How Simple Ideas Lead to Scientific Discoveries

Adam Savage walks through two spectacular examples of profound scientific discoveries that came from simple, creative methods anyone could have followed -- Eratosthenes' calculation of the Earth's circumference around 200 BC and Hippolyte Fizeau's measurement of the speed of light in 1849.

"How Simple Ideas Lead to Scientific Discoveries" was animated by the TED-Ed Animation Team (Jeremiah Dickey, Biljana Labovic, Celeste Lai, Kari Mulholland and Franz Palomares)

View the full lesson: http://ed.ted.com/lessons/how-simple-ideas-lead-to-scientific-discoveries

Adam Savage, the host of "MythBusters" on the Discovery Channel, is a longtime special-effects artist and a minor obsessive.

Why you should listen to him:

As his official MythBusters bio puts it, "Adam Savage has spent his life gathering skills that allow him to take what's in his brain and make it real." He worked as a special-effects artist, fabricator, modelmaker and general dreamer-upper for a decade and a half, working on films such as Galaxy Quest and the Matrix sequels, as well as Episodes I and II of the Star Wars series.

In 2002, he and his fellow movie-industry veteran Jamie Hyneman became the hosts ofMythBusters, a Discovery Channel show that puts urban myths and rules of thumb to test in visceral, often hilarious ways. Behind the sheer awesomeness of their rocket cars and flaming projectiles, the MythBusters are a force for science education..