Netflix: If you’re wondering what the 3-body problem means, know that it’s a real mystery to science!

SPOILER ALERT! This article returns to the main plot element of the 3-body problem series. If you haven’t seen it and don’t want to know what it contains, read no further.

As its name suggests—but not everyone necessarily knows—Netflix’s new sci-fi series, The 3-Body Problem, is inspired by a real-life celestial mechanics problem called the 3-Body Problem. No body! What is this problem and how does it affect the series?

Both in the Netflix series and in real life, the three-body problem is a classic physics and mechanics problem—a question you can answer by conducting an experiment—that models the motion of three point masses in gravitational interaction.

Yes, but still… what does this mean in simple terms? Using the initial positions and velocities of the three bodies, the problem describes their respective trajectories. The Earth, Moon, and Sun together represent the first and easiest three-body problem to understand.

unsolved problem

For more than 300 years, no one has finally solved the problem No the body. This does not mean that there are no solutions. On the contrary, numerous scientific studies have proposed solutions that agree with both Isaac Newton’s laws of motion and the laws of universal gravitation.

It just means that we don’t yet have an easy way to take the positions and velocities of the three bodies and calculate their orbital paths. (There is a whole debate about this Reddit on a topic in which amateur scientists are invited to immerse themselves for several hours).

What does this mean in the series?

What does all this have to do with Netflix’s three-body problem? This is a major spoiler, consider yourself warned if you continue reading. Similar to author Liu Cixin’s original novel, The 3-Body Problem is set in the past and present (with a future that will be catastrophic), where Earth is pitted against aliens from a star system. A trio of suns revolving around each other.

Therefore, solving the three-body problem is Sant’s number one priority. and will eventually destroy it).

The actor of the series explained

Liam Cunningham, Thomas Wade’s translator who sets himself up as the leader of the war against San Ti, summed up the situation perfectly on the AlloCiné mic:

“Our sun is the same body, right? We revolve around the sun. When there are three bodies, three suns, the gravitational forces of these three suns have an effect on the planet that cannot be predicted. This is an anomaly of theoretical physics, if you want the full expression.

So when you have a civilization that destroys this anomaly as often and regularly as it has in our history, it needs a more stable place. These people with the three-body problem find a place where there is only one body, and it is best for them to get out from where they are and join us.“

Comments collected by Emmanuel Ittier for AlloCiné on March 8