in. just left us out in the unobservable universe, felt abandoned.
Such is the journey we will all one day make. Spontaneous evolution of consciousness throughout infinity resulting in countless amounts of awareness... but for what purpose is the question no one can answer.
@@meinbherpieg4723, because there is no answer to this question. The question itself is meaningless.
...I mean yeah, that's kinda how the universe works. Infinity abandoning itself infinitely.
Or have a short cut where, as you diffuse into the Cosmos, you'll re-emerge out of the Planck Length (q.v. Mandelbrot Set) or vice versa.
@@ksalarang Purpose is the only question worth asking. If there is no purpose there is no meaning to the unimaginable amount and degree of suffering that constantly takes place and has occurred for eons. To live in an apathetic universe without meaning which causes much more suffering on average is a hell no one should choose to experience.
Speaking as a former Design Student, the Metric Paper system is a Godsend and I recommend utilizing it whenever possible, a philosophy CGPGrey has taken to its logical conclusion
As an EU citizen I personally think that if you removed the word "Paper" from your comment it would make even more sense ;)
@@B3RyL As an American citizen, I am sad we are still using barbarian units.
@@CapnCoconuts I don't want to call them "barbarian". It's such a loaded word. I prefer the term "arithmetically impaired".
@@B3RyL Given that NIST defines them using SI, they really should be called "units of pointless redirection".
@@blechtic do you mean they don't actually have The Exact Foot, somewhere safely preserved?
I have never sent such small or such large paper letters.
But an A4 letter folded twice fits nicely in a C6 envelope.
Because A4 paper is folded twice, it is A6 size.
*About a minute in*: "Oh hey, I remember learning this in drafting class in high school."
*At the end*: "What else did they neglect to tell me......?"
I've seen a lot of UA-cam videos about things I learned in science class, or history class... never would have guessed drafting class would bring one of the most interesting of them all.
Well, I didn't think of presenting the metric system like THIS... but then again, I guess you are a physicist, after all :p .
Well, I didn't think I'd see you commenting HERE... but then again, such a small world it is, after all. :D
Legend tells you can still hear a faint "ʰᶦᵈᵉᵒᵘˢ" crying out from earth if you travel so far out away from observable universe.
Hi Thomas! Love your stuff!
It's metric paper, not the metric system. Metric paper works on powers of 2, the metric system works on powers of 10.
And also an excellent video editor. Damn
@@Heavensrun 10, 100, 1000
"Everything physical you care about is an electron cloud creating the illusion of something over nothing"
I can always count on CGP Grey to humble me to the extreme degree
If you want to be humbled once more or alternatively have an existential crisis, go watch videos of the depression turtle aka exurb1a
True wisdom humbles.
It's also misleading. It's not that solidity is an illusion. You can't put your hand through the table just by knowing quantum mechanics. Solidity still works just fine, it's just not what you thought it was.
*This claim of Electron Cloud is disputed.*
*There are robust safeguards in place to ensure the integrity of existence.*
@@vyl4650 I would say yes to this aswell cause he’s mad sick videos. But apparently he’s being accused of some stuff atm that I don’t know the details of
The real problem is when you fold a sheet of paper, you halve it's length but you double it's thickness, so folding it 2^100 times would give it a spike with almost zero "lengh" and unimaginable "thickness" of ~2^98 meters - you would need a very thick folder :)
This feels like the sort of thing everyone should watch at least once in their lives.
But *only* once, as repeated viewings will lead to clinical insanity.
@@iprobablyforgotsomething i have watched this video at least 3 times
@@Drawist. The insanity may take b 5-7 business days to ship
@@iprobablyforgotsomething But. I watch this twice a week, on average. Am I insane?
I watch too many of these types of videos. My mind always defaults to thinking about how things are so small and insignificant when I have nothing to do. I think I may have gone insane.
Also, there was no point in writing this comment. I’m just going to forget about this, people who read this will also just forget it, UA-cam will probably stop being used sometime in the future, the Internet will probably be replaced by something, all life on earth will die eventually, the sun will eat up our solar system, then it will also die, along with all the other stars forming a universe of black holes which will also die, then the universe itself dies. Our lives are just a microscopically tiny fraction of all that, so what’s the point of continuing the misery and the shittyness of life? Why don’t we all just collectively kill ourselves so we don’t have to deal with this?
4:08 wow, that was interesti- WAIT NO NOT AGAIN
Now lets go to the unobservable universe with ONE PIECE OF PAPER
One paper
@@emeraldstuff2847 Emerald party
@@EmeraldBat67 yeah woohoo 3 Emeralds :D
@Orange Guy same
This video is what would happen if Vsauce focused on one topic for more than a minute
Me thoughts exactly. Very reminiscence from the classic vsauce
Content of video: if you made a really big piece of paper......... uuuhhh...... it would be really big! (it's sad that anyone could find this interesting)
He forgot the most essential element of Vsauce..... But why? *Vsauce music intensifies*
@@geckowizard9058 It's not the paper that we care about, it's the things we compare it to, and how easy it is to move so fast from something to nothing.
@@geckowizard9058 It's sad anyone finds any marvel movie entertaining, it's all fake, really.
Or that people find any games entertaining, it's all pixels, really.
It's sad that anybody lives life, we barely matter in the bigger picture of the universe, really.
It's sad that you try to make people feel bad about themselves for enjoying a video made to be enjoyed.
Gyro... This was the reason for lesson 5... Thank you. I cannot express any other word.
THE PERFECT GOLDEN ROTATION ENERGY!
1. golden rotation isn't a thing
2. it's 1:sqrt(2), not 1:(sqrt(5)+1)/2
@@Nebulisuzer its a jojo reference
@@Nebulisuzer we know, but its a jojo reference
@@Nebulisuzer 🙄
K thanks Grey it's not like I WANTED to sleep tonight.
I watched this before going to sleep, and I'll be no different when i wake up tomorrow
I have to wake up to go on a road trip in 4 hours...
why
pfp fits perfectly
idk about you but it seems pretty relaxing to me
When the "camera" is zooming in really fast to approach the Planck length, it was actually moving slower than any other moment in the video.
when it's zooming in, it doesnt move.
Excellent observation!
You sure did rob that moment of its speed
Absolutely!
3:30 if anyone wants to know
You’ve already tried converting me to the church of the hexagonal king. I’m not falling into the House of our Lord A4.
Well.. Hexagons are the bestagons
Hexagons are the bestagon.
Praise be the bestagon
Do it, A4 paper is magical
Tetragons are the bestagons!
@@DehimVerveen Heresy!
Not very often does a video about such a mundane topic bring me such existential dread. Great video!