At the age of thirteen, mathematician Steve Strogatz was astonished to find that pendulums and water fountains had a strange relationship that had previously been completely hidden from him.

And as a young boy, neurologist and author Oliver Sacks pored over the pages of the Handbook of Physics and Chemistry, fantasizing about the day that he, like the shy gas Xenon, would some day find a companion with whom to connect and share. And he feels a great gratitude to the "Siberian bigamist" who revealed what matches might be most likely.

Parabolas, a video by Will Hoffman and Derek Paul Boyle:

Read more:

Oliver Sacks, Musicophilia: Tales of Music and the Brain

Steven Strogatz, Sync: The Emerging Science of Spontaneous Order