Beneath a cloud of jazz in the bar of London’s Langham hotel, the air crackled with rational fervour. I was sat with three luminaries of the geekish world: Simon Singh (Cambridge PhD in particle physics), bestselling author of Fermat’s Last Theorem and, most recently, The Simpsons and Their Mathematical Secrets; Al Jean (Harvard maths degree), head writer and executive producer of The Simpsons; and David X Cohen (Berkeley masters in theoretical computer science), ex-Simpsons writer and executive producer of its sister series Futurama.

Ahead of their evening appearance at the Science Museum, we discussed the delights of cartoons, geek culture, the common ground between comedy and mathematical proofs—and why science means subversion. You can read the full edited transcript of our conversation over on Medium.