SDF: Science Rap Battle of History — Einstein v. Hawking

Editor’s Note: In 2012 REALscience rolled out a new feature — Science Ditty Friday. Each and every Friday we’ll compile a song (preferably with accompanying video) to kick your weekend off with a musical start. And there will be a more detailed explanation of the science in the lyrics to boot. Have a favorite science song? Send it to ditty@realscience.us.

When “Nice” Peter Alexis Shukoff and “EpicLLOYD” Lloyd Ahlquist combined their comic genius, knowledge of pop culture and intimate love for rap battles, YouTube sensation Epic Rap Battles of History was born. Now with millions of subscribers and hundreds of millions watching for their next historical pairing, the musical artists (for lack of a more descriptive term) struck a chord with geeks online.

For those unfamiliar with rap battles here’s how it works. First, close your eyes and picture Eminem in the movie 8-Mile. Now the rules. Two rappers stand on a stage armed with microphones in front of an audience hungry for confrontation. Then the battle begins. It generally starts with a funny quip about the rapper’s target, the other rapper. Then after a few extemporaneous (yeah, I went there) rhyming verses the battle heats up and gets personal…but never mean.

Albert Einstein v. Stephen Hawking, Epic Rap Battle of History

As Ahlquist told Geek Out, a CNN blog recently, “While battling is confrontational, most times the people battling are doing so just for the sake of the rapping or the show.” His rap name is EpicLLOYD and his specialty is taking on characters from history — real or imagined.

Why do it?

EpicLLOYD says, “We’ve always liked rap and free-styling. Battle rap is something that is inherently engaging and funny because it’s based on punch lines about the other person.”

Their most famous Epic Rap Battle of History has two well known figures throw down. It’s a classic what if scenario. What would Adolf Hitler say to Darth Vader if he had the chance? Over 45 million people tuned in to find out.

While they have no problem pitting non-fictional character against fictional, occasionally they do put two real life people into a fantasy rap battle. And they even pay homage to science.

Shukoff who prefers the rap handle NicePeter says, “Neither of us knew much about physics going into the Hawking-Einstein battle. We knew it was a cool pairing, a cool matchup that appeals to a section of the Internet who appreciate science and mathematics. We dove into it as much as we could, found out about Einstein and talked to people about Stephen Hawking.”

Now the video the duo debuted last year has garnered over 35 million views.

What’s next for NicePeter and EpicLLOYD? Well, historical twosomes. First up — Mario Brothers v. Wright Brothers. That’s sure to be a high-flying rap battle.

NicePeter says, “We’re gonna explore new stuff. I made a pledge to my father to use a Russian character. That will have to happen. There’s a lot of really good rappers from Russian history.”

Now the science

Okay, this is just a fun little ditty and rather light on the science. But there are a couple of things worth mentioning.

3-D image of 6-dimension Calabi-Yau Spaces That May Lie at the Smallest Scales of Unseen Dimensions in String Theory

1. Einstein came up with the theory of relativity. One tenet of his theory of general relativity is that the Universe is expanding, and the far parts of it are moving away from us faster than the speed of light. That’s a mind-blowing concept which the famous physicist alludes to in the opening salvo of the rap battle.

2. Einstein takes a few personal jabs at Hawking who is confined to a wheelchair and speaks through a computer because he is almost entirely paralyzed by a motor neuron disease related to amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) or Lou Gehrig’s disease.

3. Hawking comes roaring back later in the battle to scald Einstein with his wit, calling him a p-brane. This term is a witty physics retort, referring to the size of Einstein’s brain compared to Hawkings while also making a reference to a theoretical physics concept. Here p-brane is a spatially extended mathematical concept that appears in string theory.

4. Einstein retorts with a veiled reference to Hawking’s book A Brief History of Time as he mildly threatens him before attacking his black hole theory, which he continues to revise.

5. But Hawking deals the final blow, starting with a Your Momma insult (a common rap battle tactic) couched in math. He refers to all the known particles in the observable universe — a googol, which is estimated to be more than the 10⁷⁹ and 10⁸¹ atoms. Or as mathematician Edward Kasner famously said a googol is “one, followed by writing zeroes until you get tired.” His nine-year-old nephew Milton Sirotta coined the term. Then in 1980 cosmologist Carl Sagan famously said writing out a googol “would be physically impossible, since doing so would require more space than the known universe provides.”

6. Hawking goes on to reference the historical myth that Einstein’s famous E=MC² formula led to the atom bomb. Then he invokes Sagan from The Cosmos once more, who said, “If you want to bake apple pie from scratch, you must first create the universe.” Hawking delivers the final punch to Einstein by insulting his intelligence (another common rap battle tactic) comparing him to a 1993 Texas Instruments graphing calculator while calling himself a supercomputer. Ouch!

Albert Einstein v. Stephen Hawking

by NicePeter and EpidLLOYD

[Albert Einstein]
When I apply my battle theory minds are relatively blown
So take a seat Steve
Opp, I see you brought your own
What’s with your voice?
I can’t frickin tell
You sound like WALL-E
Having s** with a Speak & Spell
I’ll school you anywhere
MIT to Oxford
All your fans with be like:
“um, that was Hawk-ward”
I’m as dope as two rappers
You better be scared
Cause that means Albert E
Equals M C squared

[Stephen Hawking]
You’ve got no idea what you’re messing with here boy
I got 12 inch rims on my chair, that’s how I roll y’all
You look like someone glued a mustache on a troll doll
I’ll be stretching out the rhyme, like gravity stretches time
When you try to put your little p-brane against this kind of mind
I’m the best
I’m the Snoop Dogg of Science
I’ll be dropping mad apples on your head from the shoulder of giants

[Albert Einstein]
I’m a giant whose shoulders you’d have stood on, if you can stand
I’ll give you a brief history of pain with the back of my hand
You can’t destroy matter or me, for serious
Ripping holes in you bigger than the hole in your black hole theory was

[Stephen Hawking]
There are 10,000,000
Million, million, million, million, million, million, million, million, million, particles in the universe that we can observe
Your mama took the ugly ones and put them into one nerd
You wanna bring the heat
With the mushroom clouds you’re making
I’m about to bake raps from scratch, like Carl Sagan
And while it’s true
That my work is based on you
I’m a super computer
You’re like a TI-82

Created by NicePeter