Connections with James Burke

James connects the dots between Napoleon’s toothpick and the Nielsen TV ratings to see how scientists have built the quantum computer – a data-processing machine so powerful that it can predict the future.

James jumps in the sensory deprivation tank with a man who took LSD with dolphins to discover how syphilis in the French aristocracy kicked off a journey to the nanofabricator–a machine that can build anything you wish for, molecule by molecule, for free. What will that mean for the value of things?

James opens a cabinet of curiosities to discover how the French Revolution, wallpaper, and NORAD brought about the rise of big data – and a world where humans finally merge with the internet.

Dog pee, the Polaroid camera, and rocket fuel lead us to a future where AI is indistinguishable from human intelligence. If we can’t tell machines and people apart, what will that mean for humanity?

A cup of coffee in the 18th century takes James to the pioneering woman who discovered the structure of DNA, and a future with genetically engineered people. Will we want to be Super-Human?

How did a journey that began thousands of years ago with the Inca and the potato, connect to a mad scientist in a castle, and German beer, then bring us to the brink of a future with clean, limitless energy? And what will that future mean for humanity?