StarTalk Live! Let’s Make America Smart Again (Part 1)

StarTalk was at the Count Basie Theatre 4/17/17 on a mission to Make America Smart Again. Ft. Neil deGrasse Tyson, Eugene Mirman, Senator Cory Booker, former science policy advisors John Holdren and Jo Handelsman, Ophira Eisenberg and Baratunde Thurston. #LMASA NOTE: StarTalk All-Access subscribers can watch or listen to this entire episode commercial-free. Find out more at https://www.startalkradio.net/startalk-all-access/

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:01Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Welcome to StarTalk. Your place in the universe where science and pop culture collide. StarTalk begins right now.

• 0:22Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  We are live at the Count Basie Theater. We're talking about the marriage of science and policy. And I've got a great panel up here. What we're trying to do is make America smart again. Trying to find out how science and policy come together to effect change for the greater good of us all. And Eugene, we're here for you.

• 0:45Eugene Mirman?

  Yes, thank you.

• 0:47Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Well, it's still part of the Eugene Mirman Comedy Festival. Can we set the stage here?

• 0:52Eugene Mirman?

  Yes, let's do it. With me, Beritunde, everybody.

• 0:56Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah.

• 0:59Eugene Mirman?

  Ophira Eisenberg.

• 1:03Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  And I've got John Holdrman, who worked in Obama's Office of Science and Technology Policy.

• 1:11Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Also, from the Obama administration, we have a biologist, Jo Handelsman. Jo, come on out.

• 1:22Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  She's Associate Director for Science at the Office of Science and Technology Policy under President Obama. And now she's a microbiologist at the University of Wisconsin. Is that right? Cheeseheads. Yes, yes. So, this event will be in three parts. Initially, we'll talk about Earth and keeping track of what's going on and why. Talk about the science and the policy related to that. Next, we will talk about biology and all of how that affects health and get inside the National Institutes of Health and what they're all about and why. And we'll end up with a final segment on the future. The future of space, the future of AI, robotics.

• 2:07Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  And so we're going to do it all. All the science that matters in this country, and we're doing it now.

• 2:15Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Alright, well Earth Day is in April. Earth Day, April 22nd, and it coincides with the Science March on Washington. So, so John, Earth Day began in 1970.

• 2:32Speaker 02

  Right.

• 2:32Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Why, why not 1960? Surely people cared about Earth in 1960?

• 2:37Speaker 02

  No, people did, but what had happened during the course of the 60s is there were the whole series of environmental disasters that got people's attention.

• 2:44Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So, so we need disasters to protect, so we don't know how to protect something proactively?

• 2:50Speaker 02

  Disasters help.

• 2:51Eugene Mirman?

  What were like the three best disasters?

• 2:57Speaker 02

  The Cuyahoga River catching fire was one.

• 3:01Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  That'll do, that'll do.

• 3:03Speaker 02

  Lake Erie becoming totally clogged with algae, so that most of the fish were dying, was the second one in that period. And of course, the air pollution in the Los Angeles basin getting worse and worse, so that on most days you couldn't see the mountains. In fact, I was at Caltech in the early 1970s.

• 3:20Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Pasadena, yep.

• 3:21Speaker 02

  And I'd been there in Pasadena, I'd been there for six months before I knew there were mountains right behind Caltech.

• 3:27Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Okay, and so Joe, you were, you worked with John Holdren in the Office of Science and Technology Policy. Like, what is, what is OSTP? I think most people have never heard of it. So why? What's wrong, what do you not do?

• 3:42Speaker 03

  Well, we obviously didn't advertise ourselves very much. Our job was to mix policy and science, and that meant two things. Some of it was policy for science, how to make our science enterprise as strong as it could be, using policy to shape it. But the other side was using science to shape policy on issues that weren't obviously about science.

• 4:06Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Like what?

• 4:07Speaker 03

  Like forensics. Forensic science is supposedly based on science, but in fact, there's not that much science behind it, and so we brought the science to bear on that issue.

• 4:18Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  And, and so John, you're, you were appointed by Obama, is that correct? Did you have to be approved by the Senate?

• 4:25Speaker 02

  Yes, but there are two different jobs involved. Science advisor to the president is not subject to senate confirmation. Director of the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy is subject to confirmation.

• 4:38Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Did you have both titles?

• 4:38Speaker 02

  And I had both titles, but I could start serving as the president's science advisor on inauguration day 2009. Took two months to get confirmed as director of OSTP. And in those two months, I couldn't sit in the director's office, couldn't give any orders to anybody in OSTP, but I could talk to the president.

• 4:56Speaker 04

  Wow.

• 4:57Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So, so...

• 4:58Eugene Mirman?

  Glad this bureaucracy is gonna be gone now.

• 5:01Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So, so how was Obama among presidents with regard to science, would you say?

• 5:08Speaker 02

  Well, I think President Obama was the most science savvy president since Thomas Jefferson.

• 5:15Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Whoa.

• 5:16Speaker 02

  Thomas Jefferson, of course, was his own science advisor.

• 5:23Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah, yeah, he was badass. And then, yeah.

• 5:25Eugene Mirman?

  But, uh... I hope Warren Harding never hears you say this.

• 5:28Speaker 02

  But the president came into office, understanding how and why science and technology matter for the economy, for public health, for the environment, for national security.

• 5:41Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So he was preloaded?

• 5:42Speaker 02

  He just got it.

• 5:43Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Preloaded?

• 5:44Speaker 02

  He just got it. He understood it.

• 5:46Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Alright, so, Earth Day, I, I, I still, forgive me, don't really know what you're supposed to do on Earth Day. Like, what are you supposed to do?

• 5:54Speaker 04

  I, I think you're supposed to draw a picture of the Earth.

• 5:59Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah.

• 6:00Speaker 04

  And then get it on a tote bag, uh, and walk around.

• 6:03Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah, and walk around with it.

• 6:04Speaker 05

  Walk on the Earth, appreciate it.

• 6:06Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Walk on the Earth.

• 6:07Speaker 05

  Yeah, touch the Earth, you know, it'd be a good thing on Earth Day.

• 6:09Eugene Mirman?

  Eat a stick of pot butter.

• 6:11Speaker 04

  Yeah, very common.

• 6:13Eugene Mirman?

  Look at a baby for as long as it'll let you.

• 6:18Speaker 02

  Now, on a more serious note.

• 6:19Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Earth Day has, has, has a biological motive, doesn't it?

• 6:26Speaker 03

  Absolutely. Some of us think it should be renamed Soil Day because it's about the earth, but the most important thing on the earth is the soil. That's where all of our food comes from.

• 6:36Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Wait, wait, don't you study soil?

• 6:38Speaker 03

  I do.

• 6:39Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Okay.

• 6:39Speaker 03

  A little.

• 6:40Speaker 05

  When you say "some of..."

• 6:41Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  I was like, "That's very specific."

• 6:43Speaker 05

  How many want to call it Soil Day?

• 6:45Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah.

• 6:46Speaker 03

  Um, a few of us.

• 6:48Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  See, I would say like, water was pretty important.

• 6:50Speaker 03

  Yeah, that's true. Yeah, but, but soil...

• 6:54Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  See, I can go, I can go more than a week without soil. Keep telling yourself that. I'm dead in ten days without water.

• 7:03Speaker 03

  But the earth is dead really fast without soil. So, you can't use yourself as the standard. Sorry. But it's okay. I mean, we, we didn't...

• 7:11Speaker 02

  And Neil, you can't go for a week without air. Air, air is really important.

• 7:16Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah, that's minutes without air. Yeah. So, so, so when I think of Earth Day 1970, in that same year, the EPA, Environmental Protection Agency, was founded, and so was NOAA, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. So, these are, so... NOAA fan. I love that. That, that was a benchmark year for people caring. So, what's, I'm trying to understand.

• 7:40Speaker 02

  Well, on a slightly more serious note, one of the things you're supposed to do...

• 7:44Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  More serious than caring about the earth?

• 7:45Speaker 02

  No, one of, no, more serious than you're going for a week without soil.

• 7:49Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Oh, right, okay.

• 7:51Speaker 02

  On a more serious note, what it's really about, I think, is talking with folks and reminding them about all the ways we depend on air and soil and water and sunlight. And, you know, the trouble is, most people today, too many people, think that food materializes de novo on supermarket shelves. You know, they think that when you plug something into the wall, the electricity is coming from right behind the wall. They don't understand there has to be a whole system connected to it.

• 8:19Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah.

• 8:19Speaker 02

  And they think that most pest control is done by pesticides. They think that most availability of water is through canals and dams. They just don't get it, that we depend on the earth for our well-being. And that's what it's really about.

• 8:31Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  You guys worked in an office that should be household conversation, and it's not. How come?

• 8:39Speaker 03

  Well, I think partly because we backed up the president. The president was the face of OSTP in many ways because he rolled out the policy. He represented it.

• 8:48Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  I remember, how, when was it? When C. Everett Coop told people how to not, or how to use condoms or whatever. I forgot the details. As, as, what was his title again? Um, no, I forgot. I remember, but I forgot. Something about sex, okay?

• 9:03Eugene Mirman?

  I believe he told people to masturbate and then the president had to take it back.

• 9:07Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah, right.

• 9:08Eugene Mirman?

  And I think that got totally wrong.

• 9:10Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  No, no, that was the next. HHS. Yeah, that was the next.

• 9:14Eugene Mirman?

  That was Madeleine Albright.

• 9:15Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Jocelyn Elders. Yeah, that's right. Jocelyn Elders, yeah. Yeah, Jocelyn Elders. I remember the masturbation lessons, yeah.

• 9:21Eugene Mirman?

  Why do I even know his name then?

• 9:23Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Well, I, I, so he was around, I think, in the, in the AIDS era where, so, so we all knew his name.

• 9:29Speaker 03

  Yeah, yeah.

• 9:30Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  And, and so, so why didn't we know your name?

• 9:34Speaker 03

  Because you were out of it. You, you must have been out of it. Everybody I know knows John Holdren's name.

• 9:40Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  You worked with the guy.

• 9:42Speaker 03

  Well, but I know a few people who are outside the White House and they all think that he's a hero.

• 9:47Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Well, so here's the thing. Earth, okay. So, Earth Day, there was somehow in the air, no pun intended, a, a sense of concern for Earth as a planet that came out of, and that was like right in the middle when we were going to the moon, right? I think we went to explore the moon, we looked back and discovered Earth for the first time. And in that discovery, Earth became a focus of our, of our concern and of our, we wanted to preserve this spaceship floating there in, in, in the void. We basically took a planet-sized selfie. Yeah, basically, that's right, from a quarter million miles away.

• 10:30Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So, it looks like we, we exploited that fact legislatively.

• 10:36Speaker 02

  Absolutely. That, that blue marble photo, that selfie that Baratunde is just referred to was critical.

• 10:43Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  And so, EPA gets formed, apparently not under any controversy, right? I guess.

• 10:49Speaker 02

  Well, you know, it was interesting that, uh, you know, President Nixon actually thought it was important to do that.

• 10:56Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  And I think he was Republican, last I remembered.

• 10:59Speaker 02

  It, it's true. It was one of his better moments.

• 11:03Eugene Mirman?

  I think, I think today he'd be considered a communist.

• 11:09Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So, so the, the mission of the EPA, to ensure that all Americans are protected from risks to human health and to the environment, from where they live, where they learn, and where they work. So, um, so this sounds like an important organization.

• 11:28Speaker 02

  Very important organization, and one which has been built up since its inception, and which has done, on the whole, a pretty good job.

• 11:36Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  And what's the relationship between NOAA and the EPA?

• 11:40Speaker 02

  Well, NOAA is basically an environmental monitoring and a science organization. They're responsible for understanding what's happening in the oceans, what's happening in the atmosphere. The National Weather Service is part of NOAA, for example, so our weather forecasts come from NOAA. And by the way, a member of Congress once famously said, "I don't know why we have to fund NOAA, we have the Weather Channel."

• 12:02Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah, okay.

• 12:03Speaker 02

  And that's, and that's what's called unclear on the concept.

• 12:10Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So, uh, all right, so both organizations exist today, and what, can you comment on their support in Congress?

• 12:21Speaker 02

  Well, it's mixed, obviously. NOAA and EPA have had strong support through both Republican and Democratic administrations over the years. But now, uh, they are faced with severe budget cuts, most severe in EPA, if President Trump's budget is accepted by Congress, and that's not a foregone conclusion. He's proposed a budget for EPA, but Congress has to approve it, but that budget cuts EPA's total funding by over 30%, and the research and development organization in EPA is cut by 50% in that proposed budget.

• 13:00Speaker 02

  NOAA's budget is also being cut, particularly in respect to ocean monitoring and research and climate data.

• 13:08Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Now, you don't have anything to do with that, because you're not in Washington anymore.

• 13:11Speaker 02

  That's right.

• 13:12Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So why am I even asking you this question? I want to ask that of a politician. Is there a politician in the House?

• 13:22Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  He looks like one.

• 13:29Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Senator Cory Booker, New Jersey.

• 13:34Speaker 06

  So you can't come up in my house, Jersey, and not say hello, man. I got word that you were in Jersey.

• 13:40Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  You did get word.

• 13:41Speaker 06

  You crossed from the dark side of the Hudson.

• 13:43Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  I crossed the moat.

• 13:44Speaker 06

  Into the light.

• 13:45Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  I crossed the moat of the Hudson River.

• 13:46Speaker 06

  Welcome to New Jersey. It's great to have you here.

• 13:48Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Thank you. Delighted to be in your home state.

• 13:56Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Senator Booker, you're former mayor of Newark?

• 13:58Speaker 06

  Yes.

• 13:58Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  That can't have been easy.

• 14:00Speaker 06

  It was the best, hardest years of my life.

• 14:03Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  There you go. And so you're a sitting senator in midterm right now, correct?

• 14:07Speaker 06

  Thank you, New Jersey.

• 14:08Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yes, okay. So we have people who previously served, and you were in Congress while they were serving.

• 14:16Speaker 06

  First of all, their names might not be publicly known, but they're heroic people that made Obama probably one of the greatest science presidents we've ever had, because of the people he had around.

• 14:24Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  People because of the folks he put in place.

• 14:27Speaker 06

  Yeah, yes.

• 14:28Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  And so we're now talking about a president's budget, because a lot of this, I think, is just a mystery to so many people. It was certainly a mystery to me. So the president puts out a budget, and doesn't the Congress kind of have to go along with most of what that is?

• 14:44Speaker 06

  Not at all. Not at all. You read the Article I branch of the Constitution. The first branch of government described is the Congress. They have extraordinary powers. They set the budget. So the president suggests or presents something to Congress, but Congress actually makes the decisions. That is like a constitutional smackdown. That was so politely delivered. Like, Article I, son. That suggests, actually. By the way, we could do Hamilton too. Article I, son. You almost had to freestyle it right now.

• 15:16Speaker 05

  We're on it backstage.

• 15:17Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yes. So you and your fellow 99 other senators actually wield real power on that budget?

• 15:23Speaker 06

  Extraordinary power. Extraordinary power.

• 15:27Speaker 04

  I'm happy to hear that. I'm happy. More. Let's hear more how you have power.

• 15:33Speaker 06

  Well, I was aghast at the President's budget. I think it was one of the most scary documents that, basically, he put forth in one document a reflection of what his values are, which frankly, if you look at his budget, the so-called skinny budget, and the way he tears apart critical programs that affect every element of Americans' lives. Even the base of the people that voted for him, it was a patent betrayal of those people who supported him. And would, in terms of creating jobs and economic strength, is what he preached in his campaigning days, it would have really debilitated this nation's ability to compete globally in a world that now is a knowledge-based economy, which means science and innovation and technology is so critical.

• 16:14Speaker 06

  So to take away the government's role in that would really be putting both hands behind our back as we're competing with the Chinese and the Germans and the Japanese who are making significant investments, in fact, beginning to outstrip America when it comes to investing in R&D.

• 16:28Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So what is the... I want to compare, sort of, what were some of the successes under EPA and Noah, in Obama, that might be at risk right now?

• 16:39Speaker 06

  Well, I just want to let people know, I mean, everything we touch represents your public dollars. I mean, everything here, from the batteries, to the touchscreen, to the GPS, the origin of all of this science and technology that the private sector is now using to create thousands of jobs, is public-sector investments in science, technology.

• 16:59Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  And hardly anybody knows that.

• 17:00Speaker 06

  Hardly anybody knows that. A dollar invested, in fact, all of us probably are fiscal conservatives. I had to be when I was the mayor of Newark. Every taxpayer dollar was precious. The reality is, is the best return on investment for a taxpayer dollar, one of the best ones you could get in government investments, is in things like the National Institute of Health, is such things, investing in science. You get almost more than double the return in terms of long-term economic growth for our economy. And so to savage those programs, to cut the EPA...

• 17:29Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So there are people who don't recognize that the government is actually a good place where some kinds of money get spent, rather than saying the government should have no money at all?

• 17:41Speaker 06

  Yeah, well, let's take a step back and just look at the EPA. I mean, we, I believe in the principles of a free market, but Newark, for example, their environment is a testimony to the free market run amok. In other words, the river, the Perseic River is toxic, the soil in Newark is full of lead, the oxygen, we have terrible asthma rates, and those are caused by companies that weren't properly regulated pouring toxins into the world and destroying not just the health and the environment, but also the fiscal competitiveness of the city in the long term. So by the EPA being savaged like it is, not just the research and development side, but just holding people accountable for the laws that they're breaking out there and hurting the environment, actually it costs all of us money.

• 18:24Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So this is a message that needs to get out there, okay? So you're a senator with, who's elected to office, and you don't have a formal science background, so who's gonna listen?

• 18:34Speaker 06

  Oh, I have a degree in political science.

• 18:43Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  You got me there, okay?

• 18:45Speaker 06

  Thank you very much.

• 18:46Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So, so, so you have, so there are advisors, there's the National Academy of Sciences, Office of Science and Technology Policy, so you, we would like to think that when they speak, the public listens and heeds, but somehow that's not happening, and I don't think any of us understand why. So what's up with that?

• 19:09Speaker 06

  Well, I, I think that it is really important now more than ever, and I think a lot of folks learned this with this last election, that the only thing necessary for evil to be triumphant is for good people to do nothing.

• 19:22Eugene Mirman?

  Or to do like some, but not enough.

• 19:28Speaker 04

  Right, we've learned that retweeting is just not gonna cut it.

• 19:32Eugene Mirman?

  Depends on the tweet, though. Some of those tweets are high five.

• 19:35Speaker 06

  And so, the age-old wisdom which I just cited, the reality is, is we did not have activist citizenry. And a lot of folks, and we were joking before about this concept of love, but patriotism by definition is love of country. Love is not a beaten word. It demands action and sacrifice. And so if you love your country, you've got to stay engaged in these issues. You've got to stay involved. And you've got to let your elected officials know that, hey, you're going to be overseeing a budget. In fact, the budget of this country runs out on April 28th. And the budget decisions are going to be made probably on a continuing basis. What are you going to prioritize? If you're not speaking up and letting your voice be heard, engaging in the process, then you're basically surrendering.

• 20:26Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So let me just answer this in data. So in order to make an informed decision, make informed protest, even, you need data. And NOAA is responsible for many, many satellites in orbit around the earth monitoring climate, for example. And you would think that this would be sufficient so that people will then hear about the data, learn about the data, and act upon the data as citizen scientists, if you will. So where's the disconnect here?

• 20:59Speaker 02

  Well, first of all, the public actually understands climate change better than many members of the Congress do.

• 21:07Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  He just, he's right.

• 21:10Eugene Mirman?

  Got a lot of snaps to that. Sorry, Cory.

• 21:15Speaker 02

  President's company accepts.

• 21:16Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Plus, he's no longer working in the government now, so he can say that, okay?

• 21:20Speaker 02

  No, but it's true. That's what polls show. You know, polls show, and I said this to President Obama at one point, polls show that in the range of two-thirds of Americans believe that climate change is real, substantially caused by humans, already doing harm. We need to do something about it. Two-thirds. By the way, only 50% believe evolution is a fact. And when I told the president that, and I said this was, he was saying, "You scientists have to do a better job educating the public." And I said, "Well, we've done pretty well on climate change, and it's more than evolution." He said, "That's no consolation."

• 21:54Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So it's not 100%. So people, they seem to be sort of in denial of data that they don't like.

• 22:05Speaker 06

  Well, it's almost like they're afraid of what the data is gonna say. I mean, we have laws in Congress that were shocking to me that I found out, where we're blocking even studying things. Like, we're blocking even the studying of gun violence and understanding the effects of it. And so... We have supporters of blocking gun violence. Yeah, yeah. So, and so the question is why? And I want to be very blunt with some of the things that we have to understand. There are large moneyed interests, large corporate interests in this country, that are very invested into the status quo right now. And on elections, they spend billions and billions of dollars supporting people

• 22:47Speaker 06

  who will protect fossil fuel industries and others, protect the status quo. So you can't expect, with that much money being poured into the system, that the people that often get elected as a result of that won't be protecting that despite the evidence, and try to do everything they can to fight the evidence. Like, the tobacco industry, for so long, they would fund scientists who would come up with funky science that was wrong, and try to debunk, or at least confuse people as to what the data was showing about cigarette smoking.

• 23:13Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So, Joe, if you, like, for a while worked in infectious diseases, is that right? Or you were part of the programs that taught people about it?

• 23:23Speaker 03

  Yeah, in OSTP, we dealt with several epidemics, like Ebola and Zika virus, and we handled it. John and I were the key people in OSTP.

• 23:34Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So, that's a case where, if something goes wrong, people get sick and die.

• 23:39Speaker 03

  Right.

• 23:40Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So there's immediate cause and effect.

• 23:42Speaker 03

  Yep.

• 23:42Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  And climate change has a little bit more of a horizon, but if sea levels rise and you start floating, seems to me that's cause and effect.

• 23:50Speaker 02

  Well, and heat waves, and droughts, and wildfires burning larger and larger areas. You know, in the Arctic.

• 23:56Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Can't this weigh more than the billions of dollars of advertising?

• 23:59Speaker 05

  I think we might be looking at this the wrong way. First of all, funky science sounds amazing. I don't know why you're dissing it. I want to go to a funky science party. Second, John, you started by talking about, like, the EPA and NOAA were born out of rivers on fire. Maybe they're trying to return to that level of disaster and urgency to inspire us to a greater world.

• 24:19Speaker 02

  No, it's happening. I mean, the reasons so many Americans now believe that climate change is real and dangerous is they're experiencing it in their lives, they're seeing it on their TV sets, they're seeing it on their iPads, and it's stunning. If you look at the expansion of the areas afflicted by extreme heat every summer, if you look at the areas burned by wildfires, for the first time in modern times, the tundra is burning in the Arctic. The tundra is burning. That never happened before.

• 24:54Eugene Mirman?

  That sounds terrible.

• 24:56Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 24:57Speaker 02

  It never happened before in the period when we were looking.

• 25:00Speaker 04

  Right.

• 25:01Eugene Mirman?

  A tundra.

• 25:02Speaker 04

  I went to a doctor for a sinus cold, and she told me it was global warming. I swear to you. She said it was global warming.

• 25:09Eugene Mirman?

  She sounds like a coot.

• 25:10Speaker 04

  I did report her. You see every coot.

• 25:13Speaker 06

  But New Jerseyans are seeing the financial impact of climate change right now. So we have, most people don't understand, we have a massive fishing industry in New Jersey. What's happening with the acidification of our oceans, the warming of the oceans, they're seeing fish that they used to be able to find off the coast of New Jersey are now being found further up in Connecticut.

• 25:33Speaker 02

  And Maine.

• 25:34Speaker 06

  Maine.

• 25:35Eugene Mirman?

  So that's kind of nice for New England.

• 25:37Speaker 06

  And, uh, well, New England is, but New England is complaining because they're seeing lobsters and other things moving further and further.

• 25:44Eugene Mirman?

  That is a lot more.

• 25:45Speaker 06

  And, and, and so, but more than that, we are a state that lives in flood areas. And now, the flood maps literally are, now you're seeing what were used to be 100-year floods happening with more frequency, which is costing New Jerseyans a lot more money.

• 25:58Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Okay, so I like what you were saying, that, who, who, who said it, that maybe we're re- We are returning to the pre-1970 state of circumstances, where we've got to drop low before we recover as one. They're trying to inspire us, man. Oh, the disasters are trying to inspire us. Oh, that's an interesting way to think about it, yeah. It's the only way to stay sane.

• 26:24Eugene Mirman?

  So, do you think maybe it would help to just light a few local rivers on fire?

• 26:32Eugene Mirman?

  Do we need to light rivers that like Trump would come across? Like on his walks?

• 26:37Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Like Mar-a-Lago. Like Mar-a-Lago on fire.

• 26:40Eugene Mirman?

  Fifth river at my golf course is on fire.

• 26:47Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So, Joe, is it too late?

• 26:51Speaker 03

  No, I don't think it's too late, and I think the...

• 26:53Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Well, because the river on fire, and that's all kind of local stuff.

• 26:58Speaker 03

  Right.

• 26:58Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  And we talk about climate change, we're talking about planet-wide.

• 27:01Speaker 03

  Yes.

• 27:01Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So, that requires planet-wide cooperation and participation. So, is it too late?

• 27:09Speaker 03

  Well, there was one study that showed that people believe in climate change based more on the three previous days' weather than anything else.

• 27:18Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Wow.

• 27:19Speaker 03

  And so, their belief goes up and down.

• 27:22Eugene Mirman?

  So, are we just like three really warm Aprils away from people being like, "Fine, let's fix this"?

• 27:30Speaker 06

  So, I'm sorry to return to this point. The cynicism is killing me. We are a nation that the majority of us, the majority of Republicans, believe that climate change is real. The disconnect is not the people of this nation realizing that there's a problem. The disconnect is, you know, King used to always say, and one of the more eloquent than I could ever say, "The problem today, what we'll have to repent for..."

• 27:52Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Wait, who said this again?

• 27:52Speaker 06

  Martin Luther King.

• 27:53Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Martin Luther King.

• 27:54Speaker 06

  What we'll have to repent for is not the vitriolic words and violent actions of the bad people. It's the appalling silence and inaction of the good people. And so, that's the problem, is that it's not that you call Republicans, the majority of them, as you said, believe climate change is real. Millennial Republicans are so far progressive, more progressive on these issues.

• 28:14Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  On everything.

• 28:15Speaker 06

  On everything.

• 28:15Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  All issues.

• 28:16Speaker 06

  And by the way, the only major political party on the planet Earth...

• 28:22Speaker 06

  Every other nation, their right party and their left party believe in climate change. The official elected Republican leadership is the only one on the planet Earth that does not officially believe in climate change.

• 28:33Speaker 05

  That's called American exceptionalism.

• 28:38Eugene Mirman?

  So should we put that leadership on a different planet?

• 28:41Speaker 06

  I think what we need is...

• 28:43Speaker 05

  There you go Neil.

• 28:45Speaker 06

  Let me give you an example. This is, this is simple. You know, I'm always a big believer that the power of the people is greater than the people in power. But folks don't exercise that power. Alice Walker said the most common way people give up their power is not realizing they have it in the first place. And so the cynicism that gets thrown around is actually a toxic state of being because it's surrendering your ability to make change because things can't be changed. This is something very simple. If just millennials alone, Barack Obama said this in his speech to Howard students. Forget Republican or Democrat, if just millennial generation, the biggest population bubble coming up demographically right now, if they just voted at the same levels that ex-genders did, 40, 50% in midterm elections, the entire Congress would change.

• 29:30Speaker 06

  And, and so, this is not, Obama said, "This is not complicated." He looked at the young people and said, "You don't need to occupy anything, just vote." And, and so, and so that, that, this is not a problem of knowing what is right to do. And I fear...

• 29:47Eugene Mirman?

  How do we get that message on the Snapchat?

• 29:51Speaker 06

  So, so, I, I get this, I get that. And remembering that in the 60s, huge protests, all the time in every major city, campus unrest, it was a time where citizenry was trying to take back the government. And I get that, and you're getting some of that now. But at the end of the day, it comes down to policy. That's what it comes down to, doesn't it? I mean, what policies are in place that we can all agree to to solve these problems? But you can win fights. Like I came in and I actually took heat even back here in New Jersey for arguing, I said, "Okay, I need to figure out a deal to strike with Republicans." And I worked with a lot of my colleagues on this and saying, "Hey, the problem is oil and gas industry get all kind of..." ...tax credits for innovation, for all of that.

• 30:34Speaker 06

  But renewable energy, which we are losing ground to the Chinese and the Germans and their innovation, their technology, the jobs of the future, we're losing ground because the tax credits for wind and solar are one year, they're not predictable tax credits that industry needs. And so we fought with an exchange. We allowed the export of oil, something we had banned, in exchange for seven years of predictable tax credit. Well, as soon as Congress did that, what do you think's happened to the solar and wind industry in the United States? Boom, the investments are going up, the innovation is going up.

• 31:03Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  That's the art of compromise.

• 31:04Speaker 06

  And we won that battle in Congress. It's not something that made the front pages of newspapers, but we're in there every day fighting. And the thing that we need from the public, because I've watched, this has only been 100 days of the Trump administration, but people don't realize, the day Congress changed, the new Congress came in, one of the first things the Republicans tried to do in the House was to remove the watchdogs, the ethics watchdogs. And it was the public that so was outraged that they stopped them in their tracks and they reversed course. I've seen that a number of times since then, that the public and the press exposing what's happening has helped to move things back. And you and I both know history, when it comes to science, the ability for the right poets, the right inspiration to prick the moral consciousness and the urgency of people, whether

• 31:49Speaker 06

  it's Kennedy talking about going to the moon, which was fueled science like crazy, or just simple Americans, well-known people that have powerful platforms like Neil deGrasse Tyson, bringing science. Help us, Neil deGrasse Tyson. Bringing science to the mainstream. I mean, you are a guy that's getting folk woke on science issues, and I think that that's really powerful.

• 32:13Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  I don't know, I was woken folks. Well, no, what I'm trying to do is, through forums such as this and everything else, is just try to not tell people what is true about the universe, but empower people to understand why. And in that way, they can take ownership of that knowledge without even having to reference me, right? If all it was was, "This is true because Tyson said so," then I failed as an educator. You say, "This is true because A goes to B, and this caused that, and that caused that," then you own that information, and that then gets shared, and I'm not even in that picture. I don't have to be at that point. And then everybody takes command of their lives and of the country in which we live.

• 32:56Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  What a concept.

• 32:58Speaker 04

  It also, it also helps a lot of us not just wake up every day screaming, uh, cause we know that there's someone out there that sounds sane.

• 33:07Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Okay, so, so, uh, one point, um, Carl Sagan was once asked, uh, about, uh, Sagan, yeah?

• 33:16Speaker 05

  I think they were celebrating that he was asked.

• 33:18Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Did you catch that the senator earlier on said, "Billions and billions"? Did you hear that? Yeah, yeah, he, he actually said that, I heard that. He was asked, uh, with regard to superheroes, what was his favorite superhero? And he's not a fan of superheroes, because superheroes as they're portrayed, um, it gives us the excuse to not do anything about problems in the world, because you're just waiting around for someone who has the power to solve it while you're eating popcorn, watching movies. And so, so, so, to, to the senator's point, quoting, was it Alice Walker, the biggest, uh, "It's the power you don't know you actually have that is the failure."

• 34:03Speaker 06

  Yes.

• 34:04Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  I paraphrase, but...

• 34:04Speaker 06

  Yes. Alice Walker, "The most common way we give up our powers, not realizing we have it in the first place."

• 34:10Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Not even knowing you had already ceded it to someone else who's using it.

• 34:13Speaker 06

  Yes.

• 34:13Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Possibly against you.

• 34:15Speaker 06

  Most likely, if you check out of a system, uh, that system is gonna work against you.

• 34:19Speaker 05

  It's like when Time Magazine said that we were all Person of the Year.

• 34:25Eugene Mirman?

  Do you think Carl Sagan...

• 34:26Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  It did say that, I remember that.

• 34:27Speaker 05

  Remember the Mirror? Right.

• 34:29Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  That was lame, that was like the lamest Person of the Year ever.

• 34:31Speaker 05

  Or was it the best?

• 34:33Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  No, it's, it's, it's, what's the generation where there are no losers and everyone is a winner? See, I think they had the editorial board in that moment. Yeah, yeah.

• 34:43Eugene Mirman?

  Do you think Carl Sagan secretly liked Green Lantern, though?

• 34:49Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  I'll check his people on that.

• 34:51Eugene Mirman?

  Yeah, yeah.

• 34:52Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So, coming, coming up in the next segment, we're gonna explore and in fact celebrate the latest advances in medical research, genetics, and health, when StarTalk returns.

• 35:09Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Live from the St. Basil Theater, New Jersey.

• 35:20Speaker 06

  I stepped on hilarious lines.

• 35:27Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  The universe is the man. No, the universe is the gender-neutral human who we all love.

• 35:34Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Red Bank, New Jersey. Give it up for StarTalk.

• 35:41Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  We are live at the Count Basie Theater.

• 35:45Speaker 06

  Can I just point something out about Eugene?

• 35:47Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Do your thing.

• 35:48Speaker 06

  Eugene is one of the proud representatives of a great tradition in America. He is an immigrant. From, where are you from, sir?

• 35:55Eugene Mirman?

  I forget. No, Russia.

• 35:58Speaker 06

  You're from Russia?

• 35:59Eugene Mirman?

  Yeah.

• 35:59Speaker 06

  Yes.

• 36:00Eugene Mirman?

  Yeah.

• 36:00Speaker 06

  Yes, so, and...

• 36:01Eugene Mirman?

  I'm a US citizen, so you can't get rid of me.

• 36:06Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  That's right, so he's a first-generation immigrant.

• 36:07Speaker 06

  He's a first-generation immigrant. You were born in another country, you came here, and you're making...

• 36:11Eugene Mirman?

  Yeah, I can't be president, but that's fine.

• 36:16Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  On that subject, I will add, because I just did this homework, that the average, decade-by-decade average of first-generation immigrants in the United States since 1900 is about 10%. So it's 1 in 10 Americans were born somewhere else, at any given time, across the century. Now, let's ask another question. What percentage of American winners of the Nobel Prize in the sciences was a first-generation immigrant? A third of all American Nobel Prizes in chemistry, physics, and human physiology were foreign-born. So they're three times as represented in the science, this highest prize of science, than are even in the population.

• 37:01Speaker 06

  Well, I'll give you an example of this. So people who come down and lobby in Washington, I love when people don't hire lobbyists, but they come down themselves. I see lots of New Jerseyans come down. And when I see college professors from Princeton to my University of Stanford come, and they come to me and they say, "Look, this is crazy. We bring these folks in, the brightest minds, to study at our universities, on student visas. We use our resources, giving them the best education on the planet Earth. As soon as that student visa runs out, what is our country now saying to them? Get out of our nation."

• 37:28Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Right.

• 37:29Speaker 06

  And that's ridiculous, when we have a country that attracts this greatness and then sends it back out in the world.

• 37:38Speaker 02

  I would like to point out on that particular point that President Obama proposed in 2011 to staple a green card to every graduate degree in science earned by a foreign citizen. Just staple the green card to the degree. And it hasn't happened.

• 37:53Speaker 06

  Let me just tell you what works. They have in around Stanford, I was told, there's a billboard that says you can't get your H1B visa, you know, state, come to Canada. And so other countries are seeing what we used to do to accelerate ahead of the rest of the planet Earth. And one of those things that we, they saw was they had policies that tried to attract the brightest of the globe. And they're saying, okay, if America's not gonna do that anymore, we wanna do that because we wanna lead.

• 38:18Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  And just in all fairness, Newt Gingrich said that as well, to staple a green card. Just so you know, I just wanna just be fair out there. He said a lot of stuff.

• 38:27Speaker 02

  One of his huge age observations.

• 38:29Speaker 04

  I am Canadian and all my Canadian friends now treat me like I have a illness. Is that illness being American? Yeah, they're like, how's it going? Are you okay? Yeah. That's how they talk to me.

• 38:46Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So two people on the stage now are foreign born.

• 38:47Speaker 04

  Yeah, and I actually, I'm only on a green card.

• 38:50Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Authorities, can you?

• 38:53Speaker 04

  Yeah. Hey, hold on, I'm a new mom, I have an anchor baby. I'm cool.

• 38:57Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Anchor baby. Anchor baby. So, let me ask you guys something. I've got science advisors here, I have a politician here. Clue is in how advice is obtained, received, and enacted or not. What is that dynamic here? Because I don't know.

• 39:20Speaker 02

  Well, first of all, I had a great relationship with Democratic senators.

• 39:24Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  But not Republican senators?

• 39:26Speaker 02

  A few Republican senators. Many, many fewer. But, I mean, part of the way it works is there's a lot of interaction between the scientists and government and the Congress. We scientists and government testify all the time.

• 39:40Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  In front of the Senate.

• 39:42Speaker 02

  In front of the Senate and the House.

• 39:44Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  You're on a committee, what's your, you're on the science committee.

• 39:46Speaker 06

  Yes, I'm on, I'm on two committees. One is called the Commerce Committee, but the full name includes commerce, technology, science, a lot of those things. And I'm on the Environment Committee, Environment and Public Works. So, I'm on two of the main committees that deal with issues of science, technology, innovation.

• 40:00Speaker 02

  And they hear a lot of testimony, but they also meet individually with scientists and technologists from not just the White House, but from the Department of Energy, from the National Science Foundation, from NOAA. Their staffs meet all the time.

• 40:13Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So these are all the people who they, uh, who, who the Senate approved?

• 40:19Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 40:20Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So, so you, so they can just summon you at will?

• 40:23Speaker 02

  Absolutely.

• 40:25Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  And just bitch slap you when they feel like it?

• 40:30Speaker 02

  Well, you know, when I used to testify...

• 40:31Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Is that a yes or a no?

• 40:33Speaker 02

  I will, uh, I will comment that, that on days that I was testifying, we used to call that pinata day.

• 40:39Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Pinata day?

• 40:42Speaker 02

  They swing at you with a big stick. They hope to break you open and some candy will fall out. Did they ever hope you would just help their kids with their science homework?

• 40:51Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Because I once testified in front of the Science Committee of the Senate, and you either weren't there, or you weren't a senator yet.

• 40:58Speaker 06

  I was, I would be there, sir.

• 41:02Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  But I was, since I'm a citizen, asked to testify. I didn't feel like a pinata. I felt that they were just kind of gathering information. And I was commenting on the value of exploration, specifically space exploration, into a universe that has unlimited resources, especially the kinds of resources that on Earth we fight wars over. So I just thought I would highlight this fact. And, and so, so I, I was intrigued because I didn't feel like I was making much of a difference. And I was just kind of going through motions, and then they were going through motions, and I didn't feel their energy. So I, I don't, so it, does this work? When you give advice, are they actually listening?

• 41:42Speaker 02

  Sometimes. Uh, sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't.

• 41:45Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Corey, when they give you advice, do you listen? Sometimes.

• 41:50Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  What I want to know is, is one of the bipartisan points of agreement, health? The National Institutes of Health? Is that what, that's gotta be in there somewhere?

• 41:59Speaker 06

  Yeah, well, look, this-

• 42:01Speaker 05

  Wow, that took too long to say yes, that's a no.

• 42:03Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  I know, right? Well, what happened was- Yeah, yeah, Senator, that's a quick yes, alright?

• 42:09Speaker 06

  So we are, we are screwing up, in the larger sense, in our investment in biotech. And coming from a biotech and innovation and health space state, where-

• 42:19Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  New Jersey.

• 42:20Speaker 06

  New Jersey is, we are really screwing up in so many ways of this system. We're screwing up in not investing in it, other nations are beginning to pull ahead in their investments in this area, we're screwing up in, in the way the free market is contorting and making people's prescription drugs way too high-priced. I can go through the ways that this, this space frustrates the hell out of me, but what bothers me most is just the fact that Alzheimer's, my father died of Parkinson's just a few years ago, all of this that is costing us, these illnesses that are costing us so much money, we could be investing more in the cures to these diseases, we could lead humanity out of the darkness of the pain, like we look at other diseases we conquered, but we're just not making a commitment as a society to, to put our resources, our energy, our

• 43:05Speaker 06

  talent, our spirit to solve the problem.

• 43:06Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  John, it sounds like you can combine that problem with an analysis and throw in some economics, and then you have an, an argument that has no holes, that everyone just agrees with, and you, you create the policy and then you move on. Why isn't that happening? Well, some of it- Everything you say makes complete sense.

• 43:24Speaker 02

  Neil, some of it is happening. In the Obama administration, we started the Brain Initiative, which is making tremendous advances in understanding how the brain works, which will help us ultimately figure out how to cure or avoid Alzheimer's, how to cure-

• 43:37Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Or how to make better political decisions.

• 43:44Eugene Mirman?

  Does that still exist, or is it just

• 43:45Speaker 02

  No, it still exists. It still exists, maybe because I haven't found out about it yet.

• 43:50Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So Joe, what, can you think of biomedical advances that more people need to know about?

• 43:58Speaker 03

  Well, one of the big initiatives that I worked on, in fact it was my first initiative in the White House, was precision medicine, which is the idea of using big data about big populations of people to tailor medicine, treatment, and prevention to the individual. So if you can sort of parse people into lots of different groups, and based on whether it's their zip codes, or their genome, or their microbiome, something like that, you can then make predictions about their health. And this is really the future of medicine. But I had kind of an interesting experience. This is my first memo to the President. We, John and I, wrote this memo, and then we were invited a few days later, very quickly, to the Oval Office to meet with the President.

• 44:41Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  You got to write memos to the President?

• 44:42Eugene Mirman?

  Can we tell which ones will commit crimes and arrest them beforehand?

• 44:46Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  I saw that movie, yeah, okay.

• 44:49Speaker 03

  So we had this great meeting, and the President clearly had gotten precision medicine. So I walked out feeling pretty good. I said, "John, he got it, and this is pretty cool." And then next week, I was sort of perusing some old legislation, and I came across 2006 legislation written by Senator Obama on precision medicine. I was simply crushed. But that, I think, is an example of a bipartisan issue, because when we rolled out precision medicine, we had as many Republicans as Democrats at the event. And just in December, the 21st Century Cures Bill, which supports precision medicine

• 45:30Speaker 03

  and the Brain Initiative, and several other things, passed the Senate 95 to 5. Thank you very much. And that was certainly bipartisan.

• 45:39Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  He was in the 5 that didn't.

• 45:43Eugene Mirman?

  That was your thank you sarcastic as he voted against it?

• 45:47Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah, thank you very much. So, it would seem to me that health would be the most bipartisan thing going. I agree. But then I'm surprised to see a proposal to reduce the funding to the National Institutes of Health. So I don't understand that.

• 46:02Speaker 02

  By almost $6 billion.

• 46:03Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah, so Corey, what's up with that?

• 46:05Speaker 06

  It is, it is, I-

• 46:09Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  What's up with that?

• 46:11Speaker 06

  I've literally been in the scrum during these large budget deals where that, exasperatingly, you're fighting to try to say, "How can we be funding X, Y, or Z like these broken programs that don't do anything? And we're not funding something as obvious as this?" That frankly, I work in a body that we're all getting old. It's kind of one of the more thoughtful senior bodies where a lot of these diseases are going to be visited upon us. And so I don't understand it. You forget about it if you don't care about this country and you're not as much of a patriot as we all should be, but think about your family, think about yourself. Why aren't we making more of an investment? And even worse, again, I keep repeating this over and over again, but we've heard all about

• 46:51Speaker 06

  this president promising that we're going to win bigly, but, but, but the reality is, our competitors are making massive investments in terms of percentage of their GDP investing in these things. They're overtaking us. They're going to catch us and overtake us. And so I just look at what China is doing and what Germany is doing and what Russia is even doing in terms of what they're investing in.

• 47:14Eugene Mirman?

  Even Russia?

• 47:15Speaker 06

  I'm-

• 47:16Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Corey, I'm tired of something. I'm angry.

• 47:20Speaker 06

  Yes.

• 47:21Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Okay?

• 47:22Speaker 06

  Bring it. Let your inner Jersey out.

• 47:24Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Just hold me back.

• 47:29Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So, the day I realized, and this was a pretty, I don't want to call it upsetting, but disturbing day for me, when I looked back at America's presence in the space race, okay, from 1957 onwards, the launch of Sputnik, until we landed on the moon, essentially every decision we made to go into space and what to do there was reactive to what Russia, the Soviet Union, had already done or was already planning.

• 48:05Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Every single move. They put in a first satellite, we put up a satellite. They put up a dog, we put up a chimp. They put up a human, then we put up a human. They put, and we are reacting at every time, at every turn. And I wonder, can a democracy be proactive? Or do we have to wait around until we feel threatened? And only then do the pistons align for us to act the way we do?